A couple of days ago, Hashim Amla announced his retiremet from international cricket, with a test average of nearly 47 and an ODI average of nearly 50 and lesser than 10,000 runs in either format. While it is debatable whether his test numbers are up there with the very best, there is no such denial in the ODI game (he was the fastest to reach every 1000 run milestone from the 2000-run till the 7000-run mark). He’s also one of the few batsmen with 25+ international hundreds in the two longer formats of the game. The game will no doubt miss his graceful talents and the calm manner in which he went about his business.
He was one of the world’s leading all-weather batsmen from the late noughties till the middle of this decade. But over the last couple of years or so, his returns weren’t what cricket fans all over the world were accustomed to seeing from him, and this encapsulates the team that he was a part of—the mighty South Africans.
Without a doubt, it is an end of a glorious era for South African cricket. Ardent cricket fans may have a point when they say that it had already ended a couple of years ago, but a spate of retirements in the last couple of years—AB de Villiers, Hashim Amla and Dale Steyn (still intends to play white ball cricket)—has drawn the curtains on this great team and a band of extraordinary players. Yet, not many cricket fans from around the world shed many tears about this. Why is this so?
Clearly, their records are out there with some of the best teams and players that ever played the game. Take for instance the peerless AB de Villiers and Dale Steyn. Before the former was known as “Mr. 360 degrees”, was an extraordinary test batsman who dominated the ODI arena like no other. To get a sense of how ahead he was of the rest of the pack, it is essential to get an idea of the baseline. The average middle order batsman in ODIs (batting position 3-5) scored ~36.6 per dismissal at ~81 runs per 100 balls. Over this decade, AB de Villiers scored over 63 runs per dismissal and scored them at a strike rate of ~109. Make no mistake, Virat Kohli is an extraordinary player, but during the same period, de Villiers scored at an equal average but at a pace ~17% faster than Kohli’s. The last time a middle order ODI batsman performed at such a level compared to everyone else was when Viv Richards was flaying bowlers all over the world. Perhaps AB de Villiers is the closest batsman to Viv Richards in his prime.
What about Dale Steyn? Between 2005 and 2015, it was a barren 11 years for fast bowling. The average fast bowler conceded 33 runs per dismissal. In this era, Dale Steyn snared 400 wickets at ~22 runs per dismissal, getting batsmen out once every 7 overs; and he did this across the world, with hardly any perceptible dip in performance in Asia, the toughest place to bowl for a fast bowler. The last time a bowler terrorized so many batsmen was in the 1980s, when the fearsome Malcolm Marshall was getting a truckload of wickets world over. But herein lies the difference—the corresponding baseline was 29.7, in what was possibly fast bowling’s most favourable decade since the era of uncovered pitches. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that if Dale Steyn had a different coloured passport, he would surely be knighted for his services and his name would have featured a lot more in cricketing circles and a certain yellow book.
What about the team? In Graeme Smith, Jacques Kallis and Morne Morkel, they had three more world-class operators. But some of the feats achieved by the South African team of this vintage ought to get more attention.
| Period | Matches | Won | Lost | W/L | Win% |
| WI (1973-1989) | 127 | 59 | 20 | 2.950 | 46.46 |
| Aus (1995-2008) | 160 | 104 | 30 | 3.466 | 65.00 |
| SA (2005-2017) | 102 | 54 | 24 | 2.250 | 52.94 |
It is well regarded that the Australian team at the turn of the millennium and the West Indian team of the 1980s were the greatest sides to ever play the test format—blessed with class-leading batsmen and hostile bowlers. And the numbers don’t disagree with this analysis. How does this South African team stack up against these illustrious sides? For over a decade, South Africa won a higher percentage of their matches than the West Indian team (but lost more matches as well). Back then, draws were far more commonplace and this explains why the West Indies had a higher W/L in spite of only winning less than half of their matches. The highlight of this era of achievement was the tussle with Australia in 2008-09 when the changing of the guard happened; in a remarkable series, South Africa bossed Australia in the first two matches and lost the dead rubber in Sydney.
| Period | Matches | Won | Lost | W/L | Win% |
| WI (1973-1989) | 193 | 139 | 52 | 2.673 | 72.02 |
| Aus (1999-2008) | 281 | 205 | 61 | 3.360 | 72.95 |
| SA (2005-2017) | 265 | 169 | 86 | 1.965 | 63.77 |
What about the ODIs? The story isn’t too different here as well. For over a decade, South Africa won nearly two matches for every match they lost, just behind the giants before them who were clearly a league ahead of the rest of the chasing pack in their eras. Their most memorable moment as a team must have been when they outclassed India in India, a formidable team themselves (in 2015), winning the series 3-2 after pummeling them to submission at the Wankhede. But all through this era of excellence, they didn’t have a World Cup or Champions trophy to show, and this may be the reason why they aren’t as fondly remembered.
Of course, it wasn’t smooth sailing always for this South African team—they couldn’t overcome India in India and lost at home to Australia and England (in tests). But, every other cricket team also had moments where they couldn’t overcome everyone (Australia didn’t win in India for a long time, and the West Indies relatively struggled against Pakistan). Therefore, looking back at what the Proteas achieved, it is fair to say that they have a legitimate claim to being the best team to play the game (Tests and ODIs) after the immortal Australians and West Indians. Though they aren’t the team they were a few years ago, they have Dale Steyn’s successor in Rabada; a couple of more world-class performers and they should be able to shake themselves off this rut.
Interestingly, the present Indian team is performing at a level not too dissimilar from the above South African team; they were already a world-class ODI side under Dhoni and they are probably on the cusp of being an all-weather test team under Kohli (due to the makings of a world-class pace attack). But if there is a moral for the present Indian cricket team based on the performances of this great South African team, it is that you need to win the “big” moments to stay in public memory and leave behind a legacy; just sustained, high-level performance over a long period of time won’t unfortunately cut it.
paajivspunter 