Underneath the Southern Cross

by Michael Hussey

  In recognition of this, CA had been grooming Michael as vice-captain ever since Gilly’s retirement. Since 2008, he’d been doing a kind of apprenticeship under Ricky. Michael wanted to learn from Ricky, but also challenge Ricky. That can be a good element of vice-captaincy, to challenge the captain’s ideas, and it was the way Pup saw his learning process.

  If I had doubts about Michael becoming captain, I didn’t have any ready-made alternatives. It had been decided that I, being the same age as Ricky, was expected to leave the game at around the same time as him and they needed to look at the next generation. I had no problem with that. I thought I could have been a good vice-captain, because I had a good rapport with other players, building friendships, particularly with newer members to make them feel comfortable. I would do whatever my captain asked, without question. But then, I understood why they made Pup vice-captain, and then Brad Haddin and Shane Watson. That was part of the planning for the future. And I didn’t have to have the VC by my name to play that leadership role. I’d support the captain and be a conduit between him and the young guys, whether I had a formal leadership position or not. There are many ways to be a leader in a cricket team.

  We started the Sri Lankan tour with a five-match one-day series, which we won. At the end of it, Pup came up to me and said, ‘You haven’t made as many runs as you would have liked, Huss, but I back you and think you’ve got a big role to play in this team going forwards.’

  But the wonderful thing about cricket is, it’s full of surprises. Whatever my feelings at the start of that series, I played some of my best cricket under Pup’s captaincy over the next eighteen months. I don’t know quite what the chemistry was, but it worked, and in the end that’s what matters.

  The Galle wicket was like a beach, one of the most challenging I’ve ever played on. The sandy soil had the ball turning viciously. I got 95 in the first innings, which put me in a better frame of mind. The funny thing was, I didn’t worry much about just missing out on a century at the time. Ninety-five runs in a Test match is still an awesome effort. But at the end of my career, I have niggles about having 19 Test centuries, not converting that 95. I can only imagine how someone like Michael Slater feels – he would have had 23 Test centuries, not 14, if he hadn’t got out in the nineties nine times, and with those stats he probably wouldn’t ever have been dropped. It’s something you think about more when it’s all over.

  When we went into the field in Galle, our off-spinner Nathan Lyon, in his first Test innings, took 5/34 and we were in control of the match. I was particularly happy for Nathan. Whoever came into the Australian team to bowl spin post-Warne and MacGill was under pressure, and for Nathan to come in and bowl beautifully was great to see. He was clearly an out-and-out team man, who loved supporting the others and enjoyed their success, and I clicked with him from the start.

  Meanwhile, Michael was leading the team very well on the field. He was always thinking outside the box, throwing in an unconventional fielding position or new bowler to plant a doubt in the batsmen’s mind if ever he thought the game was drifting. After we won the first Test comfortably, we went to Pallekele, where we took some early wickets but Kumar Sangakkara threatened to get away. In those Sri Lankan Tests, everything I touched seemed to turn to gold, so Pup thought it might be like that with the ball too.

  He asked me to bowl, and as usual I thought, Are you serious? But I trundled in, and … to be honest, I don’t know how I got Kumar. I wish I could say it swung in and seamed away and caught the edge. But in my first over, I floated up a big wide juicy half-volley that he smashed right out of the middle of the bat. Phil Hughes took a great catch at short cover. Then Pup took me off.

  But after I made 142 in our first innings, Pup thought he might develop me into a secret weapon. I bowled a loosener to the opener, Paranavitana, and he played and missed – or at least I thought he did. I didn’t appeal. Brad Haddin appealed quite confidently, though. The umpire gave it not out. Brad was adamant, and we referred it to the video. Something was picked up, and he was out, even though I never thought he was. Everything was going my way. And it was a really good part of Michael’s captaincy to go with his gut instinct.

  We drew that match and the next, so the new skipper was off to a winning start, and quite rightly he got a lot of the credit. Shaun Marsh had made a century on debut, in front of his dad, and Phil Hughes belted a fighting hundred in the third Test. As for me, I was pinching myself. I made two centuries and totalled 462 runs at 92.6, average-wise the most successful Test series in my whole career. I was man of the match in all three Tests, which was a great feeling. For all my doubts leading into it, something was going right. I felt hugely excited to be part of the team’s future.

  We wedged in a brief visit home before a tour to South Africa that spring. Under Michael Clarke, a new demand for off-field discipline was coming in. After a win in the first of a three-match one-day series, we lost in Port Elizabeth, but as it was Brad Haddin’s birthday, some of us got together for a beer. South African players were there as well, and the next morning we were in trouble for drinking too late with the opposition. I thought it was a great opportunity to enjoy each other’s company socially. Unfortunately, the powers that be didn’t agree. In Durban the next day we were grilled about our conduct and preparation by Michael Clarke and Troy Cooley, who was standing in as coach. Their message was to pick your times. We thought we’d picked our time pretty well – we didn’t have a match for another week – but there was a strong objection to going out and having a drink after losing a match.

  We were all sheepish, but later we talked amongst ourselves and felt aggrieved. We didn’t think we were doing anything wrong. We were treated like naughty schoolboys, and it put us on edge.

  Sometimes these things can bring you together, though. Michael said, ‘When we win the series, we can party as hard as anyone.’ We did that, and had a great celebration. It’s not easy to beat South Africa at home, and we played really well in that last game. I was there at the end with the Sydney teenager Pat Cummins, who played well under pressure, and the feeling in the team was buoyant after we squeaked home.

  South African pitches, as I well knew, were sporty, but most of all in springtime. In our warm-up game at Potchefstroom, a young kid called Marchant De Lange bowled like the wind and was hitting everyone in the head or body. It was a tough initiation into red-ball cricket, but I thought it was good, because if we could get through this we could get through anything.

  The Cape Town pitch looked pretty spicy too. I was one of several Australians to fail on the first morning, as Dale Steyn, Vernon Philander and Morne Morkel gave us a torrid workout. But Michael Clarke played one of the most phenomenal captain’s innings of all time. Other than his 329 in Sydney two months later, his 151 in Cape Town was the best I’ve seen him play, and on a much more difficult pitch. I watched most of it from the pavilion. For his first half-hour he looked uncomfortable against the short ball and they peppered him, hitting him on the head and all over his body. But he counter-attacked as only he can. It was a big statement that he wouldn’t bow down, and would dictate to the bowlers even on the hardest wickets. Of our total of 284, he scored more than half the runs.

  Conditions for bowling were a lot like Headingley, and it was tailor-made for bowlers of fast-medium pace, accurate but with natural variation, such as Ryan Harris and Shane Watson. They bowled great spells, doing just enough both ways to get the nicks. They absolutely routed South Africa for 96. Halfway into the second day, we had a fantastic lead and were excited about the way the Test match was going.

  Did I say routed? I guess that wasn’t a real rout. From midway through the day, when we started our second innings, that Test match turned into a bad dream. The wicket started doing a bit less, so instead of playing and missing as we had in the first innings, we started to nick them. Philander’s big hooping swingers were hitting us in front rather than curving too much.

  In seven overs before tea, we lost Watto, Ri
cky and Phil Hughes. I came out first ball after tea in a positive frame of mind. Morkel served up what I thought was an inviting half-volley, and I went for the biggest cover-drive of all time. I nicked it to slip – first ball. It was a terrible shot, just terrible. We were 4/13. But plenty of teams have picked themselves up from there and made good scores. I sat down, feeling very low about the shot I’d played, when there was a big roar and all of a sudden Pup was sitting down beside me, taking his gear off.

  Then Hadds came back. Then Ryan Harris. Then Mitch Johnson. When Shaun Marsh came back – he’d gone in at number ten after suffering an injury – we were 9/21. There was just silence and disbelief in the dressing room. Was this really happening? We were about to wake up, right?

  On the television screen, the lowest scores in Test cricket were being posted. New Zealand’s all-time low of 26 seemed like a mile away. Finally, Peter Siddle and Nathan Lyon put on a partnership for the last wicket – and got us to 47. I don’t think the South Africans could believe it either.

  I wasn’t thinking so much about the overall collapse as cursing myself for my own performance. It was blatantly obvious that I’d played an awful shot. I’d seen it and gone for it, and it didn’t go right. Quite a few of the wickets were through good bowling, but not mine. We only needed to put 150 on the board to be in a great position.

  Still, even with 47 we led by 235, and South Africa would have to exceed their first innings by a long way. Conditions seemed to be getting better for batting, but we still had every expectation of bowling them out.

  But suddenly, Graeme Smith was finding batting easy, and Hashim Amla, coming in at number three, flicked a switch to show us how good he was. They were getting away from us until, on the last ball of the day, Amla sliced a drive to me at gully. It was an absolute dolly, and I put it down.

  First ball duck, all out 47, dropped their best player on the last ball: all in all, probably my worst day in Test cricket.

  The next morning, they cruised home. It was no contest. Smith and Amla both made centuries and it didn’t seem the same pitch as the previous day. We were in shock. How had it turned to this?

  After the game, it was the first time I’d ever seen panic in the Australian team. We had a batters’ meeting for an hour and a half. The bowlers also held a meeting, thrashing it all out. I thought, It’s been an ordinary game, but for the first half some of the guys played really well. The boys said to me, ‘What the hell were you thinking, playing that shot first ball?’ It can be good to be hear your teammates say what they’re thinking, rather than being told what you want to hear. But it’s also confronting. I had the chance to say what I was feeling. I said, ‘I know it was a terrible shot. It was instinctive, I felt I was in good position, I went for it, and I just stuffed it up.’ There were a lot of home truths spoken, and guys were being very honest with themselves. Brad Haddin said, ‘I’m really struggling at the moment.’ I think it was a weight off his shoulders to be able to say that. It saved someone else from going up to him and saying, ‘Mate, you look like you’re struggling.’ It cleared the air for him to confess how he was feeling. For Hadds, like the rest of us, the only way was up.

  Ryan Harris picked up an injury in that match, so Pat Cummins came in for his first Test in Johannesburg. He was a fantastic young bloke, who loved the team environment and had a maturity beyond his years. And Usman Khawaja, who’d been unlucky to be left out of the team since the Sri Lankan Tests, got his chance after Shaun Marsh’s injury.

  We had another bowler-friendly wicket, but the team showed a lot of character, fighting tooth and nail. Our pride was hurt by what happened in Cape Town. This Test was going to show our fighting qualities.

  The first innings were pretty much on parity, but in South Africa’s second dig Pat Cummins just bowled amazingly, with fire and penetration, really worrying all the batsmen. I would have loved to play more cricket with him, as he promised to give the team that sense of having a frightening pace spearhead. I had strong opinions about players needing to be seasoned in Shield cricket before coming into the Test team, but it was different with bowlers. Pat, like James Pattinson and Mitchell Starc after him, was a very special, precocious talent, and bowlers mature at an earlier age than batsmen. Even though none of them had had much first-class experience, I was right behind their selections.

  The match came down to us needing 310 to win on a wearing Wanderers pitch. We lost the openers early, but there was a spirit in the team that just would not accept defeat. Ricky and Usman put on a resolute stand, and then I had a good partnership with Brad Haddin. I wasn’t really happy with how I was batting. Vernon Philander was unplayable. Early in my innings I played and missed four balls in an over. I thought I’d be able to get my runs off him, if I could survive Steyn and Morkel, but now I wondered how I’d get bat on ball. I was going for big shots, feeling loose, but they weren’t there. Shot selection was a problem. I nicked a couple through slips. Just as I felt like I was settling down and getting the situation under control, my nemesis Steyn got me out. I don’t know how many times he got me over the years, but it was more than I care to remember.

  But we kept inching forward, in partnerships. We couldn’t quite get someone to bat all the way through, but that’s the nature of South African conditions. The fighting qualities of all the boys was a really good sign about the characters we had. Finally Pat Cummins and Mitch Johnson got together with 30 runs needed, and it was excruciating watching from the pavilion, with balls lobbing just beside and over the fielders. But Pat and Mitch found a way, and we had – by two wickets – one of our most exhilarating and memorable wins for many years.

  Winning the match in the third One Day International match between South Africa and Australia at the Sahara Stadium Kingsmead in Durban, South Africa on 28 October 2011. I was also awarded Man of the Series. (Photo by Steve Haag/Gallo Images/Getty Images)

  When you start your Test career at thirty, one thing that comes with the territory is that your age always seems to be a factor. If you have a rough trot when you’re young, everyone just says, ‘He’s out of form, he’ll be okay.’ When you’re in your thirties, it’s ‘He’s too old, he’s lost it, they have to bring in someone young.’

  I’d been putting up with that at the start of the previous three or four Australian summers, but it didn’t get any easier. We started the 2011–12 season with a two-Test series at home against New Zealand, and when I didn’t make any big scores it was on again. ‘Hussey’s time is up.’ It was incredibly disappointing, two or three matches after I’d had my most productive series and won the man-of-the-match award in every game. But I was used to it. I needed runs to keep the wolf from the door.

  We beat New Zealand easily in Brisbane, but on a poppy wicket in Hobart we batted poorly and lost. David Warner, formerly seen as a Twenty20 specialist, proved he was a Test batsman by carrying his bat on the last day, but we fell short. I felt the speculation intensify around my position. So I left Hobart in a bad mood, which only worsened when I made a duck in the Twenty20 Big Bash League for Perth Scorchers that followed.

  Coming into the Boxing Day Test, then, I was in what seemed like an annual state of stress. Amy and I found out we were going to have another baby, which was exciting. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t stressed about cricket. Amy said I had to find a way to get my mind off it. I wasn’t fun to be around.

  After the Hobart debacle, we had a batting camp in Melbourne. We hit lots of balls and got together for dinner as a batting group. I really enjoyed it. But unfortunately, it doesn’t matter how well you hit the ball in the nets. On Boxing Day, I came in at 4/205, a solid position, to face Zaheer Khan. He was a very wily bowler, and his first ball, a short one, caught me by surprise. I went to play at it, dropped my hands and thankfully missed it. To my dismay, the umpire put his finger up. To my absolute despair, India weren’t allowing DRS so there was no going back, when I knew a replay would show that I was not out. To be under all that pressure and get a first-ball
duck – as I walked off the MCG, I was screaming, Give me a break! Some people said they hadn’t ever seen me so animated. I was screaming at the cricket gods. Against New Zealand in Hobart, I’d been hit on the pad first ball but the umpire gave it not out; yet, because they had DRS, the Kiwis referred it and I was given out. Even DRS seemed to have a mind of its own, biased against me. That’s what I was screaming at.

  That night, I went through my usual battle with nerves and the dumps. It’s a horrible feeling, sitting in your hotel room, really tense with negative thoughts, knowing you are one mistake away from the end of your career for Australia. Everyone was saying I had to go. One good ball, one bit of bad luck, and I was finished.

  The Test match was an arm-wrestle, which turned our way on the third day when Peter Siddle and Ben Hilfenhaus wrecked the Indian middle order with a great spell of bowling. But then it swung the other way as our top order were out quickly. I came in at 4/27 to join Ricky, who was under the same age-related pressure as I was. It wasn’t something we talked about; we didn’t need to. But it annoyed me hugely that people could question Ricky Ponting’s selection, after all he’d done and the champion he was. After a handful of bad games, they wanted to get rid of him straightaway. People didn’t see how much he gave the team off the field, working with the young guys or chipping in with wise words in team meetings. It angered me almost as much as the questioning of my own selection. At any rate, Ricky was about to rise to the challenge.

  My mood was a lot like it had been in the oval Test in 2009. When I hit rock-bottom, I just thought, See the ball, and what will be will be. As so often happened, one shot unlocked me. Off my first ball, I clipped Ishant Sharma off my pads for three. I relaxed. The gods had decided I’d had enough, and the wheel turned for me. I had some good luck when Dravid dropped me at slip off Ravi Ashwin. Ricky made 60 and I got to 89 before Zaheer got me again, but we’d batted the team into a good position.