Is Jimmy Anderson really the greatest?

Last week Jimmy Anderson broke the record for the most test wickets for England, but would he be in anyone best ever England eleven.

Certainly in Anderson's favour is his longevity the first specialist bowler to do this for England, he has also stayed pretty injury free through his career, the other key thing to consider is that test cricket has become more of a batsman game, if you look 20 years ago anyone averaging over 40 was considered a good player in today's world you need to be going pass 50 to be considered as a top draw batsman.

The final piece when considering Anderson against some of his peers is the quality of the pitches that he has to bowl on, you just have to look at the pitches in the current series in the Caribbean which are lasting well into the 5 days and sheer persistent rather than outright speed and guile are rewarded.

In the case against Anderson whilst winning the odd test match he has never dominated a series, particularly against Australia, there is not for instance a DVD available called Anderson Ashes.

Leading on from this Anderson has been widely acclaimed as being high skilled in his art but never as truly frightening or unplayable, if you look back at 1981 Botham and Willis were truly devastating Anderson has never had such a day.

I have purposely avoided slavishly doing statistical analysis to prove a point as I don't feel this really adds to the argument, and the game has changed beyond recognition in the last 10 years let alone the last 50.

My view is that Anderson is a good bowler but wouldn't make the final eleven of my all time England team, for what it is worth I would go for the following players to make up my bowling line up.

Andrew Flintoff- Devastating pace when he really want to put it in, and had a golden arm.

Ian Botham- Particularly in the early years when he had combination of pace and swing

Bob Willis- I will forgive his boring persona on Sky and remember his excellent controlled fast bowling.

Graham Swann- Underwood is before my time and Swann although having DRS to help has got over 200 wickets in a successful England team on batting friendly wickets.

The other bowling vacancy is difficult to fill do you go for the unreliable sheer pace of Harmison, swing bowling of Hoggard or Anderson, however final vote goes to Gough who gives you combination of pace and seam bowling craft to complete the bowling attack.

A New Order

A New Order

This weekend saw two events that may just be the start of the changing of the guard both in the Premier League and the Golf world.

Manchester Derby

On paper Man City look a dull functional side and they confirmed this with their performance yesterday, Toure's performance was disgraceful and with all their millions spent on players they completely isolated Aguero, there needs to be a major clear out in the summer and you wonder if it will be a while before they challenge again.

On the flip side it was the best performance I have seen from Manchester United this season, Van Gaal has finally worked out that Rooney is his best striker and Mata is a quality midfield player .

The revelation is Fellini he is playing in between the solo forward and the midfield and generally gets in the way, he does make it very difficult for defenders and making late runs is a very good target at the back post, he also has a good knack of breaking up play forcing the opposition to go a little longer than they may wish and giving away possession. In addition Ashley Young is looking like the player that was signed from Villa 4 years ago.

Van Gaal will hit his target of bringing Champions League football back to Old Trafford, next season will be very interesting to see if he can make them Premier League champions.

The Masters

In some ways the Masters lacked its usual excitement, as Jordan Spieth led from start to finish, the other way to look at it is that we could have been watching the start of the next golfing superstar's career, over the next 5-10 years there could be plenty of battles between Spieth and Mcllroy for the major prizes.

Whilst I was hoping Spieth would slip up to make the tournament exciting the way he kept his nerve in the last round was compelling, his second shot straight at the flag on the 13th and the par putt on 16th showed that he had the makeup of a champion.

The old master Woods performed well, and it will be interesting to see if he can make the level required to seriously challenge at the top of a major leaderboard, I feel he has lost the fear factor though and his time has past.