Next, we look at those who played the most Tests without ever captaining their side:
Headed by England’s long-running JM Anderson with 160 Tests. (Actually, it has gone up to 162 in December 2022).
Next is his English teammate SCJ Broad with 146. Then there is the late SK Warne, whose record of 144 stood for several years.
Other prominent players here include Laxman (134), Muralitharan (132) and Mark Waugh (128).
While Anderson and Broad are expected to play a few more Tests, there are other active players such as NM Lyon (110), CA Pujara (96) and DA Warner (96) who will also add to their tally. However, there are no players from Bangladesh, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa and Zimbabwe here.
Next, we come to those who played the most Tests captaining their side in all of them:
This may sound impossible to the average cricket follower of today. But we have:
Most of them, starting with PW Sherwell and GC Grant, are from the early days of their country’s Test history. The one glaring exception is LK Germon, who captained New Zealand in all his 12 Tests in 1995-97. Apparently no other player of the team at that time was felt capable.
Many others got their captaincy not exactly on merit, often due to the bias in favour of amateurs and nobility in earlier times (e.g. Lord Harris, Calthorpe, Bligh and the prince Vizianagram). Or racial preferences where only players from certain races were thought fit to be captains (notably in the West Indies, and until recently in South Africa).
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