Cricket: 10 Greatest Spin Bowlers of All Time

By: Biplob Kishore Deb

Spin bowling seems to be an art in Cricket. With the help of wrist and fingers bowlers try to deceive the batsman where physical power is less important rather some strategic ideas of bowler can easily be silent hit for a batsman. Some of those greatest artists of this art are given below with a short illustration.

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Shane Warne

Shane Warne, the Australian legendry leg spinner, is though to be one of the best legs spinners in the history of cricket. He is the leading wicket takers in the test cricket. He first took 650 wickets in test cricket. His flipper and accurate line and length make his bowls difficult to the batsmen. He is also I the verge of his 700 test and 300 ODI wickets. He holds the world record for taking highest 976 wickets in a calendar year. He is just a few runs behind from his 3000 test runs and he sis the highest test run corers without making any century. His test career started against India in 1991 but his debut match was and series was a nightmare for him. His famous wicket known as ‘Ball of the Century’ against Mike Gatting in the Ashes series in 1993 is considered as his best delivary where the ball pitching outside of the leg stamp and bouncing a bit made Gatting played on. He is involved in many controversies including his being positive in drug test during the 2003 world cup which resulted his 1 year ban form international cricket, controversy involving women and bookmakers. In spite of theses incidents he is still creating fear to the opponent batsmen and there is no doubt about his greatness.

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Muttiah Muralitharan

Muralitharan is the greatest off spinner in the cricket history who is the second leading test wicket taker in test cricket. Despite his controversy with his unorthodox bowling action, he could be able to prove his correctness and continue taking wicket all over the world. He has highest international wickets combining both ODI and test cricket which is more than 1000 wickets. He is the highest number of 5 and 10 wicket taker in an innings in test cricket. He is the only player who took 10 wickets in an innings for the consecutive four test matches. He is the only player who got 50 wickets against every test playing nations.This greatest bowler was born in 17 April, 1972 at Kandy in Sri Lanka.

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Jim Laker

James Charles Laker is one of the all time greatest spin bowlers ever seen in the Cricket History. This former English off spinner first introduced the spin bowling as an art to the cricket world. He still holds a tremendous record in the test cricket to take the 19 wickets in a single test match which is second to none. That was the first time a bowler took all of the wickets of an innings of test crickets. This test match is known as ‘Laker’s Match’ in the cricket history which was held in 1956 against Austrailia. In his test career he took 193 wickets with an outstanding average of 21.24 and his first class career record deserves him to be noted as a legend with his 1944 wickets on an average of 18.41. In 1952 he was named as the prestigious “Wisden Crickets of the Year.”

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Anil Kumble

Kubmle is the third highest wicket taker in the test cricket with his 533 test wickets and the highest wicket taking spinner for India with his 329 wickets. His notable performance was seen in a test match against Pakistan in Delhi in 1999 where he took all of the ten wickets of the second innings of Pakistan. His strength is his faster flippers which often made opposition batsmen fell in mistiming. This is the second such examples in the history of test cricket after Jim Laker which I mentioned above. He was given the ‘Padma Shri’ award by the Indian Government in 2005.

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Lancelot Richard Gibbs

This former West Indian off spinner is regarded as one the legendary figure in the test cricket. He became first spinner to achieve the prestigious 300 wicket milestone. West Indies as a team was well-known for their dangerous pace attacks in the history and their cricket pitch was also known to be the friend to the fast bowlers. Gibbs is some of those rare cricketers who could turn the attention of the cricket world for their outstanding performance in spinning the ball. In his 79 test match appearances he took 309 wickets and he also had 1024 wickets in the first-class cricket. In his life time he played for several county teams in the county cricket of England.

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Bishan Singh Bedi

Bedi is another outrageous performer of test cricket who deserves to be one of the greatest ever spinner of the cricket history. In the late 60’s to late 70’s he dominated the world cricket with his off spin. His strength was variation in his deliveries which made him the leading wicket taker of his time in test cricket. In his international career he played 67 test matches for India securing 266 wickets with an average of 28.71 and his first class career ended up with taking 1560 wickets on an average of 21.69. This greatest figure in the test history helped India win in many matches. Later he became the coach of the Indian national cricket team.

Richie Benaud

This Australian cricket legend is considered as on e of the greatest cricket personalities in the world. In his career he showed all round performance in both bowling and bating. Though he has over two thousand runs in test cricket with 3 centuries and over ten thousand runs in first-class cricket 23 centuries, he was mostly known for his leg spin bowling. He could take 248 wickets in just 63 test match appearances in the test cricket. You will be in the dark if you do not get introduced with his first-class career record of 945 wickets in an average of 24.73 where he took 5 wickets for 56 times. As a captain of Australia, he was very successful with 12 win and 12 draws in return of just 4 defeats. For his benevolent presence in cricket, he was given the “Order of British Empire’ in 1961.

Bhagwat Chandrasekhar

Bhagwat Subramanya Chandrasekhar is also considered as one of the great leg spinners of all time. He was one of the pioneers of the leg spin who along with Bedi, Prasanna, Venkat dominated the cricket world in 1960’s to 1970’s. He was the great member of this famous spin quartet in the golden era of spin bowling. His googly and flipper were really something those seemed to be threats to the opposition batsmen. He had some inevitable contribution to many of his country India’s early success in the test history which involves India’s first victory in Australia. This leg spin legend played 58 matches for India taking 242 wickets in his career with the average of 29.74. He was named the Wisden cricketer of the Year in1972.

William Joseph "Bill" O'Reilly

Former Australian Leg Braker O’Reilly is another influential spinner in the cricket history. His bowling was little different from others spinners. He could bowl like medium pace with spinning the bowl including leg brake, off brake, googly, top spin etc. He was credited as the finest bowler ever seen by the greatest batsman in test cricket Sir Donald Bradman. He took 144 wickets in just 27 test matches in his career with an amazing average of 22.59. In his first-class career he took 774 wickets with an average of 16.60. He is the member of Australian Cricket Hall of Fame.

Abdul Qadir

Abdul Qadir is the former great spinner of Pakistan who could set himself as a dominant personality in his time in test cricket. He played his debut test match against England in 1977. This talented spinner had an outstanding power of taking wickets. In his 67 matched-test career he took 236 wickets and he has 132 ODI wickets too. His best bowling figure came in the 1987/88 season against England where he took 9 wickets for 54 runs. In his first-class career he took 960 wickets with an average of 23.24.