Style
Border is commonly agreed not to have been an especially attractive or flamboyant cricketer, and accordingly he is remembered more for his rugged graft and admirable fight than for any aesthetic depth. His batting style has been faithfully described by Malcolm Knox:
Border stood in a baseballer's crouch, bat raised, ready to hop backwards and pull or cut the short ball. The Trinidad innings of 1984 were full of twitching jabs at balls aimed into his armpits. As he aged, he became a plainly unattractive batsman to watch, all punch, no grace.
Even so, as Knox acknowledged, he was by no measure a negative player; in fact, he was "a wonderful attacker" and "arguably the best player of spin Australia has produced in 50 years."
Border was a capable bowler, but, as captain, he underused himself. He also distinguished himself as a fielder, especially in his early days as a catcher at what Knox rated "the hardest position, the wide third-to-fifth slips."
Read more about this topic: Allan Border
Famous quotes containing the word style:
“In comedy, the witty style wins out over every mishap of the plot.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“On the first days, like a piece of music that one will later be mad about, but that one does not yet distinguish, that which I was to love so much in [Bergotte’s] style was not yet clear to me. I could not put down the novel that I was reading, but I thought that I was only interested in the subject, as in the first moments of love when one goes every day to see a woman at some gathering, or some pastime, by the amusements to which one believes to be attracted.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“I never knew a writer yet who took the smallest pains with his style and was at the same time readable.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)