5 most elegant modern day batsman

Statistics are an undoubtedly essential part of the game that gives us an insight into player's performance and analytics. However, there are always certain elements beyond numbers that give us joy in admiring and watching the talent on display. The topic of discussion here is- Elegance.

Often we find the aesthetic beauty and technique of a certain batsman enthralling and satisfying to watch. It might be that high elbowed cover drive, that bottom-handed whip, or that lofted straight drive; behind the statistics there always lies this non-arithmetic elegance.

To pay tribute to the elegance that keeps me glued to the TV, here I decided to write about the five most elegant modern day batsman and the parts of the game that give me the most joy to watch.

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1) Rohit Sharma

This man is considered to be one of the more attractive stroke makers going around in world cricket

They say that time is an extremely complicated fabric, that if controlled, has the ability to perform wonders beyond logical imagination. Rohit Sharma can slow down time. Not by much, but just enough to make us think that he has that one extra picosecond to thoroughly read the round white/red question approaching him.

He answers them pretty well too, I must say. You might remember Virat Kohli praising the quality after one of his marathon double hundreds. Call him lazy or whatever, this extra fraction of a second is what brings the elegance into his game.

Elegant are his lofted cover drives, as he holds the bat high for the cameramen to snap. Elegant are the hooks when the ball almost kisses the bat and glides away over the fence. Elegance is his game.

2) Hashim Amla

If there was one man who could meditate in the middle of the game, it would be Hashim Amla

As the world around him metamorphosed from the snail paced Test format to the brouhaha of the T20 era, this man somehow managed to retain one facet that has been disappearing ever since the dawn of this new age- Calmness.

He has the elegance of calm. Calm as he walks up to the crease in his green and yellow, his spotless head twinkling in the sunlight. If Virat Kohli was the red in a rainbow, Amla would be the violet; the stark juxtaposition. The calm in the storm.

What is admirable in this particular form of elegance, is the ability of the man to stay old fashioned i.e. rely on timing instead of power, and yet compete for a spot with baby-faced debutants.

If Rohit Sharma could slow the time down, Hashim Amla can roll it back.

3) Virat Kohli

There is no place for emotions to hide in Virat Kohli's heart

No eleven is complete without the King. The man who can now claim to have conquered every condition spanning every country and continent he was given. He plays well and he plays big.

The intensity with which he plays the game is bigger than his marketing presence. He is none another that the man with the slick beard, Virat Kohli. Kohli has the elegance of passion. It was last night that Harsha Bhogle tweeted the news of Kohli struggling with a back strain, and how this was truly alarming as it takes something serious to get him off the field.

He wants to be on the pitch more than anything else, he wants to be where he can do what he loves and how he wants.

This is his elegance of passion.

4) AB de Villiers

Who says men cannot multitask?

The latest Mission Impossible I watched last night had a countless number of twists and two-faced characters. Tom Cruise, was as usual, the incredible multi-tasker he is, covering every facet of film from the action to the comedy.

This movie very much mirrored this super-talented South African batsman, who is a man of twists and turns. In a second, he's there and the next, the game slips out of your hands. He has a lot more than two faces; they say he’s a freak.

Bhogle once famously asked if there was anything this man couldn’t do: he can bat, he can field, he can keep, and his name is AB De Villiers. Mr 360 he is. This man has the elegance of unpredictability.

One moment he drops a 140 kph ball gently to his feet, and the next he’ll shuffle across the offside, get low on his knees and loft you over square for six. Entertainer, destructor and one-man army, he is as simple as ABCD, AB can do anything.

(Yes I know he has retired, but I really didn't want to exclude this incredible extra-terrestrial being from my list)

5) Kane Williamson

Kane Williamson must have been a big fan of textbooks in his childhood days

The black and white keys of the piano can barely exist without each other, and if ABD were the thrill of the black keys - the minors and the sharps - the white keys are Kane Williamson.

Textbook simplicity at its finest. He has the elegance of simplicity. If you look at the Kiwi’s game, there is no dominating presence of brute and power, just sheer timing and deft touch.

Be it the cheeky dab to third man, or the pristine cover drives with a packed offside field, Williamson treats the ball with great respect. If you ask the cricket ball which Kiwi it would prefer between the Macho McCullum or Kool Kane, the answer is obvious.