Murali vs Warne

The smh had an article yesterday comparing Warne and Murali. The question is, given a chance, on merit who would you pick ?

Your mission, and you have chosen to accept it, is to pick a cricket side like no other. A team comprising the best players from the Australian and Rest of the World XI sides strutting their collective stuff at the SCG this week. You can choose whoever you like, but there's a catch. You can have only one spinner.

Go on, take your pick - Shane Warne or Muttiah Muralitharan? Who's better?

On Sunday, having some free time I sat down to watch some the ICC test match and coincidently Murali was at his flame throwing best. He has hardly played any tests in Oz so it was a treat to watch as Peter Roebuk described it,

Hitherto, Murali had been wheeling away without much effect. His bowling has changed during the years. Nowadays, he aims his off-break at the wickets, so it is hard to tell apart from the doosra. Judging by the expression that remained on Mark Boucher's map for most of the innings, the ploy is working. Murali's off break turns less and he relies more on his "other one". As usual, the Sri Lankan had been bowling wholeheartedly but the batsmen had been playing him intelligently, working the ball into gaps, using their feet and sweeping powerfully.

Suddenly, the spinner sprang to life. Inspired by the rush of wickets, Murali put an extra flick on his deliveries, whereupon they stopped high-jumping and started pole-vaulting. His next over will linger long in the memory.

Delivered from around the wicket, another skill the tweaker has added to his repertoire, every ball curled through the air, landed on a length and jumped like a surprised child. As far as Simon Katich was concerned, the bowler was talking an unknown language.

I'm not a cricket fan though I don’t mind playing it when I get the opportunity. My interest is usually piqued only when Australia play Sri Lanka. I've decided to see who I would pick for my team. Trying to be as reasonably objective, my strategy has been to

• limit it to test cricket
• seek a good sample size ( minimum of 5 innings )
• select common opposition
• select common soil / destination
• exclude results against minnows ( Bangladesh and Zimbabwe )

This limits me to picking countries where both SL and OZ have toured. On the head-to-head count I can only use Autralia’s tours of Sri Lanka as Murali hasn’t played many tests in Oz ( IMHO, they should play at least a 3-test home and away series every four years).

The following are the results of the one-to-one comparisons using the excellent cricket statistics site provided by channel4.

Murali vs Warne

Country	Player	M(Inns)	Runs	Wickets	Avg	S/R	Wckts/Match		Runs/Over		Link
India	Murali	5(5)	731	15	48.73	105.73	3		2.77		link
	Warne	9(16)	1466	34	43.12	81.03	3.78		3.19		link
England	Murali	3(5)	517	24	21.54	59	8		2.16		link
	Warne	22(44)	2832	129	21.95	52.33	5.86		2.52		link
Pakistan	Murali	7(13)	1053	49	21.49	50.18	7		2.57		link
	Warne	3(6)	504	18	28	60.56	6		2.77		link
NZ	Murali	4(5)	382	13	29.38	77.08	3.25		2.29		link
	Warne	9(18)	1044	49	21.31	51.41	5.44		2.49		link
W.Indies	Murali	4(7)	456	25	18.24	41.92	6.25		2.61		link
	Warne	7(12)	674	17	39.65	78.29	2.43		3.04		link
S.Africa	Murali	6(10)	911	35	26.03	60.54	5.83		2.58		link
	Warne	9(16)	1060	49	24.04	63.37	5.11		2.18		link
Aus vs SL	Murali	8(14)	1223	47	26.02	54.06	5.88		2.89		link
	Warne	8(14)	794	37	21.46	42.54	4.62		3.03		link

I pick Shane Warne. He comes out on top on the more important stats (Avg and S/R) and is a better batsmen. Arguably he has always had the better, tougher and more predatory team around him and this would have contributed as well. He may be an ass but is a very good cricketer.

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image from The Age / Reuters