My Hundred: from 60 to 51

 60: Chris Gayle

After Brian Lara retired, I hoped Chris Gayle would continue the tradition of Caribbean cavaliers and attract young West Indians to the sport. It didn’t quite happen that way. Instead, Gayle’s nonchalant brilliance in Twenty20 diverted his attention away from real cricket towards the lucrative franchise league circuit. Of course he was fabulous to watch, swinging sixes with apparent ease, and I’d have placed him much higher had he not treated his Somerset contract several years ago with such apparent arrogance. A twenty-first century sporting icon nonetheless. 

59: Jos Buttler

In my biased opinion, Jos blotted his copybook after being allowed to leave Somerset for Lancashire. Not his fault, I know. He came up through the county ranks as a blazing wicketkeeper-batsman and I had a lot of respect for the teenager’s attitude to the game and spectators when I saw him play at Taunton. I didn’t foresee Jos becoming one of the finest one-day improvisers in the world, though. A frequent match-winner for England in ODIs boasting a strike rate of 120, the third highest on record, leaving the West Country certainly didn’t hold back his limited-overs career. 

58: Glen Chapple

Surely one of the greatest redheads never to play Test cricket for England, Chapple was an extremely consistent seam bowler, late-order batsman and captain for Lancashire, leading them to the Championship crown aged 37. He was granted a consolation ODI against Ireland in 2006, during which he was injured, so that was that. I was at Lord’s in ’96 when he took 6-18 to destroy Essex in the Nat West Trophy Final. Nearly two decades later I was willing him to remain fit enough to reach the 1000-wicket milestone in first-class cricket but he retired, stranded on 985. 

57: Ricky Ponting

Not the most popular of characters in England but then Aussie captains are never at the top of the Barmy Army’s Christmas card list. A more attacking batsman than Steve Waugh or Allan Border, he accumulated runs for fun in a twenty-year career, leading his country to huge success in Tests and World Cups. Hardly a loveable character, ‘Punter’ nevertheless appealed to me on various levels, notably his reluctance to go down the Twenty 20 pre-retirement route. Instead his final fixtures were for Surrey in the Championship and it seemed to me a noble way to bow out. 

56: Mushtaq Ahmed

The roly-poly leg-spinner, only 5 foot 4, is arguably the most successful spinner in the county game since Derek Underwood. ‘Mushie’ was not the best of Pakistan’s world-class crop of spinners in the Nineties but he proved a giant of the County Championship over many years. I saw him twirl for Somerset back in the 1990s but it was at Sussex in 2006 and 2007 where he took a hundred wickets twice in succession, winning titles in the process. Few players are so popular wherever he plays or, as in recent years, coaches. 

55: John Lever

Google him and you’ll probably find an association with Vaseline, like Mike Atherton’s pocketfuls of dirt. However, John Lever spent 22 years at Essex, taking more than 2,000 wickets for the county. His fast-medium swing was rarely appreciated by England selectors but JK’s wickets, economy rates and boundary fielding were instrumental in Essex’s success in both Championship and one-day competitions in the late Seventies and Eighties. I saw him play many times in an era when left-arm pacemen were a novelty. 

54: Adam Gilchrist

Such was Australia’s strength in depth that Adam Gilchrist was almost 25 when he made his ODI debut and nearly 28 when his Test chance finally came along. He soon made up for lost time, becoming the most exhilarating batsman of the Noughties, AB De Villiers and Chris Gayle notwithstanding. Unfortunately for me, he didn’t make many runs when I saw him play a T20 for Middlesex in his latter years but, like Viv Richards, he seemed to save his best for the grandest occasions like a World Cup Final,. Oh, and he was a damn fine wicketkeeper, too. 

53: Andrew Caddick

Although often derided as an inconsistent loner at international level, Andy Caddick nonetheless took 234 Test wickets, at a rate per match almost comparable with Anderson and better than Broad. Having spent twenty years at Somerset he is a legend in the West Country. New Zealand-born, he shared Richard Hadlee’s sticky-out ears, giant feet and devastating short-of-a-length seamer, and took tons of wickets on the traditional Taunton featherbed. Since his 2009 retirement I have watched several matches from in front of the Andrew Caddick Pavilion. 

52: Harry Pilling

I’ve not picked Ashton-Under-Lyne’s Harry Pilling just because he was only 5 foot 3. However, it’s certainly one of the main reasons! He was a feature of Lancashire’s hugely successful side in the 1970s, especially in one-day tournaments, and as such was frequently on my TV screen in the summer. Compared with the Lloyds, Hayes or Wood, ‘Arry wasn’t the most exciting or prolific batsman but he was highly proficient at finding the gaps and holding a one-day innings together His stature made him look comical in the field but I remember always looking out for him. 

51: Martin Crowe

It’s not Martin Crowe’s fault that the Somerset board’s decision to choose him over Viv Richards ripped the county apart. Even a massive Viv fan like me realised that the young NZ superstar was in 1987 a better prospect, and he duly delivered until his country called him home. He never played for us again but Martin went on to be one of the finest Black Cap batsmen – and useful medium-pacer – of all time. His first-class batting average was an awesome 56 and he top-scored in the 1992 World Cup. His death from cancer at just 53 rightly prompted national mourning.

England in India - England's Best XI

Last time I selected the best India Eleven in Test matches against India over the past forty years. Now it's England's turn, and there have been plenty of headaches because of all the candidates in almost every position.

Generally speaking, Graham Gooch has been England's most consistent opening batsman in this period, although Alastair Cook threatens to replace the moustachioed master. However, India was never his favourite hunting ground. Instead, there are three men who each played only five Tests in India and who each averaged more than 50. Two of them will be my openers with the other at number three. First up is former captain Andrew Strauss, who enjoyed two successful short series dating back six years. At Chennai in 2008 he even managed two hundred in the same match, only to finish on the losing side. His partner is Tim Robinson, the doughty Notts opener who earned 29 England caps before the West Indian quicks blew him away. In only his second Test, at Delhi in 1984, he compiled a match-winning 160.

Lancashire and Durham's Graeme Fowler was a dashing left-hander whose highest score was the 201 made in the victory at Madras (as was) in 1984. In the next game, he scored a patient 69 - and never played another Test! Nevertheless he is in my team, alongside the man who also scored a double-century in that Madras draw, Mike Gatting. Arguably England's least successful captain of all time, Gatts has scored more runs (862) in India than anybody in the past four decades, spread over 13 Tests. At number five is Paul Collingwood. He made hundreds in each of the 2006 and 2008 series, although neither was in the winning cause.

Two all-rounders make it into this fantasy team but each enjoyed considerable success in India with both bat and ball. Ian Botham's career zenith is often cited to be the Ashes 1981, but in the following winter, his batting was even better. He made 440 runs in eight innings, culminating in 142 at Kanpur. His other hundred came in the Golden Jubilee Test two years earlier. The most successful England touring captain was Tony Greig. Not only did he lead his side to a memorable series win in 1976-77 but he also contributed 724 runs and 21 fairly cheap wickets over ten Tests in the 1970s.

Few wicket-keepers made their mark in India but Alan Knott did at least provide some consistently useful late-order runs in the Greig era. That leaves three specialist bowling spaces. Derek Underwood took 54 wickets at 26.51, making him easily our best spinner in an era when India boasted several world-class slowies. Competition for the other seamer spots is particularly fierce. Jimmy Anderson has done quite well in recent times, and two Yorkshire stalwarts, Chris Old and Matthew Hoggard, each captured more than 20 Indian victims at under 24 apiece. Nevertheless, two ohers fared even better. Left-arm swing merchant John Lever took 10-70 on his debut at Delhi in 1976, as England won by an innings. He averaged under 14 in that triumphant series and finished with 32 wickets at under 20 in India. Sadly for him, his pace and swing were less successful elsewhere. He was brought back after a five-year international hiatus in 1986, versus India again, but this defeat was his final appearance in England colours. Bob Willis also enjoyed considerable success there, taking 32 at 22.37, taking most of the wickets left by Lever on that 1976-77 tour.

To summarise: Strauss, Robinson, Fowler, Gatting, Collingwood, Botham, Greig (*), Knott, Underwood, Willis, Lever.

But will this list change in a few months' time? Cook, Trott, Prior, Finn, Anderson et al could all be in with a chance. It should be a great series.