[citation needed] Waugh is regarded as one of the most elegant and gifted stroke makers to ever play the game and his stylish strokeplay was likened to that of Stan McCabe, Alan Kippax,[6] Victor Trumper, Charlie Macartney and Greg Chappell.

Her eldest brother Dion Bourne was an opening batsman who played for Bankstown in Sydney Grade Cricket and remains the leading runscorer in the club's history.

[37] At the end of the season, the Waugh twins signed a contract to spend the Australian winter to play for Egerton in the Bolton League in Lancashire in northern England.

This resulted in Dave Gilbert being promoted to the national squad, forcing him to forfeit his Esso scholarship, which allowed him to play Second XI cricket in the County Championship.

[3][51] Building up an impressive record at First-class level, Waugh spent two seasons with English county Essex as the team's successor to Allan Border as an overseas professional.

[3] In mid-1988, Waugh was signed to replace Australian captain Allan Border for a six-week stint as the overseas professional at Essex County Cricket Club in England, after just one full season of Sheffield Shield.

New South Wales was then sent in at the Sydney Cricket Ground and Waugh struck 137 from 185 runs on the first day, including a six from Peter Sleep that narrowly missed the clock tower.

"[73] In 1990, Waugh and his brother combined in an unbeaten partnership of 464 in 407 minutes for New South Wales against Western Australia at the WACA Ground, setting a world First-class record for the fifth wicket.

[74] Both teams were at full strength and Western Australia's attack included Test bowlers Terry Alderman, Bruce Reid and Chris Matthews.

In the second innings, Waugh bounced back to score an unbeaten 103 from 163 balls against the team regarded as the best in the world at the time, earning praise from their captain Viv Richards.

[70] At the age of 25, he was finally picked for his Test debut in 1990–91, which resulted in mixed emotions: his place in the team game came at the expense of his out-of-form brother,[85] who had only scored 82 runs at 20.50 for the series.

[93] In the first tour match against Jamaica, Waugh was felled by a bouncer from Courtney Walsh, but recovered to score a century despite the presence of his teammate's spilt blood on the pitch.

[3] A score of 112 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in the second Test of 1992–93 helped set up an Australian victory and a 1–0 lead in the Frank Worrell Trophy series against the West Indies.

Starting 1994 well, Waugh was named Player of the Finals against South Africa in the World Series Cup and he then scored a century against the same opponents in the drawn third Test in Durban.

[91] On the subsequent tour of the West Indies, Waugh scored what Paul Reiffel described as a "nonchalantly [...] beautiful"[110] 126 and combined with his brother for a 231-run partnership in the deciding fourth Test in Jamaica.

[119] During the triangular ODI tournament, Waugh was the Man of the Match in the opening game against the West Indies at the Adelaide Oval, scoring 53 and conceding only 26 runs in 10 overs.

[124] Australia progressed to the quarter-finals, where they faced New Zealand in Madras, he scored his third century (110) to guide a successful Australian run chase, again winning the man of the match.

[131] In the limited overs format, Waugh was Australia's leading runscorer in the triangular ODI tournament with 358 runs at 59.66, making 102 against the West Indies in Brisbane.

Struck by a bouncer from Shaun Pollock late on the final day, Waugh broke the stumps with his bat while walking away, so South Africa appealed for hit wicket, which was denied.

[96][157] Waugh was also a part of the limited overs team that won a silver medal at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, losing the final to South Africa.

[163] In the build-up to the third Test in Adelaide, news broke that in 1994–95 Waugh and Shane Warne had accepted money from an Indian bookmaker in exchange for pitch and weather information.

He then scored two and 41 as Australia lost to New Zealand and Pakistan respectively, leaving them needing to avoid defeat in all of their remaining matches to win the World Cup.

In the process, he passed Allan Border's Australian record of 6,524 ODI career runs and became the first person to score four centuries in World Cup competition.

His productive summer continued in the limited overs format when he went on to score an Australian ODI record of 173 in the second tri-series final against the West Indies at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

In the subsequent three-Test series against Pakistan, played on neutral grounds in Sri Lanka and the United Arab Emirates due to security reasons, he made only 80 runs at 20.

[citation needed] Waugh retired as Australia's highest run scorer and century maker (18) in ODI cricket, with these records having since been broken by Ricky Ponting.

In January 2001, the International Cricket Council's anti-corruption unit and the ACB's special investigator Greg Melick requested an interview with Waugh, which his management "presently declined".

[189] During the Singer World Series tournament, played in Sri Lanka during September 1994, Waugh made a decision which came back to affect his career four years later.

[193] In December 1998, prior to the Adelaide Test match against England, news broke that Waugh and Warne were involved with "John" four years earlier and had been fined by the ACB.

After separating from Sue Porter[197] - his partner of 17 years in 2004 - he then married Sydney Cup-winning thoroughbred trainer Kim Waugh (née Moore) on 9 April 2005.