Michael Bevan: The ODI maestro

The terms “unsung heroes” and “finishers” are used very extensively these days by many cricket experts and fans, but the name which is ignored most of the times in both the lists is “Micheal Bevan”.

For those who love stats, Bevan scored 6912 runs in 196 innings he played for the Aussies. Bevan was probably one of the finest lower middle order batsman the game has ever seen in one day internationals. His ability to just treat the ball on its merit, which was a different approach to the likes of Lance Klusener and Shahid Afridi, is a stand out factor in his game. On his day, Zulu’s finishing looks attractive and may have caught the spectators eye but Lance Klusener and Shahid Afridi are high risk men who fail as many times as they succeed, which was exactly the opposite for Bevan.

I still remember those matches in the 90′s when the Aussie team would be in sort of bother and as an Indian fan I would eye a victory for my team, but this man at the crease would keep milking the bowlers, converting ones into twos and twos into threes, and to my surprise would suddenly take the game away from us. He was capable of scoring runs at a brisk pace without any risk whatsoever and hardly a boundary or two. His ability to pick gaps and take calculative risks when needed was just amazing. His mind would read the game like a computer and produce the best innings possible for a win.

He was the master at shepherding the tail and building partnerships with them. One that comes to my mind is the New Year’s Day ODI at the Sydney Cricket Ground against the West Indies in 1996. With the Australians at one stage 6/38 chasing 173, his unbeaten 150-minute 78 got the Australians over the line with a four off the last ball of the innings. He was not a flamboyant kind of a stroke maker nor a slogger. He had a unique style of batting which would hardly get noticed but resulted in valuable contributions for his team.

Bevan’s Test career was relatively short-lived, he just played 18 tests with a batting average of 29. He had a brilliant start to his test career but he was susceptible to the short pitched delivery in the latter part of his career. He was more than useful as a left arm china-man bowler in his short test career, picking up 29 wickets in 18 tests. Once Bevan said in an interview that, his test problems were psychological not technical. His 50+ average in ODI’s is a clear indication of his capability. Some people may disagree saying he had many not out innings resulting in a high average, to them I would say, in 155 matches that Australia won while Bevan played, he was not out 53 times which means he was there till the end and ensured victory for his team. Best finisher of the game and one of the main reasons for Aussie dominance in one day internationals – Take a bow, Micheal Bevan.