smash84
The Tiger King
Number 30 Bill O Reilly
Highest Ranking 8
Total Points 142
Number of Votes Received 20/57
Rank in 1st Edition 28
Bill O'Reilly was probably the greatest spin bowler the game has ever produced. Bill Tiger O'Reilly was unquestionably one of cricket's great figures: as a player, as a character and later as a writer on the game. His cricket was proof that spin bowling was not necessarily a gentle art. He was 6ft 2in tall, gripped the ball in his enormous right hand and released it at a pace that could be almost fast-medium. It would then bounce ferociously on the hard pitches of his time and, on occasion, knock wicket-keepers off their feet. He bowled leg-breaks and, especially, top-spinners and googlies, backed up by an intimidating manner. Jack Fingleton said he was a flurry of limbs, fire and steel-edged temper. It has been suggested that his action and the general commotion before delivery were born of a deep sense of frustration at not being able to bowl fast enough to knock the batsman down. Off the field, his gruffness was mitigated by his intelligence, erudition, wit and twinkling eyes.
Number 29 Fred Trueman
Highest Ranking 6
Total Points 149
Number of Votes Received 16/57
Rank in 1st Edition 31
A classical easy action, a mop of unruly jet-black hair and a menacing scowl were the trademarks of Freddie Trueman, the Yorkshire fast bowler who was the first man from any country to take 300 Test wickets, a landmark he reached at The Oval in 1964. Since then many have gone past his overall figure of 307, but few have matched his average (21.57) and strike rate (a wicket every 49 balls). Trueman's tally might have been nearer 400 if he hadn't missed numerous matches and tours because of various disciplinary breaches, some true, some imagined - he was once hauled before the Yorkshire committee for some misdemeanour, and escaped punishment by pointing out that he was 200 miles away playing for England at the time. But on his day Trueman was fast and frightening: in his first Test series, in 1952, he helped reduce India to 0 for 4 on his debut, and took 8 for 31 - the best Test bowling figures by a genuinely fast bowler at the time - in the third match. In the second half of the '50s he formed an incisive new-ball pairing with Brian Statham, the legendarily accurate loose-limbed Lancastrian, who raced him neck-and-neck to the 250-wicket mark. By then "Fiery Fred" had great control of swing, and had some claim to being, as he only half-jokingly suggested to John Arlott as the title of his planned biography, "T'Greatest Fast Bowler Who Ever Drew Breath".
Number 28 George Headley
Highest Ranking 4
Total Points 161
Number of Votes Received 19/57
Rank in 1st Edition 22
George Alphonso Headley was the first of the great black batsmen to emerge from the West Indies. Between the wars, when the West Indies batting was often vulnerable and impulsive, Headley's scoring feats led to his being dubbed the black Bradman. His devoted admirers responded by calling Bradman the white Headley - a pardonable exaggeration. In 22 Tests, when the innings could stand or fall on his performance, Headley scored 2190 runs, including 10 centuries - eight against England - with an average of 60.83. He was the first to score a hundred in each innings of a Test at Lord's, in 1939, and it was a measure of his ability that from 1929 to 1939 he did not have a single bad Test series. By the start of the Second World War he had totalled 9532 runs in first-class cricket with an average of 72.21. Afterwards, though not the power that he had been, he extended his aggregate to 9921 runs, with 33 centuries and an average of 69.86.
Number 27 Rahul Dravid
Highest Ranking 7
Total Points 173
Number of Votes Received 19/57
Rank in 1st Edition NR
Rahul Dravid was probably one of the last classical Test match batsmen. His progress into the national side may have been steady and methodical rather than meteoric, but once there, Dravid established himself at the vanguard of a new, defiant generation that were no longer easybeats away from home. Armed with an orthodox technique drilled into him by Keki Tarapore, he became the cement that held the foundations firm while the flair players expressed themselves. Yet, for a man quickly stereotyped as one-paced and one-dimensional, he too could stroke the ball around when the mood struck him.
Number 26 Kapil Dev
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 198
Number of Votes Received 21/57
Rank in 1st Edition 36
Kapil Dev was the greatest pace bowler India has produced, and their greatest fast-bowling allrounder. If he had played at any other time - not when Imran Khan, Ian Botham and Richard Hadlee were contemporaries - he would surely have been recognised as the best allrounder in the world. In any case he did enough to be voted India's Cricketer of the Century during 2002, ahead of Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar. His greatest feats were to lead India almost jauntily, and by his all-round example, to the 1983 World Cup, and to take the world-record aggregate of Test wickets from Hadlee. It was the stamina of the marathon runner that took him finally to 431 wickets and only a yard beyond. He might not have been quite the bowling equal of Imran, Hadlee or Botham at his best, and his strike rate was less than four wickets per Test, but he was still outstanding in his accuracy and ability to swing the ball, usually away from right-handers. And he could hit a ball even more brilliantly than he bowled it, with uncomplicated flair.
Number 25 Sunil Gavaskar
Highest Ranking 7
Total Points 254
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 29
Sunil Gavaskar was one of the greatest opening batsmen of all time, and certainly the most successful. His game was built around a near-perfect technique and enormous powers of concentration. It is hard to visualise a more beautiful defence: virtually unbreachable, it made his wicket among the hardest to earn. He played with equal felicity off both front and back feet, had excellent judgement of length and line, and was beautifully balanced. He had virtually every stroke in the book but traded flair for the solidity his side needed more. His record for the highest number of Test hundreds was overtaken by Sachin Tendulkar, but statistics alone don't reveal Gavaskar's true value to India. He earned respect for Indian cricket and he taught his team-mates the virtue of professionalism. The self-actualisation of Indian cricket began under him. Since retiring, Gavaskar has served as a television commentator, analyst and columnist, as well as taken on various responsibilities with the BCCI, and served as chairman of the ICC cricket committee. He stepped down - after some controversial comments - from the latter in order to continue as a media columnist and commentator.
Number 24 Len Hutton
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 261
Number of Votes Received 25/57
Rank in 1st Edition 21
Sir Len Hutton was one of the greatest batsmen the game has produced in all its long history. In the Hall of Fame he sits at the high table with the élite, and if English cricket alone is taken into consideration he was one of the two most accomplished professional batsmen to have played for his country, the other being Sir Jack Hobbs with Walter Hammond and Denis Compton coming next haud longo intervallo.
Number 23 Ikki Ponting
Highest Ranking 1
Total Points 277
Number of Votes Received 29/57
Rank in 1st Edition 25
Ricky Ponting, the most uncompromising player of his generation, grew into Australia's most successful run-maker and only sits below Bradman in the country's overall ratings (according to some). It takes an extremely critical eye to diminish his run-scoring achievements, which seem to collect new records in every series. Like spotting a celebrity, it's necessary to look twice when analysing Ponting, first as the archetypal modern batsman, then as the country's 42nd Test captain. There is no doubt about his greatness after taking guard, but his leadership has been under scrutiny for much of his reign. While his blade has sparkled, his stewardship is pock-marked by three Ashes defeats - two in England and one at home - and stumbles to South Africa and India.
Number 22 Ian Botham
Highest Ranking 1
Total Points 280
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 20
Dominant and domineering, Ian Botham was not merely the top English cricketer of the 1980s but the leading sports personality. In an era of discreet footballers - before Paul Gascoigne and David Beckham - he commanded endless newspaper headlines as his career surged improbable heights and bottomless depths. Within a year of being elevated from Somerset to his England debut in 1977, he was undisputed as the country's leading allrounder; within three years he was captain; within four, he had resigned (a minute before being sacked), his form shot to pieces.
Number 21 Dennis Lillee
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 313
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 16
Dennis Lillee, considered by many to have been "the complete bowler", was the heart of Australia's attack for more than a decade. Through a combination of ability, showmanship and sheer hard work he won the loyal following of the nation's crowds, who often roared his name as he ran in to bowl. And Lillee repaid their faith with interest - he was the type of character whom captains could rely on to bowl "one more over" at the end of a long spell, and often made breakthroughs when success seemed unlikely. Armed with a copybook action, Lillee broke Lance Gibbs' world record of 309 Test wickets and finished with 355 dismissals from just 70 matches to underline his status as one of the all-time greats. Since retirement he has also retained a high profile through his commitment to developing new generations of fast bowlers.
Highest Ranking 8
Total Points 142
Number of Votes Received 20/57
Rank in 1st Edition 28
Bill O'Reilly was probably the greatest spin bowler the game has ever produced. Bill Tiger O'Reilly was unquestionably one of cricket's great figures: as a player, as a character and later as a writer on the game. His cricket was proof that spin bowling was not necessarily a gentle art. He was 6ft 2in tall, gripped the ball in his enormous right hand and released it at a pace that could be almost fast-medium. It would then bounce ferociously on the hard pitches of his time and, on occasion, knock wicket-keepers off their feet. He bowled leg-breaks and, especially, top-spinners and googlies, backed up by an intimidating manner. Jack Fingleton said he was a flurry of limbs, fire and steel-edged temper. It has been suggested that his action and the general commotion before delivery were born of a deep sense of frustration at not being able to bowl fast enough to knock the batsman down. Off the field, his gruffness was mitigated by his intelligence, erudition, wit and twinkling eyes.
Number 29 Fred Trueman
Highest Ranking 6
Total Points 149
Number of Votes Received 16/57
Rank in 1st Edition 31
A classical easy action, a mop of unruly jet-black hair and a menacing scowl were the trademarks of Freddie Trueman, the Yorkshire fast bowler who was the first man from any country to take 300 Test wickets, a landmark he reached at The Oval in 1964. Since then many have gone past his overall figure of 307, but few have matched his average (21.57) and strike rate (a wicket every 49 balls). Trueman's tally might have been nearer 400 if he hadn't missed numerous matches and tours because of various disciplinary breaches, some true, some imagined - he was once hauled before the Yorkshire committee for some misdemeanour, and escaped punishment by pointing out that he was 200 miles away playing for England at the time. But on his day Trueman was fast and frightening: in his first Test series, in 1952, he helped reduce India to 0 for 4 on his debut, and took 8 for 31 - the best Test bowling figures by a genuinely fast bowler at the time - in the third match. In the second half of the '50s he formed an incisive new-ball pairing with Brian Statham, the legendarily accurate loose-limbed Lancastrian, who raced him neck-and-neck to the 250-wicket mark. By then "Fiery Fred" had great control of swing, and had some claim to being, as he only half-jokingly suggested to John Arlott as the title of his planned biography, "T'Greatest Fast Bowler Who Ever Drew Breath".
Number 28 George Headley
Highest Ranking 4
Total Points 161
Number of Votes Received 19/57
Rank in 1st Edition 22
George Alphonso Headley was the first of the great black batsmen to emerge from the West Indies. Between the wars, when the West Indies batting was often vulnerable and impulsive, Headley's scoring feats led to his being dubbed the black Bradman. His devoted admirers responded by calling Bradman the white Headley - a pardonable exaggeration. In 22 Tests, when the innings could stand or fall on his performance, Headley scored 2190 runs, including 10 centuries - eight against England - with an average of 60.83. He was the first to score a hundred in each innings of a Test at Lord's, in 1939, and it was a measure of his ability that from 1929 to 1939 he did not have a single bad Test series. By the start of the Second World War he had totalled 9532 runs in first-class cricket with an average of 72.21. Afterwards, though not the power that he had been, he extended his aggregate to 9921 runs, with 33 centuries and an average of 69.86.
Number 27 Rahul Dravid
Highest Ranking 7
Total Points 173
Number of Votes Received 19/57
Rank in 1st Edition NR
Rahul Dravid was probably one of the last classical Test match batsmen. His progress into the national side may have been steady and methodical rather than meteoric, but once there, Dravid established himself at the vanguard of a new, defiant generation that were no longer easybeats away from home. Armed with an orthodox technique drilled into him by Keki Tarapore, he became the cement that held the foundations firm while the flair players expressed themselves. Yet, for a man quickly stereotyped as one-paced and one-dimensional, he too could stroke the ball around when the mood struck him.
Number 26 Kapil Dev
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 198
Number of Votes Received 21/57
Rank in 1st Edition 36
Kapil Dev was the greatest pace bowler India has produced, and their greatest fast-bowling allrounder. If he had played at any other time - not when Imran Khan, Ian Botham and Richard Hadlee were contemporaries - he would surely have been recognised as the best allrounder in the world. In any case he did enough to be voted India's Cricketer of the Century during 2002, ahead of Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar. His greatest feats were to lead India almost jauntily, and by his all-round example, to the 1983 World Cup, and to take the world-record aggregate of Test wickets from Hadlee. It was the stamina of the marathon runner that took him finally to 431 wickets and only a yard beyond. He might not have been quite the bowling equal of Imran, Hadlee or Botham at his best, and his strike rate was less than four wickets per Test, but he was still outstanding in his accuracy and ability to swing the ball, usually away from right-handers. And he could hit a ball even more brilliantly than he bowled it, with uncomplicated flair.
Number 25 Sunil Gavaskar
Highest Ranking 7
Total Points 254
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 29
Sunil Gavaskar was one of the greatest opening batsmen of all time, and certainly the most successful. His game was built around a near-perfect technique and enormous powers of concentration. It is hard to visualise a more beautiful defence: virtually unbreachable, it made his wicket among the hardest to earn. He played with equal felicity off both front and back feet, had excellent judgement of length and line, and was beautifully balanced. He had virtually every stroke in the book but traded flair for the solidity his side needed more. His record for the highest number of Test hundreds was overtaken by Sachin Tendulkar, but statistics alone don't reveal Gavaskar's true value to India. He earned respect for Indian cricket and he taught his team-mates the virtue of professionalism. The self-actualisation of Indian cricket began under him. Since retiring, Gavaskar has served as a television commentator, analyst and columnist, as well as taken on various responsibilities with the BCCI, and served as chairman of the ICC cricket committee. He stepped down - after some controversial comments - from the latter in order to continue as a media columnist and commentator.
Number 24 Len Hutton
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 261
Number of Votes Received 25/57
Rank in 1st Edition 21
Sir Len Hutton was one of the greatest batsmen the game has produced in all its long history. In the Hall of Fame he sits at the high table with the élite, and if English cricket alone is taken into consideration he was one of the two most accomplished professional batsmen to have played for his country, the other being Sir Jack Hobbs with Walter Hammond and Denis Compton coming next haud longo intervallo.
Number 23 Ikki Ponting
Highest Ranking 1
Total Points 277
Number of Votes Received 29/57
Rank in 1st Edition 25
Ricky Ponting, the most uncompromising player of his generation, grew into Australia's most successful run-maker and only sits below Bradman in the country's overall ratings (according to some). It takes an extremely critical eye to diminish his run-scoring achievements, which seem to collect new records in every series. Like spotting a celebrity, it's necessary to look twice when analysing Ponting, first as the archetypal modern batsman, then as the country's 42nd Test captain. There is no doubt about his greatness after taking guard, but his leadership has been under scrutiny for much of his reign. While his blade has sparkled, his stewardship is pock-marked by three Ashes defeats - two in England and one at home - and stumbles to South Africa and India.
Number 22 Ian Botham
Highest Ranking 1
Total Points 280
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 20
Dominant and domineering, Ian Botham was not merely the top English cricketer of the 1980s but the leading sports personality. In an era of discreet footballers - before Paul Gascoigne and David Beckham - he commanded endless newspaper headlines as his career surged improbable heights and bottomless depths. Within a year of being elevated from Somerset to his England debut in 1977, he was undisputed as the country's leading allrounder; within three years he was captain; within four, he had resigned (a minute before being sacked), his form shot to pieces.
Number 21 Dennis Lillee
Highest Ranking 5
Total Points 313
Number of Votes Received 30/57
Rank in 1st Edition 16
Dennis Lillee, considered by many to have been "the complete bowler", was the heart of Australia's attack for more than a decade. Through a combination of ability, showmanship and sheer hard work he won the loyal following of the nation's crowds, who often roared his name as he ran in to bowl. And Lillee repaid their faith with interest - he was the type of character whom captains could rely on to bowl "one more over" at the end of a long spell, and often made breakthroughs when success seemed unlikely. Armed with a copybook action, Lillee broke Lance Gibbs' world record of 309 Test wickets and finished with 355 dismissals from just 70 matches to underline his status as one of the all-time greats. Since retirement he has also retained a high profile through his commitment to developing new generations of fast bowlers.
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