Ben Dunk

Somewhere in a remote farm in Innisfail, North Queensland, a young boy by the name of Ben laboured away in the 90s, helping his father Stewart harvest bananas for a living. It isn't hard to see why Ben Robert Dunk has been well-built since a very tender age. A hoard of backyard young cricketers around his farm encouraged him to pick up the bat and have a go.

He decided to pursue a career in cricket, and moved to Brisbane, participating in a cricket program in Mitchelton State High. He then earned himself a cricket and rugby scholarship to Brisbane Grammar school and graduated to grade level cricket after consistently good performances. Rising through the ranks, his technique had been polished by qualified coaches, and by the time he got to A-grade cricket, he was a technically correct hard-hitting batsman, scoring runs consistently, and already in contention for first-class cricket.

Dunk's big moment came when he was handed a contract by the Queensland Bulls in 2010. He played some important knocks for the Bulls in One-Day cricket, including a 115 off 124 against Western Australia. However, Dunk's career came to an apparent dead-end when Queensland terminated his contract in 2012 due to consistently poor performances, especially in Shield cricket.

Uncertain about his career, Dunk decided to move to Tasmania with his girlfriend. Hailing from a modest background, he decided to apply for a backup job in PR, and continued to work. He was subsequently signed by the Tasmania Tigers for Shield cricket as well as One-Day cricket. He also traveled to England and re-evaluated his game, trying to correct the chinks in his armour.

His county stint seemed to have done the trick as he came back with a visibly compact, polished and more versatile style of batting. He delivered his break-through performance in 2014 – a one-day innings for the ages, and etched his name in history, as he became the first man in Australian domestic history to scored a double-century in One-Day cricket. He surpassed the previous record-holder David Warner's 197 as he belted an unbeaten 229 runs. To add to the theatricality of it all, he achieved this milestone against the Queensland Bulls in their home-ground. Usman Khawaja and Chris Hartley did end up spoiling the party as they chased down 399 successfully, but Dunk had already made his point. His exemplary performance earned him a spot in the Australian T20 international side in November 2014.

Dunk finally found his calling at the Big Bash League, where the need of the hour was for a hard-hitting opening batsman. He was signed by the Hobart Hurricanes franchise for the first three seasons of the league. After a forgettable inaugural season where he scored 59 runs in 7 innings at 9.83, Dunk finally came into his own, scoring 395 runs at an average of 43.89 and striking at 145.76 runs per hundred deliveries. This break-through season for Dunk included a 96 against the Sydney Thunder and took a special liking to the Brisbane Heat bowling, creaming 87 and 67 in the two games against them, breaking the record for the then-fastest half-century in the league's history, off 20 balls.

Dunk's stellar BBL season earned him lucrative contracts from the Antigua Hawksbills in the Carribean Premier League and the Mumbai Indians in the lucrative Indian Premier League, as he continued to take giant strides as a T20 specialist. His wicketkeeping skills, which tend to be over-shadowed in the wake of his batting pyrotechnics, are tidy as well and add to his T20 résumé as a backup wicketkeeper.

Dunk later moved to the Melbourne Stars franchise, after having a lean season with the Adelaide Strikers, and struck form in the 6th edition of the league, scoring 364 runs at an average of 52 and an alarming strike-rate of 163.96. He has been retained by the Stars by virtue of his performance, and will be a key player for the franchise in the upcoming 7th season of the Australian league.

Dunk continued to improve his batting, and like most players, valued red-ball cricket. He finally had a successful Shield season in 2015-16, going on to score 837 runs in the tournament and topping the run-charts, at an impressive average of 46.50, scoring his first 4 first-class centuries in the season.

At 30, he still has a good number of years to play at the top-level. He may not be in contention for the opening spot in the national side at the moment, but he has certainly been consistently working on his game and improving over the last few years, and continues to be a valuable asset franchise-based T20 cricket.

Interesting fact:

- Dunk has a major in Business from an Australian University

By Rishi Roy

As of December 2017