Both regarded as the greatest spinners in the history books of Cricket, let us see who takes the win in this detailed analysis!
Bowling style
Muralitharan was a wily bowler who could generate a lot of turn with unusual hyperextension along with having his trumpcard the doosra which earned him quite some wickets. He had slightly more pace than Warne. Was quite an unorthodox but an effective bowler!
Warne on the other hand had an orthodox and simple action, he relied on generating alot of revs in the ball which gave him huge spin and got quite alot of wickets (bowled) around batsman legs. He too had some variations in his book like the flipper and googly. He generally bowled slower than Murali and gave quite alot of flight and loop to the bowl.
Raw stats
While taking a look at raw stats Murali averaged just 22.7 at 55 SR while Warne averaged 25.41 with a slightly higher SR of 57. Clearly Murali seems better here but that could be argued due to the fact that Murali bowled alot more in the subcontinent than Warne while Warne bowled his career in Australia and other SENA countries more often.
Countrywise record
Talking about countrywise record in strong countries,
- Warne outperforms Murali in South Africa, India, and in SL than Murali in Aus.
- Murali on the other hand outperforms Warne in England, New Zealand, West Indies and Pakistan.
While Murali has been better in more countries, Warne has had much more sample size in all the away countries thus would give a tie here.
Detailed analysis
Let us compare their individual countrywise averages to the overall spin record during the matches they played in that country involving them to see how much better or worse they were than the overall spin bowling record during the matches involving them.
To make it simpler, let us assume Bowler A averages 25 in Country X and Bowler B averages 20 in the same Country X. From raw stats, it would look that Bowler B is much better, but if we assume that the overall spin bowling average in the matches Bowler A played in Country X was 40 while the overall spin bowling average in the matches Bowler B played in Country X was 25, Clearly Bowler A is better due to the fact he performed much better than other bowlers in more batting friendly conditions while Bowler B was just a tad good than others.
Note- the overall spinners average below does not exclude the respective bowlers stats and includes it.
Shane Warne
Overall spinners average in 🇿🇦 in matches involving Warne - 30.20
Warne in 🇿🇦- 24.31
Warne has 19.5 % better average than the overall spinners average in 🇿🇦 involving Warne
-
Overall spinners average in 🏴 involving Warne- 29.38
Warne in 🏴- 21.95
25.2% better average than the overall spinners record in 🏴 involving Warne
-
Overall spinners average in 🇳🇿 involving Warne- 25.06
Warne in 🇳🇿 - 21.31
14.9% better
-
Overall spinners average in 🇮🇳 involving Warne- 32.67
Warne in 🇮🇳- 43.12
31.98% worse
-
Overall spinners average in 🌴 involving Warne- 37.73
Warne in 🌴- 39.65
5.08 % worse
-
Overall spinners average in 🇵🇰 involving Warne- 39.33
Warne in 🇵🇰- 28.00
28 % better
-
Overall spinners average in 🇱🇰 involving Warne- 29.11
Warne in 🇱🇰- 20.46
29.7% better
Muttiah Muralitharan
Overall spinners average in 🇦🇺 in matches involving Murali- 44.87
Murali in 🇦🇺- 75.00
Murali has 67% worse average than the overall spin bowling average in Australia involving Muralitharan
-
Overall spinners average in 🇿🇦 involving Murali- 27.98
Murali in 🇿🇦- 26.00
7.05% better
-
Overall spinners average in 🏴 involving Murali- 26.39
Murali in 🏴 - 19.20
27.24% better
-
Overall spinners average in 🇳🇿 involving Murali- 23.54
Murali in 🇳🇿- 19.97
15.2% better
-
Overall spinners average in 🇮🇳 involving Murali- 36.25
Murali in 🇮🇳 - 45.45
25.37% worse
-
Overall spinners average in 🌴 involving Murali- 30.35
Murali in 🌴- 23
24.2% better
-
Overall spinners average in 🇵🇰 involving Murali- 37.25
Murali in 🇵🇰- 24.96
32.9% better
-
To sum things up-
Note- As I said before better or worse means better or worse from the overall spin record in the respective country. For eg.- Warne being 19.5% better in SA means Warne has 19.5% better average than the overall spin average in SA involving Warne and Murali being 7.05% better in SA means Murali has 7.05% better average than the overall spin average in SA involving Murali
- We can see Muralitharan has had the win in the countries England, India, West Indies and Pakistan
- While Warne on the other hand has had the win in the countries South Africa and better in SL than Murali is in Australia.
This shows in most countries, Murali had outperformed the other spinners at a higher rate in his away matches than Warne had done.
While Murali has been better in 4 while Warne only in 2 than Murali. If we see that in the countries Murali has been better, the difference hasn't been huge but in the Countries Warne has been better ( SA and Sl/Aus), the difference has been huge.
Thus this would be a close fought tie as Murali was let down by his miserable record in Australia and considering Warne has had more sample size in almost all the countries.
Stats reference- ESPN Statsguru
Innings wise record
Looking into the innings wise record, both have been quite similar in the 1st innings with Warne having slightly better SR and Murali having slightly better average. Murali on the other hand has much better record in the 2nd innings and takes a slight lead in the 3rd and 4th Innings as well having better averages.
Clearly Murali excels out Warne here.
Head to Head record
Let us see how do both perform in matches involving both of them
- Muralitharan in matches involving Warne- 30.51 Average
- Warne in matches involving Murali- 20.35 Average
It might seem Warne has better record due to Murali's bad record in Aus but Warne excels in SL as well in matches involving Murali with Warne averaging 19.88 compared to Murali's average of 24.88.
Warne having better record could be due to the fact Aus had a better batting lineup than Sri Lanka but I would give this a win to Warne nonetheless by a small margin.
Role
Murali was more of a main bowler in the team most of the times while Warne was more of a supporting spinner to the other Aussie pacers and not always the main bowler of the team.
To sum things up It was a tie in detailed analysis and Murali got the win in innings by innings record while Warne got the win in Head to Head record. I think both are good but I prefer Warne having been better in Head to Head record and Murali having failed completely in the best country during his time -Australia.