Cricketers playing a contrasting role in the game instead of any specified role for the sake of the team is nothing new in the world of cricket. There are several examples in the International Cricket when a player changed his role to cope up with the team. In the upcoming list, we are
going to write down about top 5 players who began their international career as bowlers but gradually turned out to be successful batsmen.
4) Cameron White – Hailing from Victoria, Australia White was another player whose conveyance from being picked as a bowler in the team to establishing himself as a hard-hitting lower order batsman was witnessed by ardent cricket followers. In International cricket, though
he was a proper middle-order batsman, he was mostly a bowler who can bat. In 1st class cricket, he has 195 wickets which prove how good he was as a bowler. From a bowler who could bat a bit, he transformed into a batsman who hardly bowls. But the ups and downs in his batting form meant he was not an ineradicable member of the team. But still he has few impactful performances for the Baggy Greens with the bat.
3) Shoaib Malik – Not many are aware of this fact that the elegant right-handed middle-order batsman of Pakistan was initially got picked as a bowler before evolving himself as a batsman. The cricketer who is in the international circuit for almost two decades has always been an
effective part-timer for his team and his impact also reflects in his stats as he has 158 wickets along with 7500+ runs. Though selectors didn’t persist with him in the test team due to not so convincing performances, he has been a regular member in the shorter formats. As a batsman
also he has batted at every position from no.1 to no.10. From a solid opener to a manufactured slogger, the cricket world has witnessed everything from the off-spinner.
2) Steven Smith – The “Smudge” needs no introduction in World cricket as the superstar has already exhibited his ability in front of the world. Like others in the list, Smith also began his career as a potential leg-break bowler who could bat a bit. His initial selection for the national
team obtained much criticism from the cricket experts, but soon he started to modify his batting ability and within next couple of years he had already made the spectators sit up straight and watch his batting. Apparently, it seemed like he has begun to take his game to another level as
he scored 402 runs in 8 innings in Australia’s successful World Cup campaign of 2015. But more than in the shorter formats, it was his batting in the longest and probably the toughest format of the game which made him the whole cricket fraternity hail him as one of the best batsmen of
the era. With the passage of time, as he gained maturity, his batting began to flourish more and more. Contemporarily, Smith doesn’t bowl except once in a blue moon, but he is the present best test batsman and is also an integral part of the Baggy Greens in the shorter formats.
1) Sanath Jayasuriya – The Sri Lankan legend has always been an impactful bowler for his team, but we’ve mostly seen him as a part-timer. But from his debut in 1989 to 1995, the hard-hitter opener never averaged over 30 in ODIs. It was only due to his effective left-arm spin, he
managed to play more or less all the matches for his nation. It was in 1996 when he just broke all the shackles and became the strafe Jayasuriya we know. From there on he didn’t have to look back ever, as he went on to become one of the best openers the world ever witnessed. But his
refinement in batting never halted his bowling as he had always been the go-to bowler for his captains and has won several matches with his bowling. In international cricket along with 20000+ runs, he has also taken 440 wickets across the formats among which 322 in ODIs only
demonstrates his brilliance in bowling. But it is more about his swashbuckling batting which Jayasuriya is mostly known for as he used to provide great starts to Sri Lanka’s innings more or less constantly and often used to transform those starts into a big ones. To be precise Jayasuriya never really transformed himself from a bowler to a batsman but from 1996 till the dusk of his career it was all about his batting that repressed his effectiveness as a bowler in front of the fans.
