5 great players who had it all figured out right from their first series

A cricket ground can be a highly unforgiving sporting arena. It is a slow, painful ordeal if you are struggling and there is no place to hide. Even for the extraordinary, life out in the middle is not a bed of roses. On the contrary, it is often a long and difficult grind to the top, and it is unusual to see players enjoy a blazing start, rise to the top of the game, and stay there for an extended period of time.More common are the instances where great players take their time to perfect their craft. Overnight successes are a rarity – you have to appreciate the basics and pay your dues in this sport before you can even think about reaping the rewards.A good career is often a slow burn; a bumpy start on the road is almost a foregone conclusion, before you finally rise to the top and let the world know who you are. Nevertheless, there are athletes who deviate from the norm, who rocket to the apex of the sport and stay there long enough to leave their mark. Here are five such cricketers.

#1 Joel Garner

Few could rival the economy of Joel Garner’s bowling at his peak.

The 6’8” Joel Garner was one of the tallest cricketers to play the game. ‘Big Bird’, as they called him, was a fast bowler from Barbados who made the batsman standing at the opposite end of the pitch feel insignificant and indecently small.

For such a tall man, Garner’s yorkers, rather than his bouncers, were much feared, and helped him to a stingy career with Test bowling average of 20.97. The first series was a good marker of things to come.

Pakistan visited the West Indies in February-April of 1977. The five-Test series ended 2-1 in favour of the home side, and Garner announced himself in some style.

25 wickets tumbled one after another as Garner rocked the Pakistani batsmen, collecting four wickets on three different occasions. Only once, at Port-of-Spain, did he go wicketless. Long spells were common, too; Garner bowled more than 20 overs in an innings five times.

234 wickets followed in the following 53 Tests, and Garner retired in 1987, having acquired a reputation almost as immense as his spectacular frame.

#2 Adam Gilchrist

Gilchrist’s explosive debut was a sign of things to come – in all forms of the game.

Adam Gilchrist is not just a superb cricketer or an effervescent batsman. He is a revolutionary; a wicketkeeper who altered our very perception of wicketkeeping.

Ian Healy’s ownership of the gloves in the Australian national setup meant that Adam Gilchrist only debuted in Test cricket at the age of 28. Even the shorter form of the game only saw Gilchrist don the gloves and pick up his bat for the first time in national colours at 25.

Pakistan was the visitors in November 1999, for three Tests before a visit of the Indians the following month. Gilchrist’s first innings was a cracking 81 on the way to a ten-wicket hammering of the Pakistanis at Brisbane.

It got even better. 149* at a strike rate of above 90 came in Hobart in the second Test as Pakistan were beaten by 4 wickets. Less than a week later, the Aussies completed a 3-0 series whitewash.

Gilchrist’s outstanding batting was matched by his proficiency with the gloves. He was involved in 14 dismissals throughout the course of the series (including stumpings and run-outs) as his potential worth to the team was ably demonstrated.

Gilchrist did not look back, and those who bet big money on the wicketkeeper’s career reaching dizzying heights are probably enjoying an early retirement in the Caribbean right now.

#3 Kevin Pietersen

Kevin Pietersen quickly silenced his doubters with three 50s and a hundred in the 2005 Ashes.

The brash, confident Kevin Pietersen commanded attention from his audience with minimal effort. Flamboyant, stylish, aggressive – all manner of adjectives have been used to describe this charismatic cricketer.

The public, however, viewed him with slit eyed suspicion upon his entry to the England side in 2005. The coloured mohawk did little to convince onlookers of his maturity, but his batting performed that duty instead.

Three half centuries (57, 64* and 71) arrived in his first three innings. These were the opening acts of his debut series, the 2005 Ashes. A baptism by fire, surely, but Pietersen was undeterred by such matters. A 45 at Nottingham served as a perfect warm up for his most iconic innings of the summer.

With England 2-1 up in the series and only requiring a draw to secure The Ashes for the first time since the 1980s, Pietersen walked out at 67-3, and England only leading by 73 runs. The rest of the side crumbled around him, but Pietersen found support in Ashley Giles as he defiantly hammered his way to 158.

Pietersen’s domination of Warne took the game away from the Australians, and England secured a draw, thereby regaining the Ashes.

Pietersen went on to even greater personal milestones, but the 2005 Ashes signalled to the world that a great player had arrived.

#4 Mohammad Azharuddin

Mohammad Azharuddin began with three hundreds in his first three Tests against England.

To watch Mohammad Azharuddin at his peak was surely a privilege. Glorious, wristy strokeplay was a signature of this simultaneously delicate and punchy batsman. He was an artist; the bat was his paintbrush, the ground was his canvas and the strokes were, well, his strokes.

He was wowing crowds right from the off. England were touring India in 1984-85, and Azharuddin was given his debut right at the very end of 1984.

110 in his first Test at Kolkata was followed a pair of superb scores, 48 and 105, in the second Test at Chennai. Just to round off a magical winter, Azhar then put on 122 and 54* at Kanpur in the third Test beginning on the last day of January 1985.

Three centuries in three Test matches were, incredibly, just the start of it. The captaincy of the Indian team followed a few years later, and England were humbled many more times before he was through.

Azharuddin’s career was forcibly brought to an end under the dark cloud of the match-fixing scandal, but even though it all ended in tears, his 22 Test centuries dazzled crowds both in India and abroad for many years and are still spoken of in admiration.

#5 Javed Miandad

Javed Miandad was rampant against the Kiwis in 1976.

‘Genius’ is a word thrown around every now and again to describe Javed Miandad. One of the greatest, maybe even the greatest, batsman to come out of Pakistan, Miandad was very highly thought of at the beginning of his career and he immediately set about showing why that faith in him was justified.

A New Zealand side containing the incomparable Sir Richard Hadlee arrived in the subcontinent in October 1976 for a three-Test series. They suffered bad defeats in the first two Tests, and although they managed to avoid a whitewash, it was a case of too little too late as Miandad’s superb batting crushed their morale in the first two Tests and ensured that even the draw at Karachi belonged to the Pakistani wizard.

A win by six wickets at Lahore saw Miandad rack up 163 and 25* in the two innings. He was around when the winning runs were hit. A slight hiccup followed at Hyderabad (Sind), but Miandad reached spectacular highs at Karachi.

206 in only his third Test match (and only his fourth ever innings) helped Pakistan post a huge total of 565/9d. 85 followed in the second innings, another personal success, although the match itself ended in a draw. Miandad finished with a staggering average of exactly 126 for his first ever series.

Javed Miandad batted with aggression and verve in both forms of the game. His first series was as memorable as it was sublime. He didn’t so much get on his motorcycle and go from 0 to 60 as much as generate enough speed so as to take off like Sirius Black’s flying bike in Harry Potter.