Description

New 550-page magnum opus centring on Mark Waugh, the more underrated of the two Waugh brothers.

The introduction includes:

1. The Deciding Tests

* There are deciding tests and there are also deciders. What is the actual difference?
* One of the hallmarks of a champion is how he or she performs when everything is on the line – how did Mark Waugh fare in these matches and how did it impact Australia’s fortunes in terms of the ultimate series result?

2. How much are runs really worth in Test cricket?

* It is completely incorrect to claim that all runs are equal, and contrary to wide spread belief, runs do not always matter on an individual batsman’s level.
* What are the different types of soft, ‘easy’ situations that batsmen can exploit to gorge themselves and bloat their personal statistics?

3. Filling boots and padding averages: a tale of two batsmen

• Brian Lara forged his reputation, as well as his 50+ average, through colossal individual scores, but does this make him a better batsman than Mark Waugh?
• What is the affect of removing the padding from Chapter 2 from a batsman’s statistics?
• Brian Lara and Sachin Tendulkar are almost universally acknowledged as the two best batsmen of the 1990s, but was Mark Waugh really that far behind them?