5 most underappreciated batsmen in the sport

BJ Watling

Watling is a top-class wicketkeeper-batsman in Test cricket

The cricketing community has been looking for a wicketkeeper-batsman who can be called a deserving successor to Adam Gilchrist since his retirement. There have been many pretenders but no one able to reach the same level of success and impact-making ability.

However, there have been many keepers who achieved great success at the Test level. Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Matt Prior, Brad Haddin are some of the names that come to mind.

But one guy, who for a time was better than all of them and yet never received the due recognition, was New Zealand’s BJ Watling.

In a period of less than a year from February 2014 to January 2015, Watling was twice part of two partnerships amounting to 350+ runs that rescued New Zealand from perilous situations and in one instance even secured victory for his team. He also starred with a hundred in New Zealand’s victory at Headingley vs England in 2015.

What these innings demonstrated was Watling’s ability to play gutsy knocks for his team in difficult situations, something he did on many other occasions as well. Still, the world of cricket never paid as much attention to him as they should have.

A strike rate of under 50 means he is not in the same mould as Adam Gilchrist but with 6 hundreds and 13 fifties in 52 matches, many of them scored in difficult situations, Watling is certainly one of the best in his category.