Showman, mind reader, master

Shane Warne took 708 Test wickets, behind only Muttiah Muralitharan's 800. His landmark victims - those he dismissed to notch up each century - reflect on what made him so hard to face.

100 Brian McMillan lbw b Warne 4, v South Africa at Adelaide, 1993-94
Pat Symcox, Daryll Cullinan and I formed a think tank to decide the best way to play Shane Warne. We decided to treat every ball as if it was the flipper, seeing as we couldn't pick it. If it wasn't, then we would have time to adjust, and play it on merit. There would be no pulling - in case it was the flipper. So he would go round the wicket, we would pad away everything that pitched outside leg stump. Warney hated that, and he would invariably come back over the wicket, and we would revert to Plan A. His 100th wicket was… a flipper. Of course it was. The best-laid plans! I played back, and it hurried through. Not long after, in South Africa, he spun one between my legs as I tried to kick it away, and bowled me. I looked a right p****, but then he made a few of us look p*****. He was incredibly competitive, but I loved playing against him. I am happy to say he was a genuine cricketing mate, and we enjoyed lots of banter and beers together. Sometimes brilliance isn't fully appreciated until it's gone, but we were all fully aware we were in the presence of greatness, even in those early years.

200 Chaminda Vaas c Healy b Warne 4, v Sri Lanka at Perth, 1995-96
Most of the Sri Lankan side had not played a Test in Australia, so there was a lot of excitement. This was Perth, and all the talk was about how the pacies were going to dominate. But Warney was equally effective. It was the first time I had played against him in any cricket, and he got me twice - both caught behind by Ian Healy. The second dismissal, the result of a big drive that went straight up in the air, was his 200th. Looking back, I sense he had the wood over some of us. Rather than playing him on merit, we were obsessed with analysing him, and we paid the price. Aravinda de Silva also got out to Warne twice in that game, for ten and 20. When he's making the team's best batsman look ordinary, there was little the rest of us could do. Warney was great, but not because of all his variations, his ability to turn the ball, or his accuracy; there were spinners more talented than him. Warney played with your mind - and cricket, after all, is a mind game.

300 Jacques Kallis b Warne 45, v South Africa at Sydney, 1997-98
I loved playing against him, once I realised what he was all about, and I got over the fact that I was a youngster. No matter how intense the situation, it was fun. He was a showman and, as a batter, you were part of his show. In the Boxing Day Test the week before the 300th, I helped save the game, and he was the first to come to our change-room with a couple of beers. He was generous enough to say it was one of the best innings anyone had played against him, which pretty much summed him up. I still regard it as one of the best Test hundreds I scored, if not the best. At Sydney he was all over us. He took five in the first innings, and he'd already taken five in the second by the time he got me. We were seven down for not many, but I'd been keeping him out. He came round the wicket, which we used to think was a good sign because he was getting frustrated. I was looking to use the pad as much as possible, but he was pitching everything in line with the stumps, so I had to play. He beat me in the flight with a googly - a googly from round the wicket! It just slipped under the bat, and hit two-thirds of the way up middle and off. Strangely enough, I didn't find him too hard to read, but reading a ball and playing it are different skills. He was way too good for me that day.

400 Alec Stewart c Gilchrist b Warne 29, v England at The Oval, 2001
I played a forward defence, and didn't quite cover the ball, which allowed it to pitch and turn. As I played it, I hit the bottom of my pad with my bat. I just felt I didn't hit the ball, and I got called into the match referee's room afterwards, as I'd been reported for dissent by umpire Peter Willey. It cost me £1,000. I got out to Warne 14 times in Test cricket, more than anyone else, but if I had my time again, I would have attacked him more. We always found ourselves on the back foot against Australia, and trying to survive. We could have taken the game to them in a controlled way, yet we were too respectful, especially to Warne. I wish I'd not allowed him to dominate me and the team. Of course, he was the master of setting you up, and I got done by his flipper in Brisbane the first time I faced him in Australia. I cut him for four, then he sent down what I thought was a long hop, went to pull it, and was bowled. Leg-spin is the hardest art in the game, and Warne mastered it. He possessed an unbelievable cricket brain and, because of his control, he could put his plans in place seamlessly. We were never ahead in enough games against Australia to change his thinking.

500 Hashan Tillekeratne c Symonds b Warne 25, v SL at Galle, 2003-04
Shane was on his comeback after his 12-month ban [for taking a proscribed substance], and the race for 500 wickets was intense between him and Murali, who began the game on 485 to Warne's 491. I was Sri Lanka's captain, and we had done really well in the first three days, carving out a first-innings lead of 160 or so. But Australia made over 500 in their second, and Shane started turning things in their favour. It was remarkable, as he had played just a couple of first-class games before this Test. By the time I was dismissed, they had the game in the bag. He came on for a fresh spell, and I scored a straight boundary from his first ball. Next ball, I went for a big sweep, but got a top edge and was easily caught close in by Andrew Symonds. We were kicking ourselves at losing that Test. That's what can happen when they have someone like Shane in the side. I remember his parents were there to see him get to 500. He was Player of the Series, and unstoppable. We lost 3-0, and I never played Test cricket again. Murali took 11 wickets in that game to Warne's ten, but had to wait until the next Test to follow him to 500.

600 Marcus Trescothick c Gilchrist b Warne 63, v Eng at Manchester, 2005
I knew what an important wicket it was - we were going well - but it was also really annoying, because I was so unlucky. The ball was outside off stump. I tried to sweep it, and it bounced round off my body, caught the back of my bat, deflected on to Adam Gilchrist's knee and popped up into his gloves. Lucky so and so! But the celebrations were quite special. Shane was the first to get 600 Test wickets, and on my wall at home I've got a picture of the ball in mid-flight, with Gilchrist about to complete the catch. Warne signed it at the end of the series. It was the execution of his skills that made him so special. Other spinners tried different things, like coming round the wicket, or bowling into the rough with a different field, and you would always feel there was a period in which you could get a few away. I never felt like that with Warne. As good as Muttiah Muralitharan and Anil Kumble were, you felt at some stage you had a chance to build momentum. Maybe playing against Murali in England was different from playing him in Sri Lanka, but wherever you played against Warne, it felt as if he pressured you the whole time. The only way I could counter him was to be really aggressive, and that meant taking chances. You never got to the stage of spreading the field and knocking him around.

700 Andrew Strauss b Warne 50, v England at Melbourne, 2006-07
It was dank and overcast, and you didn't really expect Warne to be bowling. There wasn't a lot of turn, so it felt like an opportunity to score. He moved midwicket away, which was very clever. As a left-hander, you felt you were going to hit a lot of balls into that region off him - and he'd offered me a big gap. People who watch replays of the delivery ask why I played the shot, or how I could have missed it, as it didn't really do that much. But it needs context. You have to take the field setting into consideration. He bowled the ball wider, and I tried to fetch it from outside off stump. Once again, Warne was one step ahead. He did me - not for the only time. He was a brilliant bowler - no one disputes that - but what made him so special was his showmanship, an ability to use the occasion in his favour. He seemed to understand what was going through your mind. Then there was the task of simply facing him. He would play on this in any way he could, whether through smart field changes or making you feel as uncomfortable as possible. There wasn't a great deal of sledging. He would just project his presence on to you. It was intimidating. In some ways, it can be more menacing facing a spinner than a seamer, because you have more decisions to make. Against a seamer, you just react to what comes down. Against a spinner, there are many more options to weigh up: run down the pitch, slog-sweep, or survive? Warne's skill was to know what you were going to do before you did it.

Interviews by Neil Manthorp, Rex Clementine and Richard Gibson