The World's most valuable cricketer unveiled

Paul Martin

Who is the world’s most valuable Test cricketer?

Before we bring up names, let's set some criteria. Specialist batsmen or specialist bowlers are candidates, but they have to be head and shoulders above an all-rounder to win the accolade, as they contribute to only half the game. A great fielder or catcher could beef up his chances, but only if he's also an excellent performer with either bat or ball. Great wicketkeeper-batsmen could also be prime candidates.

Now, step forward one of the Aussies, you may be saying. Or could it be Sachin Tendulkar?

Let me put forth my candidate. A South African. Okay, you're saying. The writer is biased. Maybe. But look at the facts.

Here are my two choices. Either Shaun Pollock, or Jacques Kallis.

Pollock is ranked the world's number two bowler, after Glen McGrath. He deserves it. His bowls only fast-medium. But on a wicket where he can get some swing, he is lethal. His key attributes are that he bowls from right next to the stumps -- in fact, he lets go usually as his arm passes directly over the line of off-stump. That allows him to get many lbws, and also to get the necessary away-swing that brings edges.

His Test average is close to 20 runs per wicket, and that is very much world class in any era. Combine this though with his recent batting performances, and you can see why he is a prime candidate. He is the only batsman ever to have scored two Test hundreds coming in at Number Nine (only ten have been scored by Number Nines in all of Test history).

Those two centuries have come in the past few months, the second against the Windies in the current Third Test. The difficulty for him in coming in so low in the order is that he spends some of his time farming the bowling -- trying to protect his tail-enders from getting too much of the strike.

His batting average for this series is massive -- he's only been out once, on all other occasions running out of partners.

Now let me give you the other main candidate. Jacques Kallis is a very classy number three -- though in the current series he's been unlucky to have suffered two dubious decisions. His bowling, though, is superb.

Because Allan Donald and Pollock are two of the best pacemen in the world, Kallis is not given as much of the ball early on as he deserves. Yet, when he does get it, he's usually bang on target, and able to vary his pace, bounce and length very effectively. He can bowl as fast as anyone when he really puts his back into it.

The start of the fourth day of the third Test against the Windies was a classic example of vintage Kallis bowling. With Donald off, injured, Kallis might have had an lbw off his fifth ball, then had the in-form key-man Carl Hooper caught at the wicket (for 73) off a ball that moved away and bounced.

He then went on to bowl five maidens in succession, while at the other end Makaya Ntini was conceding 29 runs. Four for 53 by lunch on the fourth day in 27 overs was a simply outstanding performance by Kallis on a rather unresponsive pitch.

Both he and Pollock are also excellent fielders, but here Kallis gets the edge for his excellent slip-catching.

Is he an intelligent cricketer? Yes, he is -- despite the occasional faux pas he allegedly makes. He's infamous for having (allegedly) remarked, as he and some colleagues jogged along a seaside beach on an overseas tour, that he wondered how the "altitude" up there could be affecting his breathing. Whatever his understanding of geography or physiology, he is an intelligent batsman, able to sum up a situation and decide whether quick or slow is the order of the day.

I'd say -- in horse-racing parlance -- Kallis is the world's most valuable cricketer -- by a nose.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh