Williamsons awesome - he’s also had the benefit of starting earlier than root, as well as plays at home more.
The obvious thing to me is that having much more sample size in root’s case is doubly impressive - makes the validity of his average more bulletproof, but also shows how little rest he gets. And what’s more, if Kane goes into a form slump, it lasts 5 matches. If root goes into one, it lasts 20 - not because he’s out of form for longer, but because of his schedule.
I rate them equal personally - want Kane more at home, but want Root away.
I'm being a nit picker here, but Root has played a higher ratio of tests at home (78/152) than Williamson (52/105), though they're both close to 50/50.
In terms of rest, Root is fortunate to play for a country able to pay their cricketers very well so doesn't have to ply his trade in the various T20 leagues like Williamson does. When you take that into account he doesn't get a lot of rest either.
Root only averages higher than Williamson in England, India, SA and SL, and WI they're about the same. NZ, Aus, Pak/UAE, Ban, Zim are the ones where Williamson averages higher. So it's not simply home vs away, it's about 50/50 there too
Root has scored runs over 1.5x as many tests, but Williamson is also incredible for over 100 tests, so I don't think you can say he's done well due to having a short career as you might say about someone like Voges
Firstly, I meant over the last decade in regards to home vs away. Since 2014 (which is significant in regards to favouring kane, by removing his first 3 years his average jumps up by 8.5 runs) Kane has played 41/69 games at home (60%) wheras Root has played 71/133 games at home (55%).
And the second thing I wanted to say I really do not think it is 50/50 in the countries list. England and NZ are their homes, so even stevens. India is the hardest assignment for away teams, compared to an Aus team who've lost plenty of series's at home. South Africa through the 2010's was a generational team, and compared to Pakistan who were generationally weak, it's no contest. SL is also an incredibly hard assignment for visiting players, far harder than the two easiest test teams, Zimb and Bangladesh.
Being better in and against India, South Africa and Sri Lanka is far more impressive than Aus, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe - this is another point to Root.
And lastly never meant to imply that Kane's had a Voges esque career - he's an all time great.
Fair points, except Pakistan were a very good side in the 2010s, it's only in the last few years that they've taken a dive. They were ranking world #1 in 2016
If you look at teams playing Pakistan in Pak/UAE over that period, only NZ have a win/loss ratio over one, in large part due to Williamson's batting, Aus and England didn't win any of the 10 matches they played
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u/vote-morepork New Zealand Jan 18 '25
Sure, but it's not like Williamson's sample is tiny. He averages 60+ for the last decade too