Adam Voges

Adam Charles Voges will always be remembered for one thing – retiring with a Test average second only to the Don. And let's be honest, 'second to the Don' has become a part of the 'Terms and Conditions' of any batting record, which highlights the magnitude of this achievement.

Voges has been unlucky to get such limited opportunities, pertaining to the settled Australian batting line-up in the 2000s. It wasn't until late 2007 that he was handed a debut in limited-overs cricket, and immediately exhibited his athletic fielding and attacking batting.

Voges continued to be the quintessential 'replacement' player until 2013, when he was given an extended run against the West Indies at home, as the management decided to rest a few key players before the Champions Trophy, and test the bench strength. He responded with a hundred against the West Indies at Melbourne and had a decent Champions' Trophy in England as well, scoring 135 runs in 3 innings with one fifty and ended up being the highest scorer for Australia in the tournament. However, the Australian selectors continued to be fickle with Voges, as he was dropped after a quiet away series in India later that year.

The Western Australian batsman persevered and continued to pile on the runs in domestic cricket. In the 2014/15 season, he scaled new heights in the Sheffield Shield, notching up an unprecedented 1358 runs at a Bradman-esque average of 104.46. His consistency was unreal, as he pelted 6 hundreds in 11 matches. Finally, at the age of 35, and after having worked supremely hard for it, the selectors could no longer deny Voges the coveted Baggy Green.

Nine years after being selected in the Test squad as a replacement for Damien Martyn, Adam Voges finally made his Test debut on the tour of the Caribbean islands in 2015. He cashed in immediately, scoring a 130 on his debut (the oldest cricketer to achieve this feat) in Dominica, and sealed his berth for the upcoming Ashes tour in England. He did not have a particularly fruitful away Ashes, starting off poorly, but he redeemed himself towards the end of the tour with a couple of fifties at Nottingham and the Oval. Moreover, he showed compact and late technique to counter the moving ball in England. This, however, did not reflect in his stats and he looked set to be the scapegoat to be axed again, in the aftermath of conceding the Ashes.

However, fortune had finally started to go Voges' way. The hangover of the lost urn saw the retirements of Rogers, Clarke, Watson and Haddin. Voges now formed an integral part of the middle-order. In addition, owing to his experience in Shield cricket and an injury to the regular vice-captain Warner, was given the honour of being deputy to captain Steven Smith. Lady luck evaded Voges again, as the tour to Bangladesh was postponed due to security concerns. However, what followed was absolutely unheard of in contemporary Test cricket.

It all started with the Hobart Test against the West Indies, where he scored a 269* on the way to a record 5th wicket stand of 449 with Shaun Marsh. He went on to score a 106* at Melbourne against the same opposition, and a 239 against New Zealand at the Basin Reserve in successive innings after that. Over the course of this innings, he rubbed shoulders with another gentleman, one Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar, whose record he surpassed by scoring the most runs between dismissals in Test cricket. He scored an unprecedented 614 runs between dismissals, breaking Tendulkar's record of 497 in the process. A plethora of other milestones tumbled in the course of these innings: his average briefly touched 100 during his 239 at the Basin Reserve when he was on 172 (it dropped to 97.46, however, after he was dismissed). He scored 969 runs in the 2015-16 season at an average of 161.50, which was another record (again, second only to the Don, who had recorded a higher season average twice).

However, after a few poor showings in Australia's home series against South Africa, Voges decided to hang up his boots with the second-highest Test average of all time (61.87) after 20 Tests. He recently slid to the 3rd spot on the list after his ex-skipper Steven Smith continued to torment the English in the home Ashes series of 2017/18, scoring his Test-best 239 at the WACA and ended the innings with a Test average of 62.32.

Voges was a useful player in T20s as well, and with the boom of T20 leagues around the world, he found himself on high demand over the years. He was signed by the Rajasthan Royals in the 2010 edition of the Indian Permier League, but couldn't make significant contributions in the limited opportunities, and was subsequently released by them. However, as the KFC Big Bash League started in his home country, he was signed by the Melbourne Stars initially, but he was roped in by the Perth Scorchers for the 4th edition of the BBL, for the club's title defence. He took to captaincy like fish to water and successfully led the Scorchers to the title defence in BBL 04. He went on to lead the Scorchers to the title in BBL 06 as well, and has been reassigned the task of leading the Scorchers in the 2017/18 edition of the BBL as well – his first stint of competitive cricket after Test retirement, at the youthful age of 38.

By Rishi Roy
As of December 2017