‘Brand of New Zealand cricket is spreading across the world’ – Brendon McCullum
New Zealand set the standards a few years ago in the way they went about the game on and off the field, and Brendon McCullum, their former captain, rightly came in for a lot of praise for instilling that philosophy in the team.
McCullum wouldn’t take all the credit, though, and praised Kane Williamson, the current captain, for giving the team direction. The 36-year-old said that while he ensured New Zealand played an attractive brand of cricket, it was Williamson who gave it consistency and direction – New Zealand won the home Test series against both Windies and England this season.
“The boys have done really well, the New Zealand team is progressing really well,” McCullum said in Bangalore on April 11, ahead of Royal Challengers Bangalore’s IPL 2018 clash against Kings XI Punjab. “That is one of the reasons why I stepped away when I did, because the team needed someone to come in and take the team in a different direction.
“My style of leadership, when I was leading New Zealand, (it was) quite consuming. It is, sort of, to go after everything. I think Kane (Williamson) was preparing to take the team to a more consistent level and he has done that.”
Yet, there is no denying that what McCullum did to the team resonated across the world. Just last week, Williamson praised McCullum for his role in giving New Zealand cricket an identity, saying, “He (McCullum) was huge in setting an environment where we wanted to play the game in a certain way. It reflected in the way we went about our business in terms of on-field, but the work went into the off-field stuff (as well) and I suppose that's really important.”
It is something that McCullum feels particularly happy about when he reminisces. “They (New Zealand) are not just very, very good cricketers, they are fantastic people as well,” he said. “That is something that the country is very proud of – how those guys hold themselves as people. The brand of New Zealand cricket is now starting to build up pretty strongly, not just in New Zealand but around the world. (It has reached this stage) on the back of good performances, but also good people.”
McCullum revealed how he had started out with a “different perspective” to the game, and how the philosophy grew from the lessons learnt during an international career that spanned 14 years. “Early on, you have a different perspective on the game than later,” he said. “I was very fortunate that I had longevity. I had the chance to come out on the other side and realise that both sides were trying to do the same things on the field. Both sides were trying to win, everyone's exactly trying to do the same things. But you can act in a decent manner as well.
“That, I think, was an authentic move for us, a representation of what our country is – humble, hardworking, and also very approachable. That is what we try and achieve in (this) New Zealand side. In the end, we had a lot of fun doing it as well, and some of those traits have remained in the team.”
It remains McCullum’s biggest achievement.