Calum MacLeod

Calum MacLeod won a place in Scottish sport folklore when he struck a century that helped Scotland beat the world's No. 1 ODI side at the time, England, in a game in Edinburgh in 2018. That year, he also produced an unbeaten 157 against Afghanistan in a World Cup Qualifier match in Bulawayo, where he expertly dealt with legspinner Rashid Khan, liberally employing a sweep shot that he put down to his time spent playing hockey. Those knocks made him a slam-dunk choice at the end of 2018 to claim the ICC Associate Player of the Year Award, making him the second Scotland player to do so following Preston Mommsen in 2014.

When MacLeod acted as a substitute fielder for England in an Ashes Test in 2009 he became the first Gaelic speaker to appear in a Test. That year, his hopes of forging a county career as a fast bowler fell apart when his action was reported after an Intercontinental Cup match. Remedial work followed, including sessions with Allan Donald, then bowling coach at Warwickshire, but he was released by the county in 2010.

Nevertheless, hours spent watching the preparations of Warwickshire's England duo, Ian Bell and Jonathan Trott, proved to be of benefit. Cricket Scotland had introduced player contracts at the end of 2008, and gradually MacLeod, who had briefly wondered about taking up hockey, surprised everyone by forcing his way into the side as a batter.

Two MacLeod centuries in succession in January 2014 - a 62-ball 113 against UAE and 175 against Canada - played a major part in Scotland's qualification for the 2015 World Cup. Durham were impressed enough to offer him a contract, as a T20 player first and then across formats, and he helped win them the Royal London One-Day Cup that year. In 2018, Derbyshire signed him up in T20, and they benefited from a 58-ball hundred against Northamptonshire.

MacLeod's run-making - exactly 4000 runs in List A cricket for Scotland and more than 4300 overall - has often come in bursts: his limited-overs average for Scotland of 32.52 is not in the country's top ten, yet he is comfortably top of the heap when it comes to List A and ODI hundreds made for the side.

He was in sizzling ODI form over the home summer of 2022, making six scores of 50-plus in nine innings and finishing with an unbeaten hundred against USA at Aberdeen in what would be his final innings on home soil. Seemingly with several prime years left, he retired out of the blue at 33 in November that year, following Scotland's exit from the T20 World Cup in Australia.