In conversation with Jaques Kallis

Dr Ali Bacher did an interview with Jaques Kallis end of 2011 and they showed it again today.

They spoke about Kallis' schooldays, his father, his career etc.

When asked who he rated top as an opening fast bowling pair, he picked Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis, in his opinion Wasim Akram was the best fast bowler he ever faced, being able to swing the ball both ways at pace was what made Wasim so dangerous, and combining that with Waqar Younis who could bowl at you toes those reverse swining yorkers was just a daunting task.

When asked about who he rated as the best spin bowler, he had no hesitation in saying Shane Warne was unbeleiveable, not only because of his bowling accuracy, but the near perfect art he made of leg spinning.

When asked about the best batsman hehas bowled to, it was Brian Lara, a tad above Sachin Tendulkar. In his opinion Lara was just that little bit better than Tendulkar in being able to manipulate fields.

When asked about being in the same class as Garfield Sobers (being the only allrounder with similar stats) hesaid he doesn't believe he is as good, he questioned how good would those guys have been if they were able to play in the pro era these days.

On a personal level, Kallis has started a foundation whereby he puts youngsters who can't afford to go to topclass cricketing schools thriugh these top schools via sponsorship, sonce he started in 2006, he now has 21 kids having been part of this foundation, his benefit year at Western Province, he donated every cent earned to this foundation.

These days the foundation have some students at university level as well.

When asked what was the one thing he still wanted to achieve, he said a world cup win. I guess that says it all, he will probably play till 2015.

Biltong there's a lot of nonsense often posted about Kallis on this form about him not being that good because he's less exciting than Lara, scores most of his runs in easy batting conditions rather than when it counts etc.. etc...

The truth is he's actually head and shoulders above any other all rounder currently plying their trade and right up there with the likes of Sobers as an all time great. Even if he decided to never bowl again (following his recent injury troubles) he could play several more years as a pure batsman and probably end up being considered as an all time great simply for his batting alone.

Having said that the lack of a world cup title is a big gap on his cricketing CV and will doubtless give him all the motivation he needs to keep going at least a few more years

Evening newballs, yes he was actually asked about his role as a batsman in the Proteas, and he said since about 4 years ago he had the freedom to play more agressively due to the strength of the batting line up, prior to that his role was always that of the guy that everyone elsehad to bat around.

As far as the world cup, I think he has a last chance, I hope his career can have a fairytail ending.

I find it interesting that he rates Lara above Tendulkar for his ability to manipulate fields. Vaughan says much the same thing in his autobiography, singling out the 400 not out knock, but also an innings in England in 04 (a series where England whitewashed the WI) where Lara made 79 or so IIRC. He says he felt with Tendulkar you could always control the game to a degree by bowling one side of the wicket for instance, but you couldn't do that with Lara.

While the lack of WC is a gap on his CV, it's not entirely his fault (in 99 where they had the strongest team he made 50 in the semi final and should have set it up for them, in 11 he did play an ordinary shot against NZ though). 2015 is still a long way away of course, but Kallis is pretty fit, and more importantly is still batting well.

Kallis maybe doesn't get the same recognition as the other batting greats of his generation, and that is probably due to the less large number of game-changing innings. It's true that for a while he was the mainstay of the side, but the same is true of Lara, who rightly or wrongly will be remebered as a better batsman.

Of course, this is minor quibbling, Kallis has been a superb batsman and servant for SA cricket over the years (and also had a fine season with Middlesex in 97 I think of course ), and will rightly go down as one of the top 5 all-rounders in history, and the n°2 batting all-rounder (at worst).

I rate Lara the best for those exact reasons.

Back to Kallis. A class act on and off the field.

Can't stand Kallis. Fat, false haired tw@t.

Hibbz wrote:Can't stand Kallis. Fat, false haired tw@t.

Don't sit on the fence.

Not a big lover of him myself, but you could have left out false

I could have but I'm not sure what fat hair is.

Sorry, did'nt know, has he done a Warne, Gooch or Rooneyyyyyyyy.

Hibbz wrote:Can't stand Kallis. Fat, false haired tw@t.

Good onyou for being so harshly judgemental, no reason to hold back.

In the absence of more specific info sounds like an irrational dislike of Kallis and as such a difficult subject on which to have meaningful discussion.

Perhaps I'm taking Hibtz much too literally - but is Kallis too fat to field well, or bowl, or play a long ininings....

The greatest all-rounder of all time question depends on what your criteria is.

For me, the greatest all-rounder of all time would have to have been great in both fields. As good as their bowling records are, its difficult to see Sobers, Kallis or Hammond as bowling greats.

Therefore, the title should, in my view, be contested between the likes of Keith Miller, Imran Khan and Ian Botham. An interesting debate.

Were any of them three, batting greats?

Stella wrote:Were any of them three, batting greats?

Not quite. But they were better batsmen than Sobers and Kallis were bowlers I think. As I say, an interesting discussion.

Keith Miller is probably the closest.

Botham between 77-82 was probably the closest there has been but his bowling became just good from 86 onwards.

Corporalhumblebucket wrote: :erm: In the absence of more specific info sounds like an irrational dislike of Kallis and as such a difficult subject on which to have meaningful discussion.

Perhaps I'm taking Hibtz much too literally - but is Kallis too fat to field well, or bowl, or play a long ininings.... :shock:

No, but then neither was Gatting or Warne so it says more about the lack of athleticism required to play cricket than it does about Kallis' conditioning. In fairness to him he has lost weight but more impressively gained hair.

Certainly an irrational dislike as I've never met him nor am I likely to and he has very little, if any affect on my life and he's a great cricketer.

Face like the Pilsbury Doughboy an all.

The discussion about what defines a great all-rounder is indeed fascinating.

I never really rated Botham (bit of a fat knacker) but accept that is almost certainly due to my age and the fact I probably missed his best years. My earliest cricketing memory is listening to the '82/'83 Ashes and the first match I went to was at Lords in the '85 Ashes when Border made 196.

One standard I've heard suggested is that the bowling average needs to be lower than the batting so maybe the greatest all-rounder should be the man who has the biggest difference between the two?

A quick scan of the stats seems to put Kallis at the head of affairs fractionally ahead of Sobers but looking further into this it would appear to favour the batting all-rounders rather than those who were really top class bowlers such as Miller, Khan and Botham.

If you were to use this system the aforementioned Border actually comes out ahead of Botham so it looks like further refinement is required

Imran averaged about 22 with the ball and 35 with the bat. Maybe it's him?

Then again you have Hadlee, who some do not class as an allrounder, who averaged about 22 with the ball and 29 with the bat.

Defining an allrounder is nigh on impossible.

That's why we say batting all-rounders and bowling all-rounders, Stella.

The all-rounder holy grail would I guess be a 50 average with the bat and a 18-22 average with the ball...that just doesn't happen, and it'd be utterly extraordinary if it did, so for now we are stuck with the two categories I'm afraid.

Kallis is a great batting all-rounder, whereas you'd say Imran was a better bowling all-rounder.

Fists of Fury wrote:That's why we say batting all-rounders and bowling all-rounders, Stella.

The all-rounder holy grail would I guess be a 50 average with the bat and a 18-22 average with the ball...that just doesn't happen, and it'd be utterly extraordinary if it did, so for now we are stuck with the two categories I'm afraid.

Kallis is a great batting all-rounder, whereas you'd say Imran was a better bowling all-rounder.

Agreed.

Kallis and Sobers well ahead of the rest in the former and Imran the best of the latter?

I even looked up Malcolm Marshall because I thought he might squeak in using my original definition. He does using FC averages but his test averages are 20.94 bowling and 18.85 batting.

Wasim misses out too so it seems the bowling all-rounders get a raw deal.

Another one I heard is that you need a bowling average below 30 and a batting average above 30.

Pollock?

23ish with the ball and 32 with the bat. To boring though

And too ginger. Didn't even think too look him up. Great stats. As an aside I thought he was really good on TMS during the summer.