Even as the cricketing world mourns the passing of Martin Crowe — one of modern cricket’s greatest and innovative stroke player and acknowledged thinker of the game — his captain for ten Test matches between 1988 and 1990, John Wright expressed his sadness and called Crowe as New Zealand’s finest ever batsman. Crowe scored 753 runs at an average of 57.92 with three centuries and as many half centuries in 14 innings under the captaincy of Wright. It was Wright who was nominated captain when Crowe, after making 91, could not take the field in Pakistan’s chase of 263 in the semifinal of the 1992 World Cup at Eden Park, Auckland.
New Zealand's finest
Paying homage to Crowe, Wright said: “Yes sad, so very sad...our finest ever batsman gone at such a young stage of his life. Some of Martin’s greatest accolades came from the players who really knew how good he was... the bowlers and captains. Bowling at him and setting a field to contain him was always very challenging. From a cricket purist’s perspective, he was always such a beautiful player to watch; the balance and the footwork.’’
Wright, who was the former India coach and is now associated with IPL team Mumbai Indians, shared his experience of batting with a player who typified classic batsmanship: “Batting with Martin was a great joy. He made it look easy. He put the bowlers under pressure right from the start and in turn, it made life easier for you as well.’’
Furthermore, Wright said: “The other memory is that he played every type of bowling outstandingly well. It didn’t really matter who he was playing and where he was playing. He was the brains behind the fore runner to T20 called ‘Cricket Max’ here in New Zealand. He was well ahead of his time.”
Wright concluded the mail to Sportstar saying: “We will miss him, his writing and intelligent assessment of the game.”
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