The most iconic cricketer of the modern era has passed. Shane Warne, age 52, has left an incredible legacy as the rock ‘ n roll cricketer who bowled brilliant leg spin with unerring accuracy and created captivating theatre for all who watched him play.
I have struggled to accept the news – but now his funeral has taken place and I have read numerous tributes to the man who was seemingly friends with the world, it is an inescapable fact. Warnie has left this world for good.
He seemed forever young. Always keen to find the fun in situations and always up for adventure. And with his passing at such a tender age, we will be able to remember him as we came to know him.
Warnie was a gift to the game. To be able to watch him play was a rare pleasure to all who witnessed his genius. To play with him as a teammate must have been extra-ordinary. To paly against him was to know what it was like to be in a battle – often a losing one.
I had the privilege of playing against the Melbourne magician when he first toured England with the Australian Cricket Team in 1993. In what was only his 2nd ever innings on English soil for Australia, I achieved the feat of stumping him out to make a trio of dismissals in Australia’s first innings – those of Allan Border and Steve Waugh coming before him. Little did I, or the cricketing world know, that SK Warne was about to begin a remarkable journey which made him such an phenomenal contributor to Australia’s dominance in Ashes series and World Cups.
He was an extra-ordinary cricketer who possessed an astute mind for the tactics of the game and also revealed the capacity for ‘getting under the skin’ of opposition.
To play against Warne was to come to know him for both his craft and his power of personality. All of his teammates idolised his skill and many idolised his personality too. Whether it was on or off the field, his energy, enthusiasm and general sense of fun brought people with him and drew them into the light which surrounded him.
Hampshire Cricket were wise to recruit him as their overseas player under Robin Smith’s captaincy in 2000. It was the first year of two-divisional 4-day county championship cricket and Warne’s ability to be regarded as ‘normal’ and ‘one of the boys’ helped to galvanise Hampshire alongside the popular captain Smith.
Two of my abiding memories is playing with Anil Kumble (for Leicestershire) against Shane Warne, and making 64 not out versus Warnie at Grace Road. To have the privilege of ‘going head to head’ against legends of the game was one of the greatest aspects of playing county cricket in the period I played professional cricket in (1982-2002) and the opportunity to experience Warnie’s ‘box of tricks’ over an extended period at the crease is something I will always treasure.
His mesmeric effect on specific passages of play really struck me – the greats seem to be able to take hold of a contest and turn it into their show. It takes skill confidence and significant personal presence to do so on a repeated basis.
The best players I played against, and came to know as men, were Sir Ian Botham and Sir Vivian Richards. Their exceptional skill levels were matched by their will to win, and their force of personality towered over their opposition. It almost seems as if Warnie had spent his schooldays admiring the pair’s all round genius and went from being an apprentice to these two giants of the game to becoming a master himself over time.
Shane had rare cricketing capability – he could bowl the most difficult deliveries with apparent ease. Wrist spin is hard to control – yet he bowled it with unerring accuracy as well as producing remarkable amounts of side spin on the ball. His top spinner was top quality and prior to his shoulder injury, his googly (or wrong ‘un) bamboozled many top batsmen as well regularly making fools out of tailenders.
A popular player wherever he went around the cricket world, Shane’s iconic status transcended the sport. He was a sporting phenomenon. Nike adverts with the legendary basketball player Michael Jordan added to his image of being regarded as a global superstar. His presence in India at the end of his career in helping to launch the Indian Premier League broadened his appeal with sponsors, broadcasters, players, coaches, umpires and the many millions of fans in the sub-continent.
The emergence of Warnie as ‘a serious cricketer’ in England on the 1993 Ashes Tour was spectacular – his previous efforts for Australia (at home versus India) didn’t suggest that consistently brilliant performances would unfold over the next two decades. With this in mind, it is important to reflect on the important role played by his Captain, Allan Border.
Australia’s captain Allan Border displayed a rare faith in his fledgling ‘leggie’ – something I believe was a key factor in helping Shane develop further and grow into the all-time great he eventually became. All bowlers benefit from the (deep) feeling that their captain has their back and Border seemed to manage Warne with a clever mix of ‘tough love’ and gentle support. Being brought on to bowl at the right time, and being protected at other times is vital to a young bowler’s development. Too many promising bowlers’ careers have been destroyed at the altar due to poor quality captaincy – especially of spinners.
Whatever, the quality of captaincy, the ultimate responsibility for performance is down to the individual player, and Warnie seemed to relish the challenge of being both ‘team-man’ and self-focused ‘match-winner’. By holding the scoring rate down in the first innings and ‘locking down’ one end, allowed his captain to rest and rotate his quick bowlers from one end (often down breeze). Then, when the match situation called for a different role, he was brilliant at seizing full responsibility for being the match-winner later in the game.
With his passing, leg spin bowling has lost its’ strongest advocate for what had seemingly become a lost art. Warnie followed before Abdul Qadir and Trevor Hohns as two ‘leggies’ that positively impacted their national teams performances in test series, and effectively paved the way. Hohns was part of Allan Border’s Ashes winning touring party to England in 1989, and later became a long-serving National Selector for Cricket Australia, overseeing Warne’s selection for many test series. His appearance for Allan Border’s team would have pleased the legendary Richie Benaud in the commentary box, himself a master practitioner of the art of leg spin bowling in his day.
Benaud’s delight at the emergence and progression of a young Shane Warne in 1993 and the fact that he was on air for the iconic moment at Old Trafford when Warnie bowled his first ball in Ashes cricket. The rest is history as they say…
The legacy he leaves – 708 test match wickets only speaks to a part of what he brought to the game – went beyond his sport. He became a sporting phenomenon.
As one of Wisden’s 5 Cricketers of the Century, he lit up the game for so many. Ironically, his excellence may possibly have made the future of the art of leg spin harder for all who have come and will come after him. I fail to see how any leg spin bowler can ever be so brilliant as the late great Shane Keith Warne.