Few fast bowlers have thrilled with such longevity in the way Dale Steyn has over the course of his career. Jo Harman profiles one of the cricketers of the decade.

Jo Harman is magazine editor of Wisden Cricket Monthly.

Wisden’s decade in review series is brought to you in association with Perry, designers of distinctive club blazers made in Yorkshire since 1946. Vote in the decade in review readers’ survey.

Dale Steyn tells a story about first falling for cricket which gives a glimpse into why he’s been so successful. He was nine at the time, watching South Africa at the 1992 World Cup, and had been spellbound by the fielding of Jonty Rhodes.

“As a young kid who was hyper and had more energy than my border collie, I would repeat everything that Jonty was doing out in our backyard,” Steyn told Wisden Cricket Monthly in 2018.

So when Rhodes performed his iconic run-out of Inzamam-ul-Haq, sprinting from point to decimate all three stumps with his own body, Steyn went into his back garden in Phalaborwa and did exactly the same. Repeatedly. “I did it so many times that my parents had to take me to hospital to be examined because I had so much bruising across my chest.”

Steyn’s pace waned a little in the latter half of this decade as the injuries he had managed to avoid earlier in his career caught up with him, but he maintained his exceptional record. Among the 14 players to have taken 200 Test wickets since 2010, Steyn’s strike rate of 43.9 is the best by some distance, while his average of 22.29 is bettered only by his ex-teammate Vernon Philander.

Alongside Philander and Morné Morkel, Steyn spearheaded what Allan Donald described as the best pace attack South Africa has ever produced. The triumvirate were instrumental in the Proteas’ climb to the top of the Test rankings in 2012, Steyn’s 5-56 against England at The Oval setting the tone for a 2-0 series victory which clinched the mace. In the two years which followed, Steyn was arguably at his peak, taking 90 Test wickets at 18.49 across 2013 and 2014. While not always bowling with the electric pace of his youth, his mastery of swing and seam was one of the game’s great spectacles.