Allan Border

Allan Robert Border, born 27 July 1955, is an Australian former international cricketer who now works as a commentator. A left-handed batsman and part-time left-arm orthodox spinner, he was Australia’s captain for many years and led the team to its first world title at the 1987 Cricket World Cup. Known by the nickname “A.B.,” he played 156 Test matches—a record until fellow Australian Steve Waugh surpassed it—and held the world record for 153 consecutive Test appearances until Alastair Cook broke it in June 2018. He also ranks second on the list for most Tests as captain. Border scored 11,174 Test runs, a world record until Brian Lara passed it in 2006, and hit 27 Test centuries. When he retired, he was Australia’s most-capped player and leading run-scorer in both Tests and ODIs. His Australian record for Test runs stood for 15 years until Ricky Ponting overtook him during the third Ashes Test in July 2009. Border was one of the 55 inaugural inductees into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame. In 2009, as part of Queensland’s Q150 celebrations, he was named a Q150 Icon for his role as a sports legend, and in 2016 he received a Queensland Greats Award. A 2017 fan poll by Cricket Australia placed him in the country’s best Ashes XI of the last 40 years.

Border was born in Cremorne, a North Shore suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, and grew up in nearby Mosman with three brothers. His father John, a wool classer from Coonamble in rural New South Wales, and his mother Sheila, who ran a corner store, raised the family in a house with a spacious backyard for games. Across the street was Mosman Oval, home to district cricket, football, hockey, and baseball clubs. He attended North Sydney Boys High School, earning his leaving certificate in 1972. As a youngster, he played in cricket teams two or three years older than his age group and also played for Mosman Baseball Club, which helped his fielding and horizontal-bat shots. At sixteen, he debuted for Mosman in Sydney Grade Cricket as a left-arm orthodox spinner, batting at number nine. He was selected for the 1972–73 Combined High Schools team in the intrastate carnival and was coached by former England international Barry Knight.

In grade cricket during 1975–76, Border scored over 600 runs. At the start of the next season, two consecutive centuries earned him selection for New South Wales. With several Test players unavailable, he made his state debut against Queensland at the SCG in January 1977, scoring 36 and taking the last three catches of the match in a victory. He then resigned from his job as a clerk in BP’s film library to play the 1977 English season for Downend in the Gloucestershire Western League, where his highlight was 159 not out against Cambridge University. Back in Australia, he scored 617 runs at 36.29 in the 1977–78 Sheffield Shield season. He returned to England to play for East Lancashire in the Lancashire League, making 1,191 runs at 56.71 and taking 54 wickets at 18.60.

During the World Series Cricket (WSC) split in 1977, many players signed with the breakaway competition and were banned from first-class and Test cricket, leaving vacancies in the Australian team. Border began the 1978–79 season with his maiden first-class century, 135 against Western Australia in Perth, followed by 114 against Victoria at the SCG. After Australia lost the first two Ashes Tests, he was selected for his Test debut at the MCG. He made a nervous start, taking over half an hour to score three runs, and finished with 29 and a run-out duck in the second innings. In the next Test at Sydney, he was in a “lonely class of his own,” top-scoring in both innings with 60 not out and 45 not out as Australia lost the match and the Ashes. He used his feet to the spinners while teammates struggled. After scores of 11 and 1 in the fifth Test at Adelaide, he was dropped for the sixth—the only Test he missed in his entire career, as he then played in all of Australia’s next 153 Tests.

Recalled for the first Test against Pakistan at the MCG, Border batted at number three and hit his maiden Test century as Australia reached 3/305 chasing 382 for victory. His dismissal for 105 triggered a collapse of seven wickets for five runs, as teammates could not handle Sarfraz Nawaz’s swing, and Australia lost by 71 runs. He then made 85 and 66 not out in a victory in Perth to square the series, topping the batting aggregates and averages with 276 runs at 92.00 in his second Test series. In May 1979, the ACB reached an agreement with WSC, allowing those players to return to international cricket for the 1979–80 season. Meanwhile, Australia toured England for the 1979 Cricket World Cup, where they were eliminated in the first round; Border scored 59 runs in two innings. A subsequent three-month, six-Test tour of India saw Australia win no matches, with Border scoring 521 runs at 43.42 in the Test series.