While cricket has evolved dramatically over the years, certain historic achievements have been placed completely out of reach for modern players. Changes in sports science, heavily packed schedules across three distinct formats, and more result-oriented strategies mean that some milestones will likely remain eternal.
The following records stand as towering landmarks that are virtually impossible to break:
Sir Don Bradman’s Test Batting Average (99.94):No one else has ever come close to this level of freakish consistency over a sustained career. Bradman scored 6,996 runs across 52 Test matches, missing a perfect average of 100.00 after getting dismissed for a duck in his final career innings. To put this into perspective, modern elite batsmen are considered legendary if they maintain a career average of 50 to 55.
Muttiah Muralitharan’s 800 Test Wickets: With the modern cricketing calendar heavily prioritizing T20 leagues over long-form Test matches, bowlers simply do not play enough Test cricket anymore to sustain a career long enough to threaten this number. The Sri Lankan spin wizard accumulated a staggering 800 wickets in just 133 Tests (and 1,347 wickets across all international formats).
Jim Laker’s 19 Wickets in a Single Test Match: Since a team can only take a maximum of 20 wickets in a game, a modern bowler would have to perfectly replicate Laker's performance or take all 20 wickets to break the record—an administrative and statistical anomaly that will likely never happen again. In 1956, England's Jim Laker pulled off the near-impossible against Australia at Old Trafford, picking up 9 wickets in the first innings and all 10 in the second.
Sachin Tendulkar’s 100 International Centuries: Achieving 51 Test centuries and 49 ODI hundreds required Tendulkar to play at the highest level for an astonishing 24 years. Given the physical burnout rate of contemporary cricketers playing non-stop franchise and international cricket, matching this longevity and century count is widely considered an impossible peak to climb.
These figures belong to unique eras of the sport, making them permanent fixtures in cricket history.