List of England Test cricketers

This is a list of England Test cricketers. A Test match is an international two-innings per team cricket match between two of the leading cricketing nations. The list is arranged in the order in which each player won his Test cap by playing for the England [cricket team]. Where more than one player won his first Test cap in the same Test match, those players are listed alphabetically by surname. The cap numbers correspond to a player's position in the chronological list of English Test cricketers. Players have this number displayed on their kit.
Statistics are correct as of 8 January 2026 after the 2025–26 Ashes series.

Early years: 1877–1889

The early years of Test cricket saw a number of tours to Australia. Most of these tours were professional in nature, and as the sea voyage was around 42 days, the tours lasted many months, and the teams were selected as much on availability as on cricketing aptitude. As a result of this, coupled with there only being a small number of Tests being played, there are many early cricketers with Test records of only a few matches.
The key players who had their Test debut during this period include the great professional all-rounders George Ulyett, who played 25 Tests, and Billy Barnes, who played 21. England's Champion cricketer WG Grace first played Test cricket in 1880. Although Test match cricket had not been invented in his heyday of the late 1860s and 1870s, he continued playing into his fifties, finally retiring from Test cricket at the turn of the century. Shrewsbury and Stoddart go down amongst the great captains of the period, as well as two of the many cricketing suicides. Johnny Briggs, who, bedevilled by mental illness, died young, notched up the most Test caps of the earliest era of Test match cricket.

Golden Age: 1890–1914

The period between 1890 and immediately before the First World War is known as the Golden Age of cricket. It saw great amateur players such as CB Fry, the Indian Prince Ranjitsinhji and captains Stanley Jackson, Archie MacLaren and Plum Warner as the leading lights in an era eulogised by Neville Cardus and others. In reality, it was not quite the great age of the amateur related in Cardus's writings. Sydney Barnes became the best paid cricketer by spurning county cricket to play in the Lancashire leagues.
However, the sheer volume of greats, that include Jack Hobbs, Tom Hayward, Gilbert Jessop and Wilfred Rhodes, means that the age retains a fond place in the memory of England's cricket fans. It was also an era in which Bernard Bosanquet invented the googly and Tip Foster became the only man to captain England at both cricket and football, and Rhodes, at 30 years, 10 months and 11 days, had the longest spanning Test career of all.

1970s

2010s

Shirt number history

Since the 2019 Ashes series, there has been an introduction of names and numbers on all Test players' shirts in an effort to engage new fans and help identify the players. This forms part of the inaugural ICC World Test Championship, a league competition between the top nine Test nations spread over a two-year period, culminating in a Final between the top two teams.

S/N	Current	Past
2	–	Alex Lees
6	Zak Crawley
7	–	Sam Billings
8	–	Stuart Broad
9	–	James Anderson
17	Ben Duckett
18	–	Moeen Ali
19	–	Chris Woakes
20	–	Jason Roy
22	Jofra Archer
23	–	Liam Livingstone
24	–	Joe Denly
25	–	Saqib Mahmood
26	Olly Stone
27	–	Rory Burns
29	–	Dawid Malan
32	–	Craig Overton
33	Mark Wood
35	Matthew Potts
37	Gus Atkinson
39	Jamie Smith
40	–	Matthew Fisher
47	Josh Hull	Dom Bess
49	–	Alex Lees
50	–	Ben Foakes
51	–	Jonny Bairstow
52	–	Dom Sibley
53	Rehan Ahmed
55	Ben Stokes
56	Josh Tongue	Zak Crawley
57	–	Ollie Robinson
58	–	Sam Curran
63	–	Jos Buttler
66	Joe Root
67	Shoaib Bashir
68	Dan Lawrence
70	–	Matt Parkinson
75	–	Jamie Overton
77	Jack Leach
79	Tom Hartley
80	Ollie Pope
82	Jacob Bethell	Matthew Potts
83	Liam Dawson
85	Will Jacks
86	Sam Cook
88	Harry Brook
90	–	James Bracey
92	Brydon Carse
93	–	Alex Lees
97	–	Haseeb Hameed