Brett Lee
Brett Lee is an Australian former international cricketer, who played all three formats of the game. During his international career, Lee was recognised as one of the fastest bowlers in the world.
Representing Australia, Lee won multiple ICC titles with the team: the 2003 Cricket World Cup, the 2006 ICC Champions Trophy, and the 2009 ICC Champions Trophy. Lee was the first bowler to take a hat-trick in the T20 format of the game which he did in 2007 ICC World Twenty20 in the inaugural tournament against Bangladesh, subsequently being the first bowler to do so at an ICC Men's T20 World Cup. Lee was also the first Australian bowler to take a hat-trick at a Cricket World Cup which he did in the 2003 Cricket World Cup Super Match game against Kenya.
In each of his first two years, Lee conceded fewer than 20 runs for every wicket taken, but later recorded figures in the low 30s. He was an athletic fielder and useful lower-order batter, with a batting average exceeding 20 in Test cricket. Lee finished his Test career with 310 wickets, and his One Day International career with 380 wickets. Considered one of the best bowlers of his generation, only Muttiah Muralitharan took more ODI wickets than Lee from 2000 to 2009.
He played his first Test in 1999 and retired from international cricket on 12 July 2012. He subsequently declined to renew his contract with his home state side New South Wales, but continued to play Twenty20 matches for several seasons after, notably in the Indian Premier League and Big Bash League.
In January 2015, Lee announced his retirement from all forms of the game, effective at the end of the 2014–15 Big Bash League season. He has since found work as a film actor and a Fox Sports commentator.
Domestic career
Lee started playing in the junior teams of his local side, Oak Flats Rats, and gradually worked his way up the ranks. He also played for Middleton cricket before he played first class career.At 16 he began playing first grade cricket for Campbelltown, where he managed to claim the wickets of a few New South Wales cricketers, and Mosman, where at one point, he shared the new ball with Shoaib Akhtar and briefly played alongside England batsman Andrew Strauss.
Lee was called up to the Australian Under 17 & 19 teams. In March 1994, he was forced out of the Australian under-19 team to tour India due to stress fractures in his lower back and it forced him to remodel his bowling action to minimise the impact on his back. He was awarded a scholarship to attend the AIS Australian Cricket Academy in the 1995–96 season. His contemporaries included fellow internationals Jason Gillespie and Mike Hussey.
Prior to making his first-class debut, Lee played for Mosman in the final of the 1996–97 Sydney Grade Cricket competition.
Lee was first named in the New South Wales Blues squad as the twelfth man for the 14–16 November match against Queensland in the 1997–98 Sheffield Shield. The following week, he made his first-class debut for the Blues against Western Australia and took 3 wickets at 114, including that of the captain Tom Moody. It would be his only appearance in the Sheffield Shield for the rest of the season. He ended a memorable month by taking a 5-wicket haul in the Sydney grade Limited-Overs Cup final against Bankstown on 30 November.
During the 1998–99 season Lee was a more regular presence in the latter stages of the Sheffield Shield. He took 14 wickets, including a 5-wicket haul against Tasmania in the second innings. He started the 1999–2000 season by claiming 8 wickets in his first two matches. Such performances impressed his New South Wales teammate Steve Waugh, who was then Australia captain, and culminated in his Test debut in December 1999. He finished the season as the Blues' second-highest wicket taker in the Pura Cup with 24 wickets in 5 matches.
After a successful Test series against India, Lee returned to domestic cricket and was named in the 2008 Pura Cup final. He hit his career best batting score, 97 against Victoria in the Blues' second innings and scored a record 176-run partnership with Beau Casson. In Victoria's second innings, he took 4–72, dismissing the last four tailenders, as the Blues won the final.
In 2009 he battled back from injury and was a key player in New South Wales' success during the Champions League Twenty20. During the final he played an important part with both bat and ball and was named Man of the Match. He also won the Man of the Series award.
Following his retirement from Test cricket, Lee stopped playing first-class cricket to concentrate on the limited-overs formats. He was the Blues' highest wicket-taker in the 2010–11 Ryobi One-Day Cup with 15 wickets and had the second best economy rate of the top five wicket-takers despite missing the latter stages of the campaign due to international duty.
In June 2012 he declined to renew his contract with the Blues, ending his 15-year association with his domestic team.
He retired from Big Bash League after playing in the final for the Sydney Sixers on 28 January 2015. In the dramatic final over, he took two wickets clean bowled in successive deliveries, and his hat-trick ball, the sixth of the over, resulted in a missed run out and the Perth Scorchers win by 4 wickets.
International career
Debut days
One month after making his first class debut, Lee was chosen to represent the Australian A team on a tour of South Africa. He claimed two wickets but in that match stress fractures in his back from the previous injury re-opened and Lee was in a back brace for over three months.Test career
By the late 1990s there were calls for Lee to be included in the national squad. Captain Steve Waugh, who also played with him for New South Wales, was impressed by Lee's debut and pushed for his inclusion into the national team. He was eventually chosen in the final 14 for the Test series against Pakistan in 1999 but failed to make the starting 11. By the time the Test series against India came around, he was twelfth man. However, he duly made his Test debut for Australia in December 1999 against the touring Indians, becoming Australia's 383rd Test cricketer.Bowling first change, Lee took a wicket in his first over in Test cricket when he bowled Sadagoppan Ramesh with his fourth delivery. He also captured Rahul Dravid in his first spell before returning to take three wickets in six balls to finish the innings with figures of 5/47 from 17 overs, becoming the first Australian fast bowler since Dennis Lillee to take 5 wickets on debut. Lee took 13 wickets in his opening two Tests at the low average of 14.15.
Lee won the inaugural Donald Bradman Young Player of the Year Award at the Allan Border Medal award ceremony in 2000 soon after his debut.
Lee took 42 wickets in his opening three series, the most by any Australian bowler in the seven matches he played. He was selected for the Test series against the West Indies in late 2000. During the first Test he scored his first half-century in test cricket and in the next Test, took seven wickets including a five wicket haul in the second innings. However, he suffered a stress fracture of the lower back which kept him out of the next three Tests. He returned against Zimbabwe but soon suffered another setback a month later when he injured his right elbow and was sidelined until May 2001.
Return from injury
Lee returned to the international team for the 2001 Ashes series after recovering from an elbow injury. His comeback saw less success than his debut, managing only nine wickets in five Tests at 55.11. However, Lee was back as Australia's leading wicket-taker in the first and third Test against New Zealand later that year, in a series which he captured 5 wickets in the second innings and made a contribution of 61 with the bat in the first Test match. The series ended in a 0–0 draw. He finished the series with 14 wickets at 25.14. The two home and away series against South Africa were not as productive, yielding 19 wickets in six Tests at 38.42.Lee only took five wickets in a match on three occasions between the New Zealand series and the 2003 Cricket World Cup. Lee came under pressure for his position after taking only five wickets at 46.50 in the three-Test series against Pakistan in 2002. Andy Bichel, who was filling for the injured Jason Gillespie, took eight wickets at 13.25. With the other frontline bowlers all taking wickets at less than 13, Lee was dropped when Gillespie returned for the first two Tests during the 2002–03 Ashes series. He returned for the Perth Test, after claiming a five wicket haul in a Pura Cup match against Queensland for New South Wales. He took thirteen wickets at 41.23 in three matches, compared to Bichel's ten at 35.1. After the 2003 Cricket World Cup, Lee took 17 wickets at 28.88 in four Tests against the West Indies. It was the first series in two years where he averaged under 30, and only the second in that period where he averaged under 40.
After a mid year break, he participated in a Two Test series against Bangladesh in northern Australia. He took six wickets at 31.66, and was Australia's most expensive bowler, with the other specialist bowlers averaging 15.55 against the lowest ranked team in Test cricket. He followed this with six wickets at 37 in a comfortable 2–0 Test series against Zimbabwe, in which the other specialist bowlers averaged 23.15.
Against the Indian batting line-up in the 2003–04 home series, which ended in a 1–1 draw for Australia, Lee was out of the first two Tests recovering from a torn abdominal muscle, an injury which he sustained during the Zimbabwe series.
Loss of Test position
Lee took eight wickets in 100 overs in the final two Tests against India, at an average of 59.50. This Test included a double century to Sachin Tendulkar in the Indians' first innings of 7/705 where Sachin and V.V.S. Laxman freely attacked Lee and other bowlers in the final Test in Sydney. He ended the series with the worst average and economy rate of Australia's front line bowlers.He was subsequently replaced by fellow fast bowler Michael Kasprowicz in 2004 during the tour of Sri Lanka when Lee's ankle injury worsened, forcing him to return home to have surgery. This injury would force Lee out of the game for four and a half months to ensure his full recovery.
Lee's form in the Test arena had been ineffective, and from July 2001 to January 2004, he had a Test bowling average of 38.42, compared to an average of 16.07 in his earlier career.
Lee was unable to reclaim his position for eighteen months, when Kasprowicz took 47 wickets at 23.74 in thirteen Tests, taking his wickets at a much lower cost than Lee had done in the previous three years. This included 17 wickets at 26.82 on the spin friendly pitches of the Indian subcontinent, helping Australia to its first whitewash in Sri Lanka, and its first series win in India for 35 years.