5 current bowlers who struggle away from home in Tests

5. James Anderson

James Anderson has been England’s highest aggregate wicket-taker in Tests

Perhaps one of the greatest English fast bowlers of all time, James Anderson has been, to be quite frank, a conditions-dependent bowler. While his stats of 451 wickets from 115 Tests may speak highly of him, it must also be noted that he has picked up almost twice as many wickets at home as he has picked away from home, while playing just 21 more home Tests. From 65 home Tests, Anderson has 284 wickets, while from 44 away Tests matches, he has accounted for 145 wickets. His bowling averages at home, and away from home, have been 25.59 and 34.86 respectively, while his strike-rates have been 51.6 and 66.3.

Quite obviously, the most number of matches that Anderson has played outside England have been in Australia, where in 13 Ashes encounters, the 33-year-old has 43 wickets to his name at 38.44. For a bowler of his class and magnitude, picking up wickets on Australian surfaces that have historically been conducive to fast bowling, should have been easy. However, his stats speak otherwise. In South Africa and New Zealand too, Anderson has averaged 39.92 and 36.27 and has only been a pale shadow of his imperious best.

Nevertheless, to his credit, the man with the most number of Test wickets for England has done exceedingly well in Indian conditions, a country where several fast bowlers have found their lives to be very difficult. In India, Anderson has picked up 22 wickets from 7 Tests at 29.81. At the same time, however, the fast bowler only has 11 wickets from 4 Tests in Sri Lanka at an average of 40.72. West Indies has been the only other Test-playing nation other than India where Anderson’s bowling average is in the 20s, as he averages 24.92 from 7 Tests and has picked up 26 wickets.