Bowling is a technique by which a person (bowler) runs up to the wickets and throws the ball to the batsman, with a full arm, trying to hit the wicket to get the batsman out. There are many types of bowlers, from fast to slow, spin to swing. Spinners are slow bowlers who manage to get the ball to change direction when hitting the ground. Swingers are those bowlers who manage to get the ball to move away or towards a batsman. Good bowlers can be terribly confusing because of the way they have perfected their bowling.

It was very difficult to formulate a list of best five bowlers because so many bowlers seem very good. This list is not absolute, and we might well have left out some genuinely deserving world bowlers by oversight.

• M Muralitharan (Sri Lanka)
  
  
• S Harmison (England)
  
  
• M Panesar (England)
  
  
• Anil Kumble (India)
  
  
• M Mortaza (Bangladesh)