He was born Jonathan Neil Rhodes, an Afrikaner, and hailed from Pietermaritzberg, Natal. As a junior, he shone in cricket, football and hockey.I n just his fifth Test, Rhodes scored his first century during a tour of Sri Lanka in 1993. He was never a prolific run-scorer, but he would come in to bat in the middle and lower middle-order, usually at No 6, and play a handy knock to finish the innings for the South Africans. It was all to change on March 8, 1992, during a World Cup match between South Africa and Pakistan at Brisbane, when a green blur swooshed in from point with the ball and crashed into the stumps to run out Inzamam-ul-Haq. The legend of Jonty Rhodes was born on this day.

“Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s Jonty!” screamed out a newspaper the next morning. It was a breakthrough moment for the mop-headed, rather frail-looking and diminutive Rhodes, who was playing in his first tournament. As it turned out, it wasn’t a one-off show; Rhodes produced many such Superman antics on the field that soon earned him a reputation for purely his fielding. He dived, he leaped, he lunged, he defied gravity while patrolling the point-cover region throughout his career. He wasn’t the tallest of blokes on the ground, but his athleticism and his agility ensured that he seemed taller than Yao Ming and faster than Usain Bolt. For a man who looked so delicate on the field in his earlier years, it was amazing that he had all his bones intact after each fall.