Thorpe averaged over 53 across the final six years of his Test career
On the latest episode of the Wisden Cricket Weekly Podcast, Wisden Cricket Monthly editor-in-chief Phil Walker, WCM editor-at-large John Stern and wisden.com managing editor Ben Gardner joined host Yas Rana to pick out Wisden’s men’s Test team of the 2000s.
One of the trickiest parts of the selection process was finalising the identities of the middle-order quartet. A number of the game’s great middle-order batsmen plied their trade across the decade leading to the omissions of some truly brilliant batsmen.
An Englishman who might not have come that close to selection but whose name was mentioned in the discussion was Graham Thorpe. Thorpe’s Test career began in 1993 but it wasn’t until the 2000s that England saw the best of Thorpe on a consistent basis, despite playing alongside well-documented off-field struggles.
On the Wisden Cricket Weekly Podcast, Phil said: “Highest average for an English middle-order player in the period – Graham Thorpe: 53 and a bit. Pietersen, a tick under 50. I’m not talking about him [Thorpe] slipping into this side but it’s interesting that if you could tack on the early part of Thorpe to the latter part of Pietersen across the decade, then you’d have one hell of a player.”
Across the final six years of his career – from 2000 to 2005 – Thorpe averaged 53.49 in Test cricket. The list of the players who scored more runs at a higher average than Thorpe in that time period – Inzamam-ul-Haq, Damien Martyn, Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara, Ricky Ponting, Rahul Dravid, Jacques Kallis and Matthew Hayden – gives an idea of consistency Thorpe achieved towards the end of his Test career.
Thorpe played key roles in some of England’s most impressive away performances at the start of the 21st century. Against West Indies in 2004, Thorpe averaged over 90 in what remains England’s only series victory in the Caribbean in the last 50 years while he also averaged over 55 in England’s away series victories in Pakistan and Sri Lanka in 2000 and 2001 respectively.
You can listen to the full episode of the Wisden Cricket Weekly Podcast on the Podcast App or Spotify
