Allan Border , a legendary player in Australian cricket, has disclosed that he has Parkinson’s disease and that it will be a miracle if he lives to be 80. Border, who became the first player in history to amass 11,000 Test runs, revealed that he received a cancer diagnosis in 2016 but had concealed the fact from the public for seven years.
The 67-year-old said to Newscorp, “I’m a pretty private person and I didn’t want people to feel sorry for me, sort of thing.“Whether people care you don’t know. But I know there’ll come a day when people will notice.”
Border’s Fox Sports colleague Steve Crawley told him at dinner last week that his good friends had already noticed.
“I get the feeling I’m a hell of a lot better off than most,” Border added. “At the moment I’m not scared, not about the immediate future anyway.
“If I make 80, that’ll be a miracle. I’ve got a doctor friend and I said if I make 80, that’ll be a miracle. He said: ‘That will be a miracle.’ No way am I going to get another 100, that’s for sure. I’ll just slip slowly into the west.”
In addition to his run-scoring exploits, Border played a then-record 156 Tests for Australia, 153 of them consecutive, in a career in which he also lifted the 1987 World Cup as captain. Australia recognizes his status in the game by awarding the Allan Border medal to their player of the year.
Parkinson’s disease is a progressive disorder caused by degeneration of nerve cells in the brain. It affects the regulation of movement, among other physical and psychological symptoms.Notable people diagnosed with the disease include Hollywood actor Michael J. Fox, the late boxer Muhammad Ali, and Scottish comedian Billy Connolly.