Australia’s greatest ODI player: Round 2

With the 11th edition of the men’s World Cup to get underway later this month, we want to know – who is Australia’s greatest ever one-day player?

Australia are the most successful one-day side in history, winning more than 60 per cent of their 932 matches and lifting the World Cup trophy a record five times, including three consecutive wins between 1999 and 2007.

Of the 228 men to have played ODI cricket for Australia, we’ve narrowed it down to the best-ever 16 to help decide the greatest of them all. Such is Australia’s long history of one-day talent, star players like Allan Border, David Warner and Michael Clarke haven’t made the cut in our top 16, leaving only the best of the best to fight it out for the title of Australia’s ODI GOAT.

Players have been rated on their performances across their one-day careers, with performances on the biggest stage of a World Cup weighted more heavily.

Fans can have their say in a series of head-to-head polls over the next week, with votes to be tallied across cricket.com.au, the CA Live app as well as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Match 12: Glenn McGrath v Shane Warne

VOTING IS NOW CLOSED. Shane Warne won 51% of the vote compared to 49% for Glenn McGrath, meaning Warne has progressed to the semi-finals

Glenn McGrath

ODI record

M: 250 | Wkts: 381 | Ave: 22.02 | SR: 34.0 | Econ: 3.88 | BBI: 7-15 | 5WI: 7

World Cup record

M: 39 | Wkts: 71 | Ave: 18.19 | SR: 27.5 | Econ: 3.96 | BBI: 7-15 | 5WI: 2

World Cup titles won: 3

The most prolific wicket-taker in World Cup history, McGrath tasted defeat just four times in 39 matches at the tournament, lifting the trophy on three occasions. Like his Test career, McGrath’s greatest strength was sheer consistency; he took at least three wickets in six of Australia’s 11 matches at the 2007 World Cup, steering Australia to the title with relentless pressure throughout rather than one-off displays of dominance. A career economy rate of 3.88, the fifth best among all bowlers to have taken more than 200 wickets, is highly impressive given he played during the high-scoring revolution at the turn of the century.

Shane Warne

ODI record

M: 194 | Wkts: 293 | Ave: 25.73 | SR: 36.3 | Econ: 4.25 | BBI: 5-33 | 5WI: 1

World Cup record

M: 17 | Wkts: 32 | Ave: 19.50 | SR: 30.5 | Econ: 3.83 | BBI: 4-29 | 5WI: 0

World Cup titles won: 1

Being the man he is, it’s little wonder some of Shane Warne’s greatest performances in one-day cricket came in knockout matches at World Cups. The spin king will forever be remembered for his stunning double in the semi-final and final of the 1999 tournament, when he dragged himself out of the worst form slump of his career to engineer Australia’s path to the title. Three years earlier, he produced another rescue act against the West Indies in a thrilling semi-final win, but his World Cup career was ultimately curtailed unexpectedly, a drug ban on the eve of the 2003 tournament denying him another title.