Muttiah Muralitharan: 800 Test Wickets — The Greatest Wicket-Taker in Cricket History
Muttiah Muralitharan was born on 17 April 1972 in Kandy, Sri Lanka. He played 133 Tests for Sri Lanka (1992–2010), taking 800 wickets at an average of 22.72 — the most wickets by any bowler in the history of Test cricket. He also took 534 wickets in 350 ODIs at 23.08. His total of 1,334 international wickets (Tests + ODIs) is a world record. He took 10 wickets or more in a Test match on 22 occasions (world record) and 5 wickets in an innings 67 times in Tests (world record). He reached 800 Test wickets on his final ball in Test cricket: the last delivery of his final Test, on 22 July 2010 against India at Galle, dismissed Pragyan Ojha to bring his total to exactly 800. His unique bowling action, centered on a naturally bent right elbow, was subjected to repeated biomechanical testing and eventually cleared by the ICC in 2004.
Muttiah Muralitharan was born on 17 April 1972 in Kandy, Sri Lanka. He made his Test debut against Australia in August 1992 and played 133 Tests from 1992 to 2010, taking 800 wickets at an average of 22.72 — the highest wicket total in Test cricket history. He also took 534 wickets in 350 ODIs at 23.08, giving him 1,334 international wickets in total — a world record. His wickets were taken with off-spin bowling augmented by the doosra (a delivery that turns in the opposite direction to conventional off-spin), generated through a biomechanically unusual wrist action. He is the only bowler to take 800 Test wickets; Shane Warne, second in the all-time list, took 708.
The Action: Elbow Controversy and ICC Clearance
Muralitharan's bowling action attracted controversy throughout his career due to the appearance of a 'bend' in his right arm at delivery. In December 1995, standing umpire Darrell Hair no-balled him for throwing in a Test at the MCG — the first time in 43 years a Test bowler had been no-balled for a suspect action. Muralitharan underwent extensive biomechanical analysis, which revealed that his arm appeared to straighten at delivery due to a natural hyper-mobility in his elbow joint, but that the actual straightening was minimal and within natural human variation. The ICC cleared him in 1999. The controversy resumed over his doosra in 2004 (a delivery that produces additional straightening), and he was cleared again under revised ICC rules permitting up to 15 degrees of elbow straightening — a threshold consistent with natural variation across the majority of fast and spin bowlers.
800th Wicket on the Final Ball of His Test Career
On 22 July 2010, in the First Test between Sri Lanka and India at Galle, Muralitharan took the final wicket of his Test career — his 800th — on the last ball of the match. Needing one wicket to reach 800, he dismissed last batsman Pragyan Ojha (caught at short leg off a turning delivery) to bring the match and his career to a simultaneous close. It was, widely, one of the most perfectly scripted endings in sporting history: an athlete's defining statistical achievement realized in his final professional act. Sri Lanka won the match by 10 wickets. Muralitharan finished his Test career with 800 wickets — 92 ahead of the next-best bowler, Shane Warne.
Match Figures and All-Time Records
Muralitharan holds the world records for 5-wicket innings hauls in Tests (67) and 10-wicket match hauls (22). His best match figures are 16 wickets for 220 runs against South Africa at Kandy in 2006 — one of only five instances in Test history of a bowler taking 16 or more wickets in a match. He took 10 or more wickets in a match against every Test nation he played. His wickets were spread across tours, domestic pitches, and away conditions: he took wickets against Australia in Australia, against England at Lord's, and against South Africa — tours where visiting spinners typically struggle. His most frequent 5-wicket victims were England (12 five-fers in Tests) and Zimbabwe (11).
Frequently asked questions
How does Muttiah Muralitharan's 800 Test wickets compare to Shane Warne's 708 and why is the debate about who was greater still ongoing?
Muttiah Muralitharan (800 wickets at 22.72) versus Shane Warne (708 wickets at 25.41) is the central comparison in debates about the greatest bowler in Test cricket history. On raw numbers, Muralitharan leads on both total wickets (by 92) and average (by 2.69 runs per wicket). But the debate persists for several reasons. First, Muralitharan played a higher proportion of home Tests in Sri Lanka (where pitches aid off-spin more than the Australian and English pitches where Warne primarily played) — though Muralitharan also took wickets in away conditions, including on England's flat pitches and in South Africa. Second, Warne's action was never questioned, while Muralitharan's was the subject of multiple controversies — though ICC cleared him twice and biomechanical analysis confirmed natural variation rather than systematic throwing. Third, Warne took 195 of his wickets in the Ashes — the highest-profile series in Test cricket — and his performances under maximum pressure in major matches are considered by some critics as a greater measure than aggregate wicket counts. Most cricket historians rank them as co-equals: the greatest spin bowler who ever lived, in two different styles — Muralitharan the highest-aggregate off-spinner ever, Warne the highest-aggregate leg-spinner ever.
What is the doosra and why did it cause controversy for Muralitharan?
The doosra (Urdu/Hindi for 'the other one') is an off-spinner's delivery that turns in the opposite direction to the conventional off-break — turning away from a right-handed batsman rather than toward them, mimicking a leg-spinner's turn. It was developed by Pakistan's Saqlain Mushtaq in the 1990s and perfected by Muralitharan. To bowl the doosra, a bowler must pronate (rotate) the wrist sharply at delivery, which biomechanically tends to produce additional straightening of the elbow — beyond what is allowed for a conventional delivery. The ICC's 2004 biomechanical studies found that Muralitharan's doosra produced elbow straightening above the then-current threshold of 5 degrees, prompting a temporary ban. In 2005, ICC revised the allowable threshold to 15 degrees across all deliveries for all bowlers — a move partly prompted by the Muralitharan case — and he was cleared again. The controversy highlighted a tension in the Laws of Cricket: the 'no straightening' rule was based on an idealized model of arm straightening that no human arm fully conforms to, and the 15-degree tolerance was set to reflect natural variation rather than a mechanical advantage.