There are certain debates which never seem to end among fans of different sports. The Greatest of All Time(GOAT) debate is famously prevalent among fans of all sports. For football fans, it’s between Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. For tennis fans – Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal.
For cricket fans, the GOAT debate is between two of the spin greats of our generation – Anil Kumble and Shane Warne. As fans of the sport, we were incredibly lucky to have witnessed these two greats at work.
Despite having contrasting styles of bowling, both – Kumble and Warne, along with Muttiah Muralitharan were undoubtedly the best bowlers over the last 2 decades. Their ability to flabbergast the batsmen with their deliveries was a sight to behold. Who could ever forget the “ball of the century” by Warne to dismiss Mike Gatting, or Anil Kumble’s famous 10 wicket haul against Pakistan in 1999.
To pick the better bowler among the two is one of the hardest tasks for anyone. In this article, we take a look into the successful careers of these two legends, and see how they succeeded in a similar fashion despite having contrasting styles of bowling.
Introductions
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble has undoubtedly been India’s best bowler over the past 2 decades, in both the ODI and Test formats. Born in Bengaluru, Karnataka, Kumble did not take long to make an impact on the selectors as he made his debut at the age of 20 against England in 1990.
Since then, he featured in 132 test matches for India and 271 ODI’s with a combined total of 956 wickets in both formats. His tally of 619 wickets in test match cricket is the 3rd highest overall, behind Muralitharan and Warne. He had the honorable distinction to have captained the Indian test cricket team for one year from November 2007 to 2008.
He also captained the Royal Challengers Bangalore team for the 2009 Indian Premier League season when RCB reached the final in South Africa. He is currently the head coach of the Indian national cricket team.
Shane Warne
Shane Warne is widely regarded as the world’s best bowler. He is no. 2 on the all-time leading wicket-takers list, behind Sri Lanka’s spin legend Muttiah Muralitharan. Born in Victoria, Australia, Warne made his debut at the age of 23 in a test match in 1992. Since then, he went on to play 145 test matches and 194 ODI’s for the Australian cricket team.
He also captained the Rajasthan Royals when they won the inaugural IPL in 2008. Warne was also quite useful with the bat, scoring over 3000 international runs which include 2 test centuries as well. He is currently a cricket commentator and a professional poker player.
Bowling Styles
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble’s bowling style was unorthodox, as he was not a big turner of the ball, unlike most other leg spinners. He heavily relied on variations of pace and bounce to trouble the batsmen, and this ability of his is what made him special and fearless. The variations in bounce he generated while bowling also earned him the nickname “Jumbo”.
Kumble was quicker than any other leg spinner, and also more accurate. He proved those critics wrong who felt that Kumble would not be a successful bowler as he was not able to spin the ball much.
As we can see in the above picture, Kumble’s bowling arm is much higher than an orthodox leg-spinner, thus he released the ball from a higher angle, which generated the quicker pace through the air. During the latter part of the first half of his career, batsman began to figure him out.
They decided to play him as a seam up bowler who basically moved the ball into the batsman. As this was a successful play against Kumble and since batsmen began to get used to facing Kumble, he decided to reinvent himself – and so he did.
He altered his bowling style by bowling a little slower through the air and adding a more orthodox googly to his game. The results were seen by us in the latter part of his career where he continued to be India’s go-to bowler.
Shane Warne
Shane Warne was one of the “conventional” leg spinners, as he was a big turner of the ball. What made him special was the amount of turn he was able to generate due to his strong shoulders, arm and wrist. He was also known for the number of variations he had in his bowling.
Warne was able to turn the ball prodigiously with amazing accuracy on unhelpful pitches as well. While most spinners have a complex bowling action due to the number of variations they bowl, Warne’s bowling action was surprisingly easy, even bordering towards being lethargic. He takes a leisurely walk, and two or three small steps before moving into delivery action. His bowling action, unlike most other leg-spinners, is very front-on.
Also Read: Analysing Shane Warne's style of bowling
What made it even harder for batsmen to read Warne’s deliveries was his ability to have a similar release action while bowling his variations in comparison to a regular leg break delivery, which can be seen in the above picture.
Impact on Team
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble was the most dominant bowler in the Indian cricket team in the 1990s. Being a part of an average bowling attack, Kumble did not have much support from fellow bowlers at times. Despite not being as effective overseas as he was at home, he proved to be India’s leading wicket taker – averaging 38.21.
This showed the effect he had on the Indian cricket team. He was also India’s leading wicket-taker in the 2000s, but he had better support in the bowling department in the form of bowlers like Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singh.
Shane Warne
Although Shane Warne was Australia’s leading wicket-taker in the Test and ODI format, he did have a lot of support from the other bowlers in his team, unlike Kumble. Warne had the pleasure of playing alongside a host of match winning bowlers such as Glenn Mcgrath, Brett Lee, Jason Gillespie and Andy Bichel – just to name a few.
Along with these bowlers and the brilliant batting line-up, Australia went on to dominate both formats of the game for many years.
| Player | Innings | Average | SR |
| Kumble | 70 | 18.43 | 43.6 |
| Warne | 174 | 22.36 | 40.87 |
If we look at both – Warne and Kumble’s contribution when their respective team won a test match, we can see that Kumble;s average and strike rate is better than that of Warne’s. For comparison sake, I have not taken into consideration the matches against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.
Overall Bowling Statistics
| Player | Tests | Innings | Wikcets | BBI | Avg | Econ, | SR | 5WI | 10W |
| Anil Kumble | 132 | 236 | 619 | 10/74 | 29.65 | 2.69 | 65.9 | 35 | 8 |
| Shane Warne | 145 | 273 | 708 | 8/71 | 25.41 | 2.65 | 57.4 | 37 | 10 |
| Player | ODI’s | Innings | Wickets | BBI | Avg | Econ | SR | 5WI |
| Anil Kumble | 271 | 265 | 337 | 6/12 | 30.89 | 4.30 | 43 | 2 |
| Shane Warne | 194 | 191 | 293 | 5/33 | 25.73 | 4.25 | 36.3 | 1 |
From the above statistics, there is no doubt that Warne was the better leg-spinner among the two. But if we take a look at the number of 5 wicket hauls in relation to the number of innings of the two in test matches – Warne has 37 in 273 innings, while Kumble has 36 in 236 innings.
Their bowling averages and economy rates are also similar, and despite playing fewer innings than Warne, Kumble has bowled 145 deliveries in test cricket than him.
This statistical disparity comes back to the fact about the support either of them received from their fellow teammates and it goes to show that Kumble carried a weak Indian bowling attack for the most part of his career.
Keeping the above points in mind, it becomes even harder to determine who the better bowler was.
Conclusion:
Both – Anil Kumble and Shane Warne have won many prestigious awards and earned numerous honors throughout their illustrious career. Kumble has had the honor of being awarded the Padma Shri and Arjuna Award, in 2005 and 1995 respectively, while Warne was named as one of the five Wisden Leading Cricketers of the Century, in 2000.
He was the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet and the only one still playing at the time.
We have not seen great bowlers like Anil Kumble or Shane Warne, since their retirement. Their legacies will live on for generations to come and their achievements and records will always remain as a benchmark for upcoming bowlers.
As a true fan for over a decade, it was an honor to watch both Anil Kumble and Shane Warne work their magic on the field.
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