Test cricket is always about playing long & scoring a lot of runs. However, this depends on how their openers set the tone and what sort of start they provide to the team. Hence, the onus always falls on the opening batter to not just show resilience by protecting their wicket for a long period but also to score runs against the opposition.
Those who did over a long period have entered the annals of cricket as one of the greatest of this sport. We, in this article, list those batters who time and again defied conditions, pace, swing, seam, and spin that are on offer to emerge as the best in their batting position. Here are the top run-getters among openers in Test cricket.
Most Test Runs as Openers
| Player | Innings | Runs as Opener | Average | High Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alastair Cook (ENG) | 278 | 11845 | 44.86 | 294 |
| Sunil Gavaskar (IND) | 203 | 9607 | 50.29 | 221 |
| Graeme Smith (SA) | 196 | 9030 | 49.07 | 277 |
| David Warner (AUS) | 202 | 8747 | 45.08 | 335* |
| Matthew Hayden (AUS) | 184 | 8625 | 50.73 | 380 |
| Virender Sehwag (IND) | 170 | 8207 | 50.04 | 319 |
| Geoffrey Boycott (ENG) | 191 | 8091 | 48.16 | 246* |
| Graham Gooch (ENG) | 184 | 7811 | 43.88 | 333 |
| Mark Taylor (AUS) | 186 | 7525 | 43.49 | 334 |
| Gordon Greenidge (WI) | 182 | 7488 | 45.10 | 226 |
Key Stats
There have been 30 batters in the history of Test cricket to score 5000 or more as an opener. This is out of 1010 players who have been designated as an opener by their respective team at least once. Only 9 of them have scored over 7500 as a Test opener for their respective sides.
56.47 – Amongst the 30, Len Hutton has the best batting average, having made 6721 runs in 131 innings with 19 tons at the top of the order. He is closely followed by Sir Jack Hobbs who averaged 56.37 after 97 innings as a Test opener. Find out here who happens to bat the most innings as opener in the format.
In fact, only three others – Gavaskar (50.29), Virender Sehwag (50.04), and Matthew Hayden (50.73) averaged over 50 while scoring 5000 or more runs as an opener in Test cricket. Hayden’s 380 is also the highest score by an opening batsman in Test cricket. Find out the same for all batting positions here.
Sachin Tendulkar, the master batter who tops the same chart for ODIs, batted mostly in the middle-order, when it comes to Tests for India.
1 – Only Alastair Cook has crossed the 10000 run mark as an opener in Tests. While India’s Sunil Gavaskar (10122) was the first man in Test history to scale mount 10000 runs, he scored only 9607 of these runs as a Test opener.
162 – The number of players to have scored 1000 or more runs as a Test opener and it is likely that this number would improve in the near future.
Check: Fastest to 1000 Runs in Test Cricket
