Shane Watson reveals the best captains he has played under; names two Indians

Shane Watson has been an important part of Australian cricket history. He carved out a niche for himself as one of the world-class all-rounders during his heydays and in fact, he was the last player to retire from Australia’s golden era of the early 2000s. Watson who played 14 years for the national cricket team had announced his retirement from international cricket in the year 2016.

The former Australia all-rounder is a sight to behold when he gets going as an all-rounder. He was actively playing the Big Bash League for Sydney Thunder franchise but retired from the league last year in a bid to spend some more time with his family. He is the all-time leading run-scorer for Thunder with 1014 runs, accounting for 19 dismissals with medium pace.

The Australian great who scored over 10,000 runs and took 291 wickets for Australia across formats currently plies his trade for Chennai Super Kings in the Indian Premier League and Quetta Gladiators in the Pakistan Super League respectively. According to Forbes, he was the highest-paid non-Indian cricket across the globe for five years in a row, i.e. from 2011 to 2015.

Shane Watson reveals the best captains he has played under

The flamboyant all-rounder has played with some of the wonderful captains during his playing days. In an exclusive interview with ESPN Cricinfo, he was asked to pick the best captains he has played under. However, Watson was quick to pick four legendary names which comprised of two Australians and as many Indians.

Watson named Shane Warne, Ricky Ponting, MS Dhoni, Rahul Dravid. When asked about the biggest gym rat in Australia national cricket team of his era, he straightaway picked former paceman, Mitchell Johnson, while also calling him as ‘The Machine’.

Last but not least, he was asked what type of shows does he binge-watch and to which Watson came up with a straightforward answer. He said, “I don’t binge-watch shows.”

The productive all-rounder has been retained by three-time IPL champions, Chennai Super Kings for IPL 2020. He has been statistically very good in numbers in the cash-rich league with 3575 runs, four centuries, registering his personal best score of 117* in the finals of the IPL 2018 against Sunrisers Hyderabad. He has also scored 19 fifties at a remarkable strike rate of 139.53 and an average of 31.08.