The five best Australian batsmen since The Don
Columnist By Kersi Meher-Homji, 20 Jul 2010 Kersi Meher-Homji is a Roar Expert
- Tagged:
- Adam Gilchrist, Cricket, Mark Waugh, neil harvey, Ricky Ponting, Steve Waugh
It’s a challenging idea! Who were the five best Australian batsmen since Sir Don Bradman retired? There have been many, from Arthur Morris, Lindsay Hassett, Colin McDonald, Neil Harvey and Norm O’Neill, via Lawry and Simpson, the Chappell brothers, and the Waugh twins
Then there was the effervescent Walters, Stackpole, Slater, Gilchrist and Hayden, to hard as rock Redpath, AB Border and Tubby Taylor, to the current stars Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke and never-say-never, Simon Katich.
My number one on the list is the elegant left-hander, Neil Harvey.
To quote John Polack from CricInfo, he was: “an electrifying batsman who thrilled spectators with the splendour of his stroke-play.”
He also fielded brilliantly and broke stumps with a throw from the boundary line, despite poor eyesight in later years when he could barely read the scoreboard.
I was lucky to watch him score two centuries in separate Mumbai Tests more than 40 years ago. In 1956, he attacked India’s feared leg-spinner Subash Gupte with gusto.
In the 1961 Kanpur Test, India’s opening batsman Nari Contractor hooked Alan Davidson ferociously. Contractor later told me: “The ball middled beautifully and Harvey at square-leg turned back to avoid injury. But the ball miraculously lodged itself in between his upper thighs and I was out.”
Ouch!
My next choice is Greg Chappell. I watched most of his innings, from his Test debut in the December 1970 Perth Test when he scored 108, to his swansong in the Sydney Test of January 1984.
Prior to his final bow, he needed 69 runs to overtake Don Bradman’s Test aggregate of 6996 and three more runs to become the first Australian to aggregate 7000 runs. He also required two catches to beat England’s Colin Cowdrey’s then Test record of 120 catches.
Despite having these landmarks in sight, he announced his retirement on the second day. And what a glorious swansong!
He took three catches to overtake Cowdrey’s record in 27 fewer Tests and played a masterly innings of 182. I still remember his dazzling strokes, especially his on-drives.
He was a majestic batsman.
Allan Border and Steve Waugh are my heroes but Mark Waugh wins the third spot. What grace while executing his wristy leg-glance, his signature tune!
Call it lazy elegance.
Like Greg, he also marked his Test debut with a century. In the 1991 Adelaide Ashes Test, he came in with Australia at 4-104 and stroked 138 runs off 186 balls.
Raved John Thickeness in Wisden: “He produced an innings which a batsman of any generation would have been overjoyed to play any time in his career, let alone in a first Test appearance and in a situation verged on crisis.”
A few months later, Mark Waugh scored an unbeaten 139 (3 sixes and 11 fours) in the St John’s Test against a frightening West Indies pace attack of Curtly Ambrose, Malcolm Marshall, Patrick Patterson and Courtney Walsh.
A journey to greatness had started, which along with twin Steve, ‘Tubby’, Warney, Healy, Gilly, McGrath, Slater, Ponting and Hayden, made Australia almost invincible from 1995 to 2007.
Mark’s ODI opening partner Adam Gilchrist is my next choice.
Born three years after the death of Stan McCabe, ebullient Gilchrist is perhaps his avatar (reincarnate). Both were scintillating excitement machines.
One expected fireworks from Gilly the minute he reached the middle. No settling period for the gregarious wicketkeeper-batsman. He was the uncrowned Six Sultan, having smashed 100 sixes in 96 Tests.
Next best is West Indies legend Brian Lara, with 88 in 131 Tests.
Gilchrist played so many magical innings that it is difficult to single out one.
To me, his outstanding effort was his unbeaten 149 against Pakistan at Hobart in 1999. In only his second Test, he led Australia to an unexpected victory with a magnificent sixth wicket stand of 238 with Justin Langer.
Challenged to score 369 for a win, Australia was in trouble at 5-126 but the valiant left-handers led the home side to a surprise victory.
“Gilchrist’s batting is as effortlessly potent as Pavarotti’s singing”, wrote Robert Drane in ‘Inside Sport’.
My final choice is Ricky Ponting.
He is the embodiment of grace and grit, power and placement, timing and tenacity. Determination oozes from every pour of his body as he takes his batting stance or stands in slips, chewing gum.
He plays all the shots with a full flourish of the bat, the cover drive and the pull predominating. Only India’s Sachin Tendulkar has recorded more centuries and runs in Tests.
It is difficult being stylish and pugnacious but Ponting is both. I have not mentioned his best innings because it is still to come.
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- Explore:
- Adam Gilchrist, Cricket, Mark Waugh, neil harvey, Ricky Ponting, Steve Waugh
July 20th 2010 @ 10:12am
sledgeross said | July 20th 2010 @ 10:12am | Report comment
Mark Waugh for me. His elegance and technique transcend era’s. Sometimes you look at older footage and wonder how older players would go in modern times, but I think Junior, from an aesthetic view, is the best batsman Ive seen.
July 20th 2010 @ 11:24am
formeropenside said | July 20th 2010 @ 11:24am | Report comment
sledgeross –
I’d agree with M. Waugh as “most gifted” Australian batsmen I have seen (an Australian Gower if you will) but not the best.
July 20th 2010 @ 10:49am
Adam said | July 20th 2010 @ 10:49am | Report comment
It is refreshing to be on The Roar and for people to rate sportsmen for exactly what they are, people who play sport. et their elegance, skills and numbers speak for themselves.
July 20th 2010 @ 12:26pm
sledgeross said | July 20th 2010 @ 12:26pm | Report comment
Openside, I guess it depends on how you classify “best”. I look back at Mark Waugh in retrospect and recognise just what a great allround batsman he was. When he was playing, i used to scorn him as wasting his talent, and pointed to the fact that for half his career Greg Matthews had a higher test score than him. He was too often seen to get a score but never go on with it. WHn he was playing I preffered the likes of AB , Boony and Tugga, because of their grit and bravado. And its only now that I relish watching Mark Waugh bat, and its too late to appreciate it! Woe is me!
July 20th 2010 @ 2:05pm
Tom said | July 20th 2010 @ 2:05pm | Report comment
I think he was guilty of laziness a bit, which is reflected in his statistics which aren’t as good as they perhaps should have been for someone of his immense talent. Certainly seeing his 173 in that one dayer against the Windies was sensational – more artistry than sport.
July 20th 2010 @ 2:29pm
sheek said | July 20th 2010 @ 2:29pm | Report comment
This is the conundrum of talent – possessing it is one thing, realising it another altogether.
In the Chappell family, the youngest – Trevor – broke both his elder brothers (Ian & Greg) records at school. All of them! It was suggested he would be a great test batsman. This never happened. Perhaps the weight of expectation was too great for him.
In the Waugh family, Mark was the more naturally gifted, but Steve was the one who applied himself better. Success doesn’t always go to the most talented, but often to the most determined & dogged.
When determining greatness, we can all get confused between what we see & what we wished we saw….. ! Then again, if we all thought the same, it would be a boring world….. ?
July 20th 2010 @ 2:40pm
Brett McKay said | July 20th 2010 @ 2:40pm | Report comment
Sheek, I can take that even further – in my last year or years of high school (early 90s), word quickly filtered through the CHS Davidson Shield ranks that one Dean Waugh had knocked up something like 225* (in a 50 over game), and what may still be a record for the competition.
Dean played a season or two of mostly limited overs games for NSW a few years later (including being the first family to have three brothers in the same NSW XI), headed to SA for a few more seasons, before fading into sibling obscurity…..
July 20th 2010 @ 8:18pm
JohnB said | July 20th 2010 @ 8:18pm | Report comment
Sheek, I’ve read or seen a doco where Ian Chappell explained that when he and Greg were at school, the school team played in the local grade competition (in second or third grade or whatever). Therefore from an early age they were playing against men – some of them on their way up through the grades, others old stagers with experience. By the time Trevor came along, the school played in a school competition and not in the grade comp. Ian thought this toughened up the good school players. I don’t think he was saying this to belittle Trevor, or his better stats (another way in which they can distort reality), but more as saying hard competition is the way to go.
Incidentally, for what it’s worth, selecting the 5 best batsmen since Bradman is in my view really selecting the 2 best besides Harvey, G. Chappell and Ponting, who are on a different level from the other contenders for mine. I’d probably go for Border as 4 but 5 depends what role you want him to play.
February 18th 2011 @ 12:34pm
Nat said | February 18th 2011 @ 12:34pm | Report comment
However Trevor Chappell gave us that other memorable underarm event, that rubbed salt into a win against the kiwis that was always going to happen anyway. I still smile when I think of how much this annoyed our bros across the ditch
July 20th 2010 @ 2:56pm
Kersi Meher-Homji said | July 20th 2010 @ 2:56pm | Report comment
Sheek and Brett,
I often wonder whether it is a help or a hindrance to have a high profiled sportsman as your dad or elder brother. Bradman’s son even changed his surname to Bradsen to avoid being constantly compared.
Would Trevor Chappell have become a regular Test player if there were no Ian and Greg; would Dean and Danny Waugh have played regularly in Shield cricket if there were no Steve and Mark?
We shall never know.
July 20th 2010 @ 2:57pm
Michael C said | July 20th 2010 @ 2:57pm | Report comment
This is all too easy,
Bill Lawry,
Dean Jones,
Brad Hodge,
Richie Robinson
and
Merv Hughes…….
July 20th 2010 @ 4:54pm
Vinay Verma said | July 20th 2010 @ 4:54pm | Report comment
Michael C,but of course he is a Victorian and they don’t like brown paper bags.
July 20th 2010 @ 4:44pm
Bob said | July 20th 2010 @ 4:44pm | Report comment
Crikey Ponting bats at three, has scored more runs and has a better average than the others. Admittedly he never had to face Holding, Garner, Marshall etc…. but his record speaks for itself. Maybe he hasn’t the clean cut image of the others- but performances matter.
July 20th 2010 @ 4:53pm
Vinay Verma said | July 20th 2010 @ 4:53pm | Report comment
Bob,I share your frustration and Ponting perhaps will be more appreciated after he retires. His legend will grow in the telling. It is a toss up between Greg Chappell and Ponting for the best since Bradman tag. Ponting’s back foot drive through extra cover is a magnificent shot and his straight driving is on a par with Norm O Neill. And of course the hook is his signature shot.
But for mine Greg Chappels’ grenadier guard and erect style takes some beating. There were no ugly lines in his batting. The sraight line from eye to shoulder to bat and the effortless caress…absolute poetry in motion.
July 20th 2010 @ 7:28pm
stu said | July 20th 2010 @ 7:28pm | Report comment
Gilly was awesome – easily the most exciting australian batsman in the last 20 years… class act in so many ways
July 20th 2010 @ 7:51pm
katzilla said | July 20th 2010 @ 7:51pm | Report comment
Notice how in 4 x 100 relay the best runner always brings it home?
I’ll just throw Michael Bevan out there.
July 20th 2010 @ 8:14pm
Fisher Price said | July 20th 2010 @ 8:14pm | Report comment
Mark Waugh. Are you having a laugh?
Wouldn’t even be in my top 5 from the ’90s.
July 20th 2010 @ 8:28pm
sheek said | July 20th 2010 @ 8:28pm | Report comment
Fisher Price,
Well, this is one of the problems. Sometimes the lines get blurred by what is meant by ‘best’.
You pick Mark Waugh or Doug Walters for style & entertainment; Greg Chappell or Neil Harvey for substance & results, & a little style; Allan Border or Steve Waugh when you need to dig yourself out of a huge hole…..
I think answering the question ought to be easy, but most of us go off in tangents (me included) so we can bring our favourites into the frame.
We even cross-over into one-dayers, so someone (Katzilla) can mention Michael Bevan….. lol….. !