Sehwag Retires

Sehwag has called it a day. I just wonder if any other batsman has made such huge scores at such a rapid rate. OK, guys have got big scores and others have made their runs very quickly. But it's one thing to make quick 60s and 70s and quite another to play massive innings of 200-plus and sometimes 300-plus and score at around a run a ball or even better.
Always difficult to make comparisons, but certainly Sehwag has proved to be one of the best-ever attacking batters.

Could have sworn he retired several years ago.

Somebody like Gayle is comparable, though he was never as consistent.

One of the best attacking openers there has been, played some truly astonishing innings in both Tests and ODIs. Only shame is he was continually picked for 3 or 4 years when he was well past it, though he can hardly be blamed for that.

100 Tests and averaged just a shade under 50 scoring at a fast rate. Undoubtedly a fine and very important player for India over the last 15 years.

However, I think his (Test) stats flatter him a bit - you can get away with hitting through the line OK when opening in India and to a lesser extent in places like Aus, but he was much less successful in England and New Zealand, but fortunately for him only played about 15 of his Tests in the two countries where the ball tends to move in the air. Probably compaeable with an England opener averaging 45 (so still very good, but a little short of true greatness).

It was slightly surprising to me that his ODI record wasn't better, given how he played in the longer format - an average of about 35 is surprisingly low for someone who was a good top of order ball striker. Perhaps at times he was too intent on playing up to his perceived role at the start of the innings and tried too much to soon?

It was a combination of his average and strike rate.... in an era where his high SR was much ahead of his time....
Our biggest test match winner along with Kumble.

sadly relied purely on hand / eye coordination and once his reflexes slowed a shade....he was not the same......very reminiscent of Viv Richards fate in his last 3 to 4 years ( Richards averaged juts shade over 30)

Three batsmen haver scored >2000 test runs at a strikerate over 75 - Sehwag, Gilchrist and Kapil (Warner is between 75 and 70)


Chris Gayle by comparison has a strike rate of 60.


Until the arrival of David Warner, Sehwag's ability to come in at the top of the order and blast the ball was unparalleled. Yes he was helped by a hard ball and batting conditions that often favour openers. Yes his record outside of Asia was vastly inferior to inside that continent - but he was a ground braking batsman.

not an all time great, but I reckon many people enjoyed watching him.

Sehwag and Gilchrist have a SR pf 82%
i don't see kapil's SR on CI nor Richards
I woul expect richards to be no less than 75%

I agree pretty much 100% with the assessments above.  Sehwag was a very fine player on the international stage who was highly entertaining and made a ground breaking contribution to world cricket on the art of opening on good batting pitches.

An absolutely unique player, a wonderful match-winner. And though he's retired from international, still is a major crowd puller even in the domestic cricket seen, as the current Ranji season shows.
The end wasn't the finest, but that really doesn't matter, he was a truly special player. And even David Warner acknowledges Sehwag's role in helping him discover the test playerwithin him, when everyone had Warner bracketed as a T-20 specialist........

It would be interesting to see Sehwag discussed on the Hall of Fame thread, but unfortunately that seems to have died off.

My starting position on him relative to the HoF members -
From pure statistics, an opener averaging 49 over an extended career deserves serious consideration.
However, for me his average is boosted by playing on the relatively opener-friendly wickets in India, and his relative failures in England suggest a weakness that perhaps pushes him below the boundary for HoF candidates based solely on the overall career stats.

Additional strengths
One of only 4 batsmen to score 2 Test triple hundreds
The only Indian to score a triple hundred in tests
The only player to score a triple hundred and take a 5-for in the same match (his only Test 5 wicket haul)
Set a new standard for aggressive opening batting in Tests (although for me this was really a development of what Matthew Hayden had already started)
The second batsman (after Tendulkar) to score a double hundred in an ODI

Overall, I think he'd make the grade for me, but mainly for the additional strengths rather than just his career stats.

Matthew Heyden and Sanath Jayasuriya were there earlier, so was Chris Gayle. But none of them made such big scores at such high rate with such consistency. They started to be more aggressive up front, but a comparison of the strike rate is quite indicative of the difference that Sehwag brought on to the table.

By the way, yet another player from that golden generation of Indian cricket retired a couple of days before Sehwag's announcement. Zaheer Khan too, has announced his international retirement.......

LondonTiger wrote:Three batsmen haver scored >2000 test runs at a strikerate over 75 - Sehwag, Gilchrist and Kapil (Warner is between 75 and 70)


Chris Gayle by comparison has a strike rate of 60.


Until the arrival of David Warner, Sehwag's ability to come in at the top of the order and blast the ball was unparalleled. Yes he was helped by a hard ball and batting conditions that often favour openers. Yes his record outside of Asia was vastly inferior to inside that continent - but he was a ground braking batsman.

not an all time great, but I reckon many people enjoyed watching him.

I certainly did . Rather unsuccessful in England ; but give him less swervy conditions and he could score - and entertain - like few others.
Reckon a HoF candidate when the dust has settled.

Well played

Are there comparable strikerates published by country? i.e. How does Sehwag's record, sr and average, fare in England (for instance) when compared against others?
Just asking, but in the sure knowledge that plenty of HOF'ers have only played in certain conditions, so is it fair therefore to cast aspersions on those current-ish players who thrived only in particular countries?
Devil's advocacy.

Even some of the HoF members have differential records in different conditions. Ponting's record in India is pretty poor by his standards. Gordon Greenidge averaged in the 30s In Asia?
With sehwag, rather than viewing his numbers separately, you have to look at the average/strike rate combo, he's pretty unique and in a league of his own in there.......

Sehwag should be an automatic HOFer.

Sehwag when he had the force with him was a typhoon. Okay he didn't score a lot in England, but he was a marauder in his element. Warne's chronic inability to not bowl pies at the Indians doesn't seem to hinder his credentials. I'll give Sehwag a pass.

msp, That's what I was getting at. And Greenidge was very much in my thoughts!