Former Sri Lanka Captain Mahela Jayawardena has played against 872 opponents during his illustrious Cricket career spanning 18 years.
Mahela has played a whopping 652 international matches ( 149 Tests, 448 ODIs, 55 T20Is), it is reasonable that he has played against such a high number of opponents.
It might surprise you that he has played against more opponents than Indian Legend Sachin Tendulkar, who has played against 845 opponents in his international career.
In fact, Mahela is in the 2nd place overall, in the list of players to have played against most number of opponents while Sachin sits at 3rd place. What will surprise you more is to find out who tops the list in this record – Ireland’s Kevin O’Brien.
Kevin has played against a humongous 952 opponents in his international career, which is well and truly still active. At age 37, Kevin O’Brien still has a couple of years of cricket left in him, which would probably see the number of opponent count increase further.
Top 10 :
1. Kevin O’Brien 952
2. Mahela Jayawardene 872
3. Sachin Tendulkar 845
4. Shahid Afridi 839
5. William Porterfield 835
6. Shoaib Malik 819
7. Shakib Al Hasan 816
8. Chris Gayle 815
9. Sanath Jayasuriya 808
9. Paul Stirling 808
10. Gary Wilson 807