Cricket is team game, a sport in which every player on the team has to work hard to win the match. We have seen many all-rounders in history who perform well with bat as well as ball. The team that has the most and the best all-rounder players is always one step ahead of the opposing team. This is the reason that in today's cricket every team lands on the field with two to three all-rounder players.

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Genuine station wagons are players to choose from for bowling or batting. These are very rare cases, and many great teams, such as the Australians of the late 1990s to early 2000s, did not have a true all-rounder.

Australia: I can’t think of a single Australian I’ve observed who could be considered a true all-rounder. Shane Warne was a world-class bowler who scored many runs as an inferior batsman, often at critical times. But he averaged up to 20 years in the cricket test and therefore would never have been chosen solely for his batting. Steve Waugh was a world-class batsman, but nothing more than a useful casual bowler hat. To be honest, his bad back prevented him from playing more bowling.

England: Ian Terrance Botham

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The curse of any promising English cricket in the 1990s was comparable to Sir Ian Botham. Such comparisons were silly. It took Botham just 21 tests to double 100 wickets and 1,000 runs, a record. Players like Chris Lewis and Darren Gough have never achieved this skill. Botham would go on to double 200 wickets and 2000 runs and triple doubles 300 wickets and 3000 runs, all in record time. As an 80's boy, I can tell you that every English guy wanted to imitate this man in the playground. Enough said.

India: Kapil Dev

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Kapil Dev is the only player to take over 400 wickets and over 5000 runs and is undoubtedly one of the greatest all-rounders. He is also his country's captain to World Cup glory in 1983. Anyone who can successfully bat, bowl and captain is truly a rarity. I remember that in 1990 Lord India had nine wickets and needed 24 more runs to avoid the follow-up. There are four clans left in Eddie Hemmings, and Kapil Dev split them all into six to avoid the continuation of his country and set a world record in the process (do you remember when sixes were rare?). According to the commentator, "only Kapil Dev."

New Zealand: Sir Richard Hadley

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Simply the best New Zealand cricketer ever created and a player with the added responsibility of moving his team. Graham Thorpe remarked that it was like meeting World XI at one end and District XI II at the other. Hadley was the first cricketer to take 400 trial wickets in just 79 matches and was almost unique in being a bowler who seemed to improve with age.

Pakistan: Imran Khan

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Another world class wagon from the 1980s and like Kapil Dev, he is the captain of his country to a World Cup triumph. In the cricket test, he averaged 37.69 with the bat and an amazing 22.81 with the ball. This is what I would call a real all-rounder!

South Africa: Jacques Kallis

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It is unfair to many consider Kallis to be a bowling alley batsman. Perhaps if we could knock 20 runs out of his 55.37 average test, more experts would consider him an all-rounder. His 292 wickets at 32.65 prove his place here and he would have taken more wickets on teams that lacked the firepower of Allan Donald, Sean Pollock and Makhai Ntini. Perhaps the generalists, whose bowling is their main strength, are simply more useful to their teams because all bowlers will have a chance to win.

West Indies: Sir Garry Sobers

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I leave the best to last. In short, it was versatile. He was a great batsman who averaged 57.78 at a time when over 50 averaged was rare. He was a terrific fielder in any position, especially when catching close to the wicket. Usually he would open the bowler hat as a fast medium rhythm, but he could also rotate two types of rotation: wrist rotation and left-handed movement. When he looked like he might miss the game, his teammates discussed what they would miss the most: his pitch? His batting? His bowling? They came to the conclusion that most of all they will miss the "man".

England captain Mike Denness once said that, as a batsman, he would be worried if Sobers made a low score because he would then be torn with a new ball determined to influence the game.

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