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BEN ROBERTS talks about how integral relationships are to cricket.

I may be going to sound like Oprah or Doctor Phil, but there is clearly a deep emotional need for success in all cricketers. They cannot subsist on footwork and line and length alone, and the absence of beneficial outside relationships is quite possibly catastrophic.

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Balanced Sports and World Cricket Watch are inviting cricket writers from around the globe to wax lyrical on who they consider their “favourite cricketer”. This week Michael Wagener, of the superb Cricket Geek, chooses a cricketer with fairytale beginnings, a wonderful record and a bucket-load of controversies – it’s Chris Pringle.

As a child I enjoyed playing cricket, and to a lesser degree watching cricket.  I think what I enjoyed most about watching cricket was that normally it was something I did with my dad.  There were a few incidents as I was growing up that made me fall in love with the game.  Firstly when Hadlee dominated Dean Jones in Australia – I remember standing outside, watching through the window as all my older cousins, my father, my uncles and my grandfather crowded around the TV at my grandfather’s house. The electricity in the air was contagious.

The next incident was the 1992-93 world cup. When Martin Crowe chose to open the bowling with Dipak Patel against Australia, and it actually worked, and when I was allowed to go to one of the games at Eden Park and saw Mark Greatbatch hit a six onto the roof.  Both of these really captured my attention.

But the ultimate incident that did it for me was in the next season. 1993-1994 the World Series Cup – Australia, New Zealand, South Africa.  My family were on holiday at Mt Maunganui, and in the little sun room at the front where I was sleeping there was a television.  This was still in the days where sports were broadcast free-to-air, and almost every night there was cricket on.  The performance of one player was a big part of why I still love cricket today.

Chris Pringle took at least one wicket in every match in that tournament.  He actually managed this in 26 matches in a row from March 1993 until October 1994, in the process playing against every test-playing nation of the time. I believe that the whole story of Pringle is one of the greatest in cricket.

The Chris Pringle Story

The start

He started off his international career after only playing 3 first class games.  New Zealand were touring England, and he was over there playing some minor league cricket.  He decided to turn up to the game to see if he could get some free tickets off some of the Auckland players that he knew. He got more than he was expecting. At first they asked him if he could help them out by bowling in the nets.  Then Martin Snedden got injured, and Pringle got told that he was playing.

After 27 overs New Zealand were in trouble. Gooch and Smith had put together a big partnership, for the 2^nd wicket, and England were 118/1. Pringle was watching Gooch bat and thought he saw a weakness. He asked the captain for the ball, and got him with a slower ball straight away. He ended with figures of 2/45 (Hadlee got 2/45).

It is a Boys Own tale – just out of school, turns up to the ground, gets to play for his country and outperforms (probably) the greatest bowler his country has ever produced.

The skills

Despite being only just over medium pace, and not really doing much with the ball, he managed to have career ODI stats very similar to Waqar Younis (Avg, rpo, sr; Pringle 23.87, 4.45, 32.1; Waqar 23.84, 4.68, 30.5). He did it by finding weakness in batsmen’s techniques and then exploiting them.

He was not built like a fast bowler, he looked like the guy that comes to fix your telephone. In fact, the first time he ever set foot inside a gym was after he had already been picked for Auckland. He had to get some of the other players to show him how to use the equipment. And perhaps this was why he was such a good bowler. He couldn’t rely on physical ability so he had to learn to think.

One of the most memorable moments was in 1991 where Australia needed 2 runs to win off the final over. Bruce Reid was batting, and all he needed was a single to tie the score. Pringle had the ball. He bowled the over of his life to the bewildered Reid, who eventually tried to sneak a single off the last ball, and was run out for his trouble, giving Pringle a final over maiden and New Zealand a win by 1 run. Pringle’s figures of 1/34 off 10 hardly told the story of his excellent performance.

On the way to a ground in Australia he noticed that there were billboards for the movie Predator outside the ground. They featured Arnold Schwarzenegger with camouflage paint on his face, looking like a warrior. Pringle got some zinc and painted similar marks on his face before coming out to bowl. Anything for an advantage.

His approach worked, and he became the most reliable wicket taker in One Day internationals in history. Here is the table of the top 10 most reliable wicket takers:

The controversies

Over the 5 years of his tragically short career he was involved in more incidents than most players are in 15 years. Before long he was just too much of a public relations disaster, and NZ Cricket couldn’t cope any more.

There were sex scandals, concern about his weight and fitness, fall outs with coaches and captains, ball tampering and even a drugs scandal. He made Flintoff, Ryder and Cronje look like beginners.

Even his cricket brain got him in trouble. He figured out that something was going wrong while he was on tour to Pakistan in 1990. The balls seemed to have some strange marks on them. Martin Crowe and him decided to fight fire with fire.  They got a bucket full of balls and experimented with ways of tampering with them.  They devised a method of scratching the balls using a bottle top, to make them swing like crazy. They tried it out in the third match, and much to their surprise, the umpires didn’t care. One of them even commented to him that at least both teams are cheating equally now. Pringle took 7 wickets, but his place in the record books will forever have an asterisk, due to being the “bottletop bandit” test.

He was also involved in the marijuana scandal in South Africa in 1994. He says that he was only in the room telling the others not to smoke it. I heard from a number of sources that he was blamed by the management for it, and his reputation never recovered.  A good friend of mine was a net partner to one of the players involved, and he has privately confirmed Pringle’s story, saying that there were no players from outside Northern Districts except Stephen Fleming involved. In a way it was nicer to believe that he was involved, and that his success was in spite of such excesses.

There were also rumours of a number of sex scandals, none of which are worth repeating, but Pringle comments on a couple of them in his book.

Overall his story is one of a great talent that was only realised briefly. One of the best thinking bowlers of all time was also one of the greatest wasted talents. He thrilled us, but like some other potentially great players like Rodney Redmond or Vinod Kambli, he did so too briefly. It would be interesting to see if he would have kept succeeding if he had managed more than 62 matches. Would the batsmen figure him out, or would he keep finding ways to break batsmen down. This intrigue is part of the reason that Pringle is my favourite cricketer.

Previous Favourite Cricketers

Brian Lara by David Siddall

Allan Border by Ben Roberts

Douglas Jardine by David Green

Curtly Ambrose by Matthew Wood

Sachin Tendulkar by Subash Jayaraman

Ian Botham by Jonathan Kilroy

Shane Warne by Murray Middleton

Rahul Dravid by Sujith Krishnan

Wasim Akram by Blaise Murphet

Glenn McGrath by Gary Naylor

Ed Giddins by Nick Harrison

Adam Gilchrist by Will Atkins

Angus Fraser by James Marsh

Paul Allott by Jonathan Howcroft

Tim Bresnan by Yorkshire Len

Sourav Ganguly by Christopher David

David Boon by Jimi Stephens

Herschelle Gibbs by Justin Lawrence

Bob Woolmer by Nigel Henderson

Darren Lehmann by Daniel Gray

Kumar Sangakkara by Nishant Joshi

Justin Langer by Sarah C Robinson

Andy Bichel by Nicko Hancock

Chris Tavare by Gideon Haigh

Gavin Larsen by Ken Miller

Ray Bright by Dan Lonergan

What do you imagine hell to be like? Assad Hasanain, of the superb AssadHas, muses over his worst nightmare of what hell might look like for a Pakistani cricket fan. Assad tweets @assad_hasanain.

Like most imaginative individuals who have an abundance of free time, I often amuse myself with images of what hell would be like. I tend to agree with the general sentiment that the usual fire and steel rods routine should suffice as decent enough punishment for the regular person. But then again, I am no regular person. I am a cricket fan. If God is smart about it, he would realize quickly that there are better ways of making me repent my sins.

When I think about an eternal punishment custom designed for me, the first logical question that springs to mind is about the devil. Maybe it’s just me, but I feel strongly that any devil worth his salt should at least be able to torture me with his words. After much deliberation I’ve decided to use Sanath Jayasuria for the role of the devil. I find it appropriate that Jayasuria’s voice accompanies me in what should be the biggest punishment of my life.

The plot begins with my orientation in Hell where the devil, Jayasuria is giving me a personal guided tour . As we walk through a narrow passageway,angry desis are running to all parts. Jayasuria points towards  a small room on the right. Glad for a chance to escape the chaos, I oblige. Jayasuria straps me to the chair in the center and turns on the TV. Imran Farhat is batting.

“You will watch this for the next two hours”, he squeaks into my ear, “every time Farhat misses the ball, I’ll have a surprise for you”.

Jayasuria has an evil smile on his face. Despite the situation, I find it hard to take him seriously.

“How bad can this be?”, I think to myself. “Farhat should at least be able to touch the ball”.

And then I start watching. Farhat is trying to drive at every ball and is missing most of his shots. Every time he misses, Jayasuria beats me with a bat. Despite the situation, the cricket fan in me can’t help but admire how powerful Jasyasuria’s bat swing is.  On the odd occasion when Farhat strikes the ball, Jayasuria decides to reward me by commentating on it.  By the end of the two hours both my body and ears are writhing in pain.

As Jayasuria unstraps me from the chair, I realize that I desperately need to use the loo. Hopefully, I turn to Jayasuria and ask him if I can be excused for a couple of minutes. He chuckles to himself. Quietly, he walks me to the other room. He does his routine of strapping me to the chair and turns on the TV. Misbah-ul-Haq is batting.

“As soon as Misbah scores a run, you can leave for the toilet”, says Jayasuria.

I nod thankfully, relieved at the thought that the devil has become sympathetic to my plight.

“This should be over soon”, I think to myself.

One hour later I am still there. Misbah-ul-Haq is stubbornly defending every ball that his thrown at him. His lunges and crouches look even uglier in Hell.  Jayasuria looks at me with a nasty glint in his eye. Scared of tortured again, I keep my eyes on the TV, trying not to concentrate on my bladder which is about to burst.

The Misbah show ends after two hours as he finally gets an inside edge to fine leg and reluctantly crosses over for a run. I am excused for a toilet break. The line to the only toilet in Hell reminds me of the entrance to the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium. The wait is long and painful. Every few minutes, tear gas is thrown into the queue of people.

“They don’t call it hell for nothing”, I think to myself.

To my immense excitement, guy standing next to me in the queue is none other than Salman Butt. Excited, I shake his hand and ask him how his experience in Hell has been.

” It’s all about the country yaar”, he says philosophically.

I ask him if he agrees with being sent to Hell. Disgruntled he replies, ” Evidence kay baghair tow these are just accusations, it’s all a conspiracy against Pakistan”.

Sycophantically, I nod my head in assent and switch the discussion to other matters.  Butt tells me that Mohommad Asif is also in Hell. “In fact,” he adds excitedly, “if you ever want to get high, you should get in touch with Asif, he’s got a secret stash”.

Not knowing what to make of this piece of information I stand back in line, quietly awaiting my turn for the toilet. Once, I finally reach my destination, I realize that even the toilet reminds of the Rawalpindi Stadium. The less said about it the better.

When I return, Jayasuria is anxious to continue the rest of the tour.

“You must be bored of sitting in a chair by now,” says the devil with a sympathetic tone to his voice. “This should cheer you up”.

Jayasuria points to a new room. As I make my way inside, I see a familiar face smiling at me with an over-abundance of teeth on display. Kamran Akmal is standing there, with his full wicket-keeping gear on looking at me excitedly.

“What is this?”, I ask the devil incredulously.

Jayasuria proceeds to explain that I will be offering catching practice to Kamran Akmal.

“Catching practice! That’s it?”, I scream out in disbelief. Jayasuria winks at Kamran Akmal.

” Well not quite, Mr Assad. You see Mr Akmal has been dropping a lot of catches recently. The responsibility of getting him to catch again has been delegated to you.”

I gulp anxiously. “And what happens if he drops a catch?”, I ask Jayasuria.

The nasty smile on his face provides me the answer to my question.

“Don’t worry Assad bhai, I’ve improved my catching a lot recently. I should even be back in the team soon”, says Kamran Akmal assuredly.

And so we start the catching practice. True to his reputation, Akmal drops the easiest of catches. Similar to the Imran Farhat routine, Jasyasuria punishes me every time the catch is dropped. And sure enough, his bat swing is as powerful as his playing days.

For the last part of the day, Jayasuria takes me to a boxing ring.

“Wait here”, he indicates. After a few minutes, Jayasuria returns with two bulky, powerful men. On a closer look, I identify them to be Matthew Hayden and Andrew Symonds.

“You’ll be boxing with me today, mate”, says Hayden enthusiastically.

“Boxing with you?”, I ask nervously.

“And when you’re done with him, we’ll do a round too”, chips in Symonds.

It’s a scenario taken right out of my worst nightmare. It is only when I stand in the ring with him that I truly appreciate how big Hayden is,  Symonds is egging him on from the sidelines. Jayasuria meanwhile has taken up the opportunity to offer some running commentary.  For the next one hour, I am at the receiving end of a beating from Hayden. At the end of the rounds, I am ready to pass out.

“Come on mate, it’s my turn now”, says Symonds.

Symonds steps into the ring.Those bulging biceps and whitened lips looks scarier than ever before. Braver than I was in the fight with Hayden, I manage to land in a couple of punches. I even throw in a few choice phrases borrowed from Harbajhan Singh. Needless to say, Symonds does not take this well. For the next one hour, my body is the victim of my stupidity.

By the end of this session, I am extremely tired and am ready to hit the bed. Sensing that I could use a break, the devil takes me to the quietest room in the area.

“So you want to sleep?”, he asks me.

“I’d appreciate that”, I reply, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice.

“Well, maybe we can do something a little more fun than that”, he suggests.Too brain-dead and tired to speculate, I am already prepared for the worst.

Jayasuria, switches on the TV. Sohail Tanvir and Salim Malik are bowling in tandem. The batsmen in the middle are Jack Russell and Shivnarine Chanderpaul. The batsmen to follow are Daniel Vettorri and Darren Lehman.

“You will watch this for the remainder of the night,” orders Jayasuria.” There is no sleeping in Hell”.

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Sometimes the words just fit the moment: Assad Hasanain, of the excellent AssadHas, shares five of his favourite pieces of commentary. Assad tweets @assad_hasanain.

Cricketing viewership in recent times has become something of an ordeal. The Arun Lals, Russel Arnolds, Danny Morissons, Jayasurias, Ian Healys and Athar Ali Khans of the world have introduced me to a previously unthinkable phenomenon…watching cricket on mute.

As subtlety continues to disappear and the men behind the microphone continue to fall in love with their own voices, cricket commentary appears to have become more of an exercise in stating the obvious. While the stellar team of Atherton, Gower and Hussain is still holding the fort in English cricket and Benaud, Crowe and Jackman provide much needed relief in matches involving their respective countries, the standard of commentary overall has slipped rather embarrassingly in recent years.

My discontent with the utter tripe insulting my ears during cricket matches often has me longing rather wistfully for better times in cricket commentary; times when the words fit the occasion; when commentary was not an annoying sideshow and actually provided context and emotion to a moment.

Iftikhar Ahmed’s commentary on Miandad’s last ball six at Sharjah is a piece for the ages. Even though the game happened years before my passion for cricket was tickled, the infectious excitement in Iftikhar’s voice instantly transforms me to that quite marvelous era of Pakistan commentary. It was a time when Qureshi and Iftikhar held the reins of Pakistan commentary, when the impact of radio made cricket commentary a profession only for the true orators.

Iftikhar’s voice reflects an almost disbelief at the miracle that has just unfolded in front of the viewers’ eyes and his comments scream out the passion that every Pakistani viewer feels at that historic moment in Pakistan cricket.

Richie Benaud’s memorable vocals behind Wasim Akram’s legendary dismissal of Alan Lamb provide insight into a different school of commentary. As Imran brings in his chief ward to land in the killer punch, Benaud and Tony Cozier are leading the commentary.

Akram bowls a sensational delivery and knocks over Lamb.Notice how the tone of Benaud’s voice does not change and there is no audible excitement in his voice. Instead, his speed of delivery picks up with the excitement of the occasion and culminates in the punchline.. “Allan Lamb has been cleaned up. Perhaps…..”.And then he pauses. It’s the pauses that make Benaud the legend that he is. It may be his mastery of delivery, or the fact that he weighs every word carefully. And then he delivers the verdict. “so too England”.

As Akram hits the top of his mark for the next ball, Tony Cozier is reeling off the names of English batsmen to follow. “Lewis, Reeve, Pringle, Defritas…Fairbrother is still there”….As Akram castles Lewis with a devilish in swinger, Richie Benaud pulls out another classic..Rather than shout out an excitable two liner ala Tony Grieg or Bill Lawry, Benaud plays off quite brilliantly off Cozier’s last comment….”Subtract Lewis from that list…Wasim Akram is on a hat-trick”….It was fitting that five of the greatest minutes in Pakistan cricketing history were accompanied not by an excitable commentator eager to hog the mic but by a brilliant orator who knew not to steal from the moment.

David Gower’s brief tribute to Tendulkar upon his entrance into Lord’s captured my imagination. Gower is an old favorite. He speaks with the same eloquence as his batting, it’s an almost lazy, casual play of words delivered in his own inimitable style.

Similar to Benaud, what stands out with Gower’s commentary are his deliberate and immaculate pauses. Notice in this case the subtle emphasis on the words “legend” and “demigod”…As the cameras seek out the crowd, Gower improvises on the spot with a delicious one-liner taken from a banner…”Lord at Lord’s”..It was just about the most perfectly executed little tribute I’ve ever heard in cricket commentary.

Once upon a time when Ravi Shastri did not have drunken outbursts on TV, he used to be a half-decent commentator. A game from the Champion’s Trophy gives me goosebumps every time I listen to the commentary (listen to the clip below at 7 mins -49 secs). Asif and Shoaib have both been banned on the eve of the trophy and Pakistan’s hastily assembled band of backup bowlers have managed to restrict Sri Lanka to a gettable total.

Pakistan’s batsmen, in true Pakistani fashion, blunder their way towards the total. With the ending in sight Razzaq decides to finish the game off in a blaze of glory. As the ball sails into the night sky, Ravi Shastri’s powerful voice booms in the background, “……its vintage Pakistan here…….”. It was a dialogue that captured everything that’s maddening and captivating about Pakistan cricket in one simple syllable. The victory really was a Pakistan classic, secured against all odds, in the backdrop of a disaster that had left them defenseless on the eve of battle. Ravi Shastri recognises the sentiments of the Pakistani viewer and his comment puts the appropriate close on a night of swinging fortunes.

Nasser Hussain’s eloquence and charisma as a commentator makes the Sky commentary team a listener’s delight. In this example from Pakistan’s tumultuous last tour of England Saeed Ajmal is announcing himself as Pakistan’s next great spinner. After tormenting England in a test match at Edgbaston, Ajmal is out to prove that his strong performance was not a one off.

The doosra that clips the inside edge of Morgan’s bat is a gem, the commentary if possible is epic. Hussain sums up the brilliance of Ajmal in one poetic sentence…”Ajmal, the destroyer at Edgbaston…is weaving his magic at the Oval”….It might just be the sheer eloquence of Hussain’s delivery, but his point left me infactuated with Saeed Ajmal.

My bias against commentators stating the obvious notwithstanding, Bill Lawry’s commentary to close out the 92 world cup still sends shivers of excitement down my spine. As Rameez Raja circles around to complete the catch, Bill Lawry’s shrieking tones capture the emotion of the moment to perfection. ” It’s up in the air, this could be victory it is! Pakistan win the world cup.

A magnificent performance in front of 87000 people. Imran Khan has led his side to victory. What a great victory.” It is the brilliance of Bill Lawry that while his commentary lacks in thought or originality, the sheer emotion in his voice is enough to keep the average viewer engaged. In this case Lawry’s voice adds color to a quite glorious moment in Pakistan’s sporting history.Contrast this to David Lloyd and Wasim Akram’s rather bland performance in Pakistan’s T20 victory, and one realizes how a passionate commentator can often capture the essence of a great moment.

It’s a tricky business judging cricket commentary. While nostalgia, national prejudice and sentimental attachments to the personalities behind the microphone inevitably color the listener’s view, cricket fans generally appear to be united in their disapproval of the utter garbage being paraded around the cricket world as ‘commentary’.

For the time being, we can at least console ourselves with the thought that for every ‘tracer bullet’ that heads to the boundary, every ‘Karban Kamaal catch’ that is completed successfully and every ‘match going right down to the wire’, there are still some sane voices left behind the microphone. And the next time we find ourselves cringing at a Tony Greig cliche, we can rest assured that a little gem from Richie Benaud is somewhere around the corner.