Sachin Tendulkar or Steve Smith - who’s the best since Bradman?

A deep dive into the careers of the two greatest modern masters yields more questions than answers - but we do reach a conclusion

Steve Smith achieved 947 rating points after the MCG Test in the 2017/18 Ashes, according to the ICC batting rankings. Only Don Bradman’s 961 is higher.

“I never saw myself play, but I feel this fellow is playing much the same as I used to play, by looking at him,” These were the words of Don Bradman on Sachin Tendulkar. The Indian legend called it the greatest compliment he’s ever got.

When you hear ‘best since Bradman’, it’s probably Sachin Tendulkar or Steve Smith.

But there are other things in common between the two, like problem-solving. Not only are they supremely talented, but they are also extremely adaptable, and they’re deep thinkers of the game. They are different from Ricky Ponting or Virat Kohli - who were extremely driven individuals and world-beaters in their prime years, but not at the same level of technical mastery.

Now, they have something else in common: over 10,000 Test runs. But who has had the better career in Tests, Steve Smith or Sachin Tendulkar?

It’s important that you realise that the last couple of years of Steve Smith have not been his normal routine. But even then, Smith has a match factor of 1.58. That means he averages 58% more than the rest of the top six batters (from both teams) in the matches he has played over his career. That’s a ridiculous record for someone going through a slump.

Tendulkar’s mark is only 30% better. But it is important to remember that the Indian great batted with Rahul Dravid, Virender Sehwag, Mohammad Azharuddin and VVS Laxman for a long time in his career. Smith has played with David Warner, Marnus Labuschagne and Usman Khawaja, which is still strong, but not at that level.

The greats around Sachin also affect his contribution to the total runs. Smith has scored nearly 16% of the runs in the matches he has played, while Tendulkar made 14.82% of the team’s runs. Both records are spectacular, but we see the effect of playing with greats being more prominent in Tendulkar’s record.

The other issue with match factor is your team's bowling attack also affects it, since the opposition’s top six batters are also considered. It would be reasonable to say that Smith has played with better bowling attacks on his team than Tendulkar ever did.

It is also important to note that Tendulkar maintained these numbers over a significantly larger sample size. He also played several matches as a teenager and then after turning 35 - with one of the best records of all time in both cases. Smith didn’t have to face the challenges and rigours of Test match batting before turning 21, and the current Test he’s playing in is only his sixth past the age of 35.

We can split Tendulkar’s career into four parts. Till 1991, he was not consistent, although he played a few brilliant knocks. However, he was 60% better than other batters in the same games as him for the next 11 years. This was his best period in Test cricket. From 2003-2010, he had a very solid period where he was 23% better than the rest.

The dip in the match factor can be explained by a few things. Tendulkar had a tennis elbow injury in 2004, which kept him out for four and a half months. Many batters never really recover from that. He also started playing on flatter pitches and alongside greater batting lineups, so he wasn’t standing out as much since everyone around him was also doing well. This is something which we notice in his ODI career too.

In the last three years, there was a clear decline. His Test average actually dipped from 56.95 after his 177th Test in Newlands in January 2011 - where he smashed South Africa - to 53.78 when he played his last match at the Wankhede. This was during a period when he averaged 14% less than the other top six batters.

Smith initially broke into the team as a lower-order batter. A match factor of 1.02 till 2013 suggests that he was about par. He followed it up with a run that few batters have ever had, performing 97% better than the other top six batters from 2014 to 2019. In the 2020s, his match factor has dropped to 1.28 - which is still pretty impressive. His slump looks worse because his average has dropped a lot, but in a period when no one was making runs, he was still great. He’s also being compared to the old Smith, who was probably the best since Bradman in that time period. But if your slump is still 28% better than everyone, that is incredible.

There is also an element of the pitches being more result-oriented in the matches Smith has played. The World Test Championship, combined with the wobbleball taking over Test match cricket, means we see more results in the game today. Of Tendulkar’s innings, 31.6% came in draws, while the corresponding number for Smith is 13.7%.

The average per wicket in result matches is 27.5, while in draws it is 37. Smith has certainly missed out on a lot of flat wickets where no bowler could get anything.

But we don’t actually see a huge change in Tendulkar’s match factor - he has a similar record in both result matches and draws. On the other hand, Smith gets a little bit of a boost from draws - even though he has played fewer such games than Tendulkar.

Don Bradman’s career lasted 80 innings. Using that as the reference, we look at the batters who have the best match factor over that period of time. Smith is the only batter other than Bradman who averaged more than twice the rest of the top-order players in his “peak”. If this is your favourite metric, he truly was the best since Bradman. Tendulkar had an outstanding peak himself, with his match factor of 1.74, featuring in the top 15 of all time.

Tendulkar played 30 innings before his best 80 innings streak, which lasted from December 1992 to December 1999. He would go on to play another 219 knocks after that. Smith played 42 innings before his peak and 82 after that. They have a similar match factor in ‘after-peak’ innings, while Smith’s better in the ‘before-peak’ phase. But being 25% better than the other batters for over 200 innings after your 80-innings peak is special.

Of course, Smith’s after-peak included him opening for a few Tests due to his own reasons. That probably didn’t help in an era when no one should open.

When the rest of the top six batters average below 35, Tendulkar is 75% better than the others, compared to 60% for Smith. However, when the other batters average more than that, Tendulkar’s ratio drops to 1.16, while Smith is almost identical. But over half of Smith's innings were low-scoring due to the wobbleball. For Tendulkar, it was only about 35% of his innings.

This means that Tendulkar was better on worse pitches, but Smith played more on them.

Since both Smith and Tendulkar spent most of their careers at number four, comparing their entry points is pretty important. In Test cricket, it isn’t just about how many runs you make, it's about when you make them as well. Teams roughly lose a wicket every 10 overs in Test cricket, so a number four walks in around the 20th over, which is why it's our baseline.

When both batters walk in before the 20th over, Smith averages 50, whereas Tendulkar averages 46. And where both walk in from the 20th over, both average around 61. So really, there isn’t much in this.

Smith has one of the most outstanding records of all time against pace bowling. At his peak from 2014-19, he averaged nearly 100 against the quicks. In Asia, his career record is above 75, while it is 54 in the rest of the world. And remember, he’s averaging 50-plus even after the pace-playing pandemic affected batting averages around the world. Tendulkar also has a terrific record where he also averages more in Asia, but even in friendlier conditions for the fast bowlers, he maintained a mark of nearly 50 over a career spanning 24 years. These are two of the greatest players of pace ever.

Their graphs have a similar pattern against spin, but Tendulkar has a better record against the slower bowlers - both in Asia and outside it. However, Smith’s record is still really good in Asia, much like Tendulkar’s brilliance versus pace outside Asia. It is no mean feat for a non-Asian batter to average 40 plus against spin in Asia. Both of these guys are in this spot because of their ability to conquer everything.

How good were they against the best bowlers of their generation? We looked at their combined head to head records versus the ten greatest of their respective eras - Smith averages above 46, while Tendulkar’s mark is almost 45. Tendulkar perhaps faced greater bowlers like Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath and Dale Steyn, but Smith did it in a more bowling-friendly era, against the likes of R Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah and Kagiso Rabada.

At the risk of repeating ourselves, these are incredible records.

Both have an average of above 40 in every country where they’ve played at least five innings. Smith has a match factor of greater than one and a half in Australia, England, India, Sri Lanka and West Indies, and is close to that in New Zealand. It is less than par only in Pakistan and UAE, despite averaging 57 and 44 respectively, suggesting that he played in very high-scoring games in both places. However, he did score 55 and 97 in two fourth-innings losses in the UAE in 2014.

Tendulkar’s highest match factor of 3.87 is from nine innings in Bangladesh, which feels like cruel and unusual punishment for what was a new Test nation. It is above 1.25 in South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, India, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe. Like Smith, his match factor is also below par in Pakistan. Despite that, he has gone on to play some really memorable knocks - 57 at Sialkot versus an attack of Imran Khan, Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis on his first tour, and the 194* in Multan (which is also remembered for the declaration).

Smith has a higher match factor than Tendulkar in England, New Zealand, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and West Indies, while Tendulkar is better than Smith in South Africa and Bangladesh. It's not fair to compare their records in India and Australia because in each case one player has a far greater sample size than the other.

The match factor includes batters from both teams, so we looked at their contributions in each country. Again, Tendulkar has a higher percentage of runs only in South Africa and Bangladesh. In a relative sense, Smith’s record looks more impressive. But we have talked about the other factors like longevity, batting support and bowling attacks. Tendulkar was consistently great over a prolonged career.

10 Test rolling match factors show us that Tendulkar’s peak of 2.20 was at the 118 matches mark, while the same for Smith was 2.52 at the 67th Test. Remarkably, it never dropped below par for Smith, though Tendulkar had a few such periods. But we also see several peaks throughout Tendulkar’s career - even if they weren’t as high as Smith’s best.

Smith is at 10 plus years, while Tendulkar had 17.

When it comes to great years (i.e. a match factor of above 1.25), they are at 8 and 13 respectively.

But Smith’s highs were higher - he had a match factor of over two in four years, compared to three for Tendulkar.

So, who is greater in Tests? Steve Smith had a peak that was second only to the Don, and dominated the world. And you can reach a very reasonable conclusion that Smith during his peak was a better batter than Tendulkar. But whose career would you take? Would you want a batter who had 10 plus years and was great for 8 of them, or one with 17 plus years and 13 of them great? That's the greatness of Tendulkar: India didn’t need to worry about another batter for 24 years. For that reason, we’re going to pick Sachin Tendulkar.

You can make a pretty good case that Tendulkar is the greatest batsman ever, even including Bradman. But you can’t make that for Smith. Yet.

Even though he said he is not sure about his Test future, he could finish with an arguably better Test career if he has two to three more great years. What if he batted for another five years at his current level? Of course, this could go the other way, his consistency could take a hit, especially if he opens again.

After scoring a hundred against India at the Gabba, Smith said that he has dabbled with his technique for about 15 years. He pretty much changes how he bats for every different game, depending on the surface. We know that one of the ways the great batter gets off strike is by turning the ball to the leg side. He’s a supervillain.

Tendulkar prepared for Shane Warne by practicing against Laxman Sivaramakrishnan, who would bowl around the wicket into a rough he dug up to be brutal. He even redesigned his arm guard after a chat with a waiter in Chennai. He decided on the field that he would not play a single cover drive in his famous innings at the SCG.

Sachin Tendulkar made his entire life revolve around scoring runs. Steve Smith shadow bats every minute he’s not out in the middle actually doing the job.

Who you think is greater will be down to your personal choice. But for us, what we really came to is how similar they are.

They might both be the best since Bradman.