Wisden 100 tables

There's a West Indian left-hander and a smallish Indian batsman at the top of the Wisden 100 for West Indies-India Tests - but they're probably not the ones you were expecting. The left-hander is Clive Lloyd, and the diminutive Indian is Gundappa Viswanath, Sunil Gavaskar's brother-in-law.

The Wisden 100 is a complex computer program which assesses every batting and bowling performance in Test history, using a number of factors. Overall, Don Bradman of Australia played the highest rated innings of them all - 270 for Australia v England at Melbourne in 1936-37 - while South Africa's Hugh Tayfield tops the bowling lists.

As the current series in the Caribbean loomed, we picked out the best-rated performances solely from Tests between West Indies and India. There were quite a few to go on - the sides have met in 70 Tests, West Indies winning 28 and India 7.

Lloyd leads the way in the batting table, with what the Wisden Almanack called a "long and sound, if dour innings" of 161 not out at Calcutta in 1983-84. It needed to be. In a match dominated by the ball, West Indies had slumped to 213 for 8 in reply to India's 241 when Lloyd was joined by Andy Roberts. Between them they added 161 - Roberts made 68 from No. 10 - to lift the total to 374. Suitably demoralised, India crumbled second time around for 90, with Malcolm Marshall taking 6 for 37.

India's best batting performance - and the only non-century on the list - is a Gundappa Viswanath masterclass at Madras in 1974-75. Coming in at No. 4, Viswanath looked on as Roberts reduced India to 76 for 6. Then, in a four-and-three-quarter-hour vigil, Vishy's 97 not out guided India to 190. The next-highest score was 19. He added a vital 46 in the second innings, and India's spinners sealed victory on the final day.

Four double-centuries make the Top Ten, including Sunil Gavaskar's 236 not out at Madras in 1983-84 - which remained India's highest score in Tests until exceeded by VVS Laxman in 2000-01 - and Rohan Kanhai's 256 at Calcutta in 1958-59. The collector's item though, and No. 3 on our list, is Faoud Bacchus's 250 at Kanpur in 1978-79. Bacchus never made another Test century - his next highest score, 96, came in the second match of the same series, at Kanpur.

Surprisingly, in the age of Lara and Tendulkar, the only current player in the Top Ten is a man better known for failing to reach three figures. Shivnarine Chanderpaul has managed just two centuries in 51 Tests, but his maiden ton, 137 not out at Bridgetown in 1996-97, was a gem. Only Curtly Ambrose, with 37, provided any support, and without it West Indies would surely have slumped to a humiliating defeat. India needed only 120 to win on the fourth day, but were demolished by Ambrose, Bishop and Rose for 81.

The bowling table is led by Lance Gibbs's extraordinary effort at Bridgetown in 1961-62. Gibbs took 8 for 38 with his whirling offspin, but that's only half the story. He bowled 53.3 overs, including 37 maidens, and all his wickets came in a devastating final spell of 8 for 6 in 15.3 overs. At 158 for 2, with Dilip Sardesai and Vijay Manjrekar going well, India had been well placed for survival, but they crumbled to 187 all out - and defeat by an innings and 30 runs.

India's best performance comes in at No. 2 … and No. 6. Short and bespectacled, with a dubious taste in headbands, Narendra Hirwani did not look the most threatening of characters. But at Madras in 1987-88, he went one run better than Bob Massie to record the best match figures by a debutant in Tests. Hirwani took 8 for 61 in the first innings and 8 for 75 in the second - 16 for 136 in the match - as India charged to a 255-run victory, and a 1-1 share of the series. But Hirwani emulated Massie in more ways than one. He was unable to live up to his debut efforts, and was dropped shortly after the 1990 tour of England, though he did bounce back briefly in 1995, and took 6 for 59 on recall against New Zealand.

The highest-rated performance by a fast bowler is by Kenny Benjamin, with 5 for 65 on a soul-destroying featherbed in Chandigarh in 1994-95. Even Kapil Dev couldn't better that - his career-best 9 for 83 at Ahmedabad in 1983-84 comes in at No. 7.

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