Shane Warne celebrates his 50th birthday on September 13. When he retired in 2007, Mike Atherton paid tribute to the career of his longtime opponent.
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In the moments after the Ashes were won at Perth in December 2006, only one of the victors managed the moment with due dignity. As the Australians hugged each other and celebrated with the crowd, England’s players, who had emerged to shake their conquerors’ hands, were ignored. Only Shane Warne broke away from the pack to acknowledge the vanquished.
At the end of the next Test, at the MCG, I was waiting near the podium to interview Warne, chivying him along because we were about to go off air. He started to walk over to me, then stopped. Andrew Flintoff was in the process of answering the usual post-match questions. Warne took off his cap, listened to Flintoff, applauded when Flintoff had finished, and then continued on his way towards me.
So, as with all great bowlers, Warne demanded that batsmen think carefully about their technique and, in order to succeed, alter it. Salim Malik, for example, had the courage to bat outside leg, showing Warne all three stumps, so that he was still able to score through the off side. No right-hander, in my view, played him better than Kevin Pietersen, who had such exquisite balance that he was able to change direction – with the drift – while still advancing down the pitch. He battered Warne into submission at Adelaide in 2006, causing him to run up the white flag by bowling so wide of leg stump that a stalemate ensued. It was a rare admission of failure.
Has any slow bowler ever bowled his overs so slowly? Grimmett was once told by his captain to slow down so that the bowler at the other end could be given more of a breather. Warne didn’t need to be told to slow down, because it was an essential part of his act. Occasionally during the last series, I timed his overs and, even when wickets were not falling, they could take up to four and a half minutes to complete. The long pause at the end of his run-up, the slow walk to the crease, the oohs and aahs after every delivery, the cold stare down the pitch at a batsman, a word or two in his ear, often a slight field change and a chat with the captain. All were designed not only to give him time to think, but to give the batsman time to think.
Every leg-spinner will be compared to Warne; every leg-spinner will be expected to be at once accurate and incisive, and to have all the tools at their disposal, at a moment’s notice, to be dropped on a length. We will never see anything closer to perfection.
