Super six (10 May 1999)
At the moment Darren Gough is a star
10-May-1999
10 May 1999
Super six
Michael Henderson
England : Darren Gough
India : Sachin Tendulkar
Pakistan : Wasim Akram
Sri Lanka : Aravinda de Silva
Australia : Mark Waugh
South Africa : Shaun Pollock
Darren Gough - England
28 years old
Right-hand bat
Fast-medium bowler
Club: Yorkshire
At the moment Darren Gough is a star. His outstanding performances
for England in the last year against Australia and South Africa show
him to be that. To become a great player, the kind of fast bowler he
wants to be acknowledged as, he still has a bit to do. The
indications are that he will not rest until he has scaled that peak,
or perished in the attempt.
"Goughy", a big-hearted and straightforward Yorkshire lad, is
England's principal banner-man in this World Cup. Hick's runs will be
important, the way that Stewart launches the innings is not
negligible, and a healed Thorpe is essential. But Gough will be the
team's natural leader. If England are to prosper, they cannot do
without Gough's wickets.
He takes them early, when there is shine on the ball, and catchers
close to the bat, and he gets them late, when he darts yorkers into
the base of the stumps with expert regularity. And, whether or not
other bowlers are getting clattered about, he always wants to bowl.
There is an innocence about Gough, to which people respond and he is
bound to become a national figure during the competition.
He may achieve greatness, or not, in Test cricket. That is the only
arena where greatness can be measured. Before then he can achieve
wonderful things in the most important one-day competition England
will take part in. It's an exciting prospect, and it's good to know
that one man is not overawed.
Sachin Tendulkar - India
26 years old
Right-hand Bat
Medium bowler
Club: Bombay
The brilliant batsman from Bombay has already achieved so much that
it seems a bit inadequate to say greatness beckons. He marched past
that threshold a while ago. He is, beyond argument, the greatest
batsman playing the game, as well as the highest-paid cricketer of
all time. The only doubt about his talent is: how high the ceiling?
Is he, as some sober-minded judges are beginning to suggest, the
greatest batsman since Bradman? And, if he is, does that make him the
second finest player cricket has seen? He boasts a Test average of
54, and enjoys film-star status in a country that celebrates its
cricketers more noisily than any other, but the people who have
helped put him there expect him to bring back a World Cup.
No player comes to this tournament with weightier hopes upon him; nor
is anybody more likely to come off spectacularly. This is a player
whose time has come.
Wasim Akram - Pakistan
32 years old
Left-hand bat
Fast Bowler
Club: Pakistan International Airlines
It takes some believing that there has been a greater bowler of his
kind than the Pakistan captain. Yorker, bouncer, slower ball; over
the wicket, round the wicket, old ball or new, on pitches of every
hue: his bag of tricks bulges. He has taken more Test wickets for
Pakistan than any other bowler, and nobody exceeds his record in
one-day internationals.
Nor does he lack incentive. Man of the match when Pakistan beat
England in Melbourne seven years ago to win the World Cup, Wasim is
taking his leave as an international cricketer in his adopted
country, and he is bang on form. Only two months ago he took
hat-tricks in consecutive Tests, as a reinvigorated Pakistan team won
the inaugural Asian Test Championship.
Wasim spent a decade with Lancashire, and has toured here three
times, so he knows English conditions. He is also familiar with
Lord's, where he excelled in domestic cup finals. Now he has been
restored to the captaincy, he is keen to emulate Imran Khan, who
retired after the 1992 World Cup.
He is in the autumn of his years, the senior member of a team who
oscillate between magnificence and banality. Led by Wasim, Pakistan
enter the World Cup with plenty of experience. This brilliant bowler
and powerful striker of the ball is a match-winner. He will not go
quietly.
Aravinda de Silva - Sri Lanka
33 years old
Right-hand bat
Off-break bowler
Club: none
The cavalier cricket that Sri Lanka played in the last World Cup,
which ended with them crowned as champions, was acclaimed by one and
all. Their daring approach to innings-building was highlighted by the
way that Aravinda stroked the delightful hundred that completed their
victory in the final at Lahore, against Australia.
De Silva is a batsman handsome enough to stand alongside Tendulkar,
Mark Waugh and Saeed Anwar of Pakistan. He drives beautifully through
cover, and is a powerful puller of balls that are not necessarily
short. He is one of the game's great pleasure-givers, and he wears
his gifts modestly.
Sri Lanka need de Silva, not only for his batting, but also for the
option he provides with his slow bowling. However important
Jayasuriya and others, de Silva represents Sri Lanka's best hope of
replicating their triumph of 1996.
Mark Waugh - Australia
33 years old
Right-hand bat,
Medium bowler
Club: new south wales
If marks were awarded for ease of stroke, Mark Waugh would win any
beauty contest for batsmen. Similarly, if umpires could grant runs
according to whim, rather than the laws, they might easily double the
value of his boundaries. For every person who lambasts the junior of
the Waughs for his apparent indifference there are a dozen spectators
simply delighted to watch him.
Batsmen of his class come along once in a generation and, when they
do, the game is beholden to encourage them. His Test record, since
making a hundred on debut against England, is excellent. His
performances in one-day cricket, where he opens the batting, are
almost equally fine. He may feel, however, that as the member of the
family who does not have a World Cup medal, he has some ground to
make up.
Steve, his brother, who captains the team, won his medal 12 years
ago, as the new boy in a side who had become an international
punchbag. That win, against England, gave Allan Border's team a
measure of self-respect, and marked the first staging-post in the
journey that has taken them to the top of the world. They will begin
as second favourites, slightly behind South Africa.
Waugh is not only an opening batsman of productive elegance, he is a
fieldsman of great ability, either in the slips, lurking at extra
cover or midwicket, where he pulls down catches other men don't
sniff. At the last World Cup, his off-spin was good enough to claim
Tendulkar and Lara.
He is irked at suggestions that he lacks his brother's steel-eyed
tenacity, and he is right. To play as Mark Waugh does takes real
courage.
Shaun Pollock - South Africa
25 years old
Right-hand bat
Fast bowler
Club: Natal
No player has made as much progress in the last year as this
all-rounder. As a bowler, he is deceptive, baffling batsmen with
leg-cutters that jag off the pitch at 85mph. His batting has come on
and, as captain, led South Africa to the gold medal at the
Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur.
That last honour gives a clue to where he is heading. He is clearly
marked out as the next captain of the Test team, a team in which he
will be one of the major players. Last winter, with Allan Donald, he
blew away the West Indies, as South Africa won the series 5-0, and he
made good runs down the order. If his bowling outweighs his batting
then he is still a genuine all-rounder, improving with every match.
He was born to be a cricketer. His father, Peter, was the spearhead
of the attack in the outstanding team of the 1960s who never grew to
maturity. His uncle was Graeme Pollock, the left-handed batsman,
whose gifts, along with those of Barry Richards, were largely denied
to the world by South Africa's expulsion from the Test brotherhood.
With that bloodline, Shaun's emergence as a player in his own right
was inevitable. He has been fortunate. To join a team with a fast
bowler as fine as Donald at the other end takes the weight off a
young man. He joined the side at a good time, too. Hansie Cronje had
taken over as captain, and Bob Woolmer's coaching brought a new
dimension to the way teams prepared for internationals. But Pollock
stood on his own feet, and is now walking confidently.
In his approach to the crease, and his almost adolescent arm action,
he doesn't always look like a Test bowler. Nor does he appear to be
that fast. Test batsmen tell a different story. Both Mark Taylor and
Michael Atherton regard Pollock as an adversary no less awkward than
Donald. Given South Africa's growing reputation, and their status as
favourites, the World Cup is coming at the right time for Shaun
Pollock.
Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)