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Just six months ago, David Warner was a figure of derision. He was floundering on the field and flailing off it.
The Australian opener had no answers against India’s spinners during the 4-0 Test rout or against England’s quicks in the Ashes that followed. He was dropped from the Australian ODI side.
Amid all this, Warner regularly courted trouble by directing either his fist at Joe Root’s head or his middle finger at journos via Twitter. When directed by Cricket NSW authorities to play Sydney grade cricket last October, he didn’t bother to turn up.
His career was in a downward spiral, and he was perhaps fortunate to have been in the Australian side for November’s first Ashes Test in Brisbane.
Now, he is being considered as a potential all-time great of Australian cricket. Justifiably so, given his astounding displays against England and in South Africa.
Over those eight Tests he carved up five of the world’s leading pace bowlers – Dale Steyn, Vernon Philander, James Anderson, Stuart Broad and Morne Morkel, and reaped 1066 runs at 71, including five centuries.
Crucially, Warner tackled three major hoodoos on the tour of South Africa – his inability to score away from home, lesser returns in the first innings of Tests, and his ineptitude on slow decks.
All three will again be tested in October when Australia tour the UAE to play Pakistan. If he can conquer the world’s best spinner, Saeed Ajmal, on expected dustbowls, it will confirm his transformation into Australia’s most important batsman and arguably the most dangerous in Test cricket.
His astounding rise has seen him soar to fifth on the world Test batting rankings, comfortably ahead of his skipper Michael Clarke in ninth.
Warner trails only number one batsman AB de Villiers, Sri Lankan maestro Kumar Sangakkara, West Indies veteran Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Proteas kingpin Hashim Amla. His talent is so outrageous he could well leapfrog that quartet in the next 18 months.
Looking further ahead, it is also possible he could become Australia’s greatest Test opening batsman.
Who would he be competing with for such a title? We can start with the two men named as openers in the Australian Cricket Board’s Team of the Century – Arthur Morris and Bill Ponsford.
Given both Morris and Ponsford played in the first half of the 20th centuries, their Test careers were limited in terms of games played, so it is difficult to compare their achievements to those of modern-day players. But Warner is well placed to match the feats of more recent greats such as Matthew Hayden, Bill Lawry and Bob Simpson.
After just 30 Tests, Warner has already scored 2467 runs at 47, including eight centuries. Hayden had 2354 runs at 49, also with eight centuries. Lawry scored 2284 runs at 46, with five centuries, and Simpson made 1968 runs at 42, with one century.
Warner’s record slightly exceeds those of Hayden and Lawry at the same stage of their careers, and is comfortably better than Simpson’s. Granted, current batting averages are inflated due to more dynamic blades and flatter pitches. But Warner’s form over the past six months, a period during which he has finally matured as a Test batsman, suggests his average could soon soar well above 50.
Having only recently turned 27, the ultra-fit Warner could easily play Tests for another eight to nine years. That would potentially bring him up to about 130 Tests. If he simply maintained his current rate of scoring 82 runs per Test that would see him finish with 10,690 runs.
Of course, this is just one extreme end of the prediction scale. He could also falter or become distracted by the shorter formats and as a result fail to fulfil his potential at Test level.
The reality is no one can be confident whether or not Warner will be Australia’s greatest ever Test opener. But it is a genuine possibility.