Sir Donald Bradman needs no résumé, or CV. His rendezvous with history was unique and without parallel. So it will always be: for today, and tomorrow. Legends are made of such stuff, and Bradman was, doubtless, a true legend — a legend like no other.
It was not for small things, but for great things, that god, or the game of cricket, created Bradman, and blessed him to (re)discover the true summit of the magical willow’s sublime harmonies. One that did not remain fully satisfied by anything limited, howsoever great that thing might be.
Bradman, thanks to his phenomenal and compelling presence on the playing arena, surveyed an entire age. Even several decades after he called it quits to the game, and his passing away, 22 years ago, he still commands worldwide veneration and admiration, more so, from an entirely new generation of cricket fans that never saw him hold the bat in hand — except for aclassycollection of good, old video footage on YouTube, among others. It’s something that exemplifies the obvious: that the Don has been canonised, in cricket’s own temple, where only the greatest would be allowed to stroll. He was not only Australia’s history; he’s, indeed, cricket’s incomparable parable.
Bradman strode over the cricket world, for 20 years, like a giant. He would have, doubtless, created a host of more formidable records, if only Adolf Hitler’s blitzkrieg had not intervened for seven long, and cruel, years — at a time when he was almost unstoppable. On the other hand, it may, perforce, be simple logic, if not poetic justice, to believe, that, it was a blessing for the hapless, if not helpless, bowlers who had received enough flak, till then, from the punishing blade of Bradman — the short-statured batting monarch.
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