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22/01/2008 08:18
Arthur Turner
Father Time has caught up with two of South Africa's key players in Shaun Pollock and Herschelle Gibbs. Both players have played a major role in the Proteas team over more than a decade.
Pollock has recognised that his international career is over and has sensibly announced his retirement from all international cricket after the current West Indies tour. It is refreshing to see a cricketer of Pollock's stature retiring from the game on his terms, he deserves nothing less.
Pollock has enjoyed a fantastic career and retires from the game as one of South Africa's all-time greats. He played in 108 Tests, 298 ODIs before the West Indies series and 10 Twenty20 Internationals and is South Africa's highest wicket-taker in all forms of the game.
Pollock also took over the captaincy of his country at a time of crisis with the match fixing scandal in 2000 and did an outstanding job. He unfairly paid the penalty for the Kingsmead debacle in the 2003 Cricket World Cup.
Difficult to replace
Pollock was always destined for greatness because of his family gene pool. His father Peter was a great South African fast bowler in the 1960s and his uncle Graeme is probably one of the greatest five batsmen of all time.
Pollock will be extremely difficult to replace as a bowling all-rounder but fortunately South Africa have healthy resources in this department. Players like Albie Morkel, Vernon Philander, Ryan McLaren and Wayne Parnell come to mind.
The time has also arrived for Gibbs to seriously consider retiring from Test cricket. His hand eye co-ordination has been affected with age and his recent performances are proof of this.
Gibbs averaged only 26 in Test cricket in 2007 and was dropped for the Newlands Test against the West Indies. He would also not have played at Kingsmead but for Neil McKenzie's injury. He finished the West Indian series averaging nine in two Tests.
Role to play
Personally, I hope he has the vision and sense to realise this before he is permanently dropped from the Test team. This would be a tragedy for a player of his immense ability.
With regards limited over cricket, he still has a role to play as we saw at Newlands against New Zealand. This is feasible as Test and ODI cricket are so different.
Gibbs is a brilliant player who sadly for years has not come close to delivering on his immense talent. He averages 41.95 in 90 Test matches compared to Jacques Kallis and Ricky Pointing who average nearly 60. For me he is more talented than both of them.
Gibbs has never been driven nor had the desire to score runs the way Kallis and Ponting have. Also, his personal life has probably contributed to him not achieving greatness. He has always lived on the edge and been involved in many unsavoury incidents like the match fixing scandal and dagga smoking.
Chronic shortage
Gibbs will go down in history as the genius who failed to fulfill his immense potential.
South Africa currently has a chronic shortage of opening batsmen and there is no natural successor to take Gibbs's place.
There are a few up-and-coming openers who have the potential to fill this position in the future like Andrew Puttick, Blake Snijman and Dean Elgar.
However, the selectors will have to improvise for an opening partner for Graeme Smith in the short to medium term by using McKenzie or AB de Villiers.
Arthur is a former cricket administrator.
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