Kalllis 50th birthday today.How great?

[Harsh Thakor]

On October 16^th the cricket world celebrates the 50^th birthday of Jacques Kallis, one of the greatest cricketers to have strode on our planet, who has a strong case for being rated the 2^nd best allrounder to Sir Garfield Sobers if not the best allrounder ever and the best cricketer of his generation.

Kallis was not the run of the mill entertainer or as explosive like Ian Botham or Kapil Dev, not as charismatic as Sachin Tendulkar or Imran Khan or as artistic as Gary Sobers or Wasim Akram. However possibly he surpassed them all for all round cricketing tenacity or endurance, with his prolonged tenures at the crease, making a habit of saving games.

 

Kallis ended up with skyrocketing figures, scaling horizons unscaled statistically and setting new parameters by an all-rounder, piling on 13,289 runs at an average of 55.37., scoring 45 centuries, in 137 tests,capturing 292 wickets and taking 200 catches. In ODI’s he scored 7995 runs at an average of 43.93 with 13 centuries at and captured 203 wickets at an average of 32.33.

He twice had purple patches where he made five hundreds in the space of eight innings or fewer, statistically surpassing the likes of Viv Richards, Brian Lara, Gary Sobers or Sachin Tendulkar, in this respect, as a run machine.

He finished with over 2000 runs against each of Australia, England and West Indies. He took five wickets in an innings five times in Tests, including 5 for 30 against West Indies in Cape Town in 1999 and 6 for 67 against them in Bridgetown two years on.

There is heated debate in the cricketing world on whether Kallis ranks above or on par with Sir Garfield Sobers , 2^nd best allrounder of all time ahead of the likes of Imran Khan, Keith Milller, Ian Botham and Kapil Dev and 2^nd best ever cricketer to Don Bradman.

Without the slightest hesitation I would not rank Kallis on par with Sir Garfield Sobers. No doubt Kallis’s staggering statistical figures were overwhelming and superseded Sobers, but comparative figures do not convey the unequalled aesthetic qualities of Sobers or overpowering influence as match-winner. Kallis did not posess the diversity of the bowling armoury of Sobers which had genuine pace, fast, medium spin and chinaman, nor as wide array of batting strokes or as contemptuous power. Kallis has never come up with innings equalling Sobers’s majestic 254 at Melbourne in 1972 and 132 in the tied test in 1961, nor turned in all round performances in a single series in the stature of Sobers in England in 1966 or playing for Rest of the World in 1970 in England. However, Kallis was the more durable and more effective in saving match and in peak stints surpassed Sobers in batting consistency., like in 2003-04. No allrounder in cricket history displayed equal consistency with the bat as Kallis or transcended as superlative heights in run scoring in peak periods.

As great fast bowlers win matches more than great batsmen the likes of Imran Khan, Keith Miller, Ian Botham and Kapil Dev could win more matches than Kallis. Kapil Dev, Miller and Botham were also more dynamic with the bat. Still had Kallis played in their era, he may well have overshadowed them all, having to carry less workload as a bowler. -with half as much cricket played then than in his era.

Pertinent that Kallis was not at his best with both bat and ball like Sobers, Botham or Miller, but one has to take into account the transition in the game, which acted against a cricketer’s all-round prowess.

Even if the verdict may well result in dead heat between Keith Miller, Ian Botham, Jacques Kallis and Imran Khan with a gun on my head I place Kallis as the runner up to Sobers, in the plethora of great all-rounders of all time. To replace Gary Sobers in an all-time test team, my first choice would be Kallis.

In comparison to the greatest cricketers like Bradman, Sobers, Viv Richards, Tendulkar and Brian Lara, Kallis lacked the crucial ‘x’ factor. Still, I would choose him amongst my top 15 cricketers of all time.

[Majestic]

Top 10 test all rounders of all time:-

 

1. Sobers

2. Kallis

3. Jadeja

4. Botham

5. Miller

6. Kapil

7. Imran

8. Pollock

9. Ashwin

10. Hadlee

 

All hail Majestic! 

[Chaos]

Meh he is ok. Watching him bat is like paint dry. If he played in this era people would throw eggs at him for his snail batting. But he did blunt great attacks to dust tho. 

[StraightDrive26]

Amazing all-rounder but a boring batter to watch. He was very effective for SA with the bat but you wouldn't want to watch him bat as a neutral in any format. His SR's of 45 in Tests, 72 in ODIs and 119 in T20Is proves the point. His bowling was more exciting than his batting, even though he was a batting all-rounder. He did average 55 in Tests and scored 13289 runs, so he is a batting great. His bowling was good and he had pace, he bowled around 13 overs an innings which is decent for an all-rounder and almost picked 300 Test wickets. So he is one of the all-time great all-rounders in Tests. He was great in ODI as well with 11.5k runs and 273 wickets. He surely will be in top 10 best all-rounders of all time. I will place Kallis behind K Miller and G Sobers. K Miller ahead of Kallis because he was so good in both disciplines for the era he played in an average of 37 with the bat was brilliant. Imran even though has a similar average, his batting was worse than Kallis. He played lots of slow knows without any aggression and put people to sleep. His average of 50+ in the latter half of his career with the bat was due to the fact that he became a strokeless wonder to get his batting average up. On the contrary K Miller as an aggressive bat and an impressive seamer. 

 

Here is my top 10 best all-rounders:

 

1. G Sobers

2. K Miller

3. J. Kallis

4. R Jadeja

5. A Faulkner (Only played 25 Tests but was a premium all-rounder with a batting average of 40 and bowling average of 26)

6. I Khan

7. I Botham

8. K Dev

9. S Pollock

10. R Hadlee

 

Ashwin misses out as his secondary skill of batting ended up inferior to the secondary skills of the players mentioned in the list. TA Goddard also is a shoe in, he averaged 34 with the bat and 26 with the ball. 

Edited October 17, 2025 by StraightDrive26

[Lord]

8 hours ago, Majestic said:

Top 10 test all rounders of all time:-

 

1. Sobers

2. Kallis

3. Jadeja

4. Botham

5. Miller

6. Kapil

7. Imran

8. Pollock

9. Ashwin

10. Hadlee

 

All hail Majestic! 

no Stokes or Cairns?

[Majestic]

25 minutes ago, Lord said:

no Stokes or Cairns?

Note that you can only have 10 names in top 10. Not more than that and not less than that 

[Majestic]

Ben Stokes is a highly impactful all rounder but at the same time very inconsistent and more known for game changing spells or knocks against any opponent in favourable conditions ( home or South Africa). There is an obvious lack of such knocks or spells outside England and South Africa for him. 
 

A player like him should have produced an impactful performance atleast in Australia. If he does it this time, he will definitely move up the ranks.

 

[Gollum]

Greatest cricketer of the modern (post 1970) era. Would have been celebrated like a demigod if he were from India or England.

[putrevus]

Not seen Sobers play but  he could not have been better than Kallis.

 

Kallis is the greatest cricketer to have played the game.

[BacktoCricaddict]

Here's the way I look at the Kallis GOAT discussion:

 

If I had to pick a squad to play and win a 5-match test series, he would be the first one I'd pencil in.

If I had to pick a team to play and win a single, everything-is-at-stake clutch match, he wouldn't be the first one I'd pick.

[tapandrun]

Can easily make a case for best cricket 

[zen]

Sobers

Imran

Hadlee 

Kallis 

…

 

[rkt.india]

One of greatest test cricketer ever to have played, probably in top 5, IMO.