Almanac Cricket: Wickets, plenty of them

 

 

 

A batsman’s game?

 

 

 

 

 

Cricket is a game built for batsmen.

• Geoff Lawson

 

 

When Geoff Lawson lamented the role of the bowler, he was commentating on ABC radio during an Ashes series, when an LBW decision had been given not out. The replay, with a ghosted set of stumps and ball-tracking, showed the ball was clipping the leg stump.

 

‘It’s hitting the leg stump,’ Lawson complained. ‘We have the technology that shows it’s out and we’re not using it. Why isn’t it out?’

 

Sitting beside him, the voice of cricket – Jim Maxwell – chuckled. ‘Why weren’t you a batsman then?’

 

Lawson’s answer was predictable. ‘Because I couldn’t bat.’

 

‘There it is then,’ Maxwell said with a laugh. ‘That’s why you were a bowler. That’s why we have batsmen and bowlers.’

 

Batsmen and bowlers. Both win games. Lawson’s lament, as a bowler, was based on experience. He took 180 wickets from 46 Tests, and would’ve played more if his back didn’t blow out. He also averaged 15.96 with the bat, which is handy for a bowler.

 

Lawson worked hard for his wickets, finishing with an average of 30.56. ‘I was a bowler by talent,’ Lawson said. ‘But cricket is a game for batsmen. We refer run-outs and stumpings to the third umpire, but not LBWs. Why not? And there’s no limit to the amount of runs a batsman can take. But bowlers have to share ten wickets, or twenty across a Test. Someone might take 20 wickets in a five Test series, but a batsman can score 500 or more runs.’

 

Maxwell was chuckling. ‘The unfairness of cricket.’

 

‘And one-day pitches are flat and give the bowler nothing,’ Lawson said. ‘The fielding restrictions are all in favour of the batsmen.’

 

‘But a good bowler will get wickets regardless of the pitch or the format and the fielding restrictions,’ Maxwell said. ‘And one mistake and the batsman is out.’

 

‘Sure, but the umpires are told to give the batsmen the benefit of the doubt.’

 

‘Sometimes rightly and wrongly,’ Maxwell said. ‘So aside from talent, why be a bowler?’

 

‘Because there’s nothing better than taking a wicket,’ Lawson said.

 

 

There was unfairness

 

For more than a century, cricket was unfair. Batters were feted for scoring 50 runs, and they raised their bat. After scoring 100 runs, they raised it again in more grandiose fashion. Some didn’t just raise the bat, they ran about, waved the bat and kissed their helmet. A show of exuberance, and rightly so.

 

But a bowler could take eight wickets in an innings, and though his teammates and the crowd offered applause and congratulations, there was no defining moment, nothing resembling the raising of the bat.

 

Glenn McGrath changed it. In 2019, McGrath told Channel 7 how he invented the bowlers ball salute during the 2001 Ashes series in England. ‘There was me, Fleming, Kasprowicz and Gillespie,’ McGrath said. ‘(I said) the next bowler to take five wickets in an international innings would take the ball and raise it to the crowd. Shortly after that we played at Lord’s in 2001. I was lucky enough to pick up my fifth wicket, I called for the ball off the umpire, raised the ball to the crowd. The batsmen had no idea what was going on.’

 

Initially, the crowd didn’t either, but they quickly worked it out, as did the commentators. Bowlers should be feted for taking five wickets. Another idea arose, to bring bowlers and batters further into comparison. Taking five wickets in an innings was akin to making a Test century.

 

Now, every bowler who takes five wickets in an innings raises the ball to the crowd. It has become traditional, and rightly so.

 

 

Statistics – and the toil

 

In Test cricket, batters and bowlers are judged by their average. Great bats average 50 or more. Great bowlers average 25 or less. Whereas batters tend to be rated purely by average, there are two statistics that rate bowlers – their average and their strike rate.

 

The importance of strike rate cannot be understated. Great Test batters tend to score at a strike rate between 42 and 50-odd, though Ricky Ponting had a strike rate of 68 runs per 100 balls. Great bowlers tend to take a wicket every 50 or so balls. Exceptional bowlers like Fred Trueman, Malcolm Marshall, Dale Steyn, Waqar Younis, Allan Donald had strike rates in the 40s. Deadly. Of the current bowlers, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc have strike rates in the 40s, while Kasigo Rabada has a strike rate of 39.

 

A bowler, obviously, is exerting more effort for a wicket every 50 balls or more.

 

Imagine if children were presented with the statistics, and the average and strike rate were analysed for them. If kids were told they would have to bowl between seven and ten overs to take a wicket, and they would have to work physically harder than batters, no one would want to be a bowler.

 

Consider the formative years of cricket. Few kids want to be a bowler. It is harder, and not just physically, to be a bowler. Kids have to get the ball on the pitch, and then they might get smacked for four. In the playground at primary school, and at junior cricket, most kids would rather bat than bowl. That leaves kids who can’t bat with two options – to quit cricket or become a bowler.

 

That old cliché, batsmen are born but bowlers are made, could be changed – batsmen are born but bowlers are forced to bowl.

 

In a Test match, a bowler might bowl forty overs, or 240 balls. They must be fit to run in and expend effort with every ball. They cannot get tired until all the wickets are taken or an innings is declared. Occasionally, bowlers have to run in across two days. And trot down to fine leg and prowl the boundary for a rest.

 

There is no suggestion that bowlers are undervalued. In cricket, there is no greater sight than a bowler taking a wicket. Test cricket fans love seeing wickets, and those moments are replayed repeatedly, because they are special, individual triumphs within a game. Wickets are cricket’s money shot, and bowlers feel no greater relief, aside from winning, when they take a wicket.

 

As a cricket tragic, I understood Geoff Lawson’s lament. I was captivated by bowlers as a kid, particularly Lillee, Thompson and all those West Indian fast bowlers that once rolled off their production line.

 

Batsmen seemed to be the conservative action of cricket. Bowlers had flair and fire. To be quick was to be dangerous. To spin, with cunning and guile, was to embarrass batsmen. I loved all bowlers, spinners, pace and those in between. I felt immense sympathy for the bowler when a catch was dropped, because they had expended all that effort for naught.

 

Catches win matches…

 

Bowlers and batters do too. Every run and wicket in Test matches are crucial, not just for the team but for the individual.

 

 

The record holders   

 

 

Trueman:

 

English fast bowler Fred Trueman was the first man to take 300 Test wickets. Nicknamed Fiery, he scoffed at suggestions he was occasionally ill-tempered and claimed Fiery rhymed with Fred. In 1965, he retired from Test cricket, having taken 307 wickets in 67 matches at an average of 21.54. In proof of his fiery temperament, he missed 51 Tests from the beginning to the end of his career, mostly because of his criticism of the establishment, and the fear he couldn’t be controlled on and off the field.

 

Upon retirement, Trueman was asked if anyone else would take 300 Test wickets. ‘Aye, but whoever does it will be bloody tired,’ he said.

 

Trueman once claimed he would’ve taken 400 Test wickets, if he hadn’t been repeatedly overlooked, and he offered advice to kids who wanted to bowl as he had: ‘To be a great fast bowler, you need a big heart and a big bottom’.

 

His record of 307 Test wickets stood more than ten years.

 

 

Gibbs:

 

On 12 December 1975, Australian opener Ian Redpath was caught by Michael Holding off the bowling of West Indian spinner Lance Gibbs. With that wicket, Gibbs surpassed Trueman’s record. The first spinner to take 300 Test wickets, Gibbs, was 41 years old when he became record holder and retired soon afterwards. He played 79 Tests and captured 309 wickets at an average of 29.09.

 

In an interview with Vaneisa Baksh in November 2018, Gibbs recalled West Indian team manager Berkeley Gaskin offering advice before he made his Test debut.

 

‘Lance, your arm must touch your ear,’ Gaskin said.

 

Gibbs explained the benefits of his bowling arm almost brushing his ear. ‘That means it is high up, and if you’re spinning the ball and you put it down in a certain spot, you can get bounce. So, the ball is not going to hit the middle of the bat, it’s going to hit the edges.’

 

Gibbs held the record for more than six years.

 

 

Lillee:

 

On 27 December, 1981, during the Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, West Indian Larry Gomes was caught by Greg Chappell at first slip off the bowling of Dennis Lillee. Chappell’s catch gave Lillee the world record of 310 Test wickets.

 

‘It was one that we’d planned,’ Lillee told Richie Benaud years later. ‘Going wider on the crease and angling right across Gomes with the slips a little wider. It worked and it gave me a lot of pleasure. Then I lost my cool, it was all too much. It think I lost my way. I went to third man instead of fine leg.’

 

The MCG crowd sung Waltzing Matilda to Lillee as he finally went to field at fine leg. Lillee was the first Australian bowler to claim 300 Test wickets and the world record. He took his 300^th wicket in his 56^th Test. Trueman’s 300^th Test wicket came in his 65th Test, while Gibbs took his 300^th wicket in his 75^th Test.

 

Lillee retired from Test cricket on January 6 1984, having taken 355 Test wickets. He played 70 Tests and would have played more if not for serious stress fractures in his back and the fracture of World Series Cricket.

 

The record belonged to Lillee for almost five years.

 

 

Botham:

 

On August 21 1986, all-rounder Ian Botham was recalled to the English team after being banned for possessing marijuana. Botham’s career had ebbed and flowed. He was undoubtedly brilliant, but had been thrust into the captaincy too soon. At times, it was easy to wonder if Botham couldn’t figure out whether he was a batter or bowler, so he often approached both with attacking abandon.

 

Against New Zealand, with his second ball of the match, Botham equalled Lillee’s record when Graham Gooch caught Bruce Edgar. The final ball of his second over, Botham captured Jeff Crowe leg before wicket, snatching the record from Lillee.

 

Arms raised and fists clenched, Botham let out a guttural roar. Teammates shook his hand and patted his back, and Botham wandered down to field in the slips to polite applause.

 

He was chuffed, but after retiring he was circumspect about the record. ‘I’m not one for looking back,’ he said.

 

He took 72 Tests to take 300 wickets, 83 Tests to take 350 wickets and 85 Tests to surpass Lillee. That’s no criticism – Botham had dual roles to play. He played 102 Tests and took 383 wickets. He arguably played too long, taking 33 wickets in his last 19 Tests, and scoring one century and just two fifties.

 

‘Retiring for good wasn’t difficult,’ Botham said. ‘I knew at the time it was right. I was no longer capable of achieving the standards I’d set myself and there was no light at the end of the tunnel.’

 

Botham held the record for 27 months.

 

 

Hadlee:

 

Botham claimed the world record against New Zealand, and it was a Kiwi – Richard Hadlee – who took it from him.

 

On 25 November 1988, Hadlee had Rashid Patel caught by Ken Rutherford for a duck. The wicket was Hadlee’s 384^th in his 76^th Test. Hadlee – who made no secret of his affection for records – continued to play. The added burden of carrying New Zealand’s bowling attack for a decade didn’t deter him. The first bowler to claim 400 Test wickets, Hadlee eventually claimed 431 from 86 Tests. He is often shamefully overlooked, because he played for New Zealand. He retired at 38, and if his body hadn’t broken down, he might have played until he captured 500 wickets.

 

Hadlee’s grim determination to take wickets ensured his record stood for more than five years. ‘To be a pacesetter, and a New Zealander to do it which was unheard of, and to manage to hang onto it for another five or so years,’ Hadlee recalled to Mark Geenty in 2018. ‘To be the one for others to chase was significant in my career. It was sheer delight and relief. This wicket had been contemplated for so long, it was there for the taking and all of a sudden it became a reality. All the players gathered around and congratulated me, my wife at the time, Karen, was there at the ground. I got tied up in the euphoria of the whole thing but the key point was it was done quickly and we got on with the game. But we got beaten.’

 

Botham claimed the record against New Zealand, and lost it to them. Hadlee claimed the record against India, and lost it to Kapil Dev.

 

 

Dev:

 

Driven by the lure of the world record, Dev claimed it after Hashan Tillkaratne was caught by Sanjay Manjrekar on 8 February 1994.

 

At stumps, Dev told journalists that he wanted to play for two more years. Minutes later, India’s selectors organised a hasty meeting to decide Dev’s future. He was 35, and they believed he was finished. Former selector Anshuman Gaekwad told journalist Prakash Rai that he thought Dev would retire after breaking the record, so he sought an urgent meeting with him in the dressing room.

 

‘Kaps, we need to talk to you,’ Gaekwad said. ‘The selectors feel that you need to quit now, and you also know it. We will give you a farewell game as per your choice, but you’ve got to call it a day.’

 

‘Thank you very much,’ Dev said. ‘I really appreciate what you told me.’

 

Dev played one more Test before retirement, and finished with 434 wickets from 131 Tests. He owned the record but he played 45 more Tests than Hadlee. His average and strike rate were considerably higher. In his 83^rd Test, he took his 300^th wicket. His 400^th wicket came in his 115^th Test.

 

In proof of his all-round ability, Dev remains the only man in Test cricket to have taken more than 400 wickets and scored more than 5,000 runs.

 

 

Walsh:

 

Dev’s reign lasted six years and 47 days. On March 27, 2000, West Indian fast bowler Courtney Walsh claimed the record against Zimbabwe, having Henry Olonga caught by Wavell Hinds. Walsh, overlooked early in his career as the poor cousin to the barrage of West Indian fast bowlers, was the original marathon man of international cricket. It was his 114^th Test.

 

‘It was very satisfying that at the end of the day it happened in Jamaica,’ he said in an interview at stumps. ‘I felt today was the day. I felt very confident from last night. When I got the first wicket, I knew it was coming. When I got the second, I felt it was only a matter of time but when Zimbabwe started to lose a lot of wickets it crossed my mind that I might not reach the record.

 

‘I told the skipper that although the record is approaching, the Test match was more important but I was very happy when he came back to me and asked me how I felt. I told him I was ready and he gave me the ball. He showed the confidence in me to give me the ball.’

 

Hours later, Kapil Dev sent four bottles of champagne to Jamaica for Walsh to enjoy with his teammates. ‘I am very happy that he has passed the record,’ Dev said in an interview in India. ‘Records are meant to be broken and it’s all the more fitting that Courtney has done it in his home country where he learnt his cricket.’

 

Walsh’s longevity was amazing, having bowled more than 30,000 balls in Tests alone. The first player to take 500 wickets, Walsh finished with 519 wickets from 132 Tests.

 

He took his 300^th Test wicket in his 80^th Test, his 400^th in his 107^th Test and remains the fifth fastest bowler to take 500 wickets after 129 Tests. He averaged 24.44, with a strike rate of 57.8. He may not have been the best West Indian fast bowler, but he out-bowled them all.

 

Walsh held the record for four years and 42 days.

 

 

Muralitharan:

 

Muttiah Muralitharan, a spinner from Sri Lanka, ate wickets for breakfast. On 7 May 2004, against Zimbabwe, the hapless batsman Alester Maregwede was caught and bowled by Muralitharan.

 

It is indisputable that Muralitharan played many Tests on spin-friendly wickets against weaker cricketing nations. Of his 520 wickets when he claimed the record, 105 came against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. Still, he played against all cricket nations, and has solid records against them all.

 

Controversy followed Muralitharan. Twice he was called for throwing in Australia – in a Test in 1995 and a one-day game in 1999. In 2004, match referee Chris Broad reported him for throwing the doosra. Aggrieved, Muralitharan underwent biomechanical tests in Western Australia. Following the tests, the ICC ordered the levels of tolerance in bending the arm in international cricket be reviewed.

 

The previous levels of tolerance for fast bowlers were set at a 10-degree elbow bend, 7.5 for medium pacers and 5 degrees for spinners. Following the biomechanical tests, the ICC asked the biomechanical scientists to decide on one figure, applicable to all bowlers.

 

The current level of tolerance is now a 15-degree elbow bend for all bowlers. That 15-degree figure meant Muralitharan’s action was legal. Those who claim he was a chucker suggest the rule was altered for him, to keep him playing. It must be said that Muralitharan insisted on the biomechanical tests, believing he was innocent of chucking.

 

Due to an enforced layoff with a shoulder injury, Muralitharan held the record just five months.

 

 

Warne:

 

Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne overtook Muralitharan on 15 October 2004, when Matthew Hayden caught Irfan Pathan at slip. The wicket was Warne’s 533^rd in his 114^th Test. After the final Test against India in 2004, Warned had played 115 Tests for 541 wickets at an average of 25.59 and a strike rate of 59.7.

 

Warne was the second Australian to hold the Test wicket record and while the moment was one to savour, he couldn’t get too attached to it. In decades past, when a bowler retired as the record holder, he often waited years for it to be broken. Warne, with Muralitharan breathing down his neck, had no time to relax.

 

It was a race to 600 wickets. Warne arrived first, on 11 August 2005, when he had England’s Marcus Trescothick caught behind. Warne kept taking wickets, beating batters with his guile and savvy. In 2005, he took a world record 96 wickets from 15 Tests, a record that is yet to be broken.

 

On 26 December 2006, Warne became the first man in cricket to take 700 Test wickets when he bowled Andrew Strauss.

 

Warne told the ABC’s Leigh Sales that the crowd was building on Boxing Day and he could feel the anticipation. ‘The ovation I got when I walked out onto the ground,’ he recalled. ‘The delay of the 700^th wicket not quite happening, and then suddenly it happened. The thing I remember is it was so quiet. It was a bit eerie how quiet it was. I’d stand at the top of my mark and normally you could hear someone, whatever they were saying. And when I was at the top of my mark there was a hush, because they thought is this going to be the ball that is going to take my 700^th. It was an eerie silence of 90,000 people. It was pretty amazing.’

 

Warne yorked Strauss, and with his right hand in the air, went for a short run, grinning and the spectators roared in delight. Then he was mobbed by his teammates. ‘I took the wicket and I was off celebrating,’ he recalled. ‘It was more like relief. I ran around in a circle and I got puffed and had to stop. The atmosphere, the energy and everything that was here that day was something very special.’

 

He later said it was uncanny the way it all panned out, as though it was scripted that he would take his 700^th wicket in front of his home crowd.

 

Warne played one more Test – his 145^th – and finished with 708 wickets. Ten times he took ten or more wickets in a Test match, and he took five wickets in an innings 37 times.

 

Warne worked through injuries to his finger and his right shoulder, and endured a year’s suspension for taking a banned diuretic. He was magnificent, a colossus of cricket and people watched expectantly for something to happen whenever he had the ball. Most of the wickets Warne played on, particularly in Australia, were more suited to fast bowlers.

 

Warne was the first bowler to take 700 wickets. But Muralitharan wasn’t going to be denied. Warne held the record almost a year.

 

 

Muralitharan again:

 

On December 3, 2007, Muralitharan bowled Paul Collingwood in Kandy to take the record from Warne. After play, Muralitharan was thrilled. ‘It’s my hometown, my parents are here, my wife is here,’ he said in an interview after play. ‘All the relatives are here and all my schoolfriends. It’s a bigger moment than if I had taken it in Australia. It’s the right time, I think. It’s not easy to take six wickets in an innings, I managed to let my pressure off now.’

 

Muralitharan took his 700^th wicket in 113 Tests, 31 fewer than Warne. He regained the world record in his 116^th Test, whereas Warne had played 145.

 

22 July 2010, Muralitharan took his 800^th wicket from his final ball in Test cricket, and retired. He was 38, and played 133 Tests, averaging 22.72 with a strike rate of 55.

 

His career was remarkable – 22 times he took ten wickets in a Test, and he took five wickets in an innings 67 times. Muralitharan is the only player in Test cricket to take 10 wickets in a match against the other Test playing countries.

 

His world record – 800 Test wickets – is unlikely to ever be surpassed.

 

 

Argument – who was better?

 

With the exception of Muralitharan and Warne, the record holders from year’s past have all shifted down the list of leading Test wicket takers. Trueman is now 36^th on the list, Lillie is at 24, Botham 19, Hadlee 13 and Dev at 11.

 

Cricinfo’s list of leading wicket takers starts the list at 200 wickets. There are 81 Test bowlers in the men’s game who have taken 200 or more Test wickets. Of those in the top 20, just four – Marshall, Dev, Hadlee and Botham – began their careers in the Seventies. Of the rest, only Walsh and Wasim Akram played their first Test in the Eighties. The modern era featuring more tours gives great bowlers the chance to play more Tests.

 

300 Test wickets remains the benchmark of a great bowler, but better diets, training and recovery is allowing bowlers to keep playing long after their contemporaries had retired. Seventeen Test bowlers have taken more than 400 wickets. Where great Test batters once played into their late thirties and forties, great bowlers are playing until they near or hit 40. Think Warne (37), Muralitharan (38), Walsh (38) and Stuart Broad (36) and Jimmy Anderson (40).

 

Age is no longer a factor. It is, as the cliché suggests, just a number for great Test bowlers. They key point in bowling longevity is taking wickets. Do that, and there is no reason to retire.

 

Examining Cricinfo’s list, it is easy to conjure up myriad arguments, on who was better.

 

So, who was better?

 

• Warne or Muralitharan?
• Anderson or McGrath?
• Lyon or Harbhajan Singh?
• Hadlee or Ashwin?*
• Marshall or Steyn?
• Kumble or Herath?
• Dev or Botham?
• Walsh or Broad?
• Pollock or Akram?
• Ambrose or Ntini?

 

*Ashwin is a spinner, so the argument perhaps cannot properly be made. Consider this then – was Lillee better than Hadlee?

 

Those arguments, if they were made, could rage on forever. Without considering the country a Test was being played in or pitch conditions, try picking four bowlers to represent your team from that list.

 

Argument?

 

It matters little who you pick.

 

The conversation between Lawson and Maxwell depicted above was recalled from hasty notes I made at the time. Lawson eventually got his way – the Decision Referral System was introduced in 2008 – and a shout for LBW that shows the ball clipping the wickets can be overturned or upheld on appeal.

 

The ICC suggest the technology doesn’t favour batters or bowlers, and it doesn’t. Test cricket is fairer with the DRS system.

 

But cricket has always been a game with a divide – batters and bowlers. It can’t be otherwise, and if bowlers grumble about sending down 40 overs in a Test, they need to remember Trueman’s words – a bowler needs a big heart and a big bottom.

 

 

Cricinfo’s list of most wickets in Tests
Player	Span	Mat	Inns	Balls	Runs	Wkts	BBI	BBM	Ave	Econ	SR	5	10
M Muralidaran (ICC/SL)	1992-2010	133	230	44039	18180	800	9/51	16/220	22.72	2.47	55.0	67	22
SK Warne (AUS)	1992-2007	145	273	40705	17995	708	8/71	12/128	25.41	2.65	57.4	37	10
JM Anderson (ENG)	2003-2022	177*	328	37811	17595	673	7/42	11/71	26.14	2.79	56.1	32	3
A Kumble (IND)	1990-2008	132	236	40850	18355	619	10/74	14/149	29.65	2.69	65.9	35	8
SCJ Broad (ENG)	2007-2022	159	293	31982	15720	566	8/15	11/121	27.77	2.94	56.5	19	3
GD McGrath (AUS)	1993-2007	124	243	29248	12186	563	8/24	10/27	21.64	2.49	51.9	29	3
CA Walsh (WI)	1984-2001	132	242	30019	12688	519	7/37	13/55	24.44	2.53	57.8	22	3
NM Lyon (AUS)	2011-2022	112*	211	29122	14300	449	8/50	13/154	31.84	2.94	64.8	21	3
R Ashwin (IND)	2011-2022	86	162	23089	10666	442	7/59	13/140	24.13	2.77	52.2	30	7
DW Steyn (SA)	2004-2019	93	171	18608	10077	439	7/51	11/60	22.95	3.24	42.3	26	5
N Kapil Dev (IND)	1978-1994	131	227	27740	12867	434	9/83	11/146	29.64	2.78	63.9	23	2
HMRKB Herath (SL)	1999-2018	93	170	25993	12157	433	9/127	14/184	28.07	2.80	60.0	34	9
Sir RJ Hadlee (NZ)	1973-1990	86	150	21918	9611	431	9/52	15/123	22.29	2.63	50.8	36	9
SM Pollock (SA)	1995-2008	108	202	24353	9733	421	7/87	10/147	23.11	2.39	57.8	16	1
Harbhajan Singh (IND)	1998-2015	103	190	28580	13537	417	8/84	15/217	32.46	2.84	68.5	25	5
Wasim Akram (PAK)	1985-2002	104	181	22627	9779	414	7/119	11/110	23.62	2.59	54.6	25	5
CEL Ambrose (WI)	1988-2000	98	179	22103	8501	405	8/45	11/84	20.99	2.30	54.5	22	3
M Ntini (SA)	1998-2009	101	190	20834	11242	390	7/37	13/132	28.82	3.23	53.4	18	4
IT Botham (ENG)	1977-1992	102	168	21815	10878	383	8/34	13/106	28.40	2.99	56.9	27	4
MD Marshall (WI)	1978-1991	81	151	17584	7876	376	7/22	11/89	20.94	2.68	46.7	22	4

 

 

 

Epilogue

 

The bowler ran in, ignoring the tight calf muscle, trying to keep the rhythm. Staring at the batter, his thoughts at that moment were myriad – pitch it up, not too straight, don’t overstep, get him hitting on the up, swing the ball, make him play – just get him out.

 

In delivery stride, the bowler’s radar zeroed in on a spot on the pitch, just short of a length and about six inches outside off-stump.

 

The umpire glanced at the crease and saw the bowler’s foot was half-behind it. Raising his eyes, the umpire heard the grunt as the bowler let the ball go. The red ball fired down the pitch.

 

Pulling up after delivery, the bowler kept his eyes on the ball as it cannoned into the batter’s pads. Twirling in mid-air, the bowler held both arms up and screamed aauuggh…

 

The wicket-keeper was already up, as were the slips. Everyone on the field, and those watching held their breath and stared at the umpire. The batter stepped away, hoping…

 

‘You are out,’ the umpire said, raising his finger.

 

Letting out a guttural cry, the bowler turned from the umpire, seeing his teammates running toward him, grinning, laughing and embracing him.

 

Head down, the vanquished batsman trudged off the field. Removing his helmet, he swore.

 

The bowler wiped sweat from his forehead and sucked a deep breath into hot lungs.

 

‘Well bowled,’ the captain said. ‘We needed that wicket.’

 

Blowing out a breath through red cheeks, the bowler accepted the pats on the back and the encouragement of his teammates. The sun beat down. He felt afire, and took another deep breath to ward off exhaustion. His quads felt heavy and he shook out his legs, then stretched his troublesome calf.

 

‘That was plum,’ the wicket-keeper said with a grin. ‘You were all over him.’

 

‘Perfect line and length,’ the vice-captain said. ‘Geez, you’re bowling well.’

 

At that moment, the bowler felt invincible. The wicket was crucial, as the match was almost slipping away.

 

‘Right,’ the captain said. ‘Everyone concentrate. Every ball. Don’t let anything past you.’ He patted the bowler on the shoulder. ‘I know you’ve bowled a lot of overs, but we need another quick wicket.’

 

The bowler took a deep breath and stepped back as his teammates ran to position. The umpire threw him the ball. Walking back to his mark, the bowler turned as the new batter took guard. I must’ve bowled 20 overs for three wickets, he thought. Sucking in another deep breath, he ran in. Just another quick wicket, he thought.

 

 

 

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