No team has ever been as reliant on one bowler as Sri Lanka were on the Kandy Konjuror. Over the course of his career, Murali took 41% of his team’s wickets, and bowled 33% of their overs – so he was bowling two thirds of the time that Sri Lanka were in the field. For nearly two decades. (By comparison, Warne, in a much stronger Australian attack, took 28% of Australia’s wickets, and bowled 28% of their overs.)
Sri Lanka have played 190 Tests since being admitted to Test cricket in 1982. Murali played in 132 of them; and they won 54 of those games. He was his team’s leading wicket-taker in 43 of those 54 wins, including 37 of 41 between September 1996 and December 2007. Sri Lanka have won just seven of the 68 Tests that Murali has not played in. History suggests Sri Lanka were four times as likely to win with Murali than without him. And that the Sistine Chapel would have 25% of the current number of tourists visiting it if Michelangelo had had to paint it with his fingers.
The closest equivalent in terms of importance to a Test team is probably Richard Hadlee, who over the course of his unstoppably moustachioed career bowled a quarter of New Zealand’s overs, and took 35% of their wickets. His country had won seven out of 102 Tests before he made his debut. They won 22 of the 86 in which he played, with Hadlee top wicket-taker in 16 of those. They won none of the 14 Tests he missed during his career, and only seven of the next 55 after he retired. Until a new generation emerged in the late 1990s, New Zealand without Hadlee were like steak and chips without the steak. And often without the chips.
