The 38-year-old announced his international retirement towards the end of 2021. His last match for New Zealand was an ODI against the Netherlands in Hamilton in April this year. The right-handed batter finished his illustrious international career with 112 Tests, 236 ODIs and 102 T20Is.

Taylor holds the record for having scored the most number of runs for New Zealand in international cricket. In 450 matches across the three formats of the game, he amassed 18,199 at an average of 42.72 with 40 hundreds and 93 fifties.

With Taylor grabbing the headlines, this time for his book, we look at five revelations made by the former cricketer in his autobiography.

#1 “One of the Royals owners slapped me across the face three or four times”

Taylor represented the Rajasthan Royals (RR) during the Indian Premier League 2011 season. Recalling his time with the franchise, he claimed that he was “slapped” by one of the owners after getting out for a duck.

In his book, excerpts of which have been published on Stuff.co.nz, the former Kiwi skipper recalled that the incident took place after RR went down to Kings XI Punjab in a match in Mohali. He wrote:

He added:

Taylor, who represented the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) from 2008 to 2010, felt that he would have had a longer IPL career had he stayed with the franchise. He wrote:

At the same time, he admitted that if he had stayed with RCB, he wouldn’t have played with greats such as Virender Sehwag, Shane Warne, Mahela Jayawardene and Yuvraj Singh.

#2 “They wanted to ambush me” - Taylor opens up on captaincy controversy

In his book, Taylor also took a dig at former New Zealand coach Mike Hesson over his unceremonious exit as captain. The Kiwi legend recalled Hesson telling him that he was “a follower, not a leader”, after which Brendon McCullum was named the new skipper.

Looking back at the tough period of his career, the 38-year-old alleged:

He further wrote that the way he was treated put immense mental pressure on him, due to which he was unable to sleep for more than two-and-a-half hours a night leading up to a Test match. The star batter recalled in his book:

Taylor admitted that he eventually did receive an apology from New Zealand Cricket (NZC), but did not feel it was sincere.

#3 “A brown face in a vanilla line-up”

The first big revelation to come out of Taylor’s new autobiography was his shocking claim regarding racism in New Zealand cricket.

The Kiwi great, who has Samoan heritage on his mother’s side, termed cricket in New Zealand “a pretty white sport”, adding that the racism he experienced inside the dressing rooms was perhaps considered mere “banter” by those involved in it.

Sharing his uncomfortable experiences, he opened up in his book and wrote:

He added:

Taylor further wrote:

On why he did not raise the issue earlier, the former cricketer explained that he was wary of being accused of playing the race card by inflating harmless banter into racism.

#4 “Just bat like you’re eating prawns” - Sehwag’s unique advice to Taylor

Taylor represented the Delhi franchise in IPL 2012. He struggled for rhythm in one of the matches when teammate Virender Sehwag advised him to bat as if he was eating prawns.

The Indian legend’s advice came after he had seen the Kiwi enjoying eating prawns at his restaurant on the eve of the game.

Recalling the amusing incident, Taylor wrote in his book:

Continuing the story, Taylor said that, during the match, Sehwag smacked the ball to all parts of the ground, making batting look easy. However, the overseas batters were struggling. The Kiwi admitted that he was nervous because he was being paid a lot of money and had to deliver. He added:

Taylor scored 197 runs in 12 games for Delhi during the IPL 2012 season, registering a highest score of 55.

#5 “4000 tigers in the wild, but only one Rahul Dravid”

During his stint with RR in IPL 2011, Taylor and Rahul Dravid went to Ranthambore National Park to spot a tiger. He revealed that, during the trip, the public who were there were more interested in Dravid than in spotting a tiger.

Sharing details of the visit, the former cricketer wrote in his book:

He recalled that the tiger was on a rock, a good 100 meters away. What happened next was what grabbed the New Zealand cricketer’s attention. He concluded the story as follows:

Taylor played 12 matches for Rajasthan during the IPL 2011 season, scoring 181 runs at an average of 36.20 and a strike rate of 119.07.

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