Bucking the Trend

by Chris Rogers

  This would be helped by the fact that Devon was a holiday destination and touring teams would visit North Devon from not only all over the country, but from all over the world. Mid-summer you could play at least six times a week and often I did – it beat working. Colin often played mid-week as well, as he owned his own fire protection company, so could do more or less as he pleased.

  Not only did I enjoy the cricket, but the ground itself is spectacular. Where two rivers meet the ocean, it sits proudly in the corner with a sea wall and thatched pavilion and scoreboard. I still think it is the most picturesque ground I’ve played at, including Lord’s.

  Those early memories of playing there were as much about the characters as the cricket. I was learning my trade and my first year was hardly spectacular. Colin was larger than life and took me under his wing and treated me like another son – he already had two, Dan and Neil.

  The year I first played there was the year the Devon League first played 50-over matches. Playing Bovey Tracey in the first game, the scoreboard had 25 overs up on the board in our innings. Walking around the ground Colin asked ‘Is that 25 overs gone or 25 to come?’ Then there was his comment when he was captain of the Sunday League side after we’d been turned over by local rivals Bideford: ‘When you boys learn to hate losing, I’ll teach you how to win.’ He was as competitive as they come, and it was for this reason there is one other moment that resides forever in my memory.

  Playing in the 16 eight-ball-over competition (the prelude to Twenty20), one of the biggest hitters in the area, Arnie Searle, played for the opposition. The sun was out this day and there wasn’t much swing, so unfortunately for Colin, Arnie decided to line him up. There wasn’t a local player who didn’t want to take Colin down a peg or two and most couldn’t. But Arnie got him this day and in one over dispatched him for six boundaries, including two maximums. It was some phenomenal hitting and we were left in awe as Arnie hit Colin where he pleased. On the last ball, a pull shot was almost valiantly stopped by a desperate boundary rider who ran 20 metres and dived, only for the ball to slip through his fingertips.

  Everyone at the ground stopped to look at Colin’s reaction. With hands on hips in the middle of the wicket, resembling a teapot, he bellowed ‘For fuck’s sake … Pick up the fielding!’ His enthusiasm was infectious and rubbed off on me. In subsequent years at North Devon and even when I played elsewhere, he was like a surrogate father to me. I had problems with living arrangements the next year but he ended up letting me live at his place of work and then my following season there I stayed with him and his family.

  As for living arrangements, the Palmers were lovely to me, but I ended up moving in with Lee Hart, the team off-spinner and No.4 bat. A lawyer by trade, he was a typical Brit. Witty, intelligent and dry, he would often have me in stitches. It was at this time I got myself my first girlfriend, but his good-natured pressure ribbing got to me. It was all a laugh; he did it brilliantly and still does. He reminds me of the British comedian Steve Merchant, Ricky Gervais’ offsider. It helps that Lee is also tall, at about six foot five.

  Lee now lives in Taunton, in Somerset, with his wife Sue and two children and while captain of that county we have been able to catch up on our friendship. Likewise with another Taunton resident, Mike Paine, who played in those days for another North Devon rival, Braunton. He is my age and about the only one around that age who would go out with me on the weekends. He lived with me in South Perth for six months too. Frank Biederman, who met me at the airport, is someone else I’m still very close to. His place was dubbed the Pig Pen; he is now married with three children. He was three stone overweight; these days he runs marathons. Who would’ve thought?

  The one other character who will never be forgotten, despite passing away a few years back, is the legendary local vicar John Edwards. He played more cricket per week than me – a phenomenal effort considering he was in his late 70s at the time.

  He had a little black book full of names who he would get to play for his mid-week sides, which is no mean feat considering there was a game just about every day. I thought Colin was slow but John would bowl genuine donkey drops … striking fear into the opposition. One wealthy side imposed a 200-pound fine on any player dismissed by him. On one occasion their West Indian import defended against him for about an over before taking an almighty swing at an Edwards delivery, only to hit it straight up and be caught. He was last seen destroying his helmet on the way off.

  Vicar John batted No.11 in every game he played. He could only block and there was no point running, as he was reduced to a shuffle by this stage. This was a fact I used to take advantage of by stationing him as the only leg-side fielder when I bowled and then aiming at leg stump. He would head after it and I would jog behind him and then swoop past him at the last second to pick it up and throw it back in. It always got a laugh, and he loved the attention.

  One game we needed 47 to win when he came in as last man, with me still at the crease. The opposition would have all the fielders on the boundary for me, so I would try to hit boundaries from the first three balls and then get a single fourth ball of the over for Edwards to face the last two deliveries. He wouldn’t even back up and would stand two metres behind the stumps when I was on strike. On this particular day we ended up winning the game and scoring the 47 for the last wicket. John made 0 not out but was carried off while I trudged after. He was a character.

  It was in these mid-week games I even batted right-handed a few times. Sometimes I’d get annoyed at the lack of sportsmanship by the opposition, who would set unrealistic targets, so I’d take the mickey and play opposite-handed. Years of batting right-handed in backyard games with my neighbour in Mount Pleasant, Josh Bolto, paid off and I managed to get a few scores doing this.

  One day I made 90 right-handed and managed to play shots I couldn’t even execute left-handed, as my dominant right hand was now my bottom hand. The opposition – not knowing I actually batted left-handed – were impressed and said they understood why I was in the WA squad at home. They were a little annoyed when they found out the truth.

  I’m telling you all this because my first three years representing North Devon were probably three of the best I have had in the UK. Every experience was brand new and playing cricket all the time with good mates was a dream. I worked in an Irish bar for my last two years and that was brilliant. I fell in love every year, including with a girl I saw for many years, and I was starting to grow up and get some much-needed confidence. Not only that but my batting was starting to develop to the point where I had returned to Perth after a few seasons in the UK and earned the chance to represent WA. I was starting to figure things out.

  CHAPTER 4

  ONCE WERE WARRIORS

  Perth, Sydney, Brisbane

  WESTERN AUSTRALIA HAS always been a place apart, by virtue of its distance from the rest of the country. For a long time the distance itself left the state lagging behind the rest, particularly in the years after the Second World War when the state was first granted a place in Sheffield Shield competition. As Anthony J. Barker relates in his history of the WACA:

  ‘In its post-war period Western Australian cricket unavoidably appeared backward in facilities as well as performance… The team had a makeshift appearance… the first WA teams took the field in a wide variety of club caps and sweaters… Western Australia in the 1940s and early 1950s was closer in lifestyle to the 1930s than to the late twentieth century.’

  Yet WA always had an uncompromising attitude to sport, which became a means of identity and a way of proving the state’s credentials against the rest. Following a fortunate Sheffield Shield victory in its debut season, 1947–48, when a percentage system favoured the state’s restricted schedule, WA waited 20 years for another. But when the Englishman Tony Lock led an emerging side to the title in 1968 it heralded a period in which the west became Australian cricket’s dominant force, lifting the Shield 14 times in 31 years. In addition, WA representation in the Test team peaked in
1981, when it provided seven of 11 players.

  That level of success began with young and united teams, helmed first by Lock then the learned John Inverarity, and persisted as less-cohesive units trampled over opponents through a combination of enormous talent, self-belief and an affinity for the WACA Ground’s uniquely fast surface.

  After leading WA to four Shield titles, Inverarity departed midway through the summer of 1978–79 to take up a teaching position in Adelaide. His sagacious manner and understanding of human psychology was to be missed, in what became an increasingly fractious team environment over the ensuing years – which ultimately would leave its mark on Chris.

  WA’s aforementioned competitive streak was exacerbated by the World Series Cricket split, which in effect doubled the number of Test cricketers taking part in state and club cricket, while adding another layer to already strong rivalries. There was a combustibility to cricket in the west.

  Rod Marsh and Kim Hughes wrestled for the leadership of both state and national sides. Graeme Wood was a highly skilled and single-minded batsman who led as much by example as anything else, but he lacked the communication skills of the best leaders and often left coach Daryl Foster mending the fissures he left in his wake. Geoff Marsh, a loyal Test match lieutenant to Allan Border, inherited the captaincy when Wood was sacked in 1991. But his career was already on the wane, and he retired in 1994. This is all without mentioning the brief coaching reign of the masterful swing bowler Terry Alderman, who was left bitterly angry at the WACA when removed from the job in 1993.

  Wood and Marsh left in their wake an increasingly divided team, where competing egos and disconnected generations scrapped with each other as much as the opposition. The early cricket experiences for the likes of Tom Moody, Damien Martyn and Justin Langer – among others – were thus characterised as much by a need for self-preservation as a fierce commitment to the team itself. This trio were pitted against one another in the race to succeed Marsh as captain, and both Moody and Langer were left nonplussed by the appointment of the sublimely skilled but unpredictable Martyn for the summer of 1994–95. The state team’s results dived almost as fast as Martyn’s own batting.

  Now the coach of WA, Langer has been a powerfully influential figure in Australian cricket, and has always promoted values of unity and team spirit – even if his unrelenting intensity are not for everyone – too much at times even for Chris Rogers.

  Moody, meanwhile, tried to find a middle ground between disappointment and friendship with Martyn, and was rewarded for his forbearance when the younger man’s leadership flamed out, leading the team to four Shield finals from 1995–99, winning the last two.

  Victories achieved through a tenuous alliance between richly talented but contrasting characters left WA with an elevated sense of self-worth once more. It was into this febrile environment that Chris Rogers found himself cast.

  THE SOUND AND sight of cricket at the WACA Ground is different to anywhere else in the world. At a sparsely attended Sheffield Shield game the sound of bat on ball is incredibly crisp. This comes from the pace of the ball off the wicket and the openness of the ground, resulting in an unmistakable crack when a batsman has middled one. Perth’s hot and dry climate also results in seemingly endless days of clear blue skies in summer, and as a kid I remember the yellow helmets of Western Australia’s batsmen standing out against this backdrop, without any moisture, smog or humidity haze to obscure them.

  Once I graduated to playing for WA, I got used to the rhythms of the ground. Typically the first session would be very tough for batting, the second would be excruciating for all concerned due to the heat, and then the last would be beautiful as the breeze came in. At lunch you would be tired, at tea completely exhausted, but then the evening would bring a literal second wind to help the players and spectators enjoy the arena as shadows crept across the field.

  Over my years in the west this experience would be affected by the way the pitch evolved. At first it was lightning fast, and I would often look back with trepidation at how far back the wicketkeeper and slips were standing. But around 2001 the surface slowed a touch and flattened right out, so much so that we nicknamed the seasons that followed as ‘the fielding years’. We spent plenty of time batting of course, but the main memory is of spending seemingly endless hours in the field and struggling to get wickets. That, more or less, is how the square has remained to this day, as exemplified by the high-scoring drawn Test between Australia and New Zealand in the 2015–16 summer.

  Batting at the WACA was a unique experience for another reason: the ability to score runs to all 360 degrees. At the MCG for example, you’re trying to hit straight and not pull or cut that much because the wicket can be a little two–paced. But at the WACA it was possible to play just about every shot in the book, provided you were able to adjust to its pace. That made it an excellent place to learn the art of batting and scoring, provided you could learn to shelve some of your shots when playing elsewhere. One technical element you developed was to punch the ball into the wicket square because it was so hard, and another was to use the pace off the pitch to advantage.

  Less visible but equally memorable was the hair-raising experience of batting in the WACA nets, which to this day are faster than any pitch prepared in the middle of any ground I’ve played at. I always hated going in for a net, from the first day I trained with the state squad. Back then all the fast bowlers in the squad were tall operators able to generate bounce – Brendon Julian, Jo Angel, Mark Atkinson, Sean Cary, Matthew Nicholson and Brad Williams to name a few – and all could leave you fending for your life in there.

  I’ll never forget one day I watched Adam Gilchrist batting out of his crease to these guys in training, cutting, driving and pulling the ball everywhere. I thought to myself ‘oh the wickets must be a bit slow today’, only to get beaten from pillar to post, bowled, nicked off, you name it. I was standing well back in my crease, but it was no use. I was left in awe of Gilchrist, and in terror of the nets. For a while I avoided them, as did Murray Goodwin, but eventually Justin Langer pulled me aside and said, ‘Mate I know you don’t want to do it, none of us want to do it, but you’ve got to get in there. That’s what makes you tough, that’s what gives you courage. If you can do it in there, you can do it anywhere.’ That resonated with me, and so I forced myself to get in there.

  It was a tough school I came home to on my return from Devon in 1998. At the time I was feeling pretty good about life. But the list of recent inductees to the Cricket Academy reminded me of how far back I was in Australian cricket. The Academy was being written about as the world’s ultimate cricket finishing school. But that one incident with Richard Done appeared to have cost me my chance. All these other young players were going to the Academy and I was left wondering if I’d been left behind. To this day I still wonder how much that cost me in later years.

  That being said, it was in many ways the best thing to happen to me, because I had to go away to England. If I’d been in another cosseted little cricket environment at the Academy I don’t think I would have grown up. I had to experience life and engage with people who had lives beyond the game. From what I heard, Rod Marsh at the Academy was trying to promote this by mandating the players also have jobs. I felt I needed the autonomy to work things out for myself.

  Having grown up largely in Perth I needed that experience, because the capital of Western Australia was not somewhere I had to stretch myself to live beyond my comfort zone. The best word I can use to describe the lifestyle of the place is ‘easy’. To this day, having moved to Melbourne, there are places and areas there that I don’t know much about, the city being so big and diverse. But in Perth it was not so hard to know everywhere, because there really isn’t that much to know. If you were playing club cricket you’d jump on the freeway and never be more than 40 minutes’ drive away from home.

  While that was comfortable and familiar, it also had a tendency to breed a kind of insularity and even incestuousness in relations
hips and behaviour – everyone seemed to know everyone else, whether they liked it or not. When I was nearing the end of my teens I remember there being a club where all the cricketers went – all except me. I didn’t feel comfortable in that company, and in knowing well before turning up that there would be so many familiar faces in attendance yet again. The rock music selections didn’t encourage me to return either.

  So I was still something of an outsider to WA cricket culture when I was first picked in the Western Australia state squad at the age of 19. This much was obvious because when I turned up no one knew me – I was starting from a long way back in terms of relationships, if not performance. That counted, because the WA team of the time was immensely strong and competitive for places.

  I was among a group of batsmen around the fringes of the state team at the time. Rob Baker, an outstanding junior batsman and sound technician was one, alongside Michael Dighton, Marcus North and myself. It was to be Baker’s decline – he was to battle chronic fatigue syndrome and not make his way back into the team – that gave me my first chance, and I quickly discovered that my lack of familiarity counted against me. The players loved Baker, and regarded me with looks that said ‘who’s this bloke?’ My first innings for the state didn’t help, when I was out to the modest part-timers of Mark Ramprakash just before the touring Englishmen took the second new ball.

  The team’s next trip was to New South Wales for a Sheffield Shield match at the SCG, in November, 1998. While it was a thrill to play at such a grand old ground for the first time, the most vivid memory is of the social dynamics of the team on tour. We were staying in Coogee and on the first afternoon we got there the group went to the Coogee Bay Hotel. I went to the bar and ordered a beer, then found myself standing next to a senior player. The following exchange took place.