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Pollock announces retirement

Cricinfo staff

January 11, 2008



Pollock took 4 for 35 in West Indies' first innings, in what is his final Test © Cricinfo Ltd





Shaun Pollock, the South Africa allrounder, has announced his retirement from international cricket following the second day's play against West Indies in Durban. The current Test, his 108th, will be his last and the one-day series that follows the final matches for his country.

"I'd like to thank Cricket South Africa for allowing me the opportunity of representing my country for the last 12 years," Pollock told a press conference after the day's play. "I thoroughly enjoy the honour and privilege of wearing the Protea badge and take with me some remarkable memories having played against some great players."

"I made the decision at the start of the season that the West Indies series would be my last," he said. "I have been fortunate to be in a team that has had the calibre of players to beat any opposition on any given day. I have made some wonderful friendships and have played against some remarkable characters."


Pollock, 34, regained his Test place for the deciding match against West Indies after not playing in the five-day game since January 2007. He currently stands on 420 Test wickets, the most by a South African, and 387 in ODIs. There is a chance he will finish with 400 in both forms depending on his success in the one-day series against West Indies.

Pollock was thrust into the captaincy of South Africa in April 2000 when Hansie Cronje was drummed out of the game, and he faced the biggest challenge of his career - to lift a shocked and demoralised South African side. However, after a solid start to his captaincy, he lost some credibility after a 3-0 drubbing in Australia in 2001-02, and was later blamed for South Africa's disastrous World Cup in which they failed to qualify for the Super Sixes.

As a result, Pollock immediately lost the captaincy and was replaced by Graeme Smith. Though his nagging brilliance around offstump remained, his pace and ability to take wickets at the top of the order dipped in latter years.

"I realise I have been blessed by God," he said, "and feel I have nurtured my talents to the best of my abilities."

Tests ODIs FC LA
Matches 107 294 183 425
Runs scored 3781 3412 6952 5369
Batting average 32.31 26.44 33.10 26.71
100s/50s 2/16 1/13 6/34 3/23
Top score 111 130 150* 134*

Balls bowled 24185 15202 38521 20748
Wickets 416 386 656 566
Bowling average 23.19 24.32 23.35 22.70
5 wickets in innings 16 5 22 7
10 wickets in match 1 n/a 2 n/a
Best bowling 7/87 6/35 7/33 6/21
Catches/stumpings 72/- 108/- 129/- 153/-
As of September 1, 2007

APart from being a very talented all-rounder he is a good bloke to have a chat with.

Think his stats says it all , was a great allrounder and more than once saved South Africa in test and one day matches, players like him don't come around all that often

If you were a young aspiring cricketer wanting an example of how to conduct yourself as a professional sportsman you could do a lot worse than follow Shaun Pollock's example.

I always though he was a fantastic bowler.
He'd nearly always have his length perfect - not too full so batsmen could drive on the front foot and not too short to pull or cut.

I always enjoyed watching Shaun Pollock play.

As a bowler, he continually reminded me of Glenn McGrath - similar as in they'd would both consistently hit that nagging length which troubles most batsman.

Played a massive part in the resurgence of South African cricket.

Fought hard with the debilitating adversity of being ginger.

best allrounder scince the era of kapil dev ,beefy botham and sir dick haddlee....havnt seen to many like this trio in pollocks era ...can any one think of any ? and mal dont say kallis because he is a long way behind these guys with the ball imo

the wonder elephant wrote:best allrounder scince the era of kapil dev ,beefy botham and sir dick haddlee....havnt seen to many like this trio in pollocks era ...can any one think of any ? and mal dont say kallis because he is a long way behind these guys with the ball imo

Yeah but all the others are equally, if not further, behind Kallis with the bat.

rod_rooster wrote:

the wonder elephant wrote:best allrounder scince the era of kapil dev ,beefy botham and sir dick haddlee....havnt seen to many like this trio in pollocks era ...can any one think of any ? and mal dont say kallis because he is a long way behind these guys with the ball imo

Yeah but all the others are equally, if not further, behind Kallis with the bat.

Agreed, although Kallis can be boring as batshit to watch sometimes....

kallis will never come near these guys with the ball though ...therefore in my opinion is not a genuine allrounder ...i did miss 1 out though and that is warne allthough he never a 100 was still a very good bat when he put his head down .....

Booney wrote:Tests ODIs FC LA
Matches 107 294 183 425
Runs scored 3781 3412 6952 5369
Batting average 32.31 26.44 33.10 26.71
100s/50s 2/16 1/13 6/34 3/23
Top score 111 130 150* 134*

Balls bowled 24185 15202 38521 20748
Wickets 416 386 656 566
Bowling average 23.19 24.32 23.35 22.70
5 wickets in innings 16 5 22 7
10 wickets in match 1 n/a 2 n/a
Best bowling 7/87 6/35 7/33 6/21
Catches/stumpings 72/- 108/- 129/- 153/-
As of September 1, 2007

Such a consistently high quality bowler, Im surprised that he took 10wi in First Class cricket only twice

the wonder elephant wrote:kallis will never come near these guys with the ball though ...therefore in my opinion is not a genuine allrounder ...i did miss 1 out though and that is warne allthough he never a 100 was still a very good bat when he put his head down .....

It's not like any of the others you mention were ever top line batsmen. Sure on their day they could do a lot of damage with the bat but it's not like they were world class batsmen as well as bowlers.

I'd argue that Kallis is a better bowler than Botham, Dev or Hadlee were batsmen.

I wouldn't, not Botham, any way

Kallis' bowling isn't good enough to run through good test sides, Where Botham was able to take teams apart with his batting, we know about us in '81 and 86-97 but the bloke scored big runs against India in '79 and 82 (double hundred) runs agaisnt Pakistan. IMHO Botham is a much better bat than Kallis is a bowler.

I'd rate Devs batting as good as Kallis bowling maybe slightly better, I never rated Hadlee much as a batter so I'm happy to concede that one