Shane Warne announces this greatest 50 cricketers that he has played with or against.

[Quagmire]

Shane Warne's list of greatest cricketers
1 Sachin Tendulkar
2 Brian Lara
3 Curtly Ambrose
4 Allan Border
5 Glenn McGrath
6 Wasim Akram
7 Muttiah Muralitharan
8 Ricky Ponting
9 Mark Taylor
10 Ian Healy
11 Courtney Walsh
12 Mark Waugh
13 Anil Kumble
14 Rahul Dravid
15 Graham Gooch
16 Andrew Flintoff
17 Matthew Hayden
18 Merv Hughes
19 Aravinda de Silva
20 Adam Gilchrist
21 David Boon
22 Martin Crowe
23 Stephen Fleming
24 Brett Lee
25 Darren Lehmann
26 Steve Waugh
27 Jacques Kallis/ Shaun Pollock
28 Saeed Anwar/ Mohammad Yousuf
29 Shoaib Akhtar/ Craig McDermott
30 Kevin Pietersen
31 Tim May
32 Robin Smith
33 Allan Donald
34 Bruce Reid
35 Michael Vaughan
36 Andy Flower
37 Stephen Harmison
38 Sanath Jayasuriya
39 Stuart MacGill
40 Kapil Dev
41 Justin Langer
42 Ravi Shastri
43 Michael Atherton
44 Alec Stewart
45 Waqar Younis
46 Dilip Vengsarkar
47 Chris Cairns
48 Brian McMillan
49 Darren Berry
50 Jamie Siddons

What does everyone think?

[Andy Mellon]

Its hard to agree/disagree with a list which is obviously his very personal view on how he perceived the people he played with and against. There's an obvious skew towards people he spent most time playing with or against. I'm sure sub-continental viewers out there will point towards there being a significant bias towards Aus-Eng-WI, but too be honest Australia and the West Indies have been the dominant sides through his career and England has been the biggest 'match up' so to speak.

Personally speaking, I find Waqar and Donald too low and can't help thinking Harmison, Mark Waugh, Lee and Merv Hughes are too high. I like the fact that he's tried to rebalance the history books somewhat with respect to Steve Waugh - a great player, but not as good a batsman as Ponting and not as good a tactician as Taylor or Border.

Some of his lower down selections I find a bit unbelievable - Robin Smith (obvious Hampshire bias there), there must be a better bat than Jamie Siddons out there (Ganguly, Chanderpaul?).

As I say though, the unquantifiable 'part' out there is how much these people influenced Warne or left an effect on him - something we obviously can't measure but something he has found or found lacking in the names I've mentioned.

[Sixhitter]

There's 1 english any more ppl

[Quagmire]

This a list of who he thinks is the best players, no obviously the players he plays with will get into the side ahead of players he hasnt just plainly because he sees more of them and that just means he sees the best of them. Tendulkar was the one batsman that was able to destroy Warne and thats why he is number 1. Steve Waugh is around where he should be and so is Darren Lehmann who never got a fair go as an Australian player because of little things that shouldnt matter.

[greg]

No Laxman is a surprise after what he did to Australia in 2001.

[Sixhitter]

wot about Grant Flower

[Rachael]

What's clear from this list is that Warne is unduly influenced by character, persona and "presence": he acknowledges talent in picks like Mark Waugh, Tim May and Darren Berry... but Flintoff, Smith and Stewart (amongst others) don't belong in this company.. and rating Hayden above Justin Langer (and mentioning either above Damien Martyn) is just as bizarre as considering Lee as more deserving of a place on the list than Caddick, Hoggard, Collymore, Vaas or Gillespie.

I admire Warne hugely... but this list says more about Warne than it does of the relative merits of the players his played against / alongside.

[Quagmire]

Well it all comes down to personal opinion, Darren Berry was said to be the best pure wicketkeeper in the world and the wicket keeper for Warnes stateside Victoria so Warne would know as good as anyone the ability that he has with the gloves.

Racheal your hate for Hayden is ridiculous, the man is a champion of the game and the undoubtably the best modern day opening batsman.

Hayden and Langer have both been great opening batsman but Hayden has been more successful than Langer in a sorter span of time.

Hayden - 89 mat, 7739 runs at 53.00, 27x100, 27x50, Hs 380
Langer - 105 mat, 7696 runs at 45.27, 23x100, 30x50, Hs 250

Gillespie and Vaas I would have expected to have been in the side, im not sure about Caddick, Collymore and Hoggard. I think Lee gets into the rankings manly based on his ODI career which is one of the best. He is also third on Australia's alltime highest ODI wicket takers behind just Warne and McGrath combined with his 231 test wickets and his batting average of 21.11 in tests and 18.02 in ODI's. I also think that there is alot of respect from Warne to Lee because of the amount of heart he shows and his work ethic.

Lee ODI career
150 mat, 267 wickets at 22.65, 6-5wi, 11-wi, bb 5/22

Im suprised that he rank MacGill as low as he did but it might just be a leg spinner thing. Players that have played well against him are going to get into the side ahead of players that played bad against him but were still great players that were successful against other nations.

Bowlers that got Warnes wicket on the most occasions in tests

Vettori - 9
Bishop - 8
Walsh - 6
Kumble - 6
Caddick - 6
Gough - 5
Flintoff - 5
Harbhajan Singh - 5
Ambrose - 5
Pollock - 5
Donald - 4
Fraser - 4

Bowlers that took Warnes wicket on the most occasions in ODI's

Pollock - 4
Afridi - 3
Vaas - 3
Prasad - 3
Kumble - 3
Cairns - 3
Harris - 2
Mushtaq - 2
Klusener - 2
De Villiers - 2
Boje - 2
Muralitharan - 2

Batsman most dismissed by Warne in test cricket

Stewart - 14
Hussain - 11
Prince - 11
Atherton - 10
Thorpe - 9
Giles - 9
Boucher - 9
Harmison - 9
Strauss - 8
Trescothick - 8
Dravid - 8
McMillian - 8
David Richardson - 8
Cronje - 8
Caddick - 8

Batsman most dismissed by Warne in ODI's

Cullinan - 8
Cronje - 7
Ul-haq - 6
McMillian - 6
Rhodes - 6
Adams - 5
Kallis - 5

Now look at the top batsman in the list he played against in the top 25

• Tendulkar
• Lara
• Dravid
• Gooch
• de Silva
• Crowe
• Fleming

Now look at the top bowlers he played against in the top 25

• Ambrose
• Akram
• Muralitharan
• Walsh
• Kumble
• Flintoff

I think he rates batsman more on how they batted against his bowling and he rates bowler not on how good they were against his batting.

[acker]

Shane Warne's list of greatest cricketers
1 Sachin Tendulkar
2 Brian Lara
3 Curtly Ambrose
4 Allan Border
5 Glenn McGrath
6 Wasim Akram
7 Muttiah Muralitharan
8 Ricky Ponting
9 Mark Taylor
10 Ian Healy
11 Courtney Walsh
12 Mark Waugh
13 Anil Kumble
14 Rahul Dravid
15 Graham Gooch
16 Andrew Flintoff
17 Matthew Hayden
18 Merv Hughes
19 Aravinda de Silva
20 Adam Gilchrist
21 David Boon
22 Martin Crowe
23 Stephen Fleming
24 Brett Lee
25 Darren Lehmann
26 Steve Waugh
27 Jacques Kallis/ Shaun Pollock
28 Saeed Anwar/ Mohammad Yousuf
29 Shoaib Akhtar/ Craig McDermott
30 Kevin Pietersen
31 Tim May
32 Robin Smith
33 Allan Donald
34 Bruce Reid
35 Michael Vaughan
36 Andy Flower
37 Stephen Harmison
38 Sanath Jayasuriya
39 Stuart MacGill
40 Kapil Dev
41 Justin Langer
42 Ravi Shastri
43 Michael Atherton
44 Alec Stewart
45 Waqar Younis
46 Dilip Vengsarkar
47 Chris Cairns
48 Brian McMillan
49 Darren Berry
50 Jamie Siddons

He certainly put some of his drinking buddies in there.
I made Merv 3 times bigger than the rest because he drinks 3 times more, maybe with exeption to Booney.

I shrank Magilla to half size because I think he is a Warney token selection.

[Warne]

Warnie was never a great buddy of Steve Waugh, mentality wise they are poles apart. It is absolutely unfair to have Steve Waugh so much down the list. Gilchrist also. It's about personal choices, but Darren Lehmann ahead of Steve & Gilly? That's not acceptable.