- By
Karthik Narayan
Cricket – The word is in his blood,
literally, to this cricketer. With almost everyone from his
family in cricket, this young man from Natal did not let his
family down at all.
The Pollock family in Cricket
- Cousin: Anthony Pollock;
- Cousin: Andrew Pollock;
- Father: Peter Pollock;
- Grandfather: A.M.Pollock;
- Great-uncle: R.Howden;
- Uncle: Graeme Pollock
 Having
played in the backyard games with his uncle, this young man
came up against the English in his debut test at Centurion
Park in 1995. And he made his name hit the headlines with
the wickets of the BIG THREE of English cricket at that
time: Mike Atherton, Graeme Hick and Graham Thorpe. The
icing on the cake was being coached by the legendary Malcolm
Marshall himself. Shaun always referred to the great West
Indian fast bowler as his mentor.
They say bowlers, fast bowlers especially, hunt in pairs;
and Pollock soon found his ally in the fearsome fast
bowler Allan Donald. Together, these
cricketers have shown the Springboks a new door to success.
Both match winning bowlers individually capable of tearing
apart bating line-ups. They complimented each other very
well indeed; Donald with his fierce speed and Pollock with
immaculate accuracy, and amazing consistency in line and
length in every game that he bowled in. In fact, this pace
duo of Donald and Pollock was rated one of the game’s
most fiercest and finest bowling pair of all
time. While at one side, Donald would have the batsmen
hopping with pace, the batsmen would look for respite at the
other end, but Pollock would do the killing job with his
famous accurate “three-quarters” length.
Pollock has got more than 300 wickets; not
by any means an easy feat considering the fact that not many
South Africa bowlers have managed it (only Allan Donald other
than Pollock), and approaching the landmark of 300 wkts (also
297 ODI wkts in 214 games). Initially starting as a bowler,
this truly wonderful cricketer soon showed that he was no
rabbit with the bat – with 2000 plus runs in 214 ODIs, and
2900 plus runs in 83 tests. He inherited the traits of both
his uncle and dad; his father Peter Pollock, known for his
aggressive fast bowling (a whopping 116 wickets in just the 28
tests he played!) and his uncle is the game’s finest ever left
handed batsman, averaging 60 plus in the few tests he played.
Shaun himself has 2 Test Match 100s, and he is en route to the
rare double of 300 test wickets and 3000 runs being the
benchmark of the great all rounders. (He is just shy of 3000
test runs). This truly reflects the greatness of the man. And
figure this in your mind: 2 100s and 20 50s in International
Cricket for a man who bats in the lower middle order! When he
first came in, South Africa could hardly boast of a great
all-rounder except for the burly Brian McMillan. All that
changed very quickly, with Pollock stamping his class. Of
course, South Africa started boasting with a bag full of all
rounders, in Kallis, Klusener, Boje and others. The list had
just started. His One Day debut launched him as the perfect
successor to McMillan, an all round performance on par with
any other’s: a dream One Day debut vs. England in Cape Town,
(1st ODI 1996) he made 66* and took 4-34 as South Africa won
by 6 runs.
The sad exit of one of the finest skippers of South Africa in
Hansie Cronje gave the Protean an opportunity of leading the
side. This was no easy job, as the whole cricketing fraternity
was screaming on the match fixing scandal when he took over as
captain. His first series was against the Aussies, where he
redeemed the pride in the game, which was getting tarnished,
with a competitive series against the Aussies in the Melbourne
Indoor Stadium. A potential match winner to begin with, he led
the team from the front as Captain; he started scoring more
runs than when he was just a team player! At Natal, his
teammates were the mercurial Jonty Rhodes and Andrew Hudson,
both great sons of South African Cricket.
He had to spearhead the attack most of the time, as Donald
began to suffer more injuries towards the fag end of his
career. He had to exercise all his experience, with the help
of the new players, he had to muster up all his experience and
come good with both bat and ball. And he never let his team
down.. In the face of adversity, he would come and give fight
till the end, most of the time he would help his team take the
honours.
He had the privilege to captain South Africa in the 2003 World
Cup, but very unfortunately for him, the senior stalwarts like
Jonty and Donald had gone. Everything went wrong for South
Africa in that World cup; they did not even make it to the
Super six stage. After the World Cup debacle, Pollock was no
longer the skipper; a new rookie player Graeme Smith was
appointed captain.
Definitely, one of the top class all rounders in world cricket
today. Cricketfundas.com wishes Shaun Pollock many more years
of International Cricket. A true match winner, consistency is
his forte. That’s the hallmark of the GREATS, and he most
certainly is one, and still going on strong.
Career Highlights for Shaun Pollock:
- Was named as Wisden cricketer of the year
2003
- First century came in the Third test v WI
2000/01 at Bridgetown when he came at No.9
- Subsequently he followed it with a 111 in
the home series against Sri Lanka, 2000/01 at Centurion
which is is highest score in 83 tests so far.
- Best bowling of 7/87 came against those
awesome Aussies in the third test (1997/98) at Adelaide.
- Over took Allan Donald as the leading
test wicket taker for South Africa, when he got wicket
no.331, in the Auckland test Vs. NZ, in 2003.
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