Josh Tongue Leads on Test Wickets, but Ollie Robinson Bowls Cheapest

Josh Tongue leads the Test Cricket 2026 wickets leaderboard with 33 wickets for England, one clear of Mitchell Starc on 32 and two ahead of Mohammad Abbas on 31. That is the headline, and at the time of writing it is the right one: nobody has taken more Test wickets this year.

A wickets total counts one thing, though. It does not count the matches it took, or the runs given away along the way. Tongue has played 7 Tests. Ollie Edward Robinson has played 4 and taken 28, at an average of 9.32. Manav Suthar has 23 from just 3. Put the board's own columns side by side and the question of who has bowled best in 2026 has more than one answer.

The leaderboard ranks all 99 players who have taken a wicket in Test cricket this season. This piece uses only its figures, last updated after Bangladesh vs West Indies on 28 October 2026.

Josh Tongue tops the count, but not every measure

The top ten by wickets

Here is the top of the board as it stands, with the matches behind each total.

The full ranking of all 99 wicket takers goes on from there. Two things stand out in the top ten. Jofra Archer and Manav Suthar are level on 23, but Archer needed 5 matches and Suthar 3. And three of the ten, Robinson, Nathan Smith and Suthar, have played four Tests or fewer.

Ollie Robinson and Manav Suthar take wickets fastest

Dividing each bowler's wickets by the matches they played, and by the innings they bowled in, shows how quickly the wickets came. These are simple divisions of the board's own columns, not a Statz statistic, and the divisor is shown alongside each.

Robinson: 28 wickets in 4 matches

Robinson's 28 wickets from 4 matches is 7.00 a match, and 3.50 an innings across his 8 innings. His last three matches on the board read 5/69, 8/35 and 8/80, newest first. Only Suthar takes them faster per match.

Suthar: 23 wickets in 3 matches

Suthar's 23 wickets in 3 matches works out at 7.67 a match, the highest in the top ten, and 3.83 an innings. His last three read 6/206, 10/131 and 7/62. Three matches is a small sample, and the board shows it plainly, but nobody in the ten has been quicker.

Where Tongue sits

Josh Tongue's Test profile shows the other side of the leader's total: 33 wickets in 7 matches is 4.71 a match, and 2.36 across his 14 innings. Starc (5.33 a match) and Abbas (5.17) have both taken theirs more quickly. Tongue leads because he has bowled in more Tests than anyone else in the top four, and kept taking wickets in them.

Who took their wickets cheapest

Bowling average, the runs conceded for each wicket, is the cleanest measure of cost. Sorted that way, the top ten looks very different.

Bowling average: Robinson 9.32, Suthar 17.35, Nathan Smith 19.21

Robinson has conceded 261 runs for his 28 wickets, an average of 9.32, and he leads the Test bowling average leaders as well as this group. Suthar (17.35) and Nathan Smith of New Zealand (19.21) are next, then Starc at 19.75.

Where Tongue's 25.70 sits

Tongue has conceded 848 runs, the most of the ten, for an average of 25.70. That puts him ninth of the ten on cost, ahead of only Taijul Islam (30.84). Outside the top ten, Khurram Shahzad of Pakistan shows the other end of the scale: 18 wickets at an average of 30.83.

Economy: Robinson and Mehidy keep it tightest

Economy tells a similar story. Robinson concedes 2.29 an over and Mehidy Hasan Miraz 2.51, the two tightest in the ten, while Abbas (2.88) and Suthar (2.84) are close behind. Tongue's 4.20 is the most expensive of the ten, and Shahzad's 4.41 is higher again. The economy rate leaders rank every bowler on it, and you can re-sort the bowlers in the Test stat finder by any of these measures.

Five-wicket hauls: where Josh Tongue's lead comes from

If Tongue concedes more than most, how does he top the count? The board's five-wicket haul column gives the answer.

Tongue's five five-fors

Tongue has five five-wicket hauls, the most of anyone in the ten. Robinson has four; Starc, Abbas, Smith, Archer and Suthar have three each; Taijul, Mehidy and Hazlewood two. When Tongue takes wickets, he tends to take them in a bunch, and that is what keeps his total ahead even though he goes at 4.20 an over. His last three matches on the board read 6/148, 5/73 and 8/89.

Starc and Abbas, one and two behind

Starc has three five-fors and an average of 19.75, and his last three matches read 9/137, 3/89 and 3/96. Abbas has three five-fors and a four-wicket haul, with 9/130 among his last three. Both have played one Test fewer than Tongue.

What to watch next

The race at the top is tight. Tongue is one wicket clear of Starc and two ahead of Abbas, so the lead on who has taken the most Test wickets this year can change in a single innings. Robinson, on 28, is five back with the best average in the game.

Form moves faster than totals. The current Test streaks show who is on a run, and the upcoming Test fixtures show who gets the next chance to add to their total.

For the full picture, with every bowler's matches, average and economy, check the live wicket takers table.

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