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From Brendon McCullum to Martin Crowe: Here Are The Top 5 New Zealand Captains Of All Time

image-lhxm81z7Brendon McCullum  as New Zealand Captain (Twitter)

New Zealand are the perennial dark horses of world cricket and they are the team who symbolize teamwork in true sense. Over the years, New Zealand cricket has not seen lot of big superstars but they always find a way to stay among the top teams in the world. They have also done pretty well in ICC tournaments over the years and let's now see Top 5 New Zealand captains of all time.

Here are our top 5 captains of New Zealand of all time : - 

5) Geoff Howarth

"Quite simply the best captain I've played under till date" - these are the words of former New Zealand player, Ian Smith about Geoff Howarth. Geoff was a charismatic leader during his time and captained New Zealand from 1980-85. His biggest achievement was the series win against the mighty Windies in 1980. 

Test Record - 30 Tests - 11 wins, 7 losses, 12 draws

ODI Record - 60 matches - 31 wins and 26 losses

4) Stephen Fleming

He was the longest serving captain of New Zealand cricket. He was made the leader at a young age of 24 and captained New Zealand in 303 international matches. He started his captaincy journey in 1997 and under his leadership, the Kiwis won the Champions Trophy in 2000, beating India in the final. 

Fleming also led from the front during his captaincy stint and scored over 5196 runs as captain in Test cricket while as ODI skipper, Fleming scored 6295 runs. New Zealand also reached the semi-final of the 2007 World Cup under his astute leadership.

Test Record - 80 matches - 28 wins and 27 losses, 25 draws

ODI Record - 218 matches - 98 wins and 106 losses

3) Martin Crowe

One of the sharpest minds ever to play the game, Martin Crowe created a lot of buzz in the 1992 World Cup with his out of the box thinking. He took NZ to the semi-final of the 1992 World Cup and is regarded as one of the best white-ball captains ever to play the game.

His strategies of sending pinch-hitter Mark Greatbatch to facilitate rapid starts and start off the bowling with an off spinner - Dipak Patel were revolutionary moves at that time, never seen before in world cricket.

Test Record - 16 matches - 2 wins and 7 losses, 7 draws

ODI record - 44 matches - 21 wins and 24 losses

2) Brendon McCullum

If Martin Crowe is known for his revolutionary moves in the 1992 World Cup, McCullum is also known to bring in revolution of sorts in New Zealand cricket itself. During his captaincy, New Zealand played an aggressive brand of cricket led by McCullum himself and his slam-bang approach took the Kiwis to final of the 2015 World Cup.

He was a successful skipper in Test cricket as well but his legacy will always be of introducing an ultra-aggressive brand of cricket in ODI format.

Tests - 31 matches - 11 wins. 11 losses and 9 draws

ODIs - 62 matches -  36 wins and 22 losses 

T20Is - 28 matches -  13 wins and 14 losses

1) Kane Williamson

Kane Williamson is the poster boy of New Zealand cricket. The man who is regarded as the greatest New Zealand batter ever, has taken New Zealand cricket to the heights never seen before in New Zealand's cricketing history.

Williamson took over the leadership role from Brendon McCullum and brought his own calm and calculated style to the table. He took New Zealand to the final of the 2019 ODI World Cup which they lost by boundary count and then took NZ to the pinnacle of Test cricket. 

New Zealand dominated the first WTC cycle and then went onto beat India in the final of the World Test Championship, as Williamson became only the second Kiwi skipper to win an ICC trophy. Blackcaps also reached the final of the 2021 T20 World Cup under his leadership which shows the consistency NZ achieved under Williamson.