Batting styles: Aussies have the power, Asians the poetry

Much in the game has changed. Steve Waugh has given way to Ricky Ponting and Mark Waugh to Matthew Hayden; Lara has had few innings to remember this time around while Tendulkar and Gilchrist have left their calling card at more than one venue.

Yet one of the lasting impressions had been the power play of such as the current Australian openers Gilchrist and Hayden. For one thing, they are about as explosive a pairing as any in the limited-overs game today and, as a tactical ploy, they provide the Aussies the sort of start the World Cup champions need to fit into their tactic of planting their heel of superiority on a battered bowling attack.

Aggressive, hungry and hunting in pairs, they have often reduced to mediocrity the efforts of some of the top bowlers at World Cup 2003.

Yet it does not make for the sort of comparison of Tendulkar who, as is his wont, has often batted with more technical and tactical skill this tournament. There is no power style about his game. Even when scoring the 98 against Pakistan at SuperSport Park last weekend there was always that South Asian flair as opposed to the bully, bruising and belligerent approach of the unsightly threshing machine adopted by the Australians.

In years to come they will be remembered more for their lack of fineness than any skilled textbook technique. It is the type of domination the Aussies enjoy: tame the opposition with the intensive power play which creates its own imagery; unattractive yet highly affective. Yet what sticks in the mind is Michael Bevan’s skill and technique as well as style which enabled Australia to beat England when under pressure St George’s Park in Port Elizabeth.

There was no clumsy rustic style of sweeping, pulling, hooking or general thrashing of the ball about his game. He placed emphasis on technique.

While the spectators may enjoy the Gilchrist/Hayden style of tactics, it does little for the art of batsmanship. There is more fun in watching the opposing styles of Sanath Jayasuriya and Marvan Atapattu; the left-hander has more finesse about his technique in one stroke than Hayden and Gilchrist can muster in a season on the slogs. Both scored centuries which have been more memorable than the half-centuries of the Australian duo; but is that not the way of the one-day game?

Being a technique-orientated game, limited-overs internationals allow for too many flaws to creep into the game. Yet if Tendulkar can create a platform of cultured strokeplay to help build a total to win a game and Dravid can work on that structure with equal calmness, it says much for the alternate styles of batting involving South Asia and Australian batsmen and coaching styles.

Whether this displays a different approach to the game is something which relies more on the identity of the batsman than the coaching methods used. After all the Australians have placed more emphasis, as have the West Indians, on their own school of coaching styles and development of technique than the predominantly English forward defensive approach which inhibited the growth of some of the budding talent in other parts of the globe.

One thing, though, which the Australians do have is the confidence they ooze when they take the field with a forceful singular aim. Perhaps the one side who might match this are New Zealand, who have had some success against Ausralia in the last couple of summers. Whether they can maintain this when the two sides meet in the Super Six is another matter.

The Kiwis have a habit of failing when success is expected; this says much about the way they play their game. Stephen Fleming has developed as a strong front-foot player but the Kiwis have yet to find an adequate replacement for Roger Twose who, in 1999, did much to help the black-clad New Zealanders reach the semi-finals.

So, whether it is Tendulkar, Dravid, Atapattu or even Aravinda de Silva, the batting styles in South Asia are more about elegance than the brash Aussies. At least the Waugh twins carried with them the flamboyance which marked them as players of skill; the current crop are about as attractive to watch as a Kangaroo chasing its shadow through endless miles of outback bush.