‘England have won the toss,’ explains Mark Nicholas to the expectant crowd. A great cheer erupts from the section housing the Barmy Army. For once, though, they are completely outnumbered.
‘Andrew, what are you going to do?’ Mark continues.
‘We are going to bowl first,’ I reply.
A groan can be heard from the same fans who were cheering seconds earlier. It is clear that not many of them agree with my decision.
As I walk back to the dressing room, I mutter to myself, ‘This had better work, or I am in serious trouble.’
Playing cricket on Boxing Day is always slightly surreal. For a start, Christmas Day is completely ruined. To me, Christmas lunch without alcohol is like a beach without water. It just doesn’t work. When you throw into the mix that you are thousands of miles away from home, have had to do training in the morning and you are putting on your Christmas hat in an enormous hotel dining room, you get the gist. It’s not fun.
This Christmas, in particular, there was plenty of tension around the dinner table. The loss of the third Test in Perth was both unexpected and confidence-sapping. An equally unexpected spell of devastating swing bowling from Mitchell Johnson had destroyed our middle order and turned the game on its head. We never recovered from the shock and subsided meekly to a 267-run defeat.
There was a strong argument doing the rounds that Australia had grabbed back the momentum in the series in time for the crucial stages. Also, both Andy Flower and I had been concerned enough by the quiet, energy-less practice session on Christmas Eve for us to call a halt and remind everyone of the importance of the next few days. We all knew that we couldn’t afford to get stage fright as we had in the opening sessions in Brisbane.
It was for this reason that the toss was so crucial. Without doubt, it was the most significant toss of my career. Although players usually pay too much attention to the toss in the irrational search for omens from the cricketing gods, it is rarely as vital as it is made out to be. This time, though, with such a massive game ahead, in such a heated atmosphere, there was a good chance that the team who won the day’s cricket on Boxing Day would go on to win the match.
The problem I was facing, as I looked at the wicket on the day before the game, was that the decision was as clear as mud. The statistics leant towards batting first. The wicket in Melbourne tends to deteriorate and get more inconsistent as the game moves on. On the other hand, it didn’t look quite right. It was the type of wicket that Justin Langer, when he was Middlesex captain, used to describe as a ‘baby eagle – it’s ------- ugly’. It was next to impossible to know how it would play on day one, or for that matter later in the game.
On the morning of the game, I arrived early, still unsure of what I was going to do. David Saker, who had played most of his cricket at the MCG, edged towards bowling first. Andy Flower was not sure. The closer we got to the toss, the more my gut feeling told me that bowling first was the right call. It would only work, though, if I could convince the bowlers that it was the right idea.
I called Jimmy Anderson over to ask his opinion about the toss.
‘I think there is going to be some movement in it,’ he said.
That was enough for me.
‘Jimmy, I’m glad you said that, because we’re going to bowl first. Potentially we can put Australia out of the game if it offers us assistance. If not, we are still in the game. Are you OK with that?’
‘Yes. We just need to make sure that we don’t chase the game,’ he replied.
With that, the decision was made.
What followed was the most extraordinary day of cricket I have ever played. A procession of Australian batsmen came and went. There was very little playing and missing. Our bowling attack, which by then included both Chris Tremlett and Tim Bresnan, relentlessly put the ball on a length on off stump and the Australians could not find a way to deal with it. Tremlett’s delivery to Ricky Ponting seemed to encapsulate the one-sided nature of the contest perfectly. Pitched just short of a length, it bounced awkwardly, nipped away and Ponting had no answer as he was caught brilliantly by Graeme Swann at second slip.
Just after lunch, a glance at the scoreboard told spectators everything they needed to know. On Boxing Day, in front of 90,000 die-hard fans, the Aussies had been bowled out for 98. If we could somehow manage to negotiate the initial barrage from Australia with the ball, we were well on the way to winning the game.
To me, the way that the Australians bowled that afternoon showed the great difference between the sides in that series. Whereas our bowlers relied on nagging accuracy, pressure and the vagaries of the wicket to press the opposition into mistakes, the Aussie bowlers and Ponting, the captain, tried far more to make things happen, switching between different plans every few overs. Perhaps the Australian bowlers weren’t able to deliver on the plans that Ponting was trying to carry out, and perhaps he was forced to chase the game as they had been bowled out for 98, but it demonstrated the dangers of setting attacking fields with radically different bowling plans. The opposition can get momentum, you cannot stem the tide of runs and any pressure you have built up can quickly dissipate.
I suppose any strategy relies on the bowlers’ ability to carry it out, and in that regard we were very fortunate. We did, however, tailor our bowling attack to our method, dropping Steve Finn for the Melbourne Test because he was finding it difficult to apply the pressure we were looking for (despite taking the most wickets in the series up to that point).
What cannot be denied is that the Australian method did not work. By the end of the day, we had reached 157–0. If Carlsberg did days of cricket, this was it. Australia were out of the Test match and the result of the game was a formality.
Three days later, the players were doing the ‘sprinkler dance’ to 20,000 Barmy Army supporters on the boundary, safe in the knowledge that the Ashes were not going to be prised from our grasp. We had an unassailable 2–1 lead.
My attention is drawn back to the circle of players in front of me on the outfield at the SCG. One after another the guys have gone through a rich and varied array of brilliant memories from the tour and it is now my turn to add to the conversation. I think briefly once again about everything that has happened over the last two months and suddenly come to the realisation that my favourite memory is actually taking place right in front of me. A group of people who have all been through an incredible shared experience are sitting together with a beer in hand, enjoying the moment. Nothing demonstrates the unique camaraderie on this tour better than the previous forty minutes.
This, more than making centuries and taking five-wicket hauls, is why we play the glorious game of cricket.
England in Australia 2010–11 – The Ashes
1st Test. BCG, Brisbane. 25–29 November 2010
England 260 (I.R. Bell 76, A.N. Cook 67, A.J. Strauss 0; P.M. Siddle 6–54) and 517–1 dec (A.N. Cook 235*, I.J.L. Trott 135*, A.J. Strauss 110)
Australia 481 (M.E.K. Hussey 195, B.J. Haddin 136, S.M. Katich 50; S.T. Finn 6–125) and 107–1 (R.T. Ponting 51*)
Match drawn.
2nd Test. Adelaide Oval, Adelaide. 3–7 December 2010
Australia 245 (M.E.K. Hussey 93, B.J. Haddin 56, S.R. Watson 51; J.M. Anderson 4–51) and 304 (M.J. Clarke 80, S.R. Watson 57, M.E.K. Hussey 52; G.P. Swann 5–91)
England 620–5 dec (K.P. Pietersen 227, A.N. Cook 148, I.J.L. Trott 78, I.R. Bell 68*, A.J. Strauss 1)
England won by an innings and 71 runs.
3rd Test. WACA, Perth. 16–19 December 2010
Australia 268 (M.G. Johnson 62, M.E.K. Hussey 61, B.J. Haddin 53) and 309 (M.E.K. Hussey 116, S.R. Watson 95; C.T. Tremlett 5–87)
England 187 (I.R. Bell 53, A.J. Strauss 52; M.G. Johnson 6–38) and 123 (A.J. Strauss 15; R.J. Harris 6–47)
Australia won by 267 runs.
4th Test. MCG, Melbourne. 26–29 December 2010
Australia 98 (J.M. Anderson 4–44, C.T. Tremlett 4–26) and 258 (B.J. Haddin 55*, S.R. Watson 54; T.T. Bresnan 4�
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England 513 (I.J.L. Trott 168*, M.J. Prior 85, A.N. Cook 82, A.J. Strauss 69, K.P. Pietersen 51; P.M. Siddle 6–75)
England won by an innings and 157 runs.
5th Test. SCG, Sydney. 3–7 January 2011
Australia 280 (M.G. Johnson 53; J.M. Anderson 4–66) and 281 (S.P.D. Smith 54*, P.M. Siddle 43, M.J. Clarke 41)
England 644 (A.N. Cook 189, M.J. Prior 118, I.R. Bell 115, A.J. Strauss 60; M.G. Johnson 4–168)
England won by an innings and 83 runs.
England won the series 3–1.
16
THE ONE-DAY RIDDLE
Why have England never won a fifty-over World Cup? It is a question that has occupied the minds of English coaches, players, journalists and supporters time and time again, usually at the end of yet another miserable World Cup campaign.
I asked myself that question at the conclusion of the 2011 World Cup in India. We had just endured a particularly painful experience, so soon after our magnificent victory in Australia, and the contrast in emotions could not have been starker. After a brutal ten-wicket defeat to Sri Lanka in the quarter-final, my dreams of leading England to victory in a World Cup had been laid to rest.
Yet I couldn’t help but feel riddled with regrets. We should have been one of the favourites to win the event, especially with our confidence so high after winning in Australia. Our recent form against any side other than Australia in the ODI format had been good, and we had come up with a method that seemed to work on most wickets around the world. How, then, had we managed to lose to both Ireland and Bangladesh in the course of a pitiful campaign?
It only takes a few seconds of reflection on the way I felt at the end of the Sri Lanka game to come up with the first reason. We were absolutely exhausted. I know that many people won’t sympathise with this point of view, thinking that playing cricket for a living and travelling the world cannot really be all that tiring. However, since we had left home for Australia at the start of the Ashes tour, we had spent 145 days in hotel rooms and only five nights in our own beds at home. We had played cricket on fifty-six of those days, we had practised on another eighty and we had had to cope with all the emotions that accompany an Ashes tour to Australia and the build-up to a World Cup. We were dead on our feet, unable to think straight, at a time when logical, intelligent thinking was crucial.
Since the 2011 World Cup, the ECB has made the sensible decision to move the Ashes so that it no longer coincides with the World Cup. In one fell swoop it has eliminated one of the primary reasons why an England side has not won the competition before. Some people will say that the Ashes series has never prevented Australia winning the World Cup, but there is a big difference between playing a series at home, with the opportunity to get out of the bubble and enjoy time with friends and loved ones, and enduring a three-month tour, when you are all living in each other’s pockets.
In an age when teams around the world move heaven and earth to make sure that they tailor their preparations perfectly to peak for the World Cup, we had been operating with both arms tied behind our backs. Even efforts to mitigate against the inevitable drop-off in performance, such as resting players for the previous year’s Bangladesh home and away series, did not work as we would have wanted.
Mind you, I think that most observers would struggle to be convinced that tiredness is the only reason we haven’t won a World Cup. One look at the history of the ODI rankings tells us all we need to know. Since 1999, England have spent most of their time occupying positions five, six, seven and eight in the rankings. So, over four World Cups, England could hardly have been expected to win. In fact, a quarter-final knockout was what the rankings suggested, and that, by and large, is what we got.
Although the ODI team has made a significant breakthrough since Alastair Cook took over the captaincy, rising to number one in 2012 for the first time in recent memory, it is quite clear that over the last fifteen years the England ODI team simply hasn’t been good enough to win consistently. No one can run away from that fact. But why have we not been good enough and what can be done about it?
Well, I think it is fair to say that ODI cricket is simply not the priority in England that it is in other parts of the world. When it comes to assessing where we stand in the pecking order in the world game, our administrators, players and supporters tend to look at our form in Test cricket. As a result, everything from tour schedules to player-rotation strategy has been tailored towards peaking for Test series, often at the expense of ODI planning and preparation.
I am uncomfortable with this attitude for two reasons. Firstly, I think that it is a little too convenient simply to say that ODI cricket isn’t as important. Would we be thinking that way if we had been number one in the world in that form of the game for a long period of time? I doubt it. We turn our back on ODI cricket too much, not because it isn’t as important, but because we aren’t very good at it.
I also think there is a flawed assumption that it’s a question of either/or – that in order to be good at one form of the game, it is impossible to allot enough time, effort and resources to the other form of the game as well. Australia, over a decade or so, proved that this needn’t be the case; it is more than possible to dominate all forms for a long period.
With that in mind, the decision by the ECB to appoint Ashley Giles as the specialist ODI coach is an excellent step in the right direction. Now there is no excuse for England one-day sides to be under-prepared for a series. Whereas it was impossible for Andy Flower to be concentrating on preparations for ODIs while in the middle of a Test series, Giles can be doing all the hard work as that Test series is going on. The two forms of the game clearly require different skills and methods, so a different style and emphasis from a coaching point of view seems logical. Would you expect the England rugby coach to oversee both the fifteen-a-side and the seven-a-side versions of the game? In fact, the decision to split the coaching makes so much sense that I wouldn’t be surprised to see many other teams following in England’s footsteps, finances permitting.
I do think, though, that England have a couple of obvious disadvantages that we still need to overcome to perform consistently in ODI cricket. Without doubt, our weather doesn’t help. In most other parts of the world, one-day cricket is not played in the same way as in England. In other countries, flat, drier wickets encourage more expansive stroke play, as well as more variety and skill from the bowlers. Simply running up and putting the ball on the spot will not work. In England, however, more cautious batting against the new ball is a necessity on many of the wickets and bowlers are rewarded for accuracy, not variety. That is in direct contrast with other parts of the world. It is unsurprising to see that the England team is generally far more competitive at home than it is away from home.
I also don’t think that the county system has helped the development of the right sort of one-day cricketers. County one-day matches are frequently played when players are close to exhaustion after strenuous four-day games, or straight after another one-day game. There is little or no time to prepare properly, analyse the opposition team, tailor your strategy in order to maximise your chances of winning and work on the specific shots required for that form of the game. Too often players simply sleepwalk from one game to another. That does not mean that the games aren’t competitive, or that the players are not trying exceptionally hard to win. It simply means that skill levels are not high enough or given enough time to develop. It is one of the negative by-products of county cricketers playing too much cricket.
As always seems the case with county cricket, I believe that the domestic structure needs to be looked at. From 2014, one-day county cricket is going to revert back from forty overs to fifty overs, thus mirroring the international game. Many, including me, might be tempted to ask why it didn’t mirror the international game in the first place. It seems incongruous to expect your domestic structure to produce excellent international cricketers if you aren’t even playing the same game.
T
he broader problem, however, is one of volume. In what can hardly be described as a radical departure from the past, the latest version of the domestic structure keeps the County Championship at sixteen games (far too many in my opinion), reduces one-day cricket by four games and adds four games into the already bloated Twenty20 league. The overall effect is completely neutral. There will be just as many days of cricket played.
To me, this is the biggest impediment for the domestic game in its quest to produce high-quality international cricketers. The two-division system has worked exceptionally well in producing better-quality and more competitive cricket, and generally counties are making huge strides in terms of their professionalism. What they all have to deal with, though, is the inevitable injuries, drop-off in intensity and lack of proper preparation as the season goes on.
I know that there are plenty of old-school cricketers who will argue that you can only get fit for bowling by bowling, but all the evidence shows that bowling too many overs puts any bowler at an increased risk of injury. Those that tend to make it through the season are the 70–80 mph type of bowlers, who are very useful in English conditions but less so in international cricket, with its better wickets. From a batting point of view, the amount of cricket is arguably more beneficial, especially in the longer form of the game, but the lack of time for high-quality deliberate practice still affects the batsmen’s development – particularly in the shorter form of the game.
In England, we should have an advantage over other countries because of our long-established domestic structure. What is desperately needed, in my opinion, is for that structure to move with the times. Administrators need to ask themselves, ‘What is the best system for producing excellent England cricketers?’, as that is where all the revenues for the game come from, rather than ‘What is in the best interests of county members?’ Looking at it from that standpoint would result in a very different domestic structure from the one we currently employ.
Driving Ambition - My Autobiography Page 22