5 reasons why Chris Cairns is the most underrated cricketer of his time

In 1985, when Lance Cairns played his final international game, little did he know that just four years later, his son would don the Black Cap. And at 19 years of age, when Chris Cairns made his Test debut against Australia at Perth, he was touted as the next-big-thing in New Zealand cricket. Teeming with talent and gifted with both bat and ball, Cairns looked destined for a great career. And despite a fifteen year international career that saw him score 3,320 runs and claim 218 wickets in Test cricket, seldom does the tall Kiwi find a mention alongside the greats of the game. Greatness in sport is universally attributed to individual feats of heroism that galvanizes a side to achieve the seemingly unreal. “Botham’s Ashes” will forever characterize the Englishman’s career efforts. Similarly, the manner in which Imran Khan propelled an unheralded Pakistani side to an improbably Word Cup win in 1992 was the culmination of an illustrious career. Unfortunately for Cairns, there was to be no World Cup win or a Test series achievement like the one that defined Ian Botham. And in the absence of such illustrious triumphs, the all-rounder remains an almost forgotten figure every time the annals of cricketing greats are revisited. While most observers acknowledged his prodigious talent, very few gave him his due accolades while labeling him an “underachiever”. That said, Chris Cairns did enough and more through this career to stake a claim as one of the greats to emerge from New Zealand. We take a look at some of the tenets that characterized the flamboyant all-rounder.

#1 Batting heroics

Cairns had a reputation for big hitting and swift scoring

Renowned for his abilities with the bat, Cairns gave the Kiwis a much deserved cushion down the middle-order. With Cairns walking out to bat, the opposition knew all too well that they had to focus. His reputation for big hitting and swift scoring in any form of the game was well acknowledged by teams the world over. South Africa was at the receiving end in 2004 when Cairns smashed 158 from 171 balls in a Test match. That innings contained 18 boundaries and seven sixes and propelled New Zealand to a 9 wicket win. In the 2000 Test at Wellington against Australia, Cairns took a liking to Shane Warne while smashing him for a couple of huge sixes.

Such was his penchant for big hitting that with 87 sixes, he once held the World Record for most sixes in Test cricket until Adam Gilchrist overhauled it. New Zealand’s record for fastest ODI hundred - a ton off 75 balls - also belonged to Cairns until Corey Anderson came along and claimed it with a century of his own off 36 balls.

With a career strike rate of 83.76 in ODIs, Cairns is number four on the all-time New Zealand batting charts while leaving behind retired stalwarts such as Martin Crowe (72.63), Nathan Astle (72.64) and current internationals in Martin Guptill (82.97) and Ross Taylor (82.44).

When a leading cricket portal listed their top 20 all-rounders ever, Chris Cairns didn’t find a mention while losing out to the likes of Shaun Pollock, Andrew Flintoff, Richard Hadlee and Wasim Akram. However, a closer look at the Test batting records reveals that with a career average of 33.53, five hundreds and 22 fifties, Cairns averages higher and has more hundreds and half-centuries than any of the aforementioned greats.

#2 Bowling prowess

Cairns was a lively fast-medium bowler

New Zealand awards the Winsor Cup for its finest bowlers in first-class cricket. Chris Cairns won it four time – only Chris Martin (5 wins) and the legendary Sir Richard Hadlee (12 wins) have more. A lively fast-medium bowler, Cairns was adept at moving the ball off the seam and bowling the lethal reverse swing. Such were his abilities to reverse-swing the ball that Sachin Tendulkar recalled an incident from the 1999 Mohali Test when he had to watch the Cairns run-up and bowling grip before relaying a coded message to Rahul Dravid who was the striker. The later part of his career witnessed Cairns improvising with the slower off-cutter in limited overs cricket.

Cairns is one of just four New Zealand bowlers to have picked 200 or more Test wickets. With an average of 29.4 and a strike rate of 53.6, he is second only to Sir Richard Hadlee (22.29 & 50.8). Despite his 361 wickets, even the talismanic Daniel Vettori (34.15 and 79.3) trails Cairns in the Test bowling averages and strike rate respectively.

With 13 fifer’s, Cairns also has more career Test five-wicket hauls when compared to his more illustrious all-rounder contemporaries in Jacques Kallis (5) and Andrew Flintoff (3) - a clear indication that his bowling performances weren’t in any way inferior to his peers.

#3 The match-winner

Three of Cairns’ four ODI hundreds propelled the Kiwi’s to wins.

Chris Cairns was a proven match-winner. Three of his four ODI hundreds propelled the Kiwi’s to wins. The most famous of his ODI tons came at Nairobi, Kenya. Chasing 264 against India in the 2000 ICC KnockOut Trophy, New Zealand were at one stage 132/5. It was then that Cairns rose to the occasion and in partnership with Chris Harris, stitched 122 runs to steer their side home to their first major ICC tournament win ever.

In Test match cricket, with 13 five-wicket hauls and one ten-wicket haul, his winning contributions with the ball to Kiwi cricket can’t be ignored. His only ten-wicket match effort, needless to say, resulted in a 9 wicket win for New Zealand against the West Indies at home.

#4 Longevity despite injuries

Despite injuries, Cairns had a 15 year international career.

Chris Cairns was plagued by injuries through has career. They hampered his progress and brought about inconsistencies in his performances. From the time of his debut in 1989 to his retirement in 2004, New Zealand played at total of 119 Tests. Cairns however, owing to his frequent injuries, played only 62 of those.

Despite shouldering the burden of batting and wicket-taking responsibilities for New Zealand in both forms of the game and considering his frequent injuries, it’s indeed quite remarkable and commendable that Cairns managed a 15 year international career.

Richard Boock, The New Zealand Herald journalist, once said "It's not a scientific measure of course, but if Cairns' body had held together long enough for him to have played 100 Tests, his figures extrapolate out to something like 5,334 runs and 351 wickets – very similar to those of Botham".

#5 Chutzpah

Cairns brought a unique flair to the game

His all-round abilities notwithstanding, Carins’ character and flair lent a unique aura to the cricketer that he was. While his uncanny ability to court controversy can hardly be claimed as an attribute to proclaim him as a cricketing great, it does showcase aspects of a professional maintaining one’s individuality amidst adversity.

This was brought to the fore when Cairns walked out of a Caribbean tour in 1996 while citing differences with the coach Glenn Turner. Cairns’ biography in 2002 claimed that Turner’s coaching was archaic, pedantic and counter-productive. He stated that problems with Turner first arose in India and when things came to a head in the West Indies, Cairns and Adam Parore left the tour early.

Despite his detractors, he continued to play his style of cricket and in March 2004 the world hailed Cairns as only the sixth man to achieve an “all-rounder’s double” of 200 wickets and 3000 runs. He had done it his way and in doing so had gotten to the landmark the second fastest (58 Tests) behind Ian Botham.

This feat alone surely warrants for Chris Cairns to be regarded as one of the best cricketer’s of his era.