A fairytale start, a slow decline

Ian Botham: one of cricket's more genuine allrounders © Getty Images

As far as allrounders go, you don't have to look very far beyond Ian Botham to pick one of cricket's best. Statistics cannot hope to capture his contribution to the game: his charisma and inspiration weighed in equally with wickets and runs and without the former, the latter would have lacked lustre.

Botham's numbers are truly impressive. He's one of only two players to have scored 5000 Test runs and taken more than 300 wickets, the other being Kapil Dev. His aggressive approach to the game and his natural ability gave him 27 five-wicket hauls and 14 centuries, making him an outright matchwinner with both bat and ball.

Botham made a memorable debut in 1977 and ran amok in the next two years, averaging nearly 40 with the bat and just above 19 with the ball. However, it must be remembered that rampant-Botham coincided with the Packer years when Australia were a severely weakened side and Pakistan, against whom Botham scored at 70.66 and took wickets at 16.07, had lost some of their frontline players to World Series Cricket. The 1981 Ashes was the pinnacle of Botham's allround powers as he tallied 399 runs, including hundreds at Headingley and Old Trafford, and 34 wickets in what is now known in English folklore as 'Botham's Ashes'.

Botham and Viv Richards got along famously as flatmates while playing at Somerset but the West Indies proved to be Botham's bogey team and the lack of a satisfactory record against cricket's team-to-beat at the time must be high up on Botham's wish-I-could-change-that list. He did not score a hundred against them and managed just four fifties in 20 games. His bowling against them wasn't too flash either, averaging a generous 35.18 and taking just three of his 27 five-wicket hauls. Botham had a terrible time in the Caribbean, where he averaged a paltry 14.17 in nine games with 38 being his highest score.

In 1980, Botham, aged 24, was named England captain, succeeding Mike Brearley, against West Indies. He was their youngest captain since the turn of the century, and perhaps he wasn't ready to balance captaincy with his allround abilities because both his batting and bowling suffered. He averaged just 13.14 with the bat and took only 35 wickets in 12 matches as captain, and didn't manage a win either, drawing eight and losing four . In fairness, all the Tests were against either Australia and West Indies. Perhaps a sign of how much it affected him was underlined by the fact he made 149* and took 6 for 91 in his first match after being sacked.

After hammering 138 of 174 balls in England's victory at Brisbane in November 1986, Botham's career went steeply downhill. Problems with fitness took their toll and in his last 16 Tests Botham hit only one half-century and took just 23 wickets at 48.82 a piece. In his last Test, Botham made just eight runs, falling to Waqar Younis both times, and bowled just five overs without success. It was a sad end, as he was clearly not up to top-class international cricket and was picked on reputation rather than ability.

Botham's decline at the end of his career was as spectacular as his successful start. But stats cannot do justice to the shot of adrenalin that his character and spirit gave to English cricket. Botham's edge was his charisma and Richards, in his autobiography, said that outside his family, 'Both' was the only person he would physically stand up and defend.