Few fast bowlers evoke the kind of excitement one experiences when Dale Steyn is in full flow. His rhythmic sprint to the crease and the whippy release is something that all young fast bowlers yearn for.
Predominantly an outswing bowler, Steyn, like all high quality bowlers, has the ability to surprise and strike with the one that goes the other way, too. His phenomenal ability to maintain a pace of over 140 kmph consistently makes him the stand out fast bowling athlete of his generation. This ability is not something that he was gifted with and he has gone on record to say that he worked very hard towards achieving it after setting himself some very high standards.
He is destined for greatness and comparisons with all-time greats have not been without reason. Steyn had an opportunity to become the quickest to get to 250 wickets, but he ended up with 249 after his 48th Test. If he had got one more, he would have joined ranks with the legendary Dennis Lillee, who reached 250 in his 48th Test. Dale became the fourth South African bowler to take 300 Test wickets after Shaun Pollock, Makhaya Ntini and Allan Donald. He got to that feat when he removed James Franklin of New Zealand in the first Test in Cape Town in January 2013.
Steyn has been an important feature of the Indian Premier League as well, churning out wonderful bowling spells, first with Bangalore and later for the Hyderabad franchise.
With his status as the premier fast bowler of his generation being undisputed, now the interest has shifted to debating his position in the list of all-time greats.
Dale is in the South African 2016 World T20 Squad in March 2016 and played in the IPL 2016 for The Gujarat Lions.
On the 5th August 2019 Dale announced his retirement from Test cricket, to focus on limited-overs cricket.