Dale Steyn - a timeless and transcendental experience

Dale Steyn - a timeless and transcendental experience

no photo

|

Getty

I have many Dale Steyn memories. From that Michael Vaughan dismissal on debut in Port Elizabeth to taming Younis Khan in 2007 in Pakistan with a classic inswinger, from Sachin Tendulkar duel to taking Brad Haddin’s middle-stump for a walk, I really have many to fall back on.

However, on Monday, while having my evening dose of filter Kapi, the memory that struck my head was that of a bouncer. A vicious one in the 2013 series against India. Virat Kohli ducked under it and let the ball reach AB de Villers’ safe hands. He flashed a smile, an embarrassing one actually, on his then former RCB teammate but Steyn walked back with frustration, the sight of which had put fears of gods into opposition batsmen for close to 15 years now.

The next one was another attempted bouncer, Kohli knew it and took his stride back, opened the face of his blade and even though the weight of the body was falling on the backward direction, he pulled it effortlessly towards square leg for a four. The duo exchanged eye contact but then Steyn stopped and gave a smile that brought a sweet reciprocation from the Indian youngster.

Cricket has always been about making memories, creating moments and letting fans rejoice for time immemorial. Steyn could only tell what triggered that smile - may be the appreciation of a youngster's immeasurable talent or a simple mind game but it talked about a character that had never taken a step back when the chips were down. When there is a wicketless spell, you know, with Steyn, a wicket is always around the corner. When there is a dull passage, you know Steyn can breathe life to it. It would be that fear factor that Steyn would always be remembered by.

But, looking back, it actually started with an inauspicious of beginnings. When Steyn had started taking his first stride in the international cricket in December 2004, he was quickly termed as another wayward bowler to have come out of SA’s franchise cricket. There was no control over the ball, and despite taking 32 wickets from the first eight matches in the following two years, he conceded runs at an average of 35.13, which had no trace of a bowler who was supposed to fill in the big shoes of Shaun Pollock in the following years. But once the Steyn Version 2.0 emerged, he became a tour de force of exquisite skill and inexplicable audacity.

The two-year period from December 2006 to April 2008 saw the big man taking 88 wickets at an average of 16.68 and the world saw the arrival of a man, who was there to take the legacy of South Africa’s great pacers like Allan Donald, Lance Klusener, and Makhaya Ntini forward. While the number of wickets and average are just insane, the strike rate revealed a lot about Steyn's character. 

His career strike-rate of 42.30 is an astounding number, the likes of which hasn’t been seen as often in the history of the game. However, more than the figure itself, Steyn has achieved this through a career that has already spanned 93 Tests over 15 years. To understand the importance of Steyn’s numbers, let’s do some further number crunching. Considering all the bowlers to have picked at least 200 wickets, the closest to Steyn’s strike-rate is the inimitable Waqar Younis, who had a strike rate of 43.5 in his glorious career. 

Since 2000, Steyn’s worthy successor Kagiso Rabada has taken 150 or more wickets at a better strike rate than the man himself. In Asia, Steyn became a beast every time he visited and his record is among the best for any pacer with 50 or more wickets in the region. In terms of strike rate, only Waqar and Richard Hadlee did better in Asia than Steyn’s 42.90.

The great bowlers of the 90s, Allan Donald, Shaun Pollock, Glenn McGrath, Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, and Curtly Ambrose had been at their terrific best when big-hitting in Tests was not a convention, but since the T20 dawn, the cricket world has seen a rise in the batting strike rate. However, Steyn still managed to soar over every best bowler of the 90s. The number speaks volumes of what Steyn brought to the table, but Steyn has been much more than that. Despite the world going gaga over Kagiso Rabada’s incredible journey on the international stage, Steyn is still one such commodity that demands respect in the dressing room with the sheer power of threatening the opposition with his hostile pace and swing.

While none would cease to admit Steyn’s ability with the red cherry, he has unfairly been blamed as an injury-prone player. But a fact to be noted that until November 2015 Test series against New Zealand, he had mostly remained injury-free and continued to be a part of the South African jigsaw, in every match - pretty much like Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock, two great South African bowlers who faced niggles but remained injury-free for impressively long periods of their careers. 

Records and numbers aside, rather the way Steyn managed to stay at the pinnacle of the sport for close to a decade was his legacy. Coming into the sport at a time when South African cricket lacked the public attention after Hansie Cronje match-fixing scandal, he restored the hope of the nation and along with AB de Villiers, set out a partnership that helped South Africa deal easily with the Post-Kallis trauma. As Sidharth Monga beautifully put it in his tribute on Cricinfo, “If Test cricket is life, Dale Steyn lived it to the fullest. If Michael Holding was the Rolls Royce of fast bowling, its Whispering Death, Steyn was a graceful gliding snake.” 

Dale Steyn’s bowling in Test cricket was brutal in its simplicity, or perhaps simple in its brutality. Kohli had understood that day but the world was being amazed by it ever since he crashed Michael Vaughan’s stumps into pieces in Port Elizabeth. Sadly, the Steyn gun wouldn’t bring out that chainshaw anymore nor do the batsmen get frightened at the prospect of facing the quickest bowler of the generation. The memories, however, will linger and for long.

Get updates! Follow us on

Open all