Kumble tops the lbw charts
With Paul Collingwood's dismissal in England's first innings at Lord's, Anil Kumble became the bowler with the highest number of lbw dismissals in Test cricket
With Paul Collingwood's dismissal in England's first innings in the first Test at Lord's, Anil Kumble became the bowler with the highest number of lbw dismissals in Test cricket. Kumble has now trapped 139 batsmen leg-before, ahead of Shane Warne, who held the record with 138 such wickets.
Player | Test wickets | Lbw dismissals |
---|---|---|
Anil Kumble | 555 | 139 |
Shane Warne | 708 | 138 |
Muttiah Muralitharan | 700 | 133 |
Wasim Akram | 414 | 119 |
Glenn McGrath | 563 | 113 |
More than a quarter of Kumble's Test victims have been dismissed leg-before - a significantly high proportion - though he ranks way below Australia's pacer Terry Alderman, who has 34.12% of his 170 Test wickets coming by way of lbws.
Player | Matches | Test wickets | Leg-before dismissals | Percentage |
---|---|---|---|---|
Terry Alderman41 |
170 |
58 |
34.12 |
|
Waqar Younis | 87 | 373 | 110 | 29.49 |
Wasim Akram | 104 | 414 | 119 | 28.74 |
Chaminda Vaas | 98 | 319 | 89 | 27.89 |
Matthew Hoggard | 64 | 240 | 64 | 26.66 |
Graham Gooch has been dismissed lbw the highest number of times in Tests. Incidentally, Alderman accounted for five of those dismissals. Three of Gooch's England opening partners - Alec Stewart, Michael Atherton and David Gower (one innings only) are not far behind.
Player | Matches | Innings | Leg-before dismissals |
---|---|---|---|
Graham Gooch | 118 | 139 | 50 |
Alec Stewart | 133 | 235 | 40 |
Sachin Tendulkar | 138 | 222 | 39 |
Brian Lara | 131 | 232 | 37 |
David Gower | 117 | 204 | 36 |
As a proportion of total dismissals, Roshan Mahanama figures in the list for both Tests (minimum 50 matches) and ODIs (minimum 100 matches). Other batsmen to have been trapped in front often include Craig McMillan and Michael Holding, who would have preferred appearing in the bowlers' list.
Player | Matches | Innings | Leg-before dismissals | Percentage |
---|
Craig McMillan | 55 | 91 | 24 | 29.63 |
Roshan Mahanama | 52 | 89 | 25 | 28.41 |
Michael Holding | 60 | 76 | 18 | 27.27 |
Younis Khan | 53 | 95 | 23 | 25.84 |
Dean Jones | 52 | 89 | 20 | 25.64 |
Daren Ganga missed out on the above table since he's only played 45 Tests. Of the 78 times that he's been out, lbws have accounted for 25, a percentage of 32.05. In the recently concluded Test series against West Indies, Ganga was out lbw to Ryan Sidebottom in both innings of the second Test at Headingley while Steve Harmison had him stuck in front of the stumps twice during the third Test at Old Trafford.
The ODI table is topped by West Indies' Roger Harper, while New Zealand's lower-order batsmen, Chris Harris and Brendon McCullum, have been trapped in front plenty of times as well.
Player | Matches | Innings | Leg-before dismissals | Percentage |
---|
Roger Harper | 105 | 73 | 12 | 22.64 |
Roshan Mahanama | 213 | 198 | 34 | 19.43 |
Brendon McCullum | 114 | 90 | 14 | 19.71 |
Chris Harris | 250 | 213 | 26 | 17.22 |
Javed Miandad | 233 | 218 | 29 | 16.38 |
The current crop of left-arm bowlers show remarkable success with lbw decisions in ODIs, with Irfan Pathan, Zaheer Khan, Chaminda Vaas and Mohammad Rafique having the highest percentages of leg-before dismissals (minimum 100 wickets). Surprisingly, Wasim Akram misses out and so does Waqar Younis, the man famous for his toe-crushing yorkers.
Player | Matches | Wickets | Leg-before dismissals | Percentage |
---|
Irfan Pathan | 73 | 115 | 26 | 22.61 |
Damien Fleming | 114 | 90 | 26 | 19.40 |
Zaheer Khan | 127 | 184 | 35 | 19.02 |
Mohammad Sami | 83 | 118 | 22 | 18.64 |
Mohammad Rafique | 125 | 125 | 23 | 18.40 |
Another left-arm spinner from Bangladesh, Abdur Razzak, has 19 leg-before dismissals in his career-haul of 76 dismissals. Pathan's ability to swing the ball into the right-handers makes him successful with leg-before appeals in both forms of the game, with 30.77% of his 91 Test wickets coming in the same manner.
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