The invisible hero

This piece on Mathew Hayden first appeared in the December 2002 issue of Wisden Asia Cricket.

Matthew Hayden's face does not haunt TV ads, unlike Adam Gilchrist. He does not stare back at you from magazine covers, unlike Brett Lee or Steve Waugh. He has never had a book written about him, unlike almost all his team-mates. He has never even been judged a Wisden cricketer of the year, either in England or Australia [After this piece appeared, Hayden was named Wisden Cricketer of the Year for 2002-03].

There is a strong case for saying Hayden is the greatest cricketer in the world today. Thirty-six years ago John Lennon incensed millions when he claimed the Beatles were "bigger than Jesus". If Hayden uttered the cricketing equivalent - that he is "bigger than Bradman" - few people would blink twice. Indeed, he doesn't have to say it; countless others are saying it for him.

Yet if that is true, it is equally true that he is one of the most unsuper superstars the game has known. He is not unliked, nor unadmired, but he is curiously uncelebrated. Maybe it has something to do with where he bats. From the swashbucklers of yore (Fred Spofforth, Syd Barnes, Bradman, George Headley) through to the modern-day maestros (Dennis Lillee, Viv Richards, Sachin Tendulkar, Shane Warne), cricket's genuine giants have invariably been middle-order batsmen, spinners or ferocious fast men. Openers, whose job description includes an unglamorous pinch of grit and guts, tend not to dazzle the senses.

But this, if it is a factor at all, is a miniscule one. Going in first did not stop Sunil Gavaskar, Jack Hobbs or Victor Trumper from becoming famous. Maybe it has something to do with the team he plays for. Steve Waugh's Australians are respected by all but resented by many. Children adore them but some old-timers quake at their ruthlessness, their fondness for the tactics of "mental disintegration". And Hayden, if his opponents are to be believed, is the doyen of disintegration.

But again, if this is a cause of Hayden's unsuperstardom, it is, at best, a marginal one. Maybe it has something to do with the way he plays: calm, pragmatic, in control, almost robotic in his unflappability. He has none of the flawed, tantalising genius of a Brian Lara or a Mark Waugh. Where, some may ask, is the romance in the man?

But they forget that Hayden was for years derided as the quintessential flat-attack bully: prolific against domestic trundlers, vulnerable against high-class spin or speed. It took him six years to play eight Tests. After a dozen matches his average was teetering in the mid-20s. If romance counts for anything, then the fall and rise of Matthew Hayden should have Mills & Boon knocking on his door any day now.

Maybe, indeed, it has something to do with those patchy beginnings in the early 1990s. People still remember how the young Hayden would poke grimly round his front pad. How he looked lost against the spinners. How his clunky footwork was exposed by Allan Donald and Curtly Ambrose. Maybe, they say, little has changed. Maybe he is merely lucky, a beneficiary of his times, when all the powerful young fast bowlers of the world - bar Shaun Pollock and Shoaib Akhtar - play for the same team he does.

But if there is anyone left who truly questions Hayden's mettle then they are ignoring the bleeding obvious. In the past two years, starting with the 2001 tour of India, he has clouted 10 Test hundreds and averaged 73.88. Luck can explain only so much. No, the world's indifference to Hayden has as much to do with us as him. He defies the coaching manual. He routinely disproves everything we know to be true. And none of us, as a result, know quite what to make of him.

We are used to cheering batsmen who uncoil flowing off-drives and delicate glances. Hayden does that but he does much else besides. He hoicks over square-leg balls that are too full to pull. He clumps past the bowler balls that are too short to drive. Inswinging yorkers become half-volleys on his pads. Big-turning doosras become fodder for one of his vast repertoire of sweep shots.

Often his timing is astray, but he swings and follows through so hard that it matters little. On occasion he still trips over his feet, but he belongs to that select band of philosophers who reckon footwork is overrated. During the recent Gabba Test against England, one sometimes felt his opening partner Justin Langer was playing much the better of the two. Yet Langer finished the match with scores of 32 and 22. Hayden made 197 and 103. Then there's his physical approach which, again, is not quite like anything we have seen before. Against Pakistan Hayden turned convention on its head by verbally taking the fight up to Shoaib - needling him, egging him on to bowl faster and faster - rather than vice-versa. Langer didn't enjoy it much but Hayden ended the series with his customary 60-plus average. Australia's thoughtful coach John Buchanan remarked in a recent radio interview: "It's unusual to find a batsman who is intimidating but Hayden is one of those players ... His presence on the field is intimidating to other teams."

He is a fast bowler in pads. He hits their best deliveries for four, so bowlers wonder where to bowl. He hits our expectations for six, so we wonder what to think. Almost 75 years ago another man had a similar effect. When Don Bradman started accumulating double-centuries the way everyone else accumulates dirty laundry, the world's first reaction was bewilderment. The experts thought him technically unsound and warned that he would soon come unstuck. He never did, of course, and uncertainty quickly turned into uninhibited devotion. Is history about to repeat itself? For most of his life Matthew Hayden has been a champion-in-waiting. At last, one senses, he is now a superstar-in-waiting.

Chris Ryan is the editor of Inside Edge.