Shane Warne Picks His All-Time Australia ODI XI

It is fair to say that former Australian cricketer Shane Warne redefined the art of leg-spin bowling in the 1990s. Warne, who had a forgettable start to International cricket with the likes of Ravi Shastri and Sachin Tendulkar carting him around the park at the Sydney Cricket Ground in 1992, tormented batsmen around the world for the best part of the next 15 years before hanging up his boots post the 2006-07 Ashes at the same venue.

Warne was the first bowler to scale Mount 700 in Test cricket. He achieved that feat in his last series when he dismissed former English captain Andrew Strauss. Warne was a magician with the ball in Test cricket but he was no mug in the white-ball format either.

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The champion leg-spinner played a total of 194 One-day Internationals in which he claimed 293 wickets at an average of 25.74 with 12 four-wicket-hauls and one five-for. That five-wicket-haul came in the 1996 World Cup semi-final against the West Indies where the leg-spinner spun Australia to what looked like an unlikely win for a better part of that match.

With the entire world under a lockdown, Warne is using this time to pick his all-time playing XIs. He recently chose his all-time England and Australia Ashes XI. And, on Tuesday, the leg-spinner extended that exercise to white-ball cricket as he shared his all-time Australian XI where he only picked the players with whom he played during his career.

No place for Steve Waugh in Shane Warne’s All-time Australian XI

Warne chose Australia’s maiden World Cup winner [1987] and the captain under whom he made his International debut Alan Border as the leader of his all-time Australian ODI XI. He chose Adam Gilchrist and Mark Waugh as openers followed by Ricky Ponting, Dean Jones, Michael Clarke in the middle-order.

“It was either between Mark Waugh or Matthew Hayden, but I had to go for Mark. Dean Jones was way ahead of his time, like running between the wickets,” Warne said on Instagram.

Warne added: “Michael Bevan was one of the all-time greatest match finishers, Symonds was a destructive player, he could bowl as well,”

One of the greatest finishers in the white-ball cricket Micheal Bevan and swashbuckling all-rounder Andrew Symonds rounded up the batting unit while the remaining three spots went to Brett Lee, Craig McDermott and the leading wicket-taker in the history of World Cups Glenn McGrath.

Shane Warne’s all-time Australian ODI XI-

Mark Waugh, Adam Gilchrist, Ricky Ponting, Dean Jones, Michael Clarke, Allan Border (c), Michael Bevan, Andrew Symonds, Brett Lee, Craig McDermott, Glenn McGrath.