Ian Harvey's statistics are sure to puzzle the reader and make him wonder as to how he got to play the number of games that he did for Australia. His batting never had any sort of consistency and his bowling at best was suited for a filler's role. A bits-and-pieces all-rounder if you could call him that, he wasn't good enough to play as a pure batsman or a pure bowler. Still, he did feature in 73 ODIs and also had his share of moments. As a batsman, he had the ability to hit the ball hard and long but seldom was it seen regularly in international cricket. One of the reasons of course was the fact that Australia had a destructive top six which meant that the lower order hardly had to do some work. But even when the opportunities did come around, Harvey mostly failed.

It won't be wrong to say that the best memories created by Harvey in national colors were with the ball. Although he was only military medium pace at his best, he could be deceptive especially with his skiddy bouncers and slower balls that worked many a time on sluggish surfaces. Although his bowling could be said to be tailored for white-ball cricket, the fact that his kind of player required better skills meant that Harvey never got a consistent run in the national side. At times his little cameos were priceless but the lack of consistency was a problem. Nevertheless, Harvey had the opportunity to be the part of a World Cup winning squad in 2003, as a replacement for Shane Watson who missed the tournament due to injury.

Since 2004, Harvey never played international cricket again but continued to be an active figure on the domestic front. He involved himself with County cricket where he had started from 1999 itself and was one of the most influential figures in Gloucestershire's rise as a trophy-winning side over the years. When the trend-setting T20 format came about in England, Harvey hammered the first century and he repeated this feat another two more times as well. He also spent time in the South African domestic circuit where was involved not only as a player but also as a coach and at times, commentator. The growth of T20 leagues saw him get a lot of opportunities and his best performances came in the rebel Indian Cricket League where he was the Man of the Tournament in Chennai's title winning season in 2008.

By Hariprasad Sadanandan