The Sunrisers Hyderabad had him in their kitty for less than $100,000, and in the first season, he didn't return the dividends - particularly given the limited opportunities he had in an unfamiliar lower-middle order position. IPL through the years Kane Williamson, who is often referred to as a classical Test batsman, was first signed by an IPL franchise in 2015. There have been quite a few knocks in that regard and he had shown in the 2017 IPL that he can adapt to that role easily. This is not to suggest that he hasn't produced impact knocks in the shorter formats. However, if he can raise his white-ball skills a notch upward, he could be a real phenomenon in world cricket.
You could argue that his role is that of a sheet anchor around which the other Kiwi batsmen revel. The only slight flaw that can be mentioned about his batting could be his relative inability to score quickly at will. Williamson's batting is a purists delight - what with his classy strokeplay blending nicely with his footwork and gritty temperament. Still a long way to go as captain in terms of success but the one thing that stands out about his leadership skills is his ability to be tactically street-smart. It was a huge role but Williamson took to it fairly well, much like people had expected him to. It happened in early 2016 after Brendon McCullum announced retirement from all forms of international cricket, just before the World T20 in India.
Being a regular player and having leadership skills at his disposal, it was only a matter of time before Williamson was appointed New Zealand's captain across formats. 2015 was also a historic year for New Zealand as they made their first ever World Cup final appearance. More than the numbers, it was the effortless ease with which he handled bowling attacks that impressed everybody. He notched up 1172 runs in Tests at a staggering average of 90 apart from amassing a gargantuan 1376 runs in ODIs at a strong average of 57. If 2014 was a superb year for Williamson, it was 2015 that put him officially into the big league of batsmen.
His five fifty plus scores are also the most by a NZ batsman in a bilateral series. He also became the fourth New Zealand player to hit five or more consecutive fifty plus scores in ODIs. With fifty plus scores in all five games, he became only the second batsman in ODI history (after Yasir Hameed) to achieve this feat.
That changed in 2014 though during ODI home series against India when he also broke a heap of records. The following years saw Williamson scoring runs albeit not at the highly consistent levels that one expected from him. The Test call up came and it was for a challenging trip to India but Williamson made a massive statement but racking up a century on debut. His white-ball cricket started in tragedy with ducks in his first two innings but his class couldn't be hidden for long as he stroked a ton against Bangladesh in Dhaka later that year. Along expected lines, the year 2010 saw Williamson donning the Kiwi colors, making his international debut in Sri Lanka for the tri-series that also featured India. His leaderships skills were in abundance, just like his batting. Since his Under-19 days, it was expected that Williamson would one day become the backbone of New Zealand's batting apart from being their captain. It was therefore not a surprise when Kane took a liking to sports and it happened to be cricket. While his father had played cricket at certain age groups, his mother was a fine basketball player and his sisters excelled in volleyball. It would be fair to say the Williamson family boasted of sports freak all around. His exceptional talent included the rare Non-Asian skill to play quality spin apart from being adept against fast bowling. Arguably New Zealand's finest batsman since the legendary Martin Crowe, Kane Williamson had been a wonder kid since his teenage days.