8 Greatest leg spinners of all time

8 Greatest leg spinners of all time: Leg spinners are the most vulnerable species to the assault of the bat. The reason? Unless a leg spinner feeds the batsman a good feast of runs, he cannot get his victim caught in the trap of googlies and flippers. Perhaps that is the reason why most of the leg-spinners never have good figures, either ways! And yet, there have been some leg-break bowlers who stormed the fields, spun the balls and won the hearts. Here we bring to you eight of those men who enriched the magic of leg-spin and went on to become legends. Check out the 8 Greatest leg spinners of all time: 1. Clarrie Grimmett, Australia Clarrie Grimmett. (Photo Source: PA Photos) Very little known to today’s cricket enthusiasts, Clarence Victor Grimmet was one of the pioneers of leg-break bowling and the inventor of ‘flipper’. Grimmet generally practiced with a single wicket in his backyard to which he bowled thousands of balls for hours. And since he couldn’t afford a ball-boy, he trained his dog to fetch back the delivered balls! Grimmett began his test career very late – in his thirties and took an average six wickets per match! Grimmett, often called a ‘miser bowler’, never conceded much runs. He had a peculiar way of playing which aimed at the test of endurance than anything else. He never delivered a ball with flight to the batsmen who were good with their feet movements. But he would take care that the ball had enough flight if the batsman was flat-footed. He did this without getting tired and bowled for days just to test the patience of the batsman. In just 37 Test matches, he grabbed 216 wickets, yes I repeat 216 wickets at an average of 24.21! Clarrie Grimmett, who is considered the final word in leg-break bowling was born in New Zealand on December 25, 1891 but played for the Australian side and was described by Bill O’reilly as, “New Zealand’s best Christmas gift to Australia!” Also Read – 7 Bowlers with the weirdest bowling actions ever 2. Shane Warne, Australia: Shane Warne. (© Getty Images) What can I say about this man?! Everyone of us has perhaps seen the Ball of the Century that Warne delivered to Mike Gatting and left him baffled like he’d seen a ghost. That expression on Gatting’s face spoke tonnes about what a bowler Shane Warne was. And yet, that is just the tip of the iceberg. Warne, the Australian leg-spinner who mastered every batsman save Sachin Tendulkar, the only specialist bowler to make his way among the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, would be one of the fewest players who cannot be described enough. In his debut match, he got one wicket for 150 runs. In his last match, he again managed to bag one wicket for 23 runs. But in-between these two incidents, everything he did was sheer magic. Taking the responsibility of a specialist bowler very seriously, Shane Warne spun the ball so well, it spun the world of cricket. The figures speak for him. 708 wickets from 145 Test matches at an average of 25.41 while playing against greats like Sachin Tendulkar and Brian Lara tells so much about what a king of spin he is! 3. Bill O’reilly, Australia: (source) Also known as the Tiger, Bill O’reilly had a bowling average that might make any of the modern day leg-spinners flip and say, “Oh really?!” His average of 22.59 came against batting experts like Herbert Sutcliffe and Wally Hammond. O’reilly held the ball in a weird fashion – the index finger and middle finger would clasp the ball from one of it’s sides while his thumb would rest on the seam. At the same time, the rest of the fingers would stay crouched under the ball. If you try and hold the ball like that you’d see – spinning it that way would give you a leg-break and if you just open your crouched fingers at the final moment of delivering the ball, you’d get a topspin! This unconventional method made Tiger O’reilly a great threat and in just 27 Tests matches, he had shown a whooping 144 batsmen the way to the pavilion! 4. Arthur Mailey, Australia: (source) Like I said in the introductory part, a leg-break bowler is generally supposed to give away some runs before trapping the batsmen in his web of spin. Arthur Mailey took that thought so seriously that Ray Robinson once said, “Mailey bowls like a millionaire!” Arthur Mailey, the Australian leg-spinner who took 10 wickets for 66 runs against Gloucestershire and later named his autobiography “Ten for 66 and All That”, was one of the funniest men the game ever saw. Mailey concentrated more on spinning the ball than pitching it at a good length (one reason why he’d never have been friends with Anil Kumble). He believed that a well-spun long hop or half volley was always better than a good-length delivery. It often resulted in very bad bowling figures for him but his googly got him wickets and that was all that mattered to him. Arthur Mailey’s googly was the most unreadable ball for the batsmen of his era, and many experts still call it the most lethal googly of all time. The millionaire bowler had 99 wickets in 21 Tests at an average of 33.91. 5. Subhash Gupte, India: Subash Gupte. (Photo Source: The Cricketer International) Undoubtedly the greatest leg-spinner India has ever had, Subhash Gupte bowled in an era when some of the greatest batting legends dominated the 22-yards. Gupte bowled and confused and further bagged the wickets of greats like Sir Frank Worrell, Rohan Kanhai, Neil Harvey, Sir Gary Sobers, Peter May, Tom Graveney and Hanif Mohammad to name a few. Although he had only played 3 international Test matches prior to the West Indies tour of 1953, Gupte literally won the Caribbean hearts. At one point, the Indian cricket team had become so dependent on Gupte that after the first six overs in the innings were bowled by the fast bowlers, the captain used to call him and put the red cherry in his hands and make him bowl right until the end of the innings! Gupte bagged 149 Test wickets at an average of 29.54 and stands atop the list of the best specialist bowlers India has ever produced! 6. Abdul Qadir, Pakistan: Abdul Qadir. (Photo Source: PA Photos) Often dubbed as a cunning fox by the Indian media, Abdul Qadir’s greatest honor came from Graham Gooch who called him a leg-spinner greater than Shane Warne. The Pakistani leg-spinner had a wide variety of balls in his arsenal, notably the flipper which requires a lot of control and if pitched rightly, can make a batsman flip! With 9 for 56 against England as his best performance, he had as many as 236 wickets in his test career that spanned over 13 years and 67 matches at an average of 32.80. 7. Richie Benaud, Australia: (source) Popularly known as a commentator, with an exciting voice that could bring alive the action on the field to the listeners, Richie Benaud brought alive the ball with his fingers and wrist in the exact manner. The Australian all-rounder could deceive a batsman by pitching the ball at the same length twice – once it would be a googly, the other time the batsman would anticipate a googly and face a topspin. That was one of the most effective tools Benaud had and he exploited it completely. He also possessed one of the rarest attributes about a leg spinner. He kept the batsman pinned since the first ball and never let him score much runs – just like Clarrie Grimmet. Richie Benaud has 248 Test wickets to his credit from 63 matches which come at an average of 27.03 8. Mushtaq Ahmed, Pakistan: Mushtaq Ahmed. (Photo Source: ESPNcricinfo Ltd) Mushtaq Ahmed, who succeeded Abdul Qadir as a genuine leg-break bowler in Pakistan’s national squad was one of the most talented googly bowlers the team ever had. Ahmed’s success as a leg-spinner is highlighted when one sees that he turned the ball using his wrist – something that needs a lot of strength and is prone to a rampage of runs. A star in first-class cricket, Ahmed was the leading wicket-taker in County Championship for five seasons in a row. Eddie Lawrence even described him as “One of Somerset’s best overseas signings.” However, his talent never got as much exposure at an international level and his career wore off after 52 Tests and 185 wickets at an average of 32.97. Also Read – Top 10 Bowlers with most wickets in List A cricket

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8 Greatest leg spinners of all time

5. Subhash Gupte, India:

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