One player, many captains

Who is the best Test captain you played under? If you asked Michael Hussey that, he'd probably shoot you a silly-question look and say, "Mate, I've only ever played under Punter." Put the same question to Mushtaq Ahmed and Mushie might mull over it for a few moments, while scratching his beard, before picking Imran Khan out of a dozen captains. Pakistan went through 12 different leaders during Mushtaq's 52-Test career, a new one every 4.33 matches on average. Australia have had only Ricky Ponting during Hussey's 50 Tests. So this week, we've dug up lists of players who played under the most captains, those who had captains change most frequently, and vice versa.

The only player to have had more captains than Mushtaq is England's Frank Woolley, who served under 14 during his 64-Test career between 1909 and 1934. His first was Archie MacLaren, under whom he played only one Test, and his last was Bob Wyatt. Woolley played the most Tests under Johnny Douglas - 18.

George Headley played only 22 Tests between 1930 and 1954 - his career was interrupted by the Second World War - but he had nine captains, a new one every 2.44 matches on average: the lowest ratio for any player with at least 20 caps. The custom in the West Indies around the start of Headley's career was to appoint a different captain in each match, usually from the place in which the game was to be played. So Headley played only a Test each under all his captains (including himself), apart from the Grant brothers. He played 12 under Jackie Grant, and three under Rolph.

Shahid Afridi has had eight captains, from Aamer Sohail in 1998 to Younis Khan in 2006, during his 26-Test career. So when he leads Pakistan during the Tests in England this summer, it will be the ninth different captaincy in his 27 matches - each one lasting only three Tests on average.

England and Australia started playing Test cricket at the same time - 1877 - but England have had 79 captains to Australia's 42. The gap widened steadily over the decades and rapidly after 1980. In the last 30 years, Australia have had six regular captains - Greg Chappell, Kim Hughes, Allan Border, Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting - and a seventh in Adam Gilchrist, when either Waugh or Ponting was injured. England, on the other hand, have had 20.

Waugh played a record number of Tests - 168 - under only three captains: Border, Taylor and himself. His average of 56 Tests per captain is the highest for any player. It was a pretty even split too - 65 under Border, 46 for Taylor and the rest during his own captaincy.

Pakistan players from the last three decades dominate the table of cricketers with the most captains in ODIs. Afridi is No. 1 this time, having played under 14 captains during his 288-match career, an average of 21 ODIs per captain. He broke the record, previously held by Wasim Akram, when he took over the captaincy for Pakistan's Champions Trophy match against West Indies at the Wanderers in 2009.

Ian Botham had 12 captains during his 116-ODI career, a different one every 10 matches or so, the lowest match-captain ratio in the table below. Botham played the most games under Bob Willis - 29 - and the least under Alan Knott, Tony Greig and John Emburey - one match each.

The player whose captain changed the most frequently in ODIs, however, is John Lever. He played 22 one-dayers for England between 1976 and 1982 under seven different captains. Among current England players, Ryan Sidebottom has the lowest match-captain ratio, having had six leaders in his 25 ODIs.

Unlike in Tests, where the Australians had the highest average number of matches for a captain, in ODIs that table is full of South Africans. South Africa had only two captains in the 188 ODIs that Hansie Cronje played - Kepler Wessels and Cronje himself. Cronje's average of 94 ODIs per captain is 13 more than that of his team-mate Jonty Rhodes.

Excluding Clive Rice, who led South Africa in their first three ODIs after readmission in 1991, they have had only two captains in the 1990s and only two more regular ones - Shaun Pollock and Graeme Smith - in the 2000s. There have been four stand-ins, though, taking the total to nine. Sri Lanka also had nine captains during this period, while Australia and India had ten, New Zealand 12, England 13, West Indies 16 and Pakistan 17.

If there's a particular List you would like to see, email us with your comments and suggestions.