One-day greats: they’re here but aren’t playing

Just as deadly as the late Malcolm Marshall: a giant as a player on the field, a gentleman off it.

When looking around World Cup 2003, memories of past events, such as World Cup 1983, quietly nudge the thoughts for attention. Twenty years is a long time, and England in those days was a far better side than they are these days with Ronnie (Reliable Rocket) Irani not even a pale shadow of Ian Botham.

Television and radio teams with names such as Holding, Sir Richard Hadlee, Botham, Sir Vivian Richards, David Gower, Ravi Shastri, Kepler Wessels and Allan Border, all mulling over the 2003 World Cup stage, do not knock the standards. Nor do they look down on the efforts of the minnows. They understand the humiliation, the flashes of bravado and the golden touches which make this one-day cricket’s biggest showpiece.

Match referees, with the jovial and good-natured Clive Lloyd and the gentle smiling Ranjan Madugalle of Sri Lanka as well as umpire Srinivas Venkataraghavan, have all had their own moments in past World Cups.

Sir Vivian, as an example, was a powerful player; a front-foot specialist who hammered rather than bludgeoned the ball. He was not a smash-and-grab type of batsman, more a hard-hitting dominator who would smile with beguiling cheek after slapping a six over long-off.

The smile was for the way the runs were scored, the rest made up his batting charm; he was that type of player…cool and calculating; immaculate wristwork and timing which would put most of today’s pretenders to shame.

In World Cup 1983, at The Oval, an innings of 119 against India on a sun-baked day was full of the Vivian Richards gusto; it was an example of how to dissect a bowling attack and go after it with one mission in mind — destroy it as quickly as possible. The result was an innings off 146 balls.

The next best was Lloyd’s 41; perhaps a little more cultured, as is the way with a panther, all grace and style. India lost that game by 66 runs; Holding three for 40 in 9.1 overs in support of the energetic and more frenetic Andy Roberts. They had different approaches to the crease: Roberts athletic and all power, a coiled spring unwinding; Holding as smooth as a sheet of silk rolled out, just as athletic yet as deadly as a cobra striking with spit and venom. His victims that day were fellow commentator Shastri, Mohinder Amaranth and Kapil Dev.

Only 10 days later, India won the World Cup for the first time; the reputations and pedigrees of Holding and Sir Vivian failing them as they did what they could to stop the magic of Kapil Dev’s team claiming that singular honour; it was so unexpected, it was also needed in the game which the Windies had long dominated.

Sir Richard Hadlee’s amazing accuracy, tight swing and discipline was always a marvel. Now convener of New Zealand’s selectors, he was a bowler who counted the stitches in a seam to know just how much would swing he might get out of the ball. A light-coloured red ball with the right number of stitches would generate cut and swing; a darker ball with the same number of stitches would create just as much swing, but the use of the wrist and body movement might have to be altered to allow for less swing. It was the precise art of tying down a batsman and making him uncertain.

At that awful Derby County Ground venue, windswept and marrowbone chilling, Hadlee proved the point in a game against Sri Lanka on June 18, 1983; his analysis of 12-3-16-1 explained much of his economy in style as he dipped the ball around, as much off the pitch as through the air. It did not stop Sri Lanka winning by three wickets; it was a defeat which eventually cost the Kiwis a semi-final place.

Lastly, two left-hand batsmen; Kepler Wessels, poker-faced and stoic with a style which is far from elegant. He is the sort who withdraws himself and closets his thoughts in a technique-orientated machine where the precision and run-making skills have that obdurate quality which few are inclined to remember. He chiselled his runs on a tablet of marble, hewn with grit and determination as well as concentration as deep as a bottomless well.

Then there was the elegance and carefree panache of David Gower. The antithesis of Wessels; runs flowed with bubbling humour and style, a never-ending source of enjoyment and urbane sense of need to get a total on the board. Here is the artist; the man that enjoys entertaining the masses as well as painting for the critics a broad canvas of relaxed strokeplay and also fun and the charm of this one-time batting Peter Pan.