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No. 2 Who was the most dominant Test batter of the 1990s?

Next in our series exploring data from the CricViz archive, Rob Smyth forensically compares the records of three all-time greats who dominated the final decade of the 20th century

ROB SMYTH Author and freelance sportswriter

Therecords section of the Wisden Almanack has been slimmed down in the past decade, a nod to the immediacy and power of the internet. Until 2014 the Almanack included a list of all male batters whose Test average was over 50, with active international players in bold. That bold lettering was the closest thing to a Michelin star for batting.

In 2010 there were 15 players on the list. A decade earlier there were just four – and one of those, Rahul Dravid, had dropped into the forties by the time the 2000 Almanack was actually published. In the 1990s, averaging 50 wasn’t just proof of greatness; it was proof of all-time-greatness.

The 1990s were a golden age of fast bowling, mystery spin and peppery pitches, and only three active players ended the decade with a Test average above that threshold. There are no surprises in their identity. The only slight curiosity is that Brian Lara, Sachin Tendulkar and Steve Waugh were not the leading runscorers of the decade. England and Australia played the most Tests and a struggling Waugh was omitted for 13 games in 1991 and 1992, a slight for which he made everyone pay over the next decade.

Sachin Tendulkar made at least 50 in 24 of his 56 Test innings in Asia during the 1990s

BEST OVERALL AVERAGE

Tendulkar ’s decade-long average of 58 is even more remarkable given he had yet to reach his theoretical peak. On Millennium Eve he was 26 years old, Lara 30 and Waugh 34. For opponents he sat somewhere in the middle between Lara’s overwhelming flair and Waugh’s wearying immovability. Many of the great bowlers of the era felt that Tendulkar was the best of the three. Allan Donald’s 1999 autobiography, White Lightning, is a reliable historical document. “Sachin is also the best batsman in the world, pulling away from Brian Lara every year,” he said. “His shot selection is superb, he just lines you up and can make you look very silly. Everything is right in his technique and judgement. There isn’t a fault there.”

Top Test run-scorers of the 1990s

Rating: Tendulkar 10, Lara 9, Waugh 9

Steve Waugh made 18 of his 32 Test hundreds in the Nineties

MASTERING CONDITIONS

Tendulkar ’s lack of unforced errors made it especially hard to get him out on flat pitches. “I played against him on the subcontinent, and once he got in on a featherbed…” says Devon Malcolm, his sentence trailing off at the futility of it all.

While Tendulkar scored runs by the gallon at home and in Sri Lanka in the 1990s, he also averaged only a fraction shy of 50 outside the subcontinent. That included an average of 59 in Australia, where he wowed the toughest crowd in world cricket by scoring two centuries as a teenager in 1991/92.