Shane Warne
(born September 13, 1969, Ferntree Gully, Victoria, Australia?died March 4, 2022, Ko Samui, Thailand) was an Australian
cricketer
who was one of the most effective
bowlers
in history, with good disguise on his top-spinner and fine control on two or three different googlies (balls bowled with fingerspin that break unexpectedly in the opposite direction from that anticipated). His success promoted the almost-forgotten art of
leg-spin and brought variety to a sport that had been dominated by fast bowling. In 2006 he became the first bowler to take 700 Test wickets.
Warne came to
cricket
relatively late in his teenage years, and his relaxed manner, bleached hair, stud earring, and fondness for surfing made him a folk hero among young cricket fans around the world. He had played just seven matches in the Sheffield Shield domestic club competition before being selected for
Australia
, and he made his Test
debut
against
India
at
Sydney
in 1991?92. In the 1993
Ashes
series against
England
, Warne took 34 wickets in six Tests at an average of 25.79. He was perhaps best remembered for one ball, bowled to England’s Mike Gatting at Old Trafford, Manchester, in the 1993 series. The ball was a perfect example of the leg-spinner’s art, pitching on leg stump and spinning viciously past the bat to hit Gatting’s off stump. It was Warne’s first ball in a Test in England and established a huge psychological advantage for Warne and the Australian team, which lasted into the next Ashes series in 1994?95. In that series Warne took 27 wickets at 20.33, including a match-winning 8 for 71 in the second innings of the first Test and a hat trick (three wickets on three balls) in the second Test.
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In 1998 Warne faced controversy when it was revealed that he and fellow Australian cricketer
Mark Waugh
had taken bribes from an Indian bookmaker four years earlier. The pair claimed they gave only pitch information and weather forecasts. (The two were secretly fined by the Australian Cricket Board soon after the bribes were given.) Despite the scandal, Warne was named one of the Five Cricketers of the Century by
Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack
in 2000. In February 2003 Warne
encountered
further controversy when he was ejected from the World Cup in
South Africa
after a drug test revealed the presence of a banned diuretic; he subsequently received a 12-month ban. In his first Test match after his return in March 2004, he took his 500th wicket, becoming just the second bowler to have accomplished the feat. By the end of the 2003?04 season, both Warne and Sri Lankan off-spin bowler
Muttiah Muralitharan
had broken the record (519) for Test wickets set in 2001 by
Courtney Walsh
of the
West Indies
.
In 2007 Warne retired from Test cricket but continued to compete on the club level until 2011. His international career totals included an
unprecedented
708 Test wickets; his record was broken by Muralitharan in 2007.