Shane Warne’s list of the top 50 cricketers he has played with or against – revealed in The Times on Saturday – has provoked strong reaction around the world. While there was delight in the Indian media that Sachin Tendulkar was nominated at No 1, irritation was expressed in the Australian press that none of their players made the top three.

Much of the Australian media preferred to concentrate on Steve Waugh’s exclusion from the top 25 rather than the fact that five Australians had finished in the top ten. “Shane Warne has snubbed all his former team-mates in naming the top three players of his era,” Will Swanton wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald.

“Warne’s list is notable for the lowly positions of two of the all-time greats. Legendary former Australia captain, Steve Waugh, is languishing at No 26, while Adam Gilchrist, widely regarded as the greatest wicketkeeper-batsman of all time, is No 20.”

Darren Lehmann’s surprise nomination ahead of Waugh at No 25 was singled out for comment. “Warne did not always see eye-to-eye with either Waugh or Gilchrist,” Swanton wrote.

“He struggled to comprehend Waugh sacking him for Stuart MacGill in the West Indies in 1999, and coveted the captaincy Waugh received after the retirement of Mark Taylor. He once described Gilchrist as too much of a ‘Richie Cunningham’ to be Test skipper, in reference to Gilchrist’s goody-two-shoes image. It was no compliment.”

Ravi Shastri, the former India captain, believes that it is a singular honour that an Indian has been rated so highly by the game’s greatest spinner. “This is from one legend to another,” Shastri, who featured at No 42, said, “and should stop all speculation about Tendulkar’s class.”