Wisden Cricket Monthly

Wisden Cricket Monthly is ‘the independent voice of cricket’. Read the best writers, exclusive interviews, and the most comprehensive coverage of both the professional and amateur game every month.

Expansion Theory

THE Top Six

The man who tamed the machine to change cricket forever • Andrew Millers pays tribute to the unsung hero, Travis Basevi, whose genius changed the way the game is understood

Team of the Month • In a new regular feature, Jo Harman selects an XI based on performances across the game in the month of October

England committed to rebrand but familiar problems persist • Stokes and McCullum have identified how they want to play in Pakistan, but they will be hampered by England’s longstanding neglect of spin bowling, writes Mark Ramprakash

Gould steps into the breach • Phil Walker considers the virtues of Richard Gould, a strong and perhaps inspired choice as the ECB’s new chief executive

Getting rich while the planet burns • The ICC’s new sponsorship deal with Aramco, the giant Saudi oil company, is a dereliction of duty at a time of global crisis, writes Lawrence Booth

FAF DU PLESSIS • In the first of a new series, our star interviewer speaks to the former South Africa skipper about old wounds, new pastures, and the art of book writing

RE: VIEW • Three writers make their predictions for England’s three-Test series in Pakistan, which begins at Rawalpindi on December 1

CRICKIPEDIA

Yorkshire THE IMPLOSION • Jo Harman explores what went wrong at Yorkshire this season as the embattled club prepares for life in the second tier of the County Championship for the first time in more than a decade

In other news...

Mailbox • In association with Botham Wines, letter of the month receives a bottle of Botham 81 Series Barossa Valley Shiraz – an extra special wine presented in a hand-embossed wooden case which commemorates Sir Ian’s Ashes heroics

Setting fire to the manual • England have doubled down on their ultra-aggressive philosophy by selecting an adventurous 15-strong squad for the three-Test series in Pakistan. Jo Harman introduces a special feature on five new or returning batters who’ve been picked to play their shots

Harry BROOK

Keaton JENNINGS

Liam LIVINGSTONE

Will JACKS

Ben DUCKETT

What England need to do to win the 2025 World Test Championship • Whatever happens in Pakistan, England are already out of contention for the 2023 World Test Championship final. But with Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes at the helm, they will be dreaming of a title push in 2023-25. Ben Gardner takes a look at what they will need to do to reach the final

The third element • James Wallace explores the art and evolution of fielding and celebrates its greatest practitioners

A GAME WITHOUT BORDERS • The Twenty20 World Cup has further highlighted the increasingly meritocratic nature of top-level cricket, a world now expanded to incorporate talents from the farthest-flung corners of the globe, writes Matt Roller

HOOKERS • In the third part of our series, Phil Walker looks back at some of the finest exponents of cricket’s most thrillingly dangerous shot

Buffeted by the winds of change • Sixty years on, Christopher Sandford looks back on the Ashes series of 1962/63 when Ted Dexter led an England tour party which didn’t always see eye to eye

PRO CREATION • In the first of a new series exploring what it’s like to be the parent of a top-level cricketer, Jo Harman speaks to Alan Butcher and his son Mark about their tight-knit relationship and the various forms that it’s taken

TIM MURTAGH • The evergreen Middlesex and Ireland seamer on the moments that have defined his career

Make a cricket ball • James Wallace heads...