Former South Africa gun fast bowler heaped praise on his ex-skipper Shaun Pollock after the legendary all-rounder was inducted in ICC Hall of Fame. Donald rated Pollock as South Africa’s Glenn McGrath, who would keep bowling accurately.
Pollock was known to be right on the money during his heydays and bowled an accurate line and length to breathe down the neck of the opposition batters. In fact, Pollock had decent speed under his armoury but he lost a couple of yards in his pace due to continuous troubles with injuries.
However, the former Proteas skipper never lost accuracy in his bowling. As Pollock used to bowl in the corridor of uncertainty and didn’t give an inch to the opposition batters, he was always instrumental in building the pressure from his bowling end. Thus, it helped the likes of Alan Donald and other South African bowlers to strike at regular intervals.
Pollock was inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame along with Sri Lanka’s Mahela Jayawardene and ex England women’s team skipper, late Janette Brittin.
Donald, who had a smooth bowling action said while talking to ICC, “What I admire a lot about you is the way you were able to adapt your game. When you first came into the Proteas side, you were this fast bowler who could terrorize batters.”
“…Despite injuries later in your career, you always managed to be effective, even if you didn’t quite have the pace you once had, and that’s a remarkable quality. You were our Glenn McGrath, the sort of bowler who could lock down an end and let the rest of us run free at the other,” Donald wrote in the letter.
Pollock had a glorious career as he scalped 421 wickets in 108 Test matches and also scored 3781 runs. The fast bowler also snared 393 wickets in 303 ODI matches and amassed 3519 runs in the 50-overs version.
“We could throw you the ball and say ‘See you tonight’. You would pile up the dots at one end and then I would have licence to express myself,” Donald wrote. “Where my style was to combine control with pace, you did so with swing, getting so close to the stumps that batters would have to play almost every ball. It took incredible stamina and concentration because you gave them nowhere to hide.”
“I think we were never better than when the West Indies came to South Africa in 1998/99. Between us we took 52 wickets in a 5-0 series victory. There was also the tour to India in 2000 when we won 2-0 and the two of us, along with the rest of the pace attack and Nicky Boje just seemed to click.”
