Not unlike other batters of the modern era, Warner moves into the run while playing front-foot strokes. He is fast, of course, but it’s his braking – the way he slows from a high-speed dash far enough from the crease at the other end to reach across with the bat, complete the run and get back for the next one – that is truly breathtaking. The other top-drawer element in his running is the confidence: this is a batter who sees opportunities where most others might not.
To the eye of the average observer (me, in this case), Warner also looks tireless; he can keep at it after six hours of batting, or late in an IPL innings in energy-sapping mid-May Chennai heat.
Like some of the best runners between the wickets, Warner isn’t terribly pretty when at it. But there is a sense of economy of effort: it’s unspectacular but effective.
“If I have to make a tackle, I have already made a mistake,” footballer Paolo Maldini once said. The great Italian defender was making a simple point: read the game, don’t miss the play, get into the right position; if you do, you won’t need the tackle, you’ll get the ball anyway. Warner, with his stolen singles, does exactly that.
Dhoni was 37 then, but you wouldn’t know it. Observe his running and you find he is similar to pro sprinters in how he is explosive off the blocks, runs in straight lines, his head is still and his strides powerful. But running fast is just one part of being quick between the wickets. Holding the bat the right way while running, turning at the right time, from the right spot, keeping an eye on who the fielder is and what angle he is going to be throwing from – a batter has to be mindful of all this when stealing runs.
In the competition with Bravo, you see Dhoni transfer the bat effortlessly from left to right hand as he turns for the second. Observe how he grips the bat at the top of the handle for the turn. Most important: check how low Dhoni is crouched compared to Bravo as he turns. That allows him a powerful, sprinter-like start for the next run.
With his judgement of runs and these basics still in place, even at 41, Dhoni remains one of the best runners between the wickets in the game.
What do we even mean by the “best” when it comes to the prosaic art of running between the wickets? The injured Jonny Bairstow is among the best of England’s hustlers, with his supermarket manager’s eye for two-for-one offers, but if it’s “fun” you’re after, a degree of ineptitude is essential – give me the lottery of Inzamam-ul-Haq or Nasser Hussain any day, and line up the victims for our delectation.
Such comedic chaos is harder to pinpoint in the modern T20 game, where run-outs tend to be an occupational hazard of hard-pressing rather than an accident waiting to be sprung by a usual suspect. For this World Cup, however, you just get the sense that there’s an incident itching to be unleashed… probably in the knockouts, and almost certainly against England, whose moral compasses have been spinning off their axes this past fortnight.
Somehow I doubt England’s opponents will be quite so reticent on such topics – either when their own bowlers are watching the encroachers out of the corners of their eyes, or maybe even when they themselves are taking liberties in a crunch situation, and testing the limits of England’s moral rectitude. At which point, all eyes will turn to England’s captain again. To appeal or not to appeal? That could be the question.
“MS [Dhoni] and I have great understanding. While running between the wickets, if he says two, I just close my eyes and run because I know his judgement is so correct, I will make it.”
Kohli’s excellence between the wickets is a result of years of hard work and sacrifice. His commitment to pushing the boundaries of his fitness through his diet, and speed, endurance and strength training has made him one of the fittest and fastest in the game. And no matter how gruelling the conditions are, he is nearly as fast at the end of a long innings as he is at the start – it’s a comparison we need to see more of on television broadcasts.