Fair-haired and level-headed, Cameron White has long seemed destined to play a significant role in Australia's future. Only the precise nature of that role has baffled his admirers. Nagging legspinner? Aggressive middle-order bat? Intuitive skipper? Or a bit of all three? The over-eager Shane Warne comparisons that festooned his first-class arrival have long since died away. Indeed White is a peculiarly unAustralian-style legspinner, tall and robust, relying on changes of pace and a handy wrong'un rather than prodigious turn or flight. He can even start a spell with an offspinner or quicker ball.
He bowls a good line and does a neat line in self-deprecation too: "There's no flippers or anything exciting like that in my repertoire," he professed a while back, "I'm just trying to get my leggie right." What is not in doubt is his cricket sense, nor his maturity. Captaining Victoria in 2003-04 at the age of 20, the youngest skipper in their history, he won rave reviews for his cool head and warm handling of more hardened contemporaries. For all that, he remains a largely unassuming country lad. Picked to tour Zimbabwe when Stuart MacGill withdrew for moral reasons, White cancelled a fishing trip to attend the press conference then boyishly shrugged aside questions about the circumstances of his selection: "I don't really know very much about politics." He was chosen as much for his no-frills batting as his bowling; David Hookes, the late Victorian coach, felt White's best chance of representing Australia was to earn a top-six spot. For a long while it looked more like the way forward, until the retirement of Brad Hogg in early 2008 opened up an ODI spin position. White was given the first chance to secure the role and even won a call-up to the Test squad in India when Victoria's first-choice legspinner Bryce McGain went down with a shoulder injury.
Despite his discomfort at being the No. 1 spinner, he held firm on debut while facing the best players of spin in the business. As the series wore on it became clear he was not the answer to Australia's troubles and after four matches he was shifted aside with five wickets and 146 runs. Back in Victoria he was under pressure following a strange performance in the FR Cup final defeat to Queensland, but he hit back with 135 in the Sheffield Shield final against the same side and was relieved to lift the trophy after a series of near misses. He also held on to his national contract while missing Australia's engagements in the United Arab Emirates and the World Twenty20.
Until 2008, it had been only White's batting that had been of any real value on the international scene. Playing eight CB Series games in 2006-07, he started by showing his impressive muscle, thumping a 32-ball 45 in the second match, but he was unable to offer a repeat until he crashed 42 from 19 deliveries in the Chappell-Hadlee Series. Between those innings he had been dropped for the tri-series finals and missed the World Cup squad, mainly because his bowling was unconvincing. After finishing the season with the Bushrangers, capturing 437 Pura Cup runs at 39.72 and nine wickets at 49.77, he held on to his Cricket Australia contract before heading to England for more plunder at Somerset. A more productive 2007-08 domestic season brought him back into the national frame. Although his six Pura Cup wickets cost 47 each, he scored 748 runs at 49.86 and guided Victoria into the first-class, one-day and Twenty20 finals.
As far back as December 2002 his hero Warne had predicted: "I think he's a [future] Australian player provided he sticks to the way he plays and doesn't try to be someone different." White made his limited-overs debut during the Super Series a year after missing a first Test cap when Nathan Hauritz was preferred in India. He had little impact and lost his national deal after a below-average Pura Cup season in 2005-06. White had a wonderful 2006 as Somerset's captain, giving the strongest indication yet that he was focusing heavily on his batting. He feasted on the county bowlers, scoring 1190 first-class runs at 59.5 and his 55-ball Twenty20 century was a record. That led him into a better home summer that featured Pura Cup and FR Cup centuries, although he was sometimes criticised for not taking enough bowling responsibility.
Cameron Leon White (b. 18 August 1983 in Bairnsdale, Victoria) is an Australian cricketer.
A powerful middle order batsman and occasional right-arm leg-spin bowler, White made his first-class cricket debut as a teenager in the 2000-01 season for the Victorian Bushrangers. This brought comparisons to leg-spinner Shane Warne, the second highest wicket-taker in Test history, and team mate in the Victorian state team. However, White's bowling style is more reminiscent of Indian leg-spinner Anil Kumble with little spin and a reliance on top-spinners and googlies. White's progress as a bowler has stagnated in recent years and he is currently viewed to be a batting all-rounder.
White first represented Australia at Under-19 level in January 2001 at the age of 17. In January-February 2002 he captained the Australian team to victory in the ICC Under-19 World Cup in New Zealand.
White warming up prior to a Twenty20 between Somerset CCC and Gloucestershire CCC, 27 June 2007
After touring Pakistan with the Australia 'A' team in September 2005, White made his full international debut in the following month against the ICC World XI in the Johnnie Walker Super Series in Melbourne. He was previously selected on the cancelled 2004 national team tour of Zimbabwe. He was chosen as the Supersub in the first two matches, and played in the final, however he had no chance to bat or bowl, except in the second match in which he bowled 4 overs without a wicket. He was selected to play in the Chappell-Hadlee Trophy matches against New Zealand in December 2005, where he made his full starting debut.
He became the captain of Victoria at 20 - the youngest player to do so in the state's long first-class history - and is widely tipped to be a regular Australian Test player of the future. It is anticipated that he will play a role similar to that of the Pakistani allrounder Shahid Afridi, a strongly-built big hitting late-middle order batsman, with some useful quickish legspin which concentrates on bowling topspinners rather than legbreaks.
White joined Somerset for the 2006 English domestic season, alongside fellow Australian Dan Cullen (South Australia). This county stint proved valuable for his development as a cricketer. During a Twenty20 match against Worcestershire he scored 141 not out, the innings took 70 balls and contained 14 fours and 6 sixes. The score was a record in Twenty20 cricket but has since been surpassed. In August 2006 his 260 not out against Derbyshire was the highest ever individual score in the fourth innings of a first-class match.
White returned to Somerset in 2007 as one of their two overseas players alongside Justin Langer. White scored 1,083 runs at 72.20 in first-class cricket, but left the club at the end of the season as the club preferred to keep Langer.
In 2008, White signed to Indian Premier League side Royal Challengers Bangalore for $500,000.
White bowling in the Adelaide Oval nets, January 2009.
White was a surprise pick for the Australian Test Team to tour India as a replacement for fellow Victorian legspinner Bryce McGain, who was sent home injured. The main spinner in the squad Jason Krejza went wicketless and conceded almost 200 runs in the tour game against the Indian Board President's XI. This made the team management exclude Krejza and include the more experienced White in the first Test in Bangalore. Through that appearance, he became the 402nd capped player for Australia. His first Test wicket was Sachin Tendulkar in the second innings of his debut Test. Tendulkar was, at the time, only 15 runs from breaking the record for the most Test runs in history.
In 2008-09 season, White captained Victoria to their first triumph in the Sheffield Shield since 2003-04. He was the player of the match with personal contributions of 135 and 61, and 1/14 and 0/40.
Cameron replaced Andrew Symonds in the Twenty20 World Cup in 2008 as Symonds was sent home under controversial circumstances.
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