100 Greatest Sports Stars - Number 92 - Adam Gilchrist

Anyone for cricket?  Number 91 on our list of the top 100 sports stars is Adam Gilchrist, who otherwise goes by the nicknames of Church or Gilly. He is the first but not the last cricketer to appear but this guy is not yet retired from the game and has redefined the role of the Australian national cricket team.

Born in 1971, Glichrist is an attacking left-handed batsman but it is for his wicket keeping that he holds world records.  He is the current holder of the record for the most dismissals by a wicket keeper by an Australian in test cricket and in One Day Internationals.  He is generally thought to be one of the best ever wicket-keeper-batsman combinations in the history of the sport of cricket.

There is more – he is the only player ever to have hit 100 (that’s ONE HUNDRED) sixes in Test Cricket.  Not only that, he has 17 Test centuries under his belt as well as 16 ODIs.  As a player who was destined to be primarily a wicket keeper, that is some achievement. 

He also has a unique record – the only player ever to score a minimum of fifty runs in successive World Cup finals (99, 03 and 07) and has actually won three titles – one of only three players to do so.

At the age of 17, Adam Gilchrist spent a summer with Richmond Cricket Club in London. He performed so well that he was interviewed by the regional BBC Sports Reporter, Michael Wale.

 
He has sometimes gone against the grain of the establishment in as much as he is a self-confessed walker.  That is, occasionally he disagrees with the umpire, who says he is in – and walks off!  Fair is fair, however, a player is more likely to know when they are out than the umpire yet many would make the contrary decision. Not so Gilchrist.

His first class debut was in 1992 and his first ODI (One Day International) debut followed four years later, with his Test debut in 99.  He has played for his home nation in 96 test matches and getting on for 300 ODIs.  In both forms he was Australia’s Vice-captain and captained the team when the regular captains were unavailable.

Here is Adam Gilchrist smashing a century in 57 balls in the Ashes 3rd test. He is the second fastest behind Viv Richards.



Although he has now retired from International cricket he still plays for the Indian Premier League with the Deccan Chargers.  He was made captain in 2009 and led the team to the Twenty20 title in the same year.

It was his style of attack batting that was key to Australia’s ODI successes when he was a member of the team, and as such it was Gilchrist who invariably opened the batting.  For a wicket keeper his batting average is more than reasonable – in the upper 40s in tests with a Test strike rate of 82 runs for every 100 balls and he is renowned for batting shots to every area of the field in a dynamic and consistent manner.

Outside of the sport Gilchrist serves as an ambassador for the World Vision charity in India – a country in which he is immensely popular.

100 Greatest Sports Stars - Number 100 - Andrew Johns

At Number 100 on our list of the greatest sports stars (ever!) is the legend who goes by the name of Andrew Johns.  An Australian Rugby League footballer he is thought of by many as the best player of all time.  During his career he was often trumpeted as the world's best halfback.  During the 1990s and the 2000s he captained the Newcastle Knights team at home and played 249 games for the team 0 a record.  He also represented Australia in 2 World Cups and played in twenty one test matches for the Aussie national side.

He retired from the game of rugby league at the age of thirty two in 2007.  This was young, but he had had a lot of injuries which, had he continued playing, would have seriously threatened his health both on the pitch and in the future.  However, he finished playing rugby league as the highest points scorer in the history of the Australian First Grade premiership.  How many pointa?  A total of 2,176.


Andrew Johns was announced as the Best Player of the Last 30 Years by the influential Rugby League Week.  For the imaginary Team of the Century  he was named as halfback.  An outstanding career which places him at number 100 in our list of the 100 greatest sports stars in the universe!

BOXING: Mayweather and Pacquiao fight deadline passes

The fight between two of the greatest fighters on the planet at the moment Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao is destined to not happen, the latest twist in the tale saw Top Rank promoter Bob Arum's deadline of 3 a.m. ET come and pass without a word from the Mayweather camp to accept the terms of a deal for a Nov. 13 fight with Manny Pacquiao, to us and probably the rest of the boxing world it seems that Money Mayweather is ducking Manny Pacquiao for some reason.

In previous attempts to get the fight on, Floyd said he would only agree to fight Manny, if the Filipino would agree to blood testing before the fight. This would mean both fighters would need to give blood samples at least 30 days before the fight, but Top Rank promoter Bob Arum suggested that Manny can give blood 14 days prior to the fight. So that stumbling block has been over come.

Floyd boasts that he loves money so much and getting this fight on would be the biggest PPV fight in history. This would make both fighters more money than they have received in any previous fights. Something don't add up right and it seems that Floyd simply doesn't want to fight Manny.

Come on Floyd, pull ya finger out. We hope this sitation can be resolved and the fight date can be set and I'm sure we speak of many fans in the World of Boxing.

But can you see it happening?