Cricket star Crowe seriously ill

Martin Crowe and wife Lorraine Downes. Photo / Doug Sherring

New Zealand cricket legend Martin Crowe is in the fight of his life.

In September, the 52-year-old tweeted that his cancer had returned, and he is now seriously ill.

Friends and family are galvanising to support him as he fights the cancer he calls his "friend and tough taskmaster".

The former captain is remaining positive, telling friends he is spurred on by the prospect of watching the World Cup return to this country in February. Crowe starred in the last World Cup here in 1992.

Crowe's revelation that he was no longer in remission for lymphoma came after a doctor's visit led to the discovery of a growth. He tweeted: "After a brilliant year of self-discovery and recovery I have more work to do. My friend & tough taskmaster Lymphoma is back to teach me."

Crowe, married to former Miss Universe Lorraine Downes, got the all-clear in June last year after being diagnosed with lymphoma two years ago.

It is understood Crowe, who has an 11-year-old daughter Emma to a former partner, has declined chemotherapy treatment at this stage.

Crowe played 77 tests from 1982-95, scoring 5,444 runs and 17 centuries at an average of 45.36. He held the record for New Zealand's highest individual test score of 299 runs for 23 years. It was broken by Brendon McCullum's 302 in February at the Basin Reserve.

He is spurred on in his battle against cancer with an upbeat attitude by continuing his active involvement on the cricket scene.

He's mentoring his latest batting project, opener Martin Guptill, following the fortunes of his beloved New Zealand team and preparing to be a World Cup ambassador. Crowe posts articulate summaries on cricinfo.com where aficionados live in awe and anticipation at his insight.

His latest entry describing the gap between balls in a test match is particularly poignant.

"This is the space between thoughts, between breaths, between fielders, between balls. They say to experience the gap wholly brings ultimate joy in what we do. In the gap there is nothing, and it's that nothing space in which lies the secret to our purpose.

"As I contemplate the meaning of much of my life, a life I now truly treasure, with dangers lurking, it is in this moment of nothing that I feel at peace. Awareness has taught me that previously I was always too quick to fill the gap with judgemental, premeditated masking and conditioning."

His revelations in his second memoir Raw, published last year, hint at a similar maturity dealing with life's obstacles.

"I want to live a life that is fearless, that is without judgement or scrutiny, let alone have any negative emotions of hate, resentment or grievance.

"I am so tired of that life, of fighting, of ego, of trying to win opinion and of needing acceptance."

Crowe writes of his earlier self: "That innocent boy became a man who harboured grudges, he became the world record-holder for grievances" and later says it was an "ongoing problem of mine - a disconnected spirit and soul overwhelmed by the ego and the emotional instability created from my unfinished teenage development".

Through Downes and Emma he appears to have found the strength to deal with his new world, a world filled with humility and wisdom.