Who is the greatest spinner ever?

It's become commonplace each time the relative merits of Muttiah Muralitharan and Shane Warne are discussed to use the descriptor: the greatest spinner ever. Such sweeping statements though border on the disrespectful and ignore the claims of some of the game's greats. Even if you overlook 19th century titans like Bobby Peel and Johnny Briggs on the grounds that no one even saw grainy newsreel footage of them in action, there are at least a half a dozen others with claims to top-dog status.

Bill O'Reilly, whose battles with Don Bradman illuminated Australian domestic cricket between the wars, would feature in any such discussion, as would a Yorkshireman, Hedley Verity. South Africa's Hugh Tayfield ploughed a lone furrow for years, and many still get misty-eyed about India's legendary spin quartet.

The Doosra offers up nine names - there will, no doubt, be many complaints over the exclusion of Abdul Qadir and Derek Underwood - and invites you to pick your number one. The stats say that Murali and Warne are a class apart. Do you agree?

Voting has now closed, and below are the results:

Comments

[Stephen McAlpine]

Murali would still be struggling to approach 400 wickets if, like Warne, he had a Glenn McGrath at the other end taking more than 500. If McGrath's job was to soften them up for Warnie's stats book then he did a bloody awful job of it because he finished with "five for" more often than not himself. And with Gillespie etc, also bowling well through the nineties it was Warne's sheer ability and willpower that saw him top the table. He lacked wickets in ODI simply because he has played far fewer of them - although he won far more important ODI's than Murali ever did, the semi final of the WC against SA back in 1999 a case in point.
BTW Murali was here in Oz a few weeks back for two Tests and the Sri Lankans managed 11 wickets between them in the series. 'Nuf said really.

[Alan]

Warne wasn't reliant on being in great Aussie teams, he was one of the main reasons they were great teams. One might as well minimise the achievements of Bradman for the same reason. A truly magnificent, thoughtful and dangerous bowler on any wicket - he didn't need his own backyard painstakingly prepared for him like Muralitharan. He single-handedly altered forever the perception of leg-spinners as occasional, expensive bowlers. A cricketing genius, definitely the greatest spinner ever and of course he bowled with a non-controversial action. (Incidentally, if steroids have anything to do with being able to bowl brilliant leg spin, I shall order some today)

[bunty]

gupte and chandra are the only 2 indian spinners who career averaged under 30/wkt outside india and performance on a variety of wickets, especially unhelpful or unfamiliar, ought to be an important factor, though this maybe due to the fact that prasanna and bedi who also looked dangerous on some tours, and others too who looked less dangerous abroad, saw their figures hurt by like nearly all indian test players playing on well beyond their shelf life;
its difficult to assess pre ww1 players, or bowlers like underwood who were unplayable on wickets that havent been seen in england since 86
but yes tayfield, reilly and grimmett who all succeeded on wickets that werent turners must be considered right up there, as will be warne n murali n i would say either gupte or chandra

[Ranga Weerakkody]

Murali is a statistical freak. The only players who achieve that freak status are Bradman, Barnes and Lohman. His stats are a class above other spinners. Stats is not everything, but it is a vital part to get the subjectivty away. Murali's statistical anomaly cannot be explained by various hypothesised factors by few of the above posters. I can go in to huge detail dissecting their carrers, but people will understand what I am telling.

Warne also failed the more "acidic" test of bowling to Indians than Murali. And other than against Pakistan, Murali has better stats against all other test playing nations than Warne.

Not to mention ODI bowling, Murali is miles ahead in ODI's than Warne.

[Surj]

I think you need to include Subhash Gupte , a very underrated bowler and underused as well.In the present list , I have always enjoyed watching Warne more than Murali.I know its proved biomechanically , but dont know why I always get this feeling that he is doing something illegal.. Well its all in the mind may be ...

[Clive Britcher]

Dileep - doosra or no doosra, Derek Underwood was unplayable on a damp wicket.
As for the stats, well I think there are many more games played now, so it's perhaps a little unjust to compare the total number of wickets taken rather than the average wickets per match. That would give us a better idea.
No doubt about it, though; Chandrasekar was a magnificent spinner, Warne is a magnificent spinner and Murali is a magnificent spinner.
Could we have a 3-way tie for 1st place??

[Sanjya]

Action suspect ! Kumble takes more frontline batsmen! Warne is more brainy!

Stop finding fault because Murali is the Greatest Bowler of all time.
He may have taken more wickets of Zimbabwe & Bangladeshi batsmen but one could safely say those batsmen play spin better the Englishmen and Warne has got most of wickets of clueless Englishmen. Murali has not required steroids to achieve his records so that probably answers the questions about brains. Kumble probably has taken more upfront wickets ( if has done so ) because the indian opening bowlers were not effective in the past. Stop whinging or taking the gloss over what murali has achieved in what some would take the most extreme conditions to play cricket in. Well done Murali.

[Sam]

S.F. Barnes?

[Richard]

I'm somewhat perplexed by the prevailing logic that Warne's wickets were easier to come by because of 'help' from the likes of McGrath, Gillespie, Lee etc. I would have thought Warne was sharing/competing for wickets with his top class team-mates whereas Murali was/is virtually a one man band (apologies to C.Vaas - a very good bowler in his own right).

Stats are one thing... my feeling is that Warne's all-round ability as a brilliant slips fielder, handy batsman, astute tactician AND matchturning prowess make him better value. Also SL played too many games against Zimb and Bang which has bolstered Murali's record.. not too mention nearly 60%of muralis matches were at home - warne less than half.

Murali's record against Oz is poor - he had little effect against the true acid test in world cricket.

Also, like it or not the debate about his action means there will always be an asterix next to his name.

[Tarun Y]

Hi Dileep,

Was wondering if you could answer a Q for me:

I saw a stat awhile (not-too-long ago) back, which showed the following:

[i] if you remove Zimbabwe and Bangladesh,
[ii] if you only include wickets of batsmen from no's 1 to 7 (ie, exclude all tail-enders)

then-

Anil Kumble has more test wickets than Shane Warne or Muttiah Muralitharan?!

Is this true?

(PS: Warne is much better than Murali. I have doubts over Murali's action)

[Philip Wright]

Warne is in a class of his own with seemingly endless variations.
Murali has been allowed to bowl with an action which at best is debateable.Certainly it offers him a degree of assistance whih allows him to turn the ball appreciably more han any other finger spinner in the very long history of test cricket.

[Arun]

Saqlain Mushtaq definitely needs to be on that list.

[Allan]

Did either Murali or Warney get 19 wickets in a test?

Only one man in it...

[Greg]

Ashley Giles - the skills it takes to bowl that negatively is something of which most mortals can only dream.

[Yasas]

How about Abdul Qudir?

Yeah, putting Warne , Murali with a whole lot of others who aren;t even close isn't a good representation of spinners.

[Tony Keir]

Not to mention Freddie Titmus ....

[Krishna]

For the sheer volume of wickets taken the tossup has to be between Murali and Warne. I would pick Murali just because he has ploughed a lone furrow for Sri Lanka over the past decade with no consistent support from the other end. Warne, also a great spinner, could always rely on McGrath and co. to soften up the batsmen before he went to work. Warne could also rely on the Aussie batting juggernaut to put up big scores. Murali did not have any bowler to consistently perform in tandem at the other end. And Sri Lankan batting was never as consistent as Australia. Murali has to be the greatest.

[Hilal Suhaib]

To be nominated for the title of the game's greatest bowler whilst still playing, shows greatness.

[am]

abdul qadir

[Cricket fan]

youve completely forgot about Saqlain Mushatq the inventor of the doosra and wisden rate him as the greatest one day spinner

[Amrit]

Murali. Simply awesome. Never had the privilege of watching anyone else apart from Murali, Warne and Kumble. But watching Murali bowl, and especially over the test match just gone, it was simply incredible. A joy to watch, and he gets people interested in test cricket while being an incredibly humble man. That's where his true greatness lies.

[Pete]

Derek Underwood?
Lance Gibbs?
Bishen Bedi?

[Geetha Krishnan]

Putting Murali and Warne into the basket is perhaps unfair. With the kind of impact they've had on the game and the numbers they present, it would take extremely unusual and almost non-cricketing parameters to pick anyone ahead of these two. It is like arguing that there is a better batsman than the Don.
It may be an idea to disqualify these two on the premise that they come from a different planet and run a poll on the next best spinner ever.

[Tan Pawar]

Playing Warne when you're a 100/0 is far easier than when you're 60/2 and credit to that goes to McGrath.

England won the 2 tests in the Ashes when McGrath wasn't playing and were able to score runs with more freedom and that meant play Warne with a lot more confidence. I'm not saying Warne isn't great, but a lot of his success is down to a strong fielding unit and a strong bowling pack, plus batsmen who have been consistent.

[Colin Gibson]

What about Eddie Hemmings?