Bharat Raj pens his first article on Allan Border for visitors of crickick.com. Read on ……………..

Australian cricket has been very strong in the last decade as they have quelled every challenge that has come in their way including the final frontier of beating India in India in 2004/05. Under the leadership of captains like Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh and now Ricky Ponting, Australian cricket has gone from strength to strength though with the retirement of great players like McGrath and Warne. Australia at present are in a transition phase. The man behind this great surge in Australian cricket is Allan Robert Border, known to his team mates and friends as “AB”, who laid the foundation on which the likes of Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting built an cricketing empire.

“AB” made his test debut in Dec 78 against England at Melbourne under Graham Yallop. It wasn’t the best of times for Australian cricket as their inspirational captain Ian Chappell had just retired from international cricket and had joined the Packer series. Other senior players like Rodney Marsh, Greg Chappell and Denis Lillee followed Ian Chappell’s footsteps and joined the rebel Packer series. So, Australia used lots of players and had different captains during that period like Graham Yallop, Kim Hughes and even Bobbay Simpson who came back from retirement to lead the side in a couple of series.

Anyway coming back to our great man Border, he didn’t have the best of starts to his career though he did make a few decent contributions but was eventually dropped as they recalled Peter Toohey back into the side against England. His debut performance was 29 which came in 105 minutes consuming 115 deliveries with a boundary four. In the second innings he failed to score.

He was recalled for the series against Pakistan at home and was picked for the tour of India. Border made his first hundred against Pakistan at Melbourne in Australia’s second innings. This test has gone into the annals of Test Cricket as “Sarfraz Nawaz’s test. He picked up nine wickets in Australia’s second innings while “AB” shone amidst the ruins to score 105 batting at number three. Needeless to say that Australia lost the match by 71 runs, but steely resilience of AB stood out for Aussies

He also did well when Australia toured India. He scored 162 and 50 on his first appearance against India at Chennai in Sep 1979. He amassed 521 runs from six tests with a hundred and three hal f centuries. It isn’t easy for a young player to do well in his first series away from home but for Border it didn’t matter. At that time there was a change in leadership as Hughes took over the captaincy. It was said that Border had a good relationship with Kim Hughes and was really motivated to perform for his captain.

Border continued to perform well and reached his peak in that epic series against England in 1981 which later came to be known as Ian Botham’s Ashes series. It was a series which would always be remembered for Ian Botham’s heroics and every cricket enthusiast would remember his match winning performance at Leeds. Allan Border aggregated 533 runs in this six test series which contained two hundreds – 123 not out at Manchester and 106 not out at The Oval. Apart from these two hundreds, he registered three half centuries and returned with an impressive average of 59.22. His 123 not out at Manchester came when Aussies were set a target of 506 for a win. Graham Yallop also made 114. Graham Yallop and Allan Border added 79 runs for the fourth wicket Allan Border and Rodney Marsh added 90 runs for the sixth wicket and Allan Border and Denis Lilee added 51 runs for the eigth wicket in this innings, which showed the “staying ability at the crease” of Allan Border even with the lower order batsmen.

It was also the time when senior players like Rodney Marsh, Lillee and Greg Chappell who all had left playing for Australia to take part in the Packer series came back and it was said that there was a divide between the senior players and players who had played when those seniors players were involved in the Packer series. It surely didn’t help Kim Hughes as the senior players weren’t said to be having a cordial relationship with him. Add to it Greg Chappell opted to play mainly in those games that were played in Australia and was even reinstated as the captain for the home matches with Hughes captaining the side whenever Chappell wasn’t available to play matches for Australia away from home. It doesn’t help any team to have two captains for sure.

All these factors didn’t worry the tenacious Border though as he continued to make plenty of runs under pressure. He was surely at the peak of his prowess as far as his batting was concerned. Against the great Caribbean team in 82 he was able to score lots of runs. The Caribbean team then had great quick bowlers like Holding, Croft, Garner and Roberts. Few former players and knowledgeable cricket fans that I have met even opine that they haven’t seen too many players who have played quick bowling better than Border did in that series. He also played a gutsy knock against the old enemy England at Melbourne and almost took Australia to victory but for Thomson, who actually had given good support to Border throwing his wicket away by chasing a rank long hop from Australia’s ultimate nemesis Botham. Pressure can make people surely do funny things!

In 84/85 Australia weren’t just in a transitional phase as senior players like Lillee, Marsh and Greg Chappell retired but because of the reported divide that was there in the dressing room between the senior players and some of the youngsters and the fact that Australia were continually hammered by the great Caribbean team made Kim Hughes to resign from the post of captaincy. Hughes is said to have cried during the press conference and that was a sad chapter for Australian cricket. It also heralded a new era in Australian cricket as Border took up the captaincy and built the team brick by brick.

Actually to start with Border was said to be a reluctant captain as he was apprehensive about captaining a side that was disillusioned and there was no clarity regarding the composition of the side. Luckily for Border he had Simpson as the coach who was appointed to resurrect the fortunes of the side. Simpson gave him confidence and slowly but surely Border became better as a captain.

Simpson’s and Border’s first task was to identify a group of players who were mentally tough and give them a decent run in the side. At that time most of the players playing in Sheffield shield had played for Australia in some form of the game which is not the way to build a side! So in came youngsters like McDermott, Boon, Jones, SR Waugh, Merve Hughes, Healy, O’Donnell, Mathews, P Taylor, Ritchie etc. These were cricketers not with huge amounts of talent but were mentally tough. The players so selected took their time to establish themselves in the side but Border and Simpson never lost faith in those players and both backed the youngsters to the hilt.

Australia continued to get hammered on the field as the old enemy England defeated Australia in their own backyard as again Botham became the nemesis of the Australian team as he took crucial wickets and scored runs. Border looked misfit as the captain of the side though continued to make important contributions as a batsman and the young players couldn’t perform. Border’s reluctance as a leader at that time could be seen by the fact that he was apprehensive to declare Australia’s innings in the famous tied test at Madras as he thought the pitch was flat and the opposition had a very good batting line up but Simpson urged him to declare and he obliged. Border afterwards even said on the last day that he was even thinking whether there was any justice in this world as Australia had declared in both innings yet were on the verge of losing! In the end of course the match ended in a tie.

His first taste of success as a captain came in 1987 when under his leadership Australia won the Reliance world cup. Australia was clearly the underdogs in the completion but they stumped everyone by winning the trophy. Boon and Marsh formed a very good opening partnership and they would serve Australia for a long time to come. Jones was the strokemaker in the middle order and Steve Waugh made an impact too but strangely for his death bowling as he introduced the slower ball concept to world cricket.

Under Border Australia regained the Ashes in 89. One can remember the famous words, can’t bat, can’t bowl and can’t field that was used to describe the Australian team before the series started but that at that time Border is said to have become a tough leader and was even called grumpy. The opposing captain Gower recently on the sky sports website did agree that he found Border a changed man on a cricket field in 89. It was also the series when the older Waugh announced himself as a batsman by making an great hundred at Headingley as he repaid the faith shown in him by Border and Simpson as Australia thumped England, 4-0 and regained the Ashes . During that time the Caribbean team was still the best side and they continued to hammer the Aussies side though no one can forget Border’s remarkable achievement of taking 11 wickets at Sydney to help Australia win a match. For a part-time spinner it was a remarkable achievement though the pitch was said to be a turning wicket.

As the 90’s dawned Australian cricket seemed to be getting stronger and stronger as they started to find players with flair like Shane Warne and ‘Afghan’ Mark Waugh. As far as Shane Warne was concerned one can never forget that Border was the one who gave him the chance to bowl at the Lankan batsmen at a crucial time and Warne turned the match on its head by taking key wickets in a magic spell to help Australia win a closely contested game. It is interesting to note that Warne had gone for plenty of runs against India in his debut test as Shastri took him to the cleaners and even in that test against Lanka the little Kalu had taken heavy toll on Warne. It indicates that Border may have had a gut feeling that Warne could do some magic and in the subsequent years to come Warne was able to repeat such feats again and again. He though has to thank Border for showing so much faith in a youngster who was not successful at that time. Australia under Border still couldn’t challenge the West indies though they came very near to beating them in 92/93. Going into the game at Adelaide they lead the series 1-0 but lost the game at Adelaide by just one run and were hammered at Perth as Ambrose and Bishop ran amok to destroy Australia. It must have been a heart breaking experience for Border and his men came so close to win prestigious Frank Worrell trophy which eluded them. It was also the time when Border was very close to breaking the world record for the highest run aggregate by any batsman which at that time was held by Sunil Gavaskar of India. His batting ability had slowed down a bit, but still he was able to reach the mile stone in New Zealand.

In 1993 he played in his last Ashes series as the side lead by Border was too powerful for an injury ravaged and an unsettled side England. It was also the series in which Border made a quick fire double hundred at Headingley. It was in this series Shane Warne bowled “the ball of the century” dismiss Gatting. Both Waugh brothers had a great time in this series along with Slater The other younger players started to blossom under the able leadership of Border

In 1994 he played in his last series against South Africa and in his last game too he did not let the side down as he supported Mark Waugh to help Australia save the final test to make sure that South Africa won’t win the series. It was a befitting end to a great career. He never achieved his dream of beating the West Indies side but he along with the help of Simpson resurrected the fortunes of Australian cricket. After retiring from international cricket he helped his state team Queensland to win the Sheffield shield for the first time ever.

So, when we think about how good the Australian team has been in recent times. the contribution of “AB” comes to ones mind as he took the side from being the also “rans “to a side which came to be known as a competitive unit and later on the likes of Steve Waugh, Taylor and Ponting were able to reap the benefits of the great man’s work.