Top 5 Bowlers with Most wickets in a single World Cup tournament

4. Zaheer Khan (Ind) (2011) / Glenn McGrath (Aus) (2003) / Brad Hogg (Aus) (2007) / S Afridi (Pak) (2011) – 21 Wickets

There are 3 bowlers who took 21 wickets in a single World cup tournament.

Zaheer Khan took 21 wickets to lead the table and India to the World cup win in the 2011 edition. His experience on Indian pitches came in very handy as he proved to be captain Dhoni’s trump card. He took wickets whenever he was called to bowl by Dhoni.

Glenn Mcgrath took 21 wickets in the 2003 World cup held in South Africa. His best bowling was 7/15 against Namibia. He was as good as ever, bowling with great line and length at the beginning and a mix of yorkers and slow balls at the death.

Australia won their 3^rd straight title in 2007 which was mainly due to their bowling. Three of their bowlers took more than 20 wickets and left arm chinaman Brad Hogg took 21 wickets for the Aussies with a best of 4-27. Hogg proved to be a quite a handful on the slow Caribbean wickets which helped him use his chinaman and wrong ones effectively.

Shahid Afridi topped the 2011 World cup most wickets table along with Zaheer Khan. As the Pakistani captain, he led from the front taking 5 wicket hauls 2 times in the tournament with a best of 5-16. His mix of fast leg spin and top spinners was perfect on the subcontinent pitches. Pakistan reached the semi-finals of the tournament where they were defeated by arch-rivals and eventual champions India.