My Top 100 Test Bowlers of all-time

Updated after the England/West Indies test series, June 2007

1 Muralitharan 1256
2 Barnes 1003
3 Warne 950
4 Hadlee 948
5 McGrath 940
6 Marshall 905
7 Ambrose 879
8 Lohmann 862
9 O'Reilly 844
10 Lillee 840
11 Grimmett 825
12 Trueman 819
13 Imran Khan 811
14 Turner 809
15 Kumble 805
16 Donald 803
17 Wasim Akram 790
18 Davidson 789
19 Waqar Younis 784
20 Garner 777
21 Walsh 773
22 Peel 766
23 S.M. Pollock 734
24 Laker 729
25 Bedser 710
26 Ferris 693
27 Holding 690
28 Briggs 689
29 Blythe 689
30 Wardle 681
31 W. Barnes 675
32 Spofforth 673
33 Adcock 660
34 Tayfield 652
35 Botham 650
36 Fazal Mahmood 648
37 Tyson 647
38 Lindwall 646
39 Underwood 645
40 Bates 639
41 Ntini 632
42 Willis 629
43 Roberts 623
44 MacGill 621
45 Johnston 618
46 P.M. Pollock 610
47 Statham 608
48 Miller 606
49 Procter 605
50 Bowes 604
51 Shoaib Akhtar 600
52 Kapil Dev 599
53 Ironmonger 592
54 Harbhajan Singh 589
55 Croft 587
56 Benaud 586
57 Trumble 586
58 McDermott 584
59 Richardson 577
60 Gibbs 576
61 Alderman 575
62 Bishop 570
63 Snow 568
64 Lock 568
65 McKenzie 567
66 Chandrasekhar 566
67 Higgs 566
68 Bedi 564
69 Hall 564
70 Verity 561
71 Reid 558
72 Fraser 557
73 Gillespie 555
74 Saqlain Mushtaq 553
75 Saunders 551
76 Tate 543
77 Palmer 537
78 F.R. Foster 527
79 Gough 525
80 Bond 525
81 Gupte 523
82 Caddick 522
83 Lockwood 519
84 Hughes 519
85 Vass 514
86 Walker 512
87 Thomson 511
88 Whitty 507
89 Cairns 502
90 Ramadhin 502
91 Danish Kaneria 501
92 Lawson 497
93 Taylor 493
94 Toshack 493
95 Abdul Qadir 492
96 Prasanna 490
97 Iqbal Qasim 484
98 Fleming 481
99 Hoggard 480
100 Srinath 479

No place for Larwood, unfortunately, his high average, and the fact that he only really had one or two good series counted against him.

Not a bad list although I ignore No.1

Fiery said:

Not a bad list although I ignore No.1

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This is gonna get ugly early....

Burgey said:

This is gonna get ugly early....

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Not willing to debate it tbh

POINTS ALLOCATED: BOWLERS

Wickets: x0.4
Average:
0-15: 675 16: 612 17: 556 18: 506
19: 460 20: 418 21: 380 22: 345
23: 314 24: 285 25: 260 26: 236
27: 215 28: 195 29: 177 30: 161
31: 147 32: 133 33: 121 34: 110
35: 100 36: 91 37: 83 38: 75 39: 68
40: 62 41: 56 42: 51 43: 47 44: 42
45: 39 46: 35 47: 32 48: 29 49: 26
50+: 24

Wickets per match: (WPM): x50

5WI: x2
10WM: x5

%5WI per match: x1.5

Less than 25 matches: -5% of rating*
Less than 20 matches: -10% of rating
Less than 15 matches: -25% of rating
Less than 10 matches: -40% of rating
Less than 5 matches: -60% of rating

* players after 1970 get 5% taken off their rating if they played between 20 and 30 matches.

Played entire career before 1914: -20% of rating
Less than 20 matches: -5% of rating
Less than 10 matches: -20% of rating

Played part of career before 1914: -10% of rating

Career interrupted by WWI/WWII: +10% or rating

Career ended by isolation (South African players):
Played first-class cricket for 5 or more years after isolation: +10% of rating
Played first-class cricket for less than 5 more years after isolation: +5% of rating


Bowling example: F.S. Trueman
Wickets: 307 x0.4 = 122.8
Average: 21.57 = 380
5WI: 17 x2 = 34
10WM: 3 x5 = 15
Wickets per match: 4.58 x50 = 229
%5WI per match: 25.37 x1.5 = 38.06
Final Rating: 819

Of course, Murali's lead might be even bigger after he's finished sh*tting all over the Bangladesh Tigers.

No way is Lohmann is the 8th best bowler of all time.

An average of 10.75 says a hell of a lot IMO.

Fiery said:

Not willing to debate it tbh

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Mate, why would any of us want to debate all that again?

Waiting for the Lillee Loathers to start here. Countdown in 5, 4, 3, 2.........

Burgey said:

Mate, why would any of us want to debate all that again?

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too true

Interesting that if you take out Murali's matches against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, his rating drops down to 1076.

The fact that Stuart MacGill is ranked #44 is ridiculous.

Fiery said:

Not a bad list although I ignore No.1

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Agree with you on this one Fiery...It is a bowlers list Not a chuckers list.....That would mean Larwood would slot in there then

JBMAC said:

Agree with you on this one Fiery...It is a bowlers list Not a chuckers list.....That would mean Larwood would slot in there then

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That's from a man who's watched the game for >50 years... Take note youngsters.

Days of Grace said:

59 Richardson 577

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Mark Richardson FTW!!!!!

That would be Tom Richardson, a fine fast bowler from yore.

The list is mathematical. A BBC tape (pre-Warne) on bowlers concluded with the top 3 bowlers being Barnes, Lindwall and Qadir

Days of Grace said:

Interesting that if you take out Murali's matches against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, his rating drops down to 1076.

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Not that interesting, he stills sits comfortably at No.1 when you do that.

As for Murali his action was cleared so what's the problem?

I expect that Hadlee (and also Murali as well I guess) are slightly overvalued by my eyes in this system because they took a lot of 5-fors due to having little comparative support. Conversely the great West Indies quicks probably get a bit penalised. Hadlee is a top 15 all-time bowler for definite, but not sure if I'd have him number 4.

It's an interesting list, but I think it just doesn't look as 'right' as the one you formulated for batsmen (which overrated modern players a bit too much but otherwise was pretty good I thought).

KiWiNiNjA said:

Mark Richardson FTW!!!!!

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Robert Croft is a bit overrated at 55 too.