Best-Ever Combined England Vs West Indies XI

I know what you’re thinking. It would be easier for us to simply put the great West Indies team of the 70s and 80s into the best-ever England vs West Indies combined XI. But we’re trying to find some semblance of balance here.

Before I get stuck in I should make it clear that this is an XI comprised of players who did brilliantly in England v Windies fixtures rather than all test matches against all opposition. It’s like one of those post-series combined XIs but for all time. So here goes …

  1. Geoff Boycott (England): Managed to play well against a savage West Indies bowling attack, scoring 5 hundreds and averaging 45.93 in 29 Tests.
  2. Len Hutton (England): England’s most fabled cricketer averaged 79 in just 13 Tests, hammering the Windies for a total of 1,661. Not bad, eh?
  3. Brian Lara (West Indies): Lara torched England’s bowling – especially in 2004 when he hit 400 not out. One of the very best in the business.
  4. Sir Viv Richards (West Indies): Richards smashed England around the shop, amassing nearly 2900 runs in just 36 Tests.
  5. Colin Cowdery (England): Cowdery smashed 6 hundreds in his career against the Windies – the joint-best with Allan Lamb against bowling brilliance
  6. Sir Gary Sobers (West Indies): The greatest all-rounder of all time? Sobers is a shoo-in in our XI after battering the English for over 3,000 runs, including 10 hundreds. He also had 102 wickets against England, too.
  7. Matt Prior (Wkt, England): Prior had a couple of centuries against the Windies, averaging over 50. He might not have been a Murray or Dujon behind the stumps but he was a more-than-useful wicketkeeper, and with a longish tail this side needs his batting.
  8. Malcolm Marshall (West Indies): The late, great bowler was amazing, with an average of 19.18 in 26 matches. That’s stunningly economical.
  9. Curtly Ambrose (West Indies): Hammered the English for 164 wickets, including two 10-fers. His spell of 8/45 in 1990 was one of the most powerful, beautiful spells of bowling.
  10. Michael Holding (West Indies): Whispering Death completes our line-up of brilliant West Indies fast bowlers, reeking havoc to English players throughout his career. He never lost against England, and put together 96 wickets including a glorious 8-92 at The Oval in 1976.
  11. James Anderson (England): Still one of the best bowlers in the business but his 7 for 42 at Lord’s in 2017 was spell-binding.

Honourable mention: Angus Fraser (England): Bowlers have taken 8 wickets in an innings just 7 times in England versus West Indies tests. Gus Fraser is the only player to record the feat twice (8-53 in 1998 and 8-75 in 1994).

So what do you think? That’s one of hell of a bowling and batting line-up – especially if you consider that Garry Sobers can bowl both pace and spin. Not a bad player to balance the team eh.

Alex Ferguson

46 comments

  • Nice XI Alex. Cheers for this. With so many great players to choose from I doubt it’s possible to please everyone.

    Love the honourable mention for Big Gus. Despite all those injuries he actually has the best average of any England bowler I can think of since 1990 (just 27.3) despite all those injuries that robbed him of his ‘nip’. He was a class act at the beginning of his career, and although some might snipe that Andy Roberts or Joel Garner was by far a better bowler – and it’s hard to argue with this in many ways – one can’t forget that Gus took 70 wickets at 23.7 against the Windies. If we’re looking for English candidates to provide ‘a semblance of balance’ (as you say) then Fraser is a great shout.

  • No Greenidge or Haynes? No Llloyd (Clive, not David or Andy, that is!). No Roberts or Garner?

    Anderson might get into my team, but not Prior. Surely Alec Stewart would be a better pick for an English wicketkeeper/batsman. I remember in the abandoned test match he scored the “best ever 10 runs” (or similar?)

    • Can’t have everyone I guess. Statistically Boycott and Hutton were better than Greenidge and Haynes. And let’s not forget that Sir Geoffrey scored his runs against the amazing Windies quicks – something G&H didn’t have to do ;-)

      I might have been tempted to choose Stewart too. His two tons in Barbados were amazing. Perhaps the best individual performance I’ve seen from an England player. But he scored those runs when playing as a specialist batsman not a keeper.

      Basically it’s impossible to choose. Lloyd would’ve been a great skipper. And yes, I don’t mean Andy Lloyd either!

      • Andy Lloyd – the only man in history to open in a test and never be dismissed. Perhaps for team harmony along with Boycott you could choose Brian Close and Tony Greig?

  • OK. Since England are playing in Barbados, here’s my stab at an all time Bajan team (to give you an idea what that small island has contributed to our game):
    Greenidge
    Haynes
    Hunte
    Worrall (c)
    Weekes
    Walcott (w)
    Sobers
    Marshall
    Hall
    Griffiths
    Garner

    That should be a decent outfit.

    Turning to yours, I have a few quibbles (tail too long, needs a spinner, Lara should be at 5), but I probably won’t improve it much!

  • I wondered if ‘best ever’ was limited, say, to post war – but there is no indication of that. So the most ludicrous selection I can imagine is Geoff Boycott (a fine player) over Jack Hobbs to open. Hobbs is often cited as the best bat of all time after Bradman. A test average of 56 on uncovered wickets and with fully two thirds of his tests against Australia. How can Boycott possibly get in?
    And where is Sydney Barnes? More universally recognised as best bowler ever than Bradman as best bat. If this selection is time limited please say so.

    • I should have added (for those who are uncertain and if the list is meant to be limited to those who played in games between the sides); Jack Hobbs played in 2 tests against the Windies. It may be stretching it a bit with Barnes, but he did play against the Windies (albeit for Wales, who were prepared to pay him) at the age of 55 and took 12-118 in the match.

    • Hi Andy. Hobbs played just two test against the West Indies, which I think might have been their first ever two test matches. The Windies therefore we’re particularly strong back then. In fact, I think they weren’t particularly strong until long after WW2. Consequently it’s pretty hard to include Hobbs. Ditto Sydney Barnes, who might have actually died before the Windies were a good side :-)

      The XI consists of players who have excelled in England v West Indies series. It’s a combined XI like they often do at the end of specific series.

      • Thanks James. I would still pick Hobbs, who averaged 106 in 2 tests despite being in his late 40s at the time!

        The great Barnes actually lived on until 1967 when he would have seen Sobers, Kanhai, Hall etc. I would be very tempted to include Kanhai for Cowdrey, just for the entertainment of his ‘falling over’ hook shot. :)

  • Matt Prior!?? Do me a favour!! What about Alan Knott who batted with great skill and bravey against the greatest Windies quicks ever.

    • Agreed. A side excluding Lloyd, Kanhai, Greenidge, Worrall, Weeks, Walcott, Garner, Roberts, Gibbs, Ramadhin & Valentine Hall, Griffiths, Walsh, Hobbs, Washbrook, Graveney, Hammond, Gower, Lamb, Botham, Willis, Snow, Underwood,…..I could go on until I get to Geoff Arnold. But INCLUDES Matt Prior?? Please. Knott over Deryck Murray even though latter once gave me a pair of wicketkeeping gloves and the former wrote back to congratulate me on selection for my primary school and telling me where I could buy a cap like his! Specialist keeper over stopper every time!

  • I’m not a fan of multinational sides (Supertest 2005, anyone?) so would prefer to choose all time national squads. Going from when I first watched cricket (1983), and picking players at the peak of their career (in those years), England would be Gooch, Trescothick, Gower, Peterson, Root, Botham, Prior, Flintoff, Swann, Broad, Anderson. Possibly Gus Fraser ahead of Broad, and Thorpe, Lamb and Robin Smith (the last two outstanding against pace and the Windies of their time) in the squad at least.

    Windies is easier: Greenidge, Haynes, Richards, Lara, Lloyd, Chanderpaul, Dujon, Marshall, Garner, Holding, Ambrose.

    Have to put the Windies as favourites, but it would slightly depend on whether it was 1980s laws and protective gear or the present day, the latter much favouring England.

    Note: Lara’s 400 was an incredible feat of endurance (other than Bradman, I don’t think any batsman in history built huge scores so many times), but I wasn’t that impressed, because overall in that series he was a failure. He scored next to nothing in the first three tests as the Windies lost the series. The old English stagers of Butcher, Nas, et al did much better when it counted. Lara would have scored more consistently and had a much easier career playing under Lloyd, though he might have scored so much because he would not have needed to.

    • Have to disagree about the outcome. That Windies side would slaughter that England side under any set of rules (including blindfolds for the Windies players).

      • Oh the Windies are strong favourites for sure, but the England side I’ve chosen is far better than any England side that has actually taken the field. But yes, Windies still ahead.

        The only teams I’d rate as having a chance of beating them from my time watching cricket would be a Pakistan side with Imran, Waqar, Wasim and Akhtar all at their peak, or Australia with McGrath, Warne, Border, Waugh, Ponting et al. Indian batting would be formidable, but India don’t have the fast bowlers to get 20 wickets. South Africa wouldn’t be far behind with Steyn, Donald, Pollock, Kallis et al.

    • I was a massive Lara fan, but the pitch he scored 400 on was a complete feather bed. It gave the bowlers absolutely nothing. Fill your boots time!

      • Allegedly the Oval 1976 pitch was a featherbed too. WI scored 687/8 and 182/0.You just had to learn how to bowl on it (full, straight and very fast). That’s one of the things that makes Holding’s 14/149 so great.

        • Point remains that Lara did nothing in that series when it mattered. He only scored the mammoth innings after it was lost.

    • James, the first international match I ever watched live was the England v Rest of World first “test” in 1970. I believe in that series (unlike the Supertest, which was a beer money exercise) the squad did bond. It also gave me the opportunity to watch Sobers bat! Maybe, if you are going to have multi national sides, you need to give them time (like the British Lions in Rugby).

      • Yes I was thinking about that side (which won the series 4-1 and did well in Aus later as well). I think the difference was that much less cricket was played in those days, so for the players their chance to excel on the biggest stage was much reduced. Also, for the SA players involved, it was their only chance.

        Nowadays the itinerary is so full the players resent rather than relish any extra matches and the Supertest timing was also appalling coming just after the greatest ever Ashes. Note however the Australians played with motivation to redeem themselves (and played as a tight unit) whereas the ‘ICC XI’ (a test side totally in contravention of the rules) were flown in from all over the place and struggled to give a damn.

  • George Headley averaged 70 (across 29 innings so it isn’t a small sample) against Cowdrey’s 51. Also Dennis Amiss averaged 70 against Boycott’s 46. The case for Headley seems overwhelming; Boycott’s feat of averaging 40 in two series when aged nearly 40 against Roberts-Holding-Garner- Croft was magnificent but so were Amiss’s two double centuries and his batting in 1973/74 generally.

    On the bowling front, Joel Garner has a better average (17.9) than any seamer who bowled over 1000 deliveries in matches between the teams. It’s truly bizarre why his reputation these days isn’t higher.

    • Windies in 1973/4 were not a patch on Windies 1980/81, and Amiss suffered badly against Lillee and Thomson so I wouldn’t rate him as having a chance against the most deadly of the Windies pacemen.

      Agree re Garner. His average is something else. The fact was that his height combined with accuracy made for completely incomprehensible bounce for most batsmen and they just couldn’t score off him. Although his strike rate was not as impressive as eg Waqar or Marshall or Steyn, his average is less than all of them because no one could get any runs.

      • Yeah. If I had to pick an all time ODI side, I’d want Big Joel in there for the death overs (ideally with Wasim Akram).

  • I know this will be controversial, but putting to one side Boycott’s inferior statistics compared with other openers, I would have great difficulty picking him when he made himself unavailable (for whatever reason) at the height of Andy Robert’s lethal powers and when Holding was introduced. A team must work as a team, and Boycott’s history (to say nothing of his dodgy fielding and running) weakens his case.

  • Restricting my comments to players I have seen, I would take some convincing to leave Greenidge out of any such side. Much though I admire Prior, I would walk out of any meeting in which my fellow selectors were contemplating picking him ahead of Knott, Murray or Dujon ! Presumably the lack of a specialist spinner means that Sobers would be doing the honours? No problem with that !

    • I met Sobers when I was at school and he bowled in the nets for us. He did a little master class. He was in his 60s but he still turned it square when demonstrating leg-spin. It was a real eye opener.

      • What a great experience for you ! He was my schoolboy hero and played in the first Test match I ever saw. I did meet him years later at an event hosted by David Gower. His charm was as natural as his batting !

  • Post war it’s difficult to make a coherent case for any English cricketers here other than uncovered wicket batsmen like Hutton and May, though I saw neither, Underwood as the spinner and Knott as the keeper.
    We’re talking about a team good in any conditions, where the ball may not swing, seam or spin or it does all 3. Stats are relatively meaningless here as players like Botham’s were massaged by Packer and apartheid.

      • Not that left field – he and Allan Lamb were outstanding against the most hostile pace bowling of the day. But depends on who this team is going to face – if it’s a battery of pacemen then they’d justify consideration.

          • I was going to put in Allan Lamb but Cowdery had a better record than him abroad. Saying that, Lamb really did take it to a fast, fast bowling attack.

    • I had to look Andy Ganteaume up – highest ever test batting average of 112! (based on one innings only, though…..) He didn’t keep in that match.

  • Was there ever a test wicket that nullified the likes of Holding, Roberts, Marshall, Garner or Ambrose. If there was I never saw it. Don’t need spinners with that lot, but you do need a top notch keeeper. Knott was the best I ever saw, but he never had to keep against that sort of relentless pace and lift. Dujon and Murray had that experience, so for that reason you can’t really argue against including one or the other for that attack. Personally I would go with Dujon, even though as a Warwick supporter I saw a lot of Murray. As one journalist put it after seeing the misprint ‘Dijon’ ‘for me he never cut the mustard’. Apologies.

    • I believe England tried to nullify the WI fast bowling attack by preparing slow pitches. However the bowlers simply pitched it fuller and were so quick through the air that they got wickets that way (see Holding’s 14/149 as an example). The England bowlers (who weren’t as quick) were the ones nullified.

  • I was going to put in Allan Lamb but Cowdery had a better record than him abroad. Saying that, Lamb really did take it to a fast, fast bowling attack.

  • Statistically that’s a good side. But it’s hardly romantic. Greenidge, simply for /that/ innings, should play ahead of Geoffrey. And George Headley was simply outstanding. I’d take them both, which leaves Hutton as the sole English batsman in any combined side.

    With all that batting you’d take the best keeper. Knott the obvious choice (though some preferred Taylor).

    For balance, Lance Gibbs rather than Anderson. A truly outstanding spinner. One of the best ever. Or Swann, who never got to bowl on uncovered wickets.

    Our best XI against theirs? Much as I love Hutton, Hobbs et al, bowling wins matches and the Windies could field at least 2 sets of pace bowlers better than Trueman, Willis, Larwood and Anderson.

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