Life without Haydos hard to imagine

Ricky Ponting, the Australia captain, says even in retirement Matthew Hayden was thinking about the team ahead of himself. He writes in the Australian:

The team will miss him tremendously, not just for his run-scoring and everything he has been to the team for such a long time, but for how genuine a bloke he's been and how hardworking he's been and how he has set such a great example to the young players who come in to the change room.

Justin Langer, who formed one of Test cricket's most successful opening partnerships with Hayden, said he knew Hayden's "awesome, single-minded commitment to the Australian cricket team were over" when he received a call from his partner on Tuesday morning. He recollects memories of his playing days with Hayden on the BBC website:

A couple of years ago while touring South Africa he scored a brilliant century in Durban. When we returned to the hotel he rushed upstairs, grabbed his surfboard and ran down to the waves.

About an hour later he knocked on the door of my hotel room, still dripping wet, and revealed that this had been one of the best days of his life. "All we need now mate is a big feed and a good sleep and life just couldn't get any better than this," he said.

In the Courier-Mail Robert Craddock, a long-time watcher of Hayden, talks about the opener’s dual existence.

These are the two lives of Hayden, the public figure and the outdoors boy who might one day just disappear into the wilderness and not come back.

Peter Lalor, writing in the Australian, gives Hayden suggestions on how he could fill a book.

Maybe you could tell people what it's like to score a Test century. Or 30. Maybe you would like to tell them what it's like to score four in consecutive Tests and fall a handful of runs short of doing it in five. Maybe you could tell them about the day you scored 380 runs and what it was like to own the world record, even if it was only for six months. Or about the time you scored 549 at 109 from just three Tests in India.

Mike Coward looks back at Hayden's career in the Australian.

All opening batsmen develop their own style. Characteristically, Hayden developed a style all of his own. He was the intimidator respected and feared in equal measure by bowlers the world over. Broad of shoulder, he was a strong man who cut a powerful figure at the crease. The time-honoured responsibility of the opening batsman is to take the shine off the ball and prepare the ground for the feted number three and four, who follow when the going is more manageable. Hayden would have none of this. As far as he was concerned it was his duty to set the agenda, call the shots and dictate the tone and tempo of an innings.

Hayden's career finished as it began, with the left-hander searching for his game, says Peter Roebuck in the Age.

Towards the end he was too anxious to assert himself. In India he broke his duck with a lofted straight drive, a risk repeated on home turf. Both belligerences spoke of a determination to convey confidence. Both indicated desperation and faltering desire. But Hayden was better than he knew. Certainly he was no mere smiter. In his prime, he batted with authority and massive certainty.

In the same paper, Martin Blake recalls his favourite Hayden memory, which came in a series against Pakistan in the UAE.

It was 40 degrees-plus every day and that was in the shade. The wicket was barren and slow, making shot-play difficult. Somebody needed to dig in. Somebody had to find the heart to bat in these inhuman conditions. Certainly the Pakistanis flagged quickly. In the first of those two Test matches, Hayden batted for 431 minutes, stopping regularly for drinks, wearing a towelling wrap under his helmet, grinding and straining and cajoling everything out of his ailing body. Who knows how much weight he lost in scoring that 119. Once again, he had found a way.

Talking to the Cairns Post, brother Gary perhaps sums up Matthew's career best: "It has been a story of setbacks and how he has overcome them."