Wisden overview
Sixteen on debut, 19 when he bypassed an academy tour to get married, Darren Lehmann is still, in his thirties, a cricket maverick. A deft and destructive left-hander, he likes to play lavish cuts and pulls, but has time to play all the textbook shots, and a faculty for inventing others. Loath to temper his game, he was made to wait more matches and make more runs than any Australian before he was picked for a Test - and then failed to do himself justice. The genial Lehmann has made more than 13,000 runs at about 50 in first-class cricket, many for his adopted Yorkshire, and seems certain to leave the aggregate record for interstate cricket far behind. Lehmann's international career seemed over when he was jettisoned after the topsy-turvy Indian tour of 2000-01, but another run-soaked season for South Australia forced the national selectors to recall him for the important tour of South Africa early in 2002. But then an indiscreet remark aimed at the Sri Lankans in January 2003 caused more heartache. Deemed racist, it cost him a five-match suspension and, not entirely coincidentally, the Yorkshire captaincy. Lehmann hit the winning run in the 1999 World Cup final and took the catch that ended the 2003 one, but his place in the one-day and Test sides was still not cast in stone - although he helped his cause by crunching 160, a belated first Test century, at Port-of-Spain in April 2003. Greg Baum

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