Waqar Younis vs Ishant Sharma: Not as Strange a Comparison as It Looks

[sarcastic]

With Josh Hazlewood becoming the newest member of the 300 Test-wicket club (41st), I was looking at the fast bowlers from India and Pakistan who have crossed this landmark.

There is an interesting symmetry.

Imran Khan — 362 wickets
Kapil Dev — 434 wickets
 

Wasim Akram — 414 wickets
Zaheer Khan — 311 wickets

Waqar Younis — 373 wickets
Ishant Sharma — 311 wickets

In a sense, India had an answer to each of Pakistan's three great 300-wicket fast bowlers:

Kapil for Imran.
Zaheer for Wasim.
Ishant for Waqar.

This is not to say that the paired bowlers were equals. Their bowling styles, peaks and career statistics were quite different.

But 300 Test wickets is a meaningful threshold for longevity. A fast bowler simply doesn't get there without remaining fit, effective and valuable to his Test side over a long period.

So I want to use this thread to look at these three India–Pakistan pairings — and particularly the most intriguing one:

Waqar Younis vs Ishant Sharma.

Both are essentially support bowlers and did their best for their teams. Why Waqar is a vastly superior ODI bowler than Ishant, their test careers are somewhat similar.
 

Edited August 16 by sarcastic

[maniac]

Ishant was a fast pacer 140+ pace and bounce dangerous bowler. Had a small phase where he lost pace

 

Waqar was a very skillful trundler. Had a small phase where was very quick. 

[nevada]

2 hours ago, maniac said:

Ishant was a fast pacer 140+ pace and bounce dangerous bowler. Had a small phase where he lost pace

 

Waqar was a very skillful trundler. Had a small phase where was very quick. 

Sounds strange to call Waqar a trundler, but by 1996-97 itself he was a shadow of his peak slef, making comeback from serious injury. He had an insane peak which made up for his lackluster run in his declined years.

 

Ishant lost his way focusing on containment rather than SR. Redeemed himself after a successful county stint under the guidance of coach Gillespie.

[JaFanatic]

5 hours ago, nevada said:

Sounds strange to call Waqar a trundler, but by 1996-97 itself he was a shadow of his peak slef, making comeback from serious injury. He had an insane peak which made up for his lackluster run in his declined years.

 

Ishant lost his way focusing on containment rather than SR. Redeemed himself after a successful county stint under the guidance of coach Gillespie.

New team management helped his cause too. The same set of bowlers who were rated useless during the prev management suddenly became world beaters and drew comparisons with the great west Indian qurtret and aussie legendary attacks. For all the criticisms they drew for their stupid team selection in WTC finals they're praised rightly for changing the Outlook of Indian fast bowling and changing the players with timid body language to aggressive and always on the opponents face approach.

[express bowling]

In terms of bowling style, speed etc. the closest pacer India had to Waqar was Umesh Yadav. 

 

Pakistan hasn't really had any test pacer of Ishant's bowling style and height. Shaheen is similar height but left armer. 

[zen]

Difficult to pick Ishant over Waqar! At one point, batsmen were tense to face Waqar, showing his impact. On the other hand, batsmen would likely line up to face Ishant.  Anyways, it is ICF so … … … 

Edited August 16 by zen

[Lord]

16 hours ago, nevada said:

Sounds strange to call Waqar a trundler, but by 1996-97 itself he was a shadow of his peak slef, making comeback from serious injury. He had an insane peak which made up for his lackluster run in his declined years.

 

Ishant lost his way focusing on containment rather than SR. Redeemed himself after a successful county stint under the guidance of coach Gillespie.

 

Waqar slowed down from his peak where he floored Lara but was still not a trundler until his final days

 

This was in 2000 well past his peak still touching 140

 

 

[goose]

only a user called 'sarcastic' could start such a thread. 

[Vk1]

14 hours ago, zen said:

Difficult to pick Ishant over Waqar! At one point, batsmen were tense to face Waqar, showing his impact. On the other hand, batsmen would likely line up to face Ishant.  Anyways, it is ICF so … … … 

I wonder how Waqar would have bowled in 90s if he knew there was no scope for tampering and biased home umpires. Noticed in random scorecards, wasim would often pick couple of wickets with new ball while waqar would dominate later along with wasim. Pak had an extreme unfair comeback advantage that other teams didn't or at the same level

[singhvivek141]

Waqar above Ishant if his bowling partners are

 

Srinath & Prasad

Kapil & Prabhakar

 

Waqar helps with the lack of reverse. Except Srinath neither were fast, and Srinath was primarily a Hit the deck bowler.

 

Ishant above Waqar if the bowling partners are

Bumrah & Shami

Bumrah & Umesh

Shami & Umesh

 

Bumrah is a multirole, Shami is relentless accuracy, Umesh is the brute force with reverse. They all can do the workhorse role but Ishant helps them focus on their primary skills.

[singhvivek141]

9 hours ago, Lord said:

 

Waqar slowed down from his peak where he floored Lara but was still not a trundler until his final days

 

This was in 2000 well past his peak still touching 140

 

 

He was just 29 then ? How did thats past its peak? 

In 2002, he was trundling at 128-131 kph. 

Edited August 17 by singhvivek141

[zen]

6 hours ago, Vk1 said:

I wonder how Waqar would have bowled in 90s if he knew there was no scope for tampering and biased home umpires. Noticed in random scorecards, wasim would often pick couple of wickets with new ball while waqar would dominate later along with wasim. Pak had an extreme unfair comeback advantage that other teams didn't or at the same level

Yeah, Wasim and Waqar were a joy to watch. Both masters of swing and reverse swing. 
 

Many on ICF equating such bowlers with Ishant is like many on Pak forums equating Babar with Kohli.
 

On stats, a Sandeep Sharma can be similar to Bumrah in IPL but their impact is measured differently. 
 

 

PS Indian bowlers used to tamper too. Guys like Prabhakar were likely assigned to tamper with the ball and that ball was used by Kapil too. “Tampering” can be a point to consider if comparing Waqar with likes of Marshall, not with likes of Ishant.  

Edited August 17 by zen

[Rightarmfast]

21 hours ago, express bowling said:

In terms of bowling style, speed etc. the closest pacer India had to Waqar was Umesh Yadav. 

 

Pakistan hasn't really had any test pacer of Ishant's bowling style and height. Shaheen is similar height but left armer. 

Interesting choice. I would put Shami there. Shami did not start off as a tearaway though, but Shami maintained his pace till the last match unlike Waqar. Had a deadly Yorker too, and was way skilled than Younis. But Yadav is also similar. 

[Rightarmfast]

On 8/16/2026 at 7:34 AM, sarcastic said:

With Josh Hazlewood becoming the newest member of the 300 Test-wicket club (41st), I was looking at the fast bowlers from India and Pakistan who have crossed this landmark.

There is an interesting symmetry.

Imran Khan — 362 wickets
Kapil Dev — 434 wickets
 

Wasim Akram — 414 wickets
Zaheer Khan — 311 wickets

Waqar Younis — 373 wickets
Ishant Sharma — 311 wickets

In a sense, India had an answer to each of Pakistan's three great 300-wicket fast bowlers:

Kapil for Imran.
Zaheer for Wasim.
Ishant for Waqar.

This is not to say that the paired bowlers were equals. Their bowling styles, peaks and career statistics were quite different.

But 300 Test wickets is a meaningful threshold for longevity. A fast bowler simply doesn't get there without remaining fit, effective and valuable to his Test side over a long period.

So I want to use this thread to look at these three India–Pakistan pairings — and particularly the most intriguing one:

Waqar Younis vs Ishant Sharma.

Both are essentially support bowlers and did their best for their teams. Why Waqar is a vastly superior ODI bowler than Ishant, their test careers are somewhat similar.
 

Waqar's and Ishant's bowling style was entirely different. Ishant too clocked 150+ in his initial yrs, but he was more of a Gillespie kind of bowler. Whether I would choose Gillespie or Ishant, that would be an interesting take. 

 

Waqar did have skills which others didnt have. And skilled also in tampering. 

[maniac]

On 8/16/2026 at 12:56 AM, nevada said:

Sounds strange to call Waqar a trundler, but by 1996-97 itself he was a shadow of his peak slef, making comeback from serious injury. He had an insane peak which made up for his lackluster run in his declined years.

 

Ishant lost his way focusing on containment rather than SR. Redeemed himself after a successful county stint under the guidance of coach Gillespie.

Bro look at Waqar  speed guns from highlights post 1999, he was skillful trundler.

 

Ishu can still bowl 145+ in IPl post retirement.

[express bowling]

7 hours ago, Rightarmfast said:

Interesting choice. I would put Shami there. Shami did not start off as a tearaway though, but Shami maintained his pace till the last match unlike Waqar. Had a deadly Yorker too, and was way skilled than Younis. But Yadav is also similar. 

 

Waqar had many similarities with Shami like reverse swing mastery, skiddy pace, high skills and ability to take wickets on flat decks ......  Where Shami differed was that he had a high release point that maximized his shorter height, a better seam position and more bounce from back of a length than Waqar and more dependence on seam movement. While his peak speeds were less than Waqar.

 

The reason why I chose Umesh is because both Umesh and Waqar had round arm actions with lower than optimum release points, peak recorded speeds around 152 / 153 kph, 5 to 6 very quick years, more dependence on swing than seam and ability to take wickets with old ball in tests in Asia with reverse swing. 

 

 

[express bowling]

7 hours ago, Rightarmfast said:

. Ishant  was more of a Gillespie kind of bowler.

 

 

Feel the same. 

 

[Strangering]

Tell me you don't know anything about pace bowling without telling me. 

 

[Adamant]

Delulu is the solulu.

[Adamant]

15 hours ago, Rightarmfast said:

Waqar's and Ishant's bowling style was entirely different. Ishant too clocked 150+ in his initial yrs, but he was more of a Gillespie kind of bowler. Whether I would choose Gillespie or Ishant, that would be an interesting take. 

 

Waqar did have skills which others didnt have. And skilled also in tampering. 

Waqar bowled 145-155 regularly in his early days, Ishant bowled a dozen balls above 148. there is absolutely no comparison.

 

 

Edited August 18 by Adamant