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Martin Crowe became the measure for batting in New Zealand, as within his initial phase of cricketing career he became the best youngest batsman in the world. He entered into test cricket at the age of 19 only, and by the end of his career he was the lead scorer of runs and centuries for New Zealand.
The proficient batter, Martin Crowe
- Martin Crowe: The Batting Maestro of New Zealand
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He was born in Henderson, Auckland, New Zealand, on September 22, 1962. Son of a cricketing family, his father was a first-class cricketer who played test crickets. In his teens itself, he was turning into a complete batsman, as he had all the shots of the book and was destined to be the greatest of all time.
He was shimmering with techniques of defence and attack, a tough competitor to play with a deep innate sense of cricket. In his prime, Crowe was seen as a batter with an extra nanosecond to play the ball before hitting, just like Rohit Sharma. His batting style was technically sound to the audience, and it was always a treat to watch his classic shots down the ground, which he played the most and were his signature shots as well.
When 21-year-old Martin Crowe played in place of Viv Richards in county cricket for Somerset, he was remarked as ‘the one who could soar like an eagle’ by Peter Roebuck.
Martin Crowe’s contribution for New Zealand with the bat
Along with legendary players like Richard Hadlee, he was one of the main pillars of New Zealand’s most successful cricket team at the time. Martin played a total of 77 test matches and 143 ODI’s for New Zealand, and his matches were memorable for his prolific style of playing high-quality pace and spin against the world’s best bowling line-up in the 80s.
In 1992, Martin captained the New Zealand team. He utilised all the resources of the home to their maximum potential with a different style of approach. He started the opening overs with his right arm off spinner Dipak Patel, which was a rare sight to see at that time as spinners were supposed to come bowl after the ball got damaged a bit or lost its shine.
Along with the changes in bowling, he promoted the batting order of Mark Greatbatch, who was a hard hitter for New Zealand. He sent him to open and utilise the field restrictions to Mark’s full potential of getting a couple of boundaries.
Martin Crowe had a great career performance where he scored the most runs in an inning against Sri Lanka in Wellington of 299*, which was the most by any individual from New Zealand until Brendon McCullum scored 302* against India in 2014.
Also Read : Batsman With Most Centuries In ICC World Test Championship
Martin Crowe’s struggling phase (not with the bat)
Unfortunately, there came a time when Crowe got into a struggle with his injuries to the lower back, shin, and hamstrings. Martin Crowe was in his best time of test cricket, where he played 16 test matches with an impressive average of 55.5, which was 10 runs higher than his overall average across all formats of international cricket.
Martin Crowe played 77 matches in his career span of 1982–92 and made 5444 runs with an average of 45.36, followed by seventeen centuries and eighteen half centuries.
After retiring from cricket, Martin Crowe became a prominent figure in the media. He led Sky’s television coverage of cricket in New Zealand, created a new format called Cricket Max, and contributed to the early success of the Royal Challengers Bangalore in the IPL.
A respected commentator and mentor, Crowe continued to influence the next generation of New Zealand cricketers. Sadly, he passed away in 2016 at the age of 53 after a battle with lymphoma.
