Glenn McGrath

A fast bowler from Narromine

Glenn McGrath grew up in Narromine, a small town in rural New South Wales, and made his Test debut for Australia against New Zealand at the WACA in Perth in 1993. He was tall and thin, quicker than medium pace but never truly fast by the standards of the West Indian and South African attacks of his era, and what set him apart from the start was not raw speed but where the ball landed. Across 124 Tests over fourteen years he built a reputation as the most relentlessly accurate fast bowler of his generation, a bowler who could ask the same question over and over until a batter finally got the answer wrong.

He finished with 563 wickets at 21.64, the most by any specialist fast bowler in Test history at the time of his retirement, taken with a method built almost entirely on discipline rather than variation. He also played 84 winning Tests from his 124, an extraordinary winning record shared with the great Australian sides of the late 1990s and 2000s that he did as much as any bowler to build.

The corridor

McGrath's bowling was often described by the phrase he himself used: the corridor of uncertainty, the line just outside off stump that forces a batter to decide whether to play or leave, over and over, until the decision goes wrong. He bowled that length with a repeatability few pace bowlers before or since have matched, supported by height that gave him steep bounce even from a good length, and he rarely strayed far from it regardless of the conditions, the opponent or the state of the match.

The results of that discipline show clearly in his numbers: 29 five-wicket innings and three ten-wicket match hauls, with an average that stayed low against every major opponent he faced. His figures against England, 157 wickets at 20.93 from 30 Tests, are the largest tally against any single side and reflect how often Ashes cricket became the stage for his best work.

Two eights

McGrath's best single-innings bowling figures, 8 for 24, came against Pakistan at the WACA in Perth in 2004, a spell of the accuracy he built his career on, working through the Pakistan order on a pitch that rewarded exactly the line he bowled all his career. Seven years earlier, in the 1997 Ashes, he had taken 8 for 38 against England at Lord's, and later that same series a further 7 for 76 at the Oval, figures that helped make that tour one of the most productive of his career even though England won the Oval Test itself. His best match figures overall, 10 for 27, came against West Indies at the Gabba in Brisbane in 2000, built around a first-innings 6 for 17 in a match Australia won comfortably.

What links all four spells is the same lack of drama: no injuries interrupting his rhythm, no loss of pace through the middle of a spell, just the same line and length delivered for over after over until the scoreboard did the talking. It is why his wicket tallies read so consistently across opponents rather than being concentrated in one or two demolitions, 110 wickets against West Indies at 19.38 and 80 against Pakistan at 21.70 sitting either side of his outsized tally against England.

An Ashes weapon

No opponent suffered more from McGrath than England. Across 30 Tests against them he took 157 wickets at an average under 21, and two of his best innings figures, 8 for 38 at Lord's in 1997 and 7 for 76 at the Oval the same year, came in a single Ashes tour. He also famously predicted, before several Ashes series, that Australia would win five-nil, a habit that became a running joke in the English press but one that, given his own contribution most summers, English batters found harder to laugh off than most predictions of that kind.

The partnership with Warne

McGrath's new-ball partnership with the leg-spinner Shane Warne, pace at one end and spin at the other, was one of the defining combinations of Australian cricket's dominant years either side of 2000. Between them they gave Australian captains an attack that could take twenty wickets in almost any conditions, and McGrath's share of that record, 84 wins from the 124 Tests he played, a winning percentage few bowlers in history have enjoyed, owed a great deal to how rarely he had an off day: even his worst spells tended to go for economical figures by the standards of fast bowling anywhere else in the world.

The numbers

The full career: 124 Tests, 563 wickets at 21.64, 29 five-wicket innings, 3 ten-wicket match hauls, with a best of 8 for 24 and best match figures of 10 for 27. His batting was never the point, 641 runs at 7.37 from 138 innings with a highest score of 61, and he was dismissed cheaply often enough to become a running joke of his own among Australian supporters, but as a strike bowler he was named player of the match 11 times. Australia won 84 of his Tests, lost 20 and drew 20.

His bowling average barely moved across his career, 22.88 in his earlier years through the 1990s and 20.54 in the 2000s, a rare fast bowler who got more economical, not less, as he aged into his mid-thirties. He took more wickets at home, 289 at 22.43 from 66 Tests, than away, 260 at 21.35 from 55 Tests, though his average was slightly sharper on the road despite the extra travel and unfamiliar conditions that usually work against touring fast bowlers. His most productive ground was the Gabba in Brisbane, 65 wickets from 13 Tests, just ahead of the Sydney Cricket Ground, where his career had begun to peak and where it also ended.

The last over at the SCG

McGrath retired after the 2006-07 Ashes series, his final Test coming against England at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 2007. He took 3 for 67 in England's first innings of 291 and 3 for 38 as they were bowled out for 147 second time round, six wickets in his farewell appearance as Australia completed a ten-wicket win and, with it, a five-nil series sweep, the very scoreline he had predicted before the series began. He left the game as the leading wicket-taker among fast bowlers in Test history at the time, a mark James Anderson later passed, a record built one metronomic over at a time rather than through pace or theatrics.

The full scorecards behind every figure above are on his CricArcade player page, and the Australia team archive carries the sides he played in across his career. In The Follow-On you can open the bowling with him and see how long you can hold that line.

Sources

• CricArcade player page: full career record, best bowling and scorecard links
• ESPNcricinfo: Glenn McGrath player profile and Test career statistics
• Wikipedia: Glenn McGrath