5 risky captaincy picks that turned out to be brilliant decisions

2. Graeme Smith (South Africa)

South Africa’s Graeme Smith was just 22 years old when he was handed the captaincy of the national side in 2003, in the aftermath of Proteas’ poor performance in that year’s World Cup. He had played only eight Test matches and 22 ODIs before he was handed over the captaincy. There were other options like Jacques Kallis, Herschelle Gibbs, and others who were senior to him and were not considered for captaincy.  

After initial hiccups, he led the South African side and made them a formidable name in both the Tests and the ODI formats, respectively. His best moment came in the Test series against England in 2003, where he slammed 277 and 259 in back-to-back Tests and ended with 714 runs in the series. He was chosen to captain the ICC World XI in the ICC Super Series Test Match between the ICC World XI and Australia in October 2005.

Smith is the only player to captain his side in 108 Tests and 117 Test matches under him during his career. Notably, under his terrific leadership, South Africa won 60 of them. He won 23 out of the 33 T20s in which he captained and recorded 115 wins in 197 one-day internationals.