WHAT does bowlers Chetan Sharma, Saqlain Mushtaq, Chaminda Vaas
and Brett Lee all have in common?
They are the only four to have taken a hattrick at World Cup tournament
level -- 1975 to 2003.
TnT Mirror today, profiles Brett Lee: one of Wisden’s top
cricketers for the year ending 2005.
At the end of the two-match Test series against Bangladesh, the
handsome Australian speed demon had secured a place amongst his
country’s greats.
He is the 12th Australian bowler to claim 200 or more Test match
wickets, with shadow leg-spinner Stuart Mac Gill tantalisingly
poised in becoming the 13th in the near future. He has 198 (average
27.22).
Brett Lee for sometime acknowledge worldwide, as one of the fastest
bowlers of all time, was born in the industrial town of Wollongong,
south of Sydney, Australia, on November 8, 1976.
He made a dream debut in the 1999 Boxing Day Test match at Melbourne
against India, picking up 5/47 clocking 98 m.p.h.
Over the intervening seven years, his rise to stardom has had
many hiccups: injuries of varying kind, breakdowns, operations,
re-modelling of his bowling action, chucking allegations and likes.
Yet, Brett Lee has stood strong and stands out as a menacing fast
bowler.
Shoaib Akhtar and Brett Lee -- are the quickest bowlers operating
in international cricket today.
Nicknamed “The Ferrari of Fast Bowlers” -- he at times
touches 99 m.p.h. and boasts a strike-rate as good as anyone of
the greats.
When he releases the throttle and begins that smooth acceleration,
the spectator stays his drinking hand.
Lee’s leaping, classical delivery may produce a devastating
yorker, a devilish slower ball or a masterly Allan Donald-like
outswinger.
Add a dash of peroxide, a fruity vocabulary, a trade-mark jump
for joy, a stylish bat, a streak of sadism when bowling at tail-enders,
a member of a pop group called (Six And Out) and modelling assignments
and you have the 21st Century’s first designer cricketer
-- not to mention a priceless pin-up idol, similar to those in
India and Pakistan.
Lee bowls short-pitched stuff and full-length stuff with equal
relish.
At age 29, he is still a world leader and fearsome as he ever
was.
The table beneath gives a close-up of the data of the 12 warlords
of Austra-lian cricket.
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