Wellington: Just a week after being discharged from hospital in Canberra following a life-threatening heart attack and paraplegia, the New Zealand cricket legend Chris Cairns has revealed he has been diagnosed with bowel cancer.
In an Instagram post on Saturday, Cairns, 51, wrote:
“Another fight ahead but here’s hoping this one is a swift upper cut and over in the first round,” the 51-year-old, one of the world’s top all-rounders in the early 2000s, said on social media.
“I was told yesterday I have bowel cancer… big shock and not what I was expecting.
“So, as I prepare for another round of conversations with surgeons and specialists, I keep remembering how lucky I am to be here in the first place.”
Cairns was only discharged from hospital last week, five months after he underwent a life-saving heart operation and was then paralysed by a subsequent stroke.
Cairns played 62 Tests for New Zealand between 1989 and 2004, averaging 29.4 with the ball and 33.53 with the bat.
He hit 87 sixes, a Test world record at the time, and was the sixth player to achieve the all-rounders’ double of 200 wickets and 3,000 runs.
However, his on-field achievements were overshadowed by match-fixing allegations, strongly denied by Cairns, that resulted in two court cases.
