All quiet on the Kallis front

It is not difficult to name the almost universally agreed greatest ever all-rounder, a title which sits as easily upon the shoulders of Garry Sobers as the sobriquet of best batsman fits Bradman. Identifying the modern player whose statistics can match, and even shade Sobers, is a tad more troublesome. After all, you knew Jacques Kallis was good, but really that good? In numbers, at least, Kallis' Test career bears a remarkable resemblance to that of the great West Indian. Their Test averages differ by just 0.04, while Sobers has more wickets (from fewer games) and a better economy rate, while Kallis possesses the superior average and strike rate. There, as they say, the comparisons end, but not without serving to show just how underrated and high-achieving Kallis is in the pantheon of the modern game.

As South Africa's best batsman since re-admission, he is their top run-scorer, having just gone past 9000 Test runs with 186 against New Zealand. Only the three best seamers since 1992 - Donald, Pollock and Ntini - can better his haul of 219 wickets. Yet as neither batsman nor all-rounder has he achieved pre-eminence. Ponting, Lara, Tendulkar, Inzamam and Dravid are at least five who would be considered above him in an evaluation of the best batsmen since 2000, yet only the first can improve on his Test average of 57.74. He has a better bowling average and economy rate than Andrew Flintoff, his only contemporary in the genuine all-rounder capacity. Style plays some part - his strokeplay, while withering, is neither elegant nor dashing - there also lingers the suspicion that he only shows real willingness to bowl when there is something in it for him. Nevertheless, he is capable of producing good pace and movement, and four 5 wicket hauls in Tests mark him out as more than just a steady customer in the role of 5th bowler. Being from South Africa - a cricketing nation which has achieved excellence yet remained perennial bridesmaid in the modern age - is a contributing factor. Of the many high-achieving and talented South African players since 1992, stardom has only really visited itself on one, in Allan Donald, while often the focus on great South Africans is biased towards the generation to which circumstance denied the chance to make a mark on Test history.

It seems indicative of the Kallis paradox that one has to resort to endless statistics to prove his worth. With a player of his stature, this should not be necessary, but it is only in the numbers that the extent of his achievements are truly apparent. It is not necessary to know, or even refer to the Test average, or number of centuries of a Lara or Tendulkar. Their greatness is obvious on the field, the statistics fall neatly in line behind them; with Kallis it seems rather to be the other way around. To suffer at the hands of Kallis is not unexpected, yet the extent of his abilities seems only to be clear after he has made the fielding team sick of the sight of him; a knowledge which is stored at the back of the mind, rather than seared indelibly into the consciousness. Yet for all this semi-anonymity, Kallis is a singular, in ways unique player. Most of the great all-rounders have been primarily bowlers - Miller, Imran, Hadlee, Botham, Dev - who would take the new ball and bat in the lower-middle order. Even Sobers, like Kallis a batsman first, tended towards the middle rather than top of the order. Yet Kallis, who cannot offer anything approaching their bowling record, is a top 4 batsman, while his haul of over 200 Test wickets means he cannot be relegated into the batsman who bowls category.

That he is someone who profits by pillaging against the lesser teams is an accusation frequently leveled against him and not without foundation. Still, he is by no means alone in this, and all of his three centuries against Zimbabwe came when they were far from the token presence they have since become. An average of 48.53 in Australia and a mark of 64.6 in the three main subcontinental countries shows he is adaptable to all conditions. That his average is greater and he has more of his centuries away from home is indicative of his importance to South African cricket.

What is more, he has seemed to improve with age. In the second part of his career, his average has been 65; batting at 4, a position he assumed permanently in early 2002 and where he has batted for half of his Tests, that rises to over 70. Ominously, he is not yet a month past his 32nd birthday, while four centuries in three Tests this season show an intent uncommonly strong even in a man like Kallis. Next year, South Africa make their 5-yearly tour of England, Kallis' third and likely final visit. His record there is patchy, an average of just 37 with a solitary century, although he did bowl his team to victory at Headingley in 2003. Should he continue his current run of form, his contribution to the series could be vital in attempting to win the series in England, something South Africa have not done in their three trips since re-admission. Achieve that and maybe he will start to receive the sort of recognition which his talent and record deserve.