Wisden's top five

1. Sir Donald Bradman - 100 votes 2. Sir Garfield Sobers - 90 3. Sir Jack Hobbs - 30 4. Shane Warne - 27 5. Sir Vivian Richards - 25

Warne's inclusion at number four is a tribute to the incredible interest he has developed in the game throughout the world, since first setting international cricket alight with the so-called "ball of the century" to Mike Gatting at Old Trafford in 1993.

Predictably Sir Donald Bradman, whose Test average of 99.94 remains unbeaten, tops the list.

West Indian all-rounder Sir Garfield Sobers finished 10 votes short of Bradman, while Sir Jack Hobbs - the only Englishman in the leading five - fell a further 60 votes short in third place.

The poll was conducted by cricketing almanack Wisden

BBC Cricket correspondent Jonathan Agnew, one of the 100 experts to have taken part in the poll, said the list would not satisfy everyone.

"It's wasn't supposed to," he said. "And the fact that only Bradman and Sobers recorded over 30 per cent of the vote reflects the difficulty of the task."

Sir Vivian Richards, the "master-blaster" from Antigua, completes the top five in the poll, which was weighted to reflect the number of Tests each country had played over the century with England receiving the most votes with 28.

Former England captain Ian Botham, widely regarded as one of the great players of the modern era, finished a disappointing 16th in the survey to mark the 137th edition of the famous yellow book, which is published on Thursday.

And there was no place in the list for two of the greatest batsmen of the modern era - Brian Lara, who holds the records for highest Test score and highest first-class innings, and Steve Waugh, the only player to have scored 150 or more against all the Test nations.

Editor Matthew Engel, who is stepping down after seven years in charge to be replaced by predecessor Graeme Wright, claimed the choice was so tough that not one of the 100 judges correctly voted for the eventual top five.

"Not one of our hundred voted for all the final five, yet I don't believe anyone will argue that we have got it terribly wrong," he said.

Full results:

1 Sir Donald Bradman - 100 votes
2 Sir Garfield Sobers - 90
3 Sir Jack Hobbs - 30
4 Shane Warne - 27
5 Sir Vivian Richards - 25
6 D.K. Lillee, Sir Frank Worrell -19
8 W.R. Hammond - 18
9 D.C.S. Compton - 14
10 Sir Richard Hadlee, Imran Khan -13
12 S. M. Gavaskar - 12
13 S. F. Barnes, L. Hutton - 11
15 W.J. O'Reilly - 10
16 I.T. Botham - 9
17 H. Larwood, R.R. Lindwall, S. R. Tendulkar - 6
20 R.Benaud, G.A. Headley, Kapil Dev - 5
23 R.G. Pollock , W. Rhodes, V. T. Trumper - 4
26 T.G. Evans, M. D. Marshall, Wasim Akram - 3
29 Sir Alec Bedser, C.V. Grimmett, F. S. Trueman, F. E. Woolley - 2
33 C. E. L. Ambrose, M. W. Tate, 1, K. C. Bland, A. R. Border, B. J. T. Bosanquet, B. S. Chandrasekhar, I. M. Chappell, Lord Constantine, A. A. Donald, A. P. Freeman, L. R. Gibbs, M. A. Holding, C. H. Lloyd, S. J. McCabe, B. Mitchell, K. S. Ranjitsinjhi, Sir Pelham Warner- 1.

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