I am an Australian, I love cricket and see no way whatsoever anyone can possibly think Shane Warne is in the same class as Muralitharan. I tried to settle this debate among my friends and did a few hours of research I'd like to share with my fellow cricket fans.

Six reasons...

1 - look people, the rules were changed. Rule changes are part of Test cricket. They change the size of the stumps, the ball, the equipment, the rules on no balls, the rules on lbw, the rules on playing conditions. Rule changes are a part of the game, Murali does not break the rules as they are presently constructed, it's that simple. I know Australians (and I am an Australian but it's clear that Muralitharan is a class above Warne) want Warne to be unchallenged and debate Muralitharan from this highly biased position but they changed the rules, as they often do, and Murali does not break them - end of story.

2 - the minnows thing, totally agree, Zimbabwean and Bangladeshi wickets basically don't count, so let's take them out of the equation. Muralitharan (without ZIM & BAN stats) 5.83 wickets per match, 23.87 average, 2.35 econ. Warne CAREER (we'll even give him ZIM and BAN numbers for an edge) 4.88 wickets per match (like 20% worse here, a huge margin to Murali), 25.41 average (another significant edge to Murali, although closer than the wpm), 2.65 econ (advantage Murali though this is the closest of all categories). And Warne had the benifit of bowling with one of the top 3-5 fast bowlers of all time - who was carrying the load for Murali?

3 - My favourite Warne stat, remember, this is supposed to be the "best bowler ever", between 1996 and 2001 inclusive (53 Test matches, a massive chunk of a career) Warne averaged 30.21. Yes, OVER THIRTY FOR FIVE YEARS. That's unbelievable considering the accolades he gets. It's like if Lara had five years in the middle of his career averaging 36 and everyone said he was the best postwar batsman. Since 1998, when Murali became the bowler we know today, Murali has averaged over 22.30 ONCE in a year.

4 - Warne averaged nearly fifty against a Test opponent he played 14 times against...and he never bowled to Australia - those are by far the two strongest batting cards of his time. Murali struggled against both, averaging north of 30, but he relatively held his own, Warne folded entirely, he was a LIABILITY against India.

5 - Records

http://stats.cricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283203.html

Muralitharan appears on this list five times to Warne's one. He appears four times before you even see Warne's name.

http://stats.cricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283211.html

He appears three times on this list, Warne doesn't even have an entry.

http://stats.cricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283256.html

Warne doesn't have an entry here either, there are more than SEVENTY ONE NAMES ahead of him here. Cut it off at 50 Tests and there are still 19 names. THIRTEEN PLAYED IN THE SAME ERA AS WARNE!

http://stats.cricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283354.html

Examine this list. Murali and Warne are one and two. Warne has played 27 more Tests than Murali and Muralitharan has TWENTY FIVE more five wicket hauls and TEN more ten wicket hauls. Warne has 60% of the five wicket hauls of Muralitharan and 50% of the ten wicket hauls. This is despite Muralitharan playing 81% of the Test matches Warne has. This is a MASSIVE, UNBELIEVABLE disparity. 20 matches Muralitharan has basically won by himself, crazy. He has TWO periods of four consecutive ten wicket matches, and for all the haters, only one of those eight tests was against Bangladesh. Only ONE player in the 130 year history of the game even has three ONCE.

6 - The Asia thing, the "dustbowl" theory. The argument is that it's so easy to bowl slow in Asia and so hard in Australia. The issue here isn't about bowling but about how easy batting is and how dead pitches are - batting is unquestionably easier in Asia than the rest of the world.

I did a quick look at 20 international grounds - 10 in Asia, 10 in the rest of the world. Surprisingly, Adelaide Oval had the highest average (35.46), but the next FIVE are Asian grounds (Feroz Shah Kotla, Gadaffi, SSC - yes, SSC, Chinnaswamy and Eden Gardens, in order). They are followed by the WACA and then another Sri Lankan ground - Galle.

Only two of the ten Asian grounds averaged below 30, four of the non Asian grounds, including two Australian grounds (MCG and SCG) averaged below 30.

32.8% of the Tests played at the non Asian grounds I looked at ended in draws - not including timeless Tests. In Asian nations this was a staggering 45.7%.

In scoring rates, the WACA was the easiest ground to score runs on (3.05 econ), following that were Asgriya (3.04), SSC (2.97), Chinnaswamy (2.94), Gaddafi (2.93), Chepauk (2.92) and Wankhede (2.82) before a non Asian ground (Lord's).

So there we have it - it's harder to be a bowler in Asia than in Australia, that's what FORCES slow bowlers into action - more overs are bowled with the old ball. Murali has bowled on pitches MORE difficult to get wickets on and slow batsman down than Warne. He should get MORE credit, not less.

He's quite simply the best cricketer any of us will ever see, the things he has done are just mind boggling, it irritates me that people dismiss it and elevate Warne because he is more "blokey" and gets more Western press. You can't possibly look at this and believe Warne is on the same level, let alone better.

Hi clwalcott

This has been discussed extensively in this thread recently

Muralitharan's shortcomings exposed

It pretty much lays out Murali's record in it's true light. No anecdotes. No references to his action. Just the stats.

Read through the thread. If you can add anything to it that puts Murali ahead of Warne then go for it. No one else could.

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OK, great!

SSC – 33.95 ave, 2.97 econ, 9/30 draws (30.0%)

This is the HISTORY of SSC, that average was the third highest I found (the grounds I used were Chinnaswamy, Eden Gardens, Chepauk, Feroz Shah Kotla, Wankhede, Gaddafi, National, SSC, Asgriya, Galle and non Asian, Adelaide Oval, WACA, Gabba, SCG, MCG, Lords, The Oval, Headingley, Wanderers and Newlands, a good cross section considering that Asian teams tend to stay in their own and vice-versa)

Asgriya's average is low, but the run rate is very high, and it is chicken and egg, how can you quantify the effect Muralitharan himself had on a ground that has seen just 21 Tests, the vast, vast majority Murali played in.

The issue here is not the strength of Sri Lanka's batting card (which Warne averaged 20.45 against in what was probably about eight Tests, most likely before 1998 when Sri Lanka were an established power) but the difficulty of bowling in Asia which is, and this is important UNQUESTIONABLY more difficult than outside Asia. If only because bowling with the new ball is so difficult and as such, slow bowlers bowl to batsman far more, inflating their averages.

Dealt with this adequately in #2, the minnow factor is DRAMATICALLY exaggerated, take these numbers out, Murali is still much, much better.

You speak of these tailor made Sri Lankan wickets but the numbers do not support this. SSC and Galle have some of the highest batting averages in the world. This is a misconception you have made without researching.

I also think point #5 is simply overwhelming. This isn't a close race. This isn't something where idiosyncratic stats are likely to sway a genuinely open minded individual. The difference is ENORMOUS.

I dispute this. I think Australia's wickets are of the highest quality in the world but to suggest that they aren't incredibly fast compared to anywhere else in the world perhaps save RSA is mistaken in my opinion. This is simply how Test cricket works outside Asia, you need pace bowlers because the new ball is exponentially more important.

Once again, the minnow issue has been taken into account, but to be honest, the fact Warne never bowled to Australia, comfortably the best side in the world at the time, almost balances that factor alone.

I also like Ninjaman's piece of research (presuming it is accurate)

You respond thusly;

Which with all due respect, seems an extremely long bow. 62.8% of Warne's wickets are what we might term loosely "batsman", whereas 67.3% of Murali's wickets are. That seems to me to be a significant difference, especially when most of your argument seems to centre on the quality of Muralitharan's wickets. I notice the other slow bowlers Ninja Man references, and again, it seems Murali is a long way ahead, just like he is in every other statistical category.

You suggest that the stats suggest Warne is the King which baffles me. You have provided the stats against ZIM and BAN, which are nearly irrelevant to the debate (#2), and numbers in India (favour Murali) and against Australia (patently unfair seeing as we do not have Warne's stats and covers approximately 8 Test matches). The stats unequivocally favour Muralitharan, against every country except Pakistan, in essentially any of the past ten years, and if you will look over those links I posted, particulary when it comes to records.

clwalcott. Some interesting points made here, and i look forward to replying to them as well as those of your threadstarter.

It's almost midnight though, so it will have to wait until tomorrow.

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Not really a valid comparison IMO.

The Australian team had several options during Warne's career. eg: McGrath, Gillespie, etc.

Sri Lanka really have not had a first class bowler other than Muralitharan period.

Australian wickets were shared between several TOP quality bowlers, Sri Lanka's were not.

One had a solid / legal bowling action. The other hasn't and the rules were changed to accomodate him once the ICC realised there was a problem.

Maybe Murali's wickets prior to the rule change shouldn't be included

I argue that they are easier to bat on because the quicker bowlers do not get bounce from them.

I still think they favor slower bowlers who often thrive on lack of bounce.

Dead, slow pitches where it's harder for fast bowlers to get wickets. Spinners are the main wicket takers in most cases on these pitches.

Warne's never liked slow and low pitches: he's learnt to cope with them... but the first time he went to India he was taken apart because of the lack of bounce - he'd flight the ball, get lots of dip... and then find the fireworks he'd expect from a hard, bouncy pitch were reduced to a damp squib as the energy was absorbed by the softer surface.

Warne faced two problems: the lack of fireworks meant batsmen didn't even need to get right to the pitch of the ball... and his flighted deliveries gave all the batsmen plenty of time to move to the pitch of the ball. He did, of course, learn to cope... as have others... but let's not pretend that he (or Giles for that matter) would look forward to playing on a slow and low pitch at Adelaide more than to playing at (say) the SCG!

ps. The reason spinners tend to do better on slower and lower pitches is as often as not just lack of competition - it's not that the spinners can dominate on a pitch just because it's slow and low... but if the seamers are neutered by the pitch the spinner does tend to get a LOT of overs!

Good point !

I was trying to say that in an around about way