James Anderson and Stuart Broad’s career records in focus after England omission

James Anderson and Stuart Broad have both been left out of England’s Test squad to tour the West Indies next month.

Anderson, 39, and 35-year-old Broad are among only seven bowlers ever to take more than 500 Test wickets and here, the PA news agency looks at their career records.

Anderson is the record Test wicket-taker among seamers with 640 from his 169 Tests, with only Sri Lanka spinner Muttiah Muralitharan’s remarkable 800 and Shane Warne’s 708 for Australia ahead of him.

India’s Anil Kumble follows on 619 while Warne’s long-time team-mate Glenn McGrath is the nearest seamer behind Anderson with 563. Broad has 537 wickets in 152 Tests, with West Indian Courtney Walsh completing the list on 519.

McGrath has the best average of the septet with 21.64, edging out Muralitharan’s 22.73, with Anderson’s 26.58 and Broad’s 27.81 ranking fifth and sixth ahead of Kumble.

Anderson has 31 five-wicket hauls, the best of the seamers in that group but behind all three spinners, with Muralitharan once more away in the distance with a scarcely-believable 67 – Warne ranks second among all Test bowlers with 37. Broad has 19, including 12 instances of taking six or more.

While Anderson will turn 40 this summer, one of the more remarkable aspects of his Test career is the way he has improved in later years.

Since the start of 2014, when he was already 31 with the wear and tear of 91 Tests as a new-ball paceman in his legs, he has played another 78 games and taken an astonishing 300 wickets at 22.02.

Only 36 bowlers including Anderson have 300 wickets in their full Test career and of those, only four have an average lower than his in that phase – West Indies greats Malcolm Marshall at 20.94 and Curtly Ambrose at 20.99, Fred Trueman with