Michael Bevan

The Michael Bevan Medal, for the player of the match in the Australian Domestic One-Day Cricket Final, is named after him.

[5] He made his ODI debut on 14 April 1994 against Sri Lanka in the 1994 Austral-Asia Cup at Sharjah and was not required to bat as Australia chased down 155 comfortably with nine wickets to spare.

He proved a reliable anchor at the bottom of the middle order, and he would often patiently guide Australia to victory following a rare top-order collapse – leading to him being nicknamed "The Finisher".

[8] He batted 45 times in successful ODI run chases for Australia and out of those 45 outings, he remained unbeaten at the crease on 25 occasions.

[12] He featured in his first World Cup tournament during the 1996 Cricket World Cup and played a crucial role to help Australia to reach the final of the tournament by scoring 69 runs in the semi-final clash against the West Indies, a match which is highly remembered and known due to the dramatic collapse of the West Indies in a low scoring run chase of 208.

[13] He also played an important cameo of unbeaten 36 off 49 balls in the 1996 World Cup final which propelled Australia to a decent total of 241/7 on the board.

He was selected to the Australian squad for the 50 over cricket tournament at the 1998 Commonwealth Games where Australia became runners-up in the competition to South Africa.

[16][17] Rest of the World XI at one stage were reeling at 7/196 in the 37th over[18] and was staring at a big defeat before Bevan came to the rescue who smashed 19 fours and five sixes to provide a glimmer of hope.

[19] He alongside Andy Caddick put on a 119 run partnership for the eighth wicket which led to a great recovery for the chasing side.

Caddick was involved in a brainfade moment in the critical juncture of the match as he was run out on the penultimate delivery effectively denying Rest of the World XI a famous win given the circumstances on how the game had panned out.

[20] In January 2002, he scored a crucial unbeaten 95 ball 102 in a match against New Zealand in a modest run chase of 246 at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground.

[21] He arrived to the crease as he once again had to do the bulk of scoring runs after all familiar Aussie top-order collapse as Australia were reeling at 82/6 at one point to then reduced to 143/7.

His last knock was an unfortunate golden duck in the semi-final against Sri Lanka and he was not required to bat in the final which Australia won.

Histogram of batting averages highlighting Bevan's ODI record
Michael Bevan's Test career batting performance.