Where have all the allrounders gone? Or have they …

Wiaan Mulder is the only allrounder in South Africa’s squad. But no eyebrows were raised when he was released to play for the Lions.

Sunday Times

TELFORD VICE in London

IT’S 1976 and filming for the vast waste of talent and money that is Star Wars starts in Tunisia, California takes a giant leap towards civilisation by repealing its sodomy law, and apartheid shows the extent of its evil by turning the guns on Soweto’s children.

Exponentially less disputed than any of the above is this: Alan Knott is the world’s best wicketkeeper in 1976 and would thus walk into any XI on the planet.

That was unarguably true even though 24 players scored more runs in tests than Knott that year. Among them were Deryck Murray, Warren Lees, and Syed Kirmani — the only other wicketkeepers among the top 50 runscorers.

Murray led the pack at No. 16. Why focus on 1976? Because that was the last year before Kerry Packer’s World Series changed the game forever.

Flip the record book’s pages to 2018 and there are 16 stumpers among the leading 50 test runscorers. Kusal Mendis is second on the list overall and Jos Buttler fifth. Tom Latham and Jonny Bairstow are also in the top 20.

And, unlike Knott, none of them could be sure of their place in the side on the strength of their glovework alone. More often than not modern wicketkeepers are batters first.

The rise of the batter-wicketkeeper — who used to be called wicketkeeper-batsmen, who were different from wicketkeepers — is the single biggest reason for the apparent demise of the genuine allrounder: someone who could hold down a place as either a batter or a bowler and, happily for them and their team, does both.

Wiaan Mulder is the only player with those credentials in South Africa’s squad for their series against Sri Lanka, which started at Kingsmead on Wednesday. But no eyebrows were raised when he was released to go home to Joburg and play for the Lions.

Quinton de Kock, the epitome of the batter-wicketkeeper, and so, in the current understanding of the description, South Africa’s allrounder, left no doubt about his priorities when he spoke to reporters after Thursday’s play in Durban.

De Kock’s skills behind the stumps have improved exponentially, but he talked of “the profession of batting at No. 7 … six or seven” and made the point that “batting with the bottom order it can go either way”.

That might rankle, ever so slightly, Kagiso Rabada. With a highest score of 34 in his 50 test innings, there’s potential for the fast bowler to strengthen his second suit, and the seriousness of his study of batting is plain from the chiselled technique he brings to the crease. But South Africa’s No. 9 proved there’s more to the craft of batting when he middled a full toss down deep square leg’s throat.

“I think he couldn’t understand how he hit the ball all the way to the boundary like that,” De Kock said. “It’s [a case of], ‘Sorry, bru — it happens. Too strong, hey’. But everyone knows ‘KG’ can bat.”

He can, which doesn’t help the cause of players like Mulder. Even so, Ben Stokes, Mahmudullah, Hardik Pandya and Jason Holder — allrounders all — were among 2018’s top runscorers, and Holder burnished his reputation with his undefeated 202 against England in Barbados last month. Who fit the bill in 1976? Tony Greig, Bob Woolmer, Imran Khan and Bernard Julien.

So it seems cricket still has, like it always has, a place for the allrounder. But Mulder would do himself a favour by adding another arrow to his quiver: learn to keep wicket.