West Indies from the 1980s and Australia from the early 2000s have usually held the tag of the greatest cricket teams to ever to be assembled, but do they have a new challenger now?
With the Australia women team winning the 2022 Commonwealth Gold medal, the debate is on—is this Australian women team among the greatest cricketing sides ever?
List of Greatest Cricket Teams
We will consider the modern-day cricket i.e. only the eras after the 1970s (there were great dominant Australian teams in the 1940s and earlier as well).
Winners of the 1975 ODI World Cup, 1979 ODI World Cup, and Runner Up in the 1983 ODI WC (regarded as a massive upset), Clive Lloyd’s men etched their name into glory.They were world beaters in Test match cricket as well with towering fast bowlers even till the mid-1990s.
Record
Most Consecutive Test Series without defeat (29), from 1980-1995
Key Players
Clive Lloyd (C), Garfield Sobers, Sir Vivian Richards, Sir Gordon Greenidge, Desmond Haynes, Michael Holding, Malcolm Marshall, Sir Andy Roberts, Joel Garner, Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose, Lance Gibbs, Colin Croft, Deryck Murray, Lawrence Rowe, Alvin Kallicharan, Roy Fredericks, Rohan Kanhai, Larry Gomes
2020 T20 World Cup, 2022 ODI World Cup, 2022 Commonwealth Gold, 26 Winning ODI Streak (2018-2021)
Women’s cricket in Australia was always going to be one step forward due to awareness and funding. They have most of the ODI and T20 World Cups anyway, so how much better could this team be?
Well, this team is very, very good. They do not lose Test matches, have only lost a couple of ODIs in the last four years, and when it seemed the gas was running out, Ash Gardner & co made sure Australia had the mental strength to comeback from jaws of defeat. All this with the great Ellyse Perry on the sidelines.
16 Series Without Defeat (2001-2004) followed by 9 series (2005-2008)
Key Players
Ricky Ponting, Steve Waugh, Matthew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist, Justin Langer, Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee, Shane Watson, Andrew Symonds, Michael Bevan, Mark Waugh, Dean Jones, Darren Lehmann, Damien Martyn, Stuart MacGill, Jason Gillespie, Simon Katich, Brad Hogg, Brad Hodge, Michael Kasprowicz, Andy Bichel, Nathan Bracken
During this era, South Africa did not win a World Cup. Nor did they establish absolute dominance, but the thing was in an era where the Australian side had begun their descent, no team in the world was quite as strong.
South Africa though challenged teams all around the world, most notably winning in Australia and drawing in India. The era finally collapsed after 2015-16 season, but they gave it all in their final stand – The Blockathon.
Test Record
14 series without defeat (2008-14)
Key Players
Graeme Smith, Jacques Kallis, Faf du Plessis, Hashim Amla, AB De Villiers, Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel, Mark Boucher, Vernon Philander, JP Duminy, David Miller, Imran Tahir, Shaun Pollock (end of career), Makhaya Ntini (end of career), Ashwell Prince
Most World Cup winning teams are some of the greatest teams in a nations history, but why did I choose the England 2015-2022 team? It is because of the dominant nature of their high risk ODI cricket that they became famous for. Started by Brendon McCullum in the 2015 ODI World Cup, Eoin Morgan took the baton and carried England forward.
Yes flat pitches, bigger bats, and all but 498/4, 481/6, 444/3, 418/6, 408/9, & 399/6 is just another level of dominance. High risk meant that they lost more often, but they changed ODI cricket forever.
Key Players
Eoin Morgan, Joe Root, Alex Hales, Jonny Bairstow, Jason Roy, Jos Buttler, Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Chris Woakes, Moeen Ali, David Willey, Sam Curran, Mark Wood, Tom Curran, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, James Vince, Joe Denly
Honorable Mention
Sri Lanka (1996-2015), Pakistan (1985-1999), India (2008-2013), India (2018-present), South Africa (1992-1999), England (2008-2011)
Do you agree that these are the greatest cricket teams? Comment below and let us know.
Who do you think is the most stylish batsman of the century? Tendulkar, Lara, Ponting, or the Fab 5?
Let’s have some fun today. Instead of just picking 11 today, we will pick an entire squad of 15 members with 7 reserves, similar to the guidelines for the COVID-19 bio-security bubble age.
Today’s Twist – Most Stylish Batsman:
Pick a squad of 22 members, where each player plays the best of a certain shot. The constraint is that you can only pick 1 player per shot. Who would you pick for the best cover drive, the best square cut, etc.? Note, we only pick players from the past 25 years for the current iteration.*
The Catch:
Babar Azam vs Virat Kohli was all over twitter this past week, but who do you think plays the best cover drive? For someone like Sachin Tendulkar who has all the shots in the game, if you were to only pick one, which shot would it be?
Almost all shots are linked next to a video, so have fun watching some of our favorite shots!
Which players would you pick? Which is your favorite video?
Who is the most stylish batsman in your opinion? Comment below with some of your favorite videos, share, and don’t forget to subscribe!
Well, that is it for right now. Stay tuned for more coming up later this week!
Sources: Youtube (Videos), cricket.com.au
*The article has been edited to only include the players of the recent past for the current iteration. We will do a sequel to this article considering players from earlier eras in our future iterations.
Create an All-time XI with the twist that you can pick only one player from each World Cup. Since we have 12 world cups to choose from, we will create a XI with a 12th player. There are multiple players who have shined in each of cricket’s finest ODI tournament, but who do you pick-the best batsman, bowler, player of the series, or the inspirational captain?
The catch:
How would you go about choosing between Martin Crowe and Wasim Akram in ’92, Lance Klusener and Shane Warne in ’99, or more recently between Kane Williamson, Rohit Sharma, Mitchell Starc, and the infallible Ben Stokes in 2019? Whatever it is, this is bound to be a fun ride.
Before we reveal our XI, let’s refresh our memory with relevant statistics regarding the highest run-scorer, wicket taker, player of the series, and captain of the winning team from each cricket world cup.
World Cup – Year
Most runs (runs scored)
Most Wickets (wickets taken)
Player of the series
Winning Captain
1975
Glenn Turner (333)
Gary Gilmour (11)
N/A
Clive Lloyd
1979
Gordon Greenidge (253)
Mike Hendrick (10)
N/A
Clive Lloyd
1983
David Gower (384)
Roger Binny, Ashantha de Mel (18)
N/A
Kapil Dev
1987
Graham Gooch (471)
Craig McDermott (18)
N/A
Allan Border
1992
Martin Crowe (456)
Wasim Akram (18)
Martin Crowe
Imran Khan
1996
Sachin Tendulkar (523)
Anil Kumble (15)
Sanath Jayasuriya
Arjuna Ranatunga
1999
Rahul Dravid (461)
Geoff Allott, Shane Warne (20)
Lance Klusener
Steve Waugh
2003
Sachin Tendulkar (461)
Chaminda Vaas (23)
Sachin Tendulkar
Ricky Ponting
2007
Matthew Hayden (659)
Glenn McGrath (26)
Glenn McGrath
Ricky Ponting
2011
Tillakarante Dilshan (500)
Shahid Afridi, Zaheer Khan (21)
Yuvraj Singh
Mahendra Singh Dhoni
2015
Martin Guptill (547)
Mitchell Starc, Trent Boult (22)
Mitchell Starc
Michael Clarke
2019
Rohit Sharma (648)
Mitchell Starc (27)
Kane Williamson
Eoin Morgan
ODI World Cup Statistics
Our All Time XI:
Graham Gooch (1987)
Sachin Tendulkar (2003)
Kane Williamson (2019)
Martin Crowe (1992)
MS Dhoni (2011) – WK
Clive Lloyd (1979) – Captain
Arjuna Ranatunga (1996)
Lance Klusener (1999)
Kapil Dev (1983)
Mitchell Starc (2015)
Glenn McGrath (2007)
Glenn Turner (1975)
Honorable Mentions: Matthew Hayden, Ricky Ponting, Wasim Akram, Kumar Sangakkara (most World Cup dismissals and 4 centuries in 2015)
Note, we chose MS Dhoni at the expense of Yuvraj Singh in order to have a wicket-keeper in the side. We decided not to factor great finals’ innings like Ben Stokes in 2019 and Adam Gilchrist in 2017…’Great World Cup Innings’ would have to wait till a later post.
In any case, choosing from the great 1975-1983 West Indian and 1999-2015 Australian sides was always going to be a difficult task anyway…
Agree? Disagree? In any case, let us know in the comments below what your ideal Cricket World Cup XI would be.
For more articles in our series World XIs – With Twists, check this page out!
Stay tuned for new fantasy teams, and please share and subscribe below!
Creating fantasy World XI? We have all been here before. There is just one issue—there are just too many good players across eras. So, here is our new series on creating our World XIs, with a twist of specific constraints. In all of our posts, we will limit the category of players after ODI cricket began.
Today’s twist:
Build a Test and ODI World XI so that (1) there is a maximum of two players per country in the XI and (2) a player is not repeated in both lists.
The catch:
There are some greats that could easily fit in both teams. For example, Sachin Tendulkar, Ricky Ponting, and AB De Villiers are fan favorites and a versatile players, but which list are you going to put them in?
Test World XI:
Sir Alastair Cook (Eng)
Graeme Smith (SA) – Captain
Kumar Sangakkara (SL) – WK
Sachin Tendulkar (Ind)
Brian Lara (WI)
Steven Smith (Aus)
Jacques Kallis (SA)
Kapil Dev (Ind)
Shane Warne (Aus)
James Anderson (Eng)
Muttiah Muralitharan (SL)
Honorable Mentions: Rahul Dravid (Ind) , Dale Steyn (SA), Courtney Walsh (WI), Richard Hadlee (NZ)
ODI World XI:
Sanath Jayasuriya (SL)
Chris Gayle (WI)
Ricky Ponting (Aus) – Captain
Virat Kohli (Ind)
Vivian Richards (WI)
AB De Villiers (SA)
MS Dhoni (Ind) – WK
Shakib Al Hasan (Bang)
Wasim Akram (Pak)
Waqar Younis (Pak)
Glenn McGrath (Aus)
Honorable Mentions: Brett Lee (Aus), Daniel Vettori (NZ), Virender Sehwag (Ind), Adam Gilchrist (Aus)
Well, only choosing two out of Sehwag, Kohli, Tendulkar, and Dhoni or Gilchrist, Ponting, Warne and Mcgrath was always going to be a tough task…
Anyway, send us your World XIs and let us know what you think in the comments section below! Stay tuned for the next fantasy team, where we will build an ODI World XI with exactly one player from each World Cup.
