Technically, it was a dropped catch, by Glenn Phillips’ standards. Zak Foulkes bowled outside off and Shubman Gill cut it hard. At backward point, Phillips took flight and met the ball mid-air to his left, his body almost parallel to the ground. The ball didn’t stick and the Kiwi super-athlete was disappointed. For lesser mortals, he saved a certain four, but Phillips is the modern-day Jonty Rhodes.
In the Indian dressing room, a wide-eyed Virat Kohli held his head in disbelief. Out there in the middle, Gill broke into a smile. As is his wont, Phillips wowed the fans with his fielding in Vadodara also in the first ODI of the series like he does everywhere else.
Phillips’ fitness and agility apparently makes him good enough for any sport. It feels like he can trade his position in the BLACKCAPS and seamlessly fit in as a fly-half in the All Blacks. A member of the New Zealand cricket team staff agreed.
Of late, Phillips is batting left-handed at the nets. It’s not like John Buchanan’s “ambidextrous theory” that suggested every young cricketer should be trained to be ambidextrous. The former Australia coach probably mixed chalk with cheese, and Shane Warne, who else, came up with a derisive response: “Verbal diarrhoea”.
Ambidexterity in sport is for those who are born with a special talent, and Phillips has it. But even he is still not confident enough to bat left-handed in international matches. He is doing it at the nets, and tried it in odd domestic fixtures. Going ahead, will we see him switching to be a left-hand batter in high-octane international games?
“I did see him (Phillips) do that for his team in New Zealand in the T20 format, so yeah I’m not sure whether you will see it,” said Henry Nicholls, the New Zealand opener, at the pre-match press conference. “He is certainly someone who, obviously, the way he works on his game and you see that in the field as well, the things he does is certainly like no one else. So I wouldn’t be surprised if you see him bring it out at some point, but yeah he is certainly an X-factor player that whatever he is doing, batting, bowling or fielding, it’s hard to miss him. So yeah, he is certainly impressive.”
And when Phillips is not playing cricket, he is flying planes. Aviation is his passion and the 29-year-old is a qualified pilot. At this moment, his ‘adventures’ are restricted to flying smaller aircrafts at flying clubs.
Trivia: Can you name another cricketer who is a certified pilot?
Answer: Colin Croft, the former West Indies fast bowler, holds a Commercial Airline Pilot’s licence.
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