Jacques Kallis vs rest of the world: The ultimate comparison guide

Jacques Kallis has announced that he would be saying good-bye to Test cricket after the Durban Test. This will bring one of the most successful careers in Test cricket to an end. Because whatever Kallis did, he did it in exemplary fashion.

Kallis’ numbers are just mind-numbing. He is the only player to score 10,000 runs, take 250 wickets and hold 100 catches - both in Tests and ODIs.

With 13,174 runs, Kallis holds the record of highest aggregate by a South African player. Only three players have scored more runs in Test cricket than Kallis and only one has scored more Test centuries than Jacques Kallis. Last but not the least, Kallis has won more Man of the Match awards than any other player in Test cricket – a testimony of his real worth.

So how good an allrounder has Kallis been? Among all players who have scored 1,000 runs and taken 100 wickets in Test cricket, Kallis is one of only two players whose batting average is over 50 and exceeds his bowling average by 20 or more. The other great is Gary Sobers.

Here are the away records of the top allrounders

Gary Sobers was one of the greatest match-winners in Test cricket. In matches won by West Indies, Sobers averaged 77.42 with the bat and 24.04 with the ball — a difference of more than 53 points. Here also, Kallis is second with a batting average of 62.01 and bowling average of 24.31 — a difference of 37.70 between the averages.

Not just Test cricket, Kallis is one of the greatest exponents of his trade in shorter versions of the game as well. He is the only player to aggregate 25,000 runs, 500 wickets and 250 catches in international cricket. And he is right on the top when it comes to the difference between batting and bowling averages.

Where does Kallis rank among game’s greatest names? The following table lists leading run-scorers in Test cricket. Kallis is fourth in this list behind Tendulkar, Ponting and Dravid. Only Sangakkara has managed a higher batting average. And only Sachin Tendulkar has scored more centuries than Kallis. These figures are enough to put Kallis’ name in the same bracket along with the game’s greatest names. Add to this the 292 wickets he has taken and Kallis is in a league of his own, with no one else anywhere near him.

It is, therefore, a mystery why Kallis never got that much attention that a player of his caliber richly deserved. Is it because of his no-nonsense approach that he looked stereo-typed to cricket-fans or is it because of an inherent bias from media towards the other players for non-cricketing reasons? Whatever be the reasons, the current generation is really fortunate to have seen Kallis playing. One does not know when we shall again see a complete player changing the course of a match with his batting, bowling or fielding like Kallis used to do.

Note: All statistics are complete and updated before the start of Durban Test.