The Sydney Test match against Pakistan at the turn of 2024 brought close to the illustrious Test career of David Warner.
The first Australian player ever to make his T20I debut before even playing in a first-class game, David Warner bowed out with 112 Test caps. The left-hander scored 8786 runs at an average of 44 and a strike rate of 90. He raised 26 Test hundreds and 37 fifties.
David Warner, who has also announced his ODI retirement, goes out as arguably Australia’s greatest all-format batsman. He won the ODI World Cup twice, a T20 World Cup, and a World Cup Test Championship, along with multiple Ashes series wins and retaining the Ashes twice in England.
With Warner ending on a high, Australian fans are wondering whether Warner is their country’s greatest Test opener. His competition to that claim is with two other greats – Matthew Hayden and Mark Taylor, the only two other Australian openers to feature in over 100 Test matches.
Stat comparisons: David Warner vs Matthew Hayden
Runs and average
Warner scored 8747 runs as an opener at an average of 45. Matthew Hayden scored 8625 runs at an average of 50.
Centuries:
Hayden raised 30 Test centuries, which is four more than David Warner’s 26 Test hundreds. But, Warner had 37 fifties, 8 more compared to Hayden’s 29.
Highest score:
Hayden’s highest score is 380 and Warner’s is 335*.
First innings of the team:
The first innings of the team (first or second innings of the match) is generally where teams setup their wins, aiming to get a big first innings lead.
Their numbers are very similar in this case. In Australia’s first innings in the game, Warner averaged 49 with 17 centuries while Hayden averaged 50 with 19 centuries.
Conclusion: It can be observed that Matthew Hayden’s numbers are slightly better than Warner’s. However, one must always keep in mind when comparing batters of two different era the conditions and the game.
It should be noted that since 2018, opening the batting in Test cricket has been the most challenging period in the 21st century. Because of the pitches assisting bowlers much more than it used to in earlier times, say during Hayden’s period, and the bowling attacks being deeper and fitter than before, the frequency of draws nowadays is significantly less than it was from 2000 to 2014.
It could be tempting for the previous generation of fans to simply claim Hayden as a greater Test opener than Warner, but when you put the lens of a neutral, you’d find compelling reason to give Warner the benefit here for batting and succeeding on some very spicy tracks, against much deeper bowling attack than what Hayden faced.
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