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All you need to do is just look at the bowling speed showed by speed gun when Brett Lee is bowling in this spell. The ball is coming out of the hand like a torpedo. It may well whistle like a beetle when its seam is rotated in the direction of wind. The batsmen must have amazing hand eye coordination to tackle it especially on bouncy tracks. When you look at McGrath who is bowling from the other end you can notice the difference in speed of at least 25 kilometres per hour. Forget about 150 kilometres per hour. It takes some doing even to bowl at 140 kilometres per hour. Many fast bowlers have been injured doing that. Not surprisingly at one stage of Shoaib Akhtar’s career, he had missed more test matches in comparison to the total test matches that he had represented Pakistan from his debut. Even Brett Lee had once said in an interview that it takes lots of hard work and sacrifice to bowl very fast. Dale Steyn is one incredible bowler who I see not injured prolonged after bowling very fast which is a rare exception.
- Series – Australia tour of New Zealand, 5 Match ODI Series, 5th ODI
- Year – 2005
- Venue – McLean Park, Napier
- Date – 5 March, 2005
- Result – Australia won
- Margin – 122 runs
- Player of the match – Ricky Ponting
- Series won by – Australia
- Margin – 5-0
Written on September 2014