THE NAME OF THE ROSE (BB08)

Moddershall 1st XI’s narrow failure to win promotion this year – just eight points from second place, following a campaign of 10 wins and numerous winning draws; eight points behind a team who they might have bowled out for 30 in a game ended by inclement weather – got me thinking about the mid-1990s and the club’s previously most recent effort to haul itself from the second tier to the first.

In 1992, only our third season in the North Staffs and South Cheshire League, we were promoted when we perhaps weren’t quite ready for the standard in the top division and were promptly relegated at the first attempt (thus my feeling that, given the age profile of the current team, it may not be all that bad a thing to have missed out this time). In 1994 we signed Jon Addison as pro – arguably the decisive moment in the modern history of the club – and in 1995 we were the best team in what was then Division B, but came third, pipped on the final weekend. In 1996 it was not so much a case of ‘third time lucky’ as ‘third time, just desserts’: with any trace of complacency expunged, we were promoted at a canter. Indeed, on the final afternoon, away at Kidsgrove, we set what was then a league record by scoring 370 for 6 (Addo blitzed 168 and was dismissed in the 35th over). However, our captain for the day, the ex-‘Grove player Dave Wellings, rather charitably declared when we still had nine overs (and some quality batsmen in a shuffled order) to bat. I was at the crease at the time and almost refused to walk off. 450 was there for the taking.

Anyway, the Saturday before that, having all but guaranteed promotion with three games to go, we ventured to Burslem’s brand new Festival Heights ground for the first match of a league double-header (there were fourteen teams per division then). Our opponents were locked in a tussle for the second automatic promotion slot with Newcastle and Hartshill, so were sure to be as fiercely competitive as they always were (needle locked at ‘radge’ on the Aggro Scale). As Addo and I pulled on to the car park, the first thing we noticed, a vision that threw something of a damp towel on our excited chatter, was a six feet, five inch West Indian standing on the square, as unmissable as a wind turbine on a nearby hilltop. “Who the eff is that?!”, we both either thought quietly or said out loud, assuming he was there to play the game and not, y’know, shoot some hoops.

It was an overcast September day, none too warm, and with a fresh breeze blowing across a ground not quite as exposed as Barnfields to the elements, but still not the best protected from an ill wind. And this guy was sure to bowl like an ill wind. Burslem’s regular professional that year was Steven Lowndes, a bustling phantom seamer and gutsy, resourceful, if ultimately limited batsman. Where was he?!?! Not perusing the track, that was certain.

After a length of time, we discovered that the guy’s name was Franklyn Rose, then in the early stages of a career that would bring him 19 Test appearances, 27 in ODIs, and an overall first-class record of 296 wickets at 26.51, with PBs of 7 for 39 and 96 with the willow. He would be subbing for the day. Those of a conspiratorial bent among us suggested that Lowndes had gone to Alton Towers with a broken nail, sprained earlobe, or whatever injury he was deemed to have. Rose was still a few months from his Test debut at this stage, and had been playing the summer for Enfield in the Lancashire League. Today, he would be bringing unexpected menace – beyond the usual, expected menace you got in that neck of the woods – for Burslem.

The precise nature of that menace became a whole lot clearer, and yet a whole lot darker, when we took the customary stroll out to the square – a square I had never before set foot on. This was an era before play-cricket, before The Sentinel were printing scorecards, so I don’t think the season’s scores at Burslem – whether they had been lower than at other grounds – had registered with us, particularly. Who cared? We felt we were the best team in the division and would cope better with any conditions than our opponents. Unless, of course, they brought in beanpole Jamaicans to whack it into a dry and crumbling surface such as this (I ought to go on record here as saying the square is 100 per cent better now than it was back then, and that Burslem is an enjoyable ground to play at). In fact, as we now walked over it, it became apparent that there were large cracks – canyons, crevices, ravines! – where the turf hadn’t bound together. And visible down those cracks was the highly tensile plastic orange mesh that you see on the side of mountains to stop skiers falling to their death. Or around roadworks. Orange mesh! On (well, just under) the square!! Addo and I exchanged a rueful smile at what lay in store (the sort that visiting batsmen often made at Barnfields during the Immy years), a fate that was deferred by a few hours when he called correctly at the toss.

The details of the game are, understandably, quite sketchy. We took a couple of early wickets – probably courtesy of John Myatt and Iain Carr – and Mr Rose sauntered out to the crease at No4 or No5 with next to nothing on the board. This can be deduced from the fact that, using a method that by and large involved planting his foot on off stump and swinging violently to the legside, he proceeded to make around 80 from a total of around 115 all out.

As well as being not the most graceful innings (although, strangely, his agriculturalism did not lead to him being sledged all that much, as I recall), it was also far from chanceless. Indeed, he was dropped at mid-wicket by Wellings while still in single figures, one of the easiest catches you’ll ever see, the ball’s slow arc evading his jerking hands altogether and hitting him plush on the stomach before coming to rest somewhere on that geological wonder of a square. Undoubtedly, Welly’s dropped clanger was the result of him (an opening batsman) contemplating this giant figure who would soon be propelling the ball at him quite briskly. He was daydreaming, then he was panicking. It happens.

The bowler, John Myatt, was not best pleased. His mood darkened even further when a pair of vociferous lbw appeals were rejected after he’d hit Rose plush on the foot, one of which looked very adjacent. And so, reprieved, on the big guy swiped and smeared – I recall dropping him myself, out at long off, off Addo, when he had 60-odd – eventually taking them to what was certainly going to be a competitive score – unattainable, we probably felt, although no-one admits these things.

Yours truly had the task of opening. I forget who with. Probably Welly, although I wouldn’t actually make it to a mid-wicket conference. On the way out – a journey akin to the First World War Tommies charging helplessly, haplessly, hopelessly into No Man’s Land – I was given some words of sarcastic encouragement by a former Burslem paceman, Dave ‘Foll’ Follett, then enjoying a stint in first-class cricket with Middlesex. He wasn’t the brightest button in the proverbial box, but he did have a booming voice, a choice vocabulary, and a sharp understanding of the psychology of facing quick bowling. I felt like a dead man walking. The End Is Nigh.

I asked for my guard, taking care not to notice how far back the cordon was stood (and in any case, they would soon be moving up a few yards…). Rose stood at the top of his run, obligatory gold chain visible through dishwater light, perhaps ruminating over a cash incentive to dismiss or maim as many of our team as possible. The sightscreen looked like a matchbox. It wasn’t very often in my playing days that I walked out to bat with the feeling that I didn’t really stand any chance whatsoever, but this day I did (by which I mean I didn’t ... stand a chance). However, like the bull in the corrida, we still had to go through the inevitable ritual death.

He began his run: long, loping strides, a slightly stiff, upright posture, and a lean away to the offside as he hit the crease. The first ball slammed into the pitch just short of a length and bounced two or three times on the way through to the keeper. I did a spot of gardening, half-expecting to find wildlife down those cracks – those ravines. You could get your bat stuck down them.

The second ball was an attempted bouncer that reacted off the wicket in something like the way a slightly stale muffin would respond if hurled violently at a mattress, the red cherry looping slowly over my head and again failing to reach the keeper’s mitts. They say it is a skill of opening batsmen, or ought to be one, to be able read the conditions and adapt your game quickly to them. Well, yes, but you cannot de-program a decade of learning in the time it takes a West Indian paceman to get to the top of his run – which, admittedly, is quite a long time given the general disregard for over-rates (or perhaps, in this instance, the certain knowledge that we’d be lucky to bat much more than 20 overs). It’s a bit like getting into the water with a crocodile someone’s told you has been domesticated and saying to yourself: “oh, lovely cutie-wootie kwokodile just want to have a cuddle” rather than “Oh my f****** God, get me out of here, this is one of nature’s ultimate killing machines”.  

Eventually, Rose barrelled in for the third ball, again slammed uncomplicatedly into the pitch, this time well short of back-of-a-length. Instinctively, I jumped to play a back-foot defence, but the ball scuttled along the ground like ... like a crocodile after a baby piglet (it seemed to go under my feet, almost), and then crashed into the off-stump what can only have been a third of the way up at most. At Moddershall in 1996, the same delivery would have probably had the ‘keeper jumping to take it.

Off I trudged toward the dressing room at deep point, stopping out of morbid curiosity to peer over my shoulder – as you would when passing a car accident – and see how far back the stump had been sent cavorting. Pretty far, to be fair, certainly further than the previous delivery had travelled before its second bounce. As I got to the edge of the pitch, Foll guffawed, then drawled: “fuuuckiiin’ ‘elll”. 

Addo passed me on the way out, sporting the same sort of resigned grin as I wore, the difference being that my ordeal was over. The collective mood might have been considerably more perturbed had we not been playing Haslington the following day and Kidsgrove a week later with only a few points required (assuming, that is, we failed to chase down these runs).

Addo was soon out, and then another man, and another – a procession reminiscent of England’s 46 all out in Trinidad a couple of years earlier. It was carnage. Yet bestriding the disarray was Iain Carr, who played one of the gutsiest, not to mention most highly skilled innings that it was my privilege to watch as a Moddershall player. Batting about four feet down the pitch (at least) and getting a large stride in, he grafted his way to 30 out of our 52 all out, cudgelling a couple of defiant, almost miraculous straight-driven fours off Rose, who finished with 6 for 20, figures that did not flatter him. Burslem had been lucky to make 50; we were lucky to get 30.

As it turned out, our opponents would narrowly fail to secure promotion. As for Rose, despite not seeing him in the bar after the game – yes, he was the longest in the shower – a couple of our stragglers told us that, with the blood no longer pumping through his limbs (by which I think they meant his adrenaline had worn off), it was apparent that he was limping badly. It turned out that he was unable to play his Lancashire League club’s game the following day with a very badly bruised toe, a pyrrhic victory that Mauler enjoyed greatly. Too greatly.

That gloomy day at Festival Heights wasn’t the last we’d see of Mr Rose. The following March he would debut for West Indies on his home ground, Sabina Park in Kingston. Any thoughts that this was a token homer to appease the crowd – and there is a history of boycotting matches in the Caribbean, as for instance when a Bridgetown crowd responded to the controversial omission of local bowler Anderson Cummins with the banner, ‘No Cummins, No Goings’ – were rebuffed by a man-of-the-match performance in a bat-dominated draw, the first five of his 6 for 100 being Laxman, Dravid, Tendulkar, Azharuddin and Ganguly. Steady effort, that. Slightly shades Oliver, Addison, Hawkins, Myatt, Stones, et al…  

He ended up taking 53 wickets at 30.88 in his 19 Tests, the most memorable of which – not from his perspective, mind – came at Lord’s in 2000, a crazy game in which, with England conceding a first-innings lead of 133, Caddick (5 for 16) then skittled Windies for 54, before Dominic Cork bundled England over the line for a famous two-wicket victory, in large part due to Rose bowling with his ego and continually slapping it in halfway down. I don't believe there was any orange mesh visible below the Lord’s turf...

Rose was a fiery fellow, and no mistake. Reputed to have pulled a knife on Brian Lara on the plane en route to the ill-fated South African tour of 1998-99, in 2002 the guy who stood cradling the new ball on that minefield at Burslem was convicted of assaulting a Canadian woman in Ocho Rios. And earlier this summer his name was brought up during a conversation I had with with someone from New Zealand. He told me that Rose had been beaten up by youths trying to steal his car and was now living destitute out in Auckland having apparently lost all his money gambling.

It seems that those hair-rock titans Poison were right all along: every rose has its thorn, just like every night has its dawn. And for this current group of Moddershall players, next season could well be the dawn of a great era.   

Previous columns for Moddershall CC's newsletter, 'Barnfields Buzz':

BB01: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener… | On club loyalty

BB02: The King and I | Early forays in the press box and meeting IVA Richards 

BB03: Chris Lewis: Still out in the Cold | The coldest cricket match I ever played 

BB04: Sam Kelsall: Role Model | How a 15-year-old's standards inspired a team to the title

BB05: Astle la vista, Baby | Surrealism and hypocrisy with a NZ star

BB06: The Geometry of Captaincy (A Hunch) | Waxing philosophical about setting the field 

BB07: A Brief History of Moddershall in the Staffs Cup | A look back at our four finals

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MODDERSHALL IN THE STAFFS CUP FINAL (BB07)

They say you learn more from defeat than victory. Probably true in the long run, but in the short term defeat stings. Moddershall’s agonising two-run loss in the Staffordshire Cup final to Knypersley was not a ‘moral victory’, but neither was it a blow to crush the spirit and derail the significant individual and collective progress that’s been made by the side this year. There are, as they say, positives aplenty.

A battling (though not blemish-free) performance in the field was followed by a couple of errors in the run-chase, but the overwhelming feeling – after a rousing partnership between Bagnall and Moores had set up an intriguing endgame, then Moores and Irfan had batted with great composure to take Modd to the brink – was bittersweet rather than bitter. Several cricketers of distinction who were watching on – including at least two former county captains – were mightily impressed by a young team who are in a great environment to learn the game, and at a delightful cricket ground that still looks like a picture postcard.

There are a million ways to slice and dice a close match, but the fag-paper margins in a game like that are epitomised by their two crucial direct hits in the field, the second to seal the deal. No matter, a team that, on paper, is not far off the best in the Premier League, were given a right royal scare by a hugely inexperienced side.

Sunday’s defeat leaves Modd’s record in Staffs Cup finals at played 4 lost 3. However, the tea leaf readers might look back at the previous finals and see some patterns, some positive omens amidst the chaos of events…

The first Staffs Cup final Moddershall reached came in 1996 – when, coincidentally, we were also a second-tier side – playing away at Porthill Park on a balmy late summer afternoon. It was Jon Addison’s third year as pro and, at the third time of asking, after two third-place finishes (following our relegated-at-the-first-attempt season in 1993), we had more or less secured promotion to Division 1. Finally. So, we went into the game with the main target nailed (in fact, on the last day of the season, we scored a then league record 370 for 6, and had it not been for our honorary skipper, Dave Wellings, taking pity on his former team, Kidsgrove, we may well have added another 70 or 80 in the last nine overs) which no doubt relaxed us a wee bit.

The details of the game are a bit of a blur now – and I appear to have mislaid a folder of cuttings from the Sentinel – but I remember the home team batted first on a dry pitch with the small, fast outfield making it difficult to keep the run-rate in check. Even so, we had a strong and varied attack and, despite 80-odd from their Indian pro SukhvinderSingh, did well to keep their score manageable going into the final few overs. However, a blitz from Neil Ellsmore took them past 270 – and a run-a-ball back then was a much more daunting target than it is today. Still, if you’re going to knock them off anywhere, it’ll be at Porthill…

I’m not sure we particularly discussed how to go about the chase at tea – how the runs / wickets / overs remaining equations might work – but we got to around 100 for 1 after 25 overs, with Wellings and Addison [pictured] both in and well set. Perhaps today, in a post-T20 world with bigger, pingier bats, that might have been deemed a strong position, but with ‘Suki’ Singh ragging it there was a distinct tetchiness in our dressing room about when the acceleration was going to come. We felt we had some firepower in the shed, but, after consulting several rocket scientists, we also felt that one of the pair out there needed to tee off, the other to bat through. As it was, they both got out at the same time and John Myatt, myself and Drew Heard (father of Floppy) threw the kitchen sink at it, scoring between 35 and 50 each, at a good lick, entertaining the crowd in the process, but falling around 30 short with three overs left. Still, we had a decent consolation prize: we not only won promotion, but immediately won Division 1 the following year, the first team ever to do that. In that defeat at Porthill were the seeds of a powerhouse team.

It took us another seven years to return to the Staffs Cup final, however (although we did pick up a couple of Premier League titles and a Talbot Cup by then), when we faced Himley, who had beaten us in a tight semi-final the previous year. Could their return to Barnfields in 2003 bring us revenge?

We won the toss and fielded, and just as with the Porthill final seemed to have things under control with five overs to go in the first innings. Himley were 200 for 9 and we had a West Indian Test bowler to finish things off, but Adam Sanford got things badly wrong and somehow we found ourselves chasing 245, which was around 25 over par when we might have chased 20 under.

The momentum shift continued afterward when, in the face of a tidy attack that featured former Worcestershire bowlers Stuart Lampitt and Stuart Wedge, as well as the miserly ex-Staffs seamer Tim Heap, we subsided to 40 for 4, including our best two batsmen, Carr and Cornford. From there on, it seemed a case of playinf for respectability. I made 73 – enough for man of the match, it turned out – yet just as we had got ourselves back to a 25% chance to win at 150-odd for 5, I tickled Lampitt to the keeper while trying to keep the strike. The game was up.

(Here’s how the rest of the day panned out: I had somehow gone since breakfast without eating, something I didn’t rectify in the evening, and several beers later I found myself at the Butcher’s Arms in Forsbrook, where I fainted on the car park and was transported to Longton nick, sans mobile. There, I managed to throw up on my clothes – already removed so that they could dress me in a presumably suicide-proof jumpsuit made of industrial-strength j-cloth material – and, awakening groggily the following morning, I was greeted by the duty officer, former Modd teammate, Dave Stones. With almost no money – the proud parent £20 had been spent on ‘recycled’ booze – no phone numbers, unwearable clothes, and no inclination to get on public transport looking like a giant baby, I had little option to ring the folks and get a lift. Not my finest hour…) 

Anyway, after the loss to Himley it was gratifying to see them bumped out at the semi-final stage in 2004 by Hem Heath, who thus became our opponents for a third tilt at the Staffs Cup. It was their first year at Trentham Lakes and the wicket was far from flat. On this occasion, I won the toss and we batted first. It was hard going. Darren ‘Doc’ Carr and Hawk were nipped out fairly early, before Iain Carr and I slowly laid a platform against some searching seam bowling on an uneven pitch. I felt that 180 would be a good target – and indeed owed a fair bit to reading some of Kim Barnett’s columns about the strategies of the brilliant Gloucestershire side of 1999-2002, for whom he’d opened the batting – but we managed to get up past 200 thanks to a magnificent, brutal, match-swinging knock of 45 by Myatt.

At tea, as we readied ourselves to finish the job, the HH chairman, without knocking, strolled blithely into our dressing room with some guests whom he was keen to show the club’s swanky new facilities. This brought a sharp snap of admonishment from myself – “Excuse me, what on earth do you think you’re doing?! We’re in the middle of a game. Get out!” – and perhaps gave us a little more focus. Still, some felt 200 was under par and a job clearly had to be done.

Truth is, we bowled magnificently, Iain Carr and Shaun Brian setting the tone after an iffy first set of six. Nonetheless, HH were 50 for 1 at around the 17-over mark, with their pro and Brian Sims (both of whom made hundreds against Himley) still at the crease. I had been keeping our trump card, Imran Tahir, back, even bowling Martin Weston before him, much to the consternation of the GET-THE-BLOODY-PRO-ON merchants. On he came. Sims was lbw to a flipper. I snuck in at silly point, telling the No4 how much pressure he was under. A perfectly pitched googly; an attempt to drive it into my shinbone; bowled through the gate for 0. 50 for 3. Jakey Hawkins took a phenomenal legside stumping to see off Ako, wickets were whittled away, and Darren bowled tidily at the end to bag a 4-fer and a frankly fortunate MoM award that ought to have gone to ‘Mauler’ Myatt.

The abiding memory I have of that day is the enjoyment of the last few overs, knowing he result was even beyond a miracle, bowling out the remaining deliveries to conclude proceedings before we had the cup in our hands. I looked around our team. We shared smiles of satisfaction, relief, excitement. The season had started very shakily – we were joint favourites for the league yet the first team skipper had resigned four games in, beating a mutiny by hours, and left the club entirely – and I felt our transformation and growth as a side merited some silverware, especially as we’d already lost in the Talbot Cup final to Audley. This was vindication. The following year, we really ought to have won another league title.

It isn’t an easy thing to win a cup final. I’m not entirely sure it gets any easier with time (I mean, you can, I suppose, be mentally scarred by continually losing finals). There are no mysterious patterns, tea-leaf readers, no hidden fate or destiny, only a series of moments, with multiple causes, that roll into and affect one another, sometimes logically, sometimes haphazardly. Such is the story of a game. And in cricket matches, cricket seasons, cricket careers, those moments, by hook or by crook, have to be seized. Throwing down the stumps, for instance. 

One games. 660 deliveries. Carpe Diem.

Previous columns for Moddershall CC's newsletter, 'Barnfields Buzz':

BB01: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener… | On club loyalty

BB02: The King and I | Early forays in the press box and meeting IVA Richards 

BB03: Chris Lewis: Still out in the Cold | The coldest cricket match I ever played 

BB04: Sam Kelsall: Role Model | How a 15-year-old's standards inspired a team to the title
BB05: Astle la vista, Baby | Surrealism and hypocrisy with a NZ star
BBo6: The Geometry of Captaincy (A Hunch) | Waxing philosophical about setting the field

THE GEOMETRY OF CAPTAINCY: A HUNCH (BB06)

Euclid: Captain of Geometry

They say a captain is only ever as good as his bowling attack. Well, maybe. But how good is a bowling attack? Is this ability a fixed property, like the hardness of diamonds, or can the captain get the most out of a bowling unit by deploying them wisely, setting good fields, responding quickly to circumstances, and generally helping the bowler find rhythm and confidence? Surely a bowling attack has a range, like tuning in a radio. The skipper has to try to eliminate the hiss and crackle of bad performance. 

Yet it seems to me also that a captain’s way of affecting things negatively (the game as a whole, I mean, not just the bowling attack) probably outweighs his ability to affect things for the better. That’s because his chances of influencing things positively are constrained more tightly by the abilities of the players (getting 5% more out of Joe Bloggs is futile if you need James Anderson to solve your problem), whereas things can become infinitely negative if a captain’s decisions are atrocious and his (or her) team become so demoralised that they lose any pride in their performance, all their resolve and drive. Glass ceiling, bottomless cavern.

Some of this occurred to me while watching the Ashes’ opening exchanges, although, in many ways, captaining a club team and a national team are as night is to day. The Test side will have a huge support staff around to enable the skipper to concentrate on on-field matters (in theory, anyway), exactly the way it should be, although there may still be some ego-massaging, some coaxing and cajoling to do for the likes of Alastair Cook and, especially, Michael Clarke.

Anyway, where the similarities between club captaincy and international captaincy are most alike – assuming you don’t have a fully-fledged media pack on your case night and day – is on the field. Yes, the weaponry you have at your disposal is vastly different, but the principles of engagement and the nature of the conflict, remain, in the abstract, the same, whatever the level. Bat versus Ball. 

So, after this Jonathan Trott-taking-guard of a pre-amble, I suppose I should re-velcro my pads one final time, scratch one last line in the dirt, and elaborate upon what I believe to be the crux of The Art of Captaincy (apologies, Mr Brearley) when it comes to tactics. Hopefully, it might help provide a way of tackling an at times very difficult job for young captains (the better you are, the more difficult it feels because the more you perceive), who may occasionally feel swamped by all the information that has to be processed and the personalities to be looked after. You need to think quick – with clarity and as little noise as possible – so I would suggest the following might be a fruitful place to concentrate your attention... 

First and foremost, then, I believe the captain has to properly and fully understand the precise balance of power between bat and ball at any given time – which of course is constantly and subtly changing (the good captain perceiving this like cattle sensing rain, ‘ahead of the game’, the mediocre one doing so reactively, when the scoreboard makes it unquestionable) – and then must act accordingly. Decisively. Projecting strength (or solutions) as much as possible. Which brings me on to the second point: once the balance of power is grasped and adjustments have been made (to the field, to the bowling, to the plans), he should not allow that to affect the manner, behaviour and alertness of the team. As Shane Warne once said, if you turn up at a game halfway through, you shouldn’t be able to tell what the state of the game is from the body language of the players.

Of course, all of this should not be a leadership responsibility that falls squarely and solely with the captain. Managing the mood of the group is largely a distraction for the captain and in a good, united team ought to be self-policed. You need strong characters – be they quietly determined or vocal and boisterous – dragging the team through, giving the captain the headspace to think about the front lines, and, yes, little gee-ups to individual bowlers while the group thermostat is set by others.

So, to fully understand the balance between bat and ball is to imply understanding several other things (par score for the conditions; the relative statistical or abstract strength of the two sides; if not a knockout, the league situation and the implications of different results, etc). But right at the coalface you must deal with the next ball going down, and to do that you must also understand its ‘geometry’. This is the information that the captain must process: What is the point of release (angle on the crease and the height)? What line is being bowled? What swing is there? Is there any seam movement? What is the response off the surface, bounce-wise? How is the batsman holding the bat: soft or hard hands; closed or open face, hitting straight or square? And beyond the ‘geometry’ is the intent: How hard is he hitting it? How aggressive is he generally? And how is he responding to the unfolding match situation?

Nevertheless, it is primarily the geometry (or is it the physics?) that will allow you to set a good field, get the angles right, with minor tinkering according to the balance of power. It is not about asking someone to bowl “good areas” – as Warne’s leg-spinning mentor Terry Jenner once said, “it’s not where it lands that matters, it’s how it gets there”. You need a mental picture of where the ideal standard delivery of your bowler (not his absolute snorter) will come out and what the batsman will likely do with it. Once you have that picture, then you will start to get a feel for the types of angles where the ball is likely to go, the ones that demand of this particular batsman a greater element of risk (trying to hit it those three yards straighter or squarer…). You pull them out of their comfort zone and create opportunity: cat and mouse. It is then down to you to decide how many resources you can commit to attack.

As any player who played under me will vouch, I was hugely – and unapologetically – fussy about the positioning of my fielders as a captain. There would be occasional outbursts with repeat-offending wandering fielders. Then again, it could be difficult in the midst of the hurly-burly of a game to communicate the reasoning behind the differences in positions for two batsmen, particularly when they were both right- or left-handed (swapping between the two helps the fielder ‘get it’), even more so if you were not inclined to divulge this reasoning to the batsmen – which wasn’t always the case, if buttons needed to be pushed and theatre created. Windy conditions would exacerbate this. The signalling and gesticulations occasionally got like Rafa Benítez working as an airport runway attendant.

But the primary point about the micro-adjustments made throughout the game is this: the captain might not exactly know at the start of a batsman’s innings where he wants his angles (in levels of cricket with video preparation, this is less the case, of course). He will experiment and tinker as the game goes on. It’s guesswork. 

All captains will tell you that the most satisfying moments are when a hunch, off the cuff, yields an instant wicket. It feels like free money, like winning the lottery. A hunch is even more satisfying than when a plan works out – and, admittedly, there isn’t much time for plans in club cricket, which rarely affords the opportunity for a skipper to get beyond generalities (however sound the principles on which they’re based) to specifics: “C’mon lads, keep going”; “Let’s just keep wickets in tact until 30 overs and reassess”; “Let’s bowl on one side of the wicket”; “Win or lose, always booze”…  

A couple of successful hunches have stuck in my mind – probably because, I think, of the speed with which I acted upon them (and, perhaps, the rarity with which they occurred). One was to dismiss the Meir Heath pro of the day, Carel Fourie, in a low-scoring match at Moddershall. We were defending somewhere in the region of 150 and Fourie and Stonier had taken our derby rivals to 30 without loss inside around eight overs. Iain Carr had bowled really well without reward, extracting bounce and seam movement from the surface, beating the bat several times. I noted that Fourie – once he got down that end after a period facing Shaun from the pavilion end – was playing with low hands and even perhaps trying to play slightly outside the line of the ball to cover the swing. There were three balls left in the over and I suddenly had a picture of him nicking on to his thigh pad from one that nipped back from Billy’s natural length. So, shouting vaguely in the direction of the pavilion, I asked for a helmet to be brought out. There was no acting twelfthers, of course; nor any manager or flunky to do it. The few spectators that were there were disinclined to move. Rather than let the hunch pass, I stopped the game while ‘Rick’ Astley – at fine leg but our regular short-leg fielder – went to fetch his lid, while I offered the umpires some diversionary flannel as they registered their unhappiness with the delay (their complaints weren’t quite as forthright as an out and out objection. Incidentally, the issue of over-rate penalties is an interesting one; it’s perfectly valid to want to finish a game before 8.45pm, of course, but then it seems pointless rushing through a game without tactical reflection; such over-rate strictures are, I believe, detrimental to developing the art of captaincy). Anyway, once Astley was in situ, and one of my fielders with psychiatric qualifications had dragged his unhappy mug down to fine leg for the remainder of the over, Iain came barrelling in, all grunts and chafing inner thighs, and, two balls later, did exactly what I’d envisaged (I envisage a lot of things happening; they almost never do!). After that, the door was ajar – what would have happened if they’d made twenty or so runs, or if, to not waste those two minutes, I’d waited till the following over? – and the team promptly burst through it. We won by 30 or so runs, I believe.

The second occasion was a JCB Knockout final at Checkley. I’m guessing this was in 1998, a season I skippered between Moddershall's first two titles when, as one of the younger players in the team, I struggled at times to impose my will on senior players used to winning or to get them to buy into my fussiness with the field (the pro and skipper, Addo, had given me, as vice-captain and wicket-keeper, a certain amount of responsibility with this). I grew tetchy. For various reasons – not least because two of our best bowlers were infrequently inclined to do so – we underperformed and it was a steep learning curve. But in this final, against Little Stoke, the team that would end up winning Division 1A (as the Prem was then known), we knew the Checkley wicket, generally, skidded on to the bat okay but didn’t bounce much. Sort of glassy. Glenn Haywood took the new ball for us, a short, bullishly strong bowler capable of very good pace when he clicked (enough, two years earlier, to put Richard Harvey in hospital with a broken jaw, as well as demolishing Addo’s castle and repeatedly sitting Hawk on his backside). I’d set a very conservative 5-4 offside field: three in a ring each side, one slip, third man and fine leg. In the third over, Heywood, now loose, suddenly got one to zip through and bounce. Was it a new-ball wicket? Did I need more ‘proof’ that there was life in the deck? Then again, it was Tony Dutton, a high-class player and fixture in the Staffordshire team that won three Championships and two MCCA Knockout trophies between 1991 and 1993. The key man. Immediately, I moved our pro Addo from mid-wicket to second slip. Immediately, Heywood got one in a similar spot, with similar bounce, only this time found an edge off the shoulder of the bat that flew straight into Addo’s mitts, which closed round the ball like the night closes round a campsite on the Moorlands. Buzzing, on at least two levels.

Now, while I appreciate you are probably at present standing in front of your computers and giving me a round of applause, please don’t. Conversely, if you’re thinking all of this is a bit of long-winded boasting, well, maybe (although I haven’t admitted that to myself, so am not going to do it to you). But the broader point is to illustrate that it was an educated guess based on the exact balance of power between bat and ball: the geometry of captaincy. Strip the game back to that, while keep an eye on the energy-levels and confidence of your bowlers, and you are focussed on the correct things.

I suppose all of this is another, fancier way of saying something pretty obvious: captains, you need to be able to read the game (better). But it is also more refined and exact than that. If you told ten people – gnarled old veterans or fresh-faced youngsters – that you need to read the game better, you’d get ten nods of agreement (or ten like, durrrrrs) but no-one would be any the wiser. OK, so I need to read the game better; errrm… You’re simply saying what you need, as an end point, rather than how it should be tackled, as a process. This is the process, the details that add up to the overall story of the game. 

Reading the game. Like any great book, a cricket match can be ‘read’ in many ways. That almost infinite complexity is part of cricket’s richness as a sport, and often the way a game is read says more about the temperament of the reader than the ‘reality’ of the match situation. Even so, whether your instincts are to gamble or to sit in holding patterns and ‘wait for something to happen’, you still need to be able to base your decision-making on a good reading of the balance between bat and ball, given the conditions and the situation and the current use of resources (whether you have bowlers up your sleeve to sustain pressure). And, as I say, the nitty-gritty of this is the ‘geometry’ (or ‘physics’) of how the ball is getting down the other end, the peculiarities of the batsman in trying to deal with that, and – the details that you can alter, or simply get exactly right and then leave unaltered – the exact angles you place your men to try and make the game as difficult as possible for the opponent and so, slowly, alter that balance of power. 

Previous columns for Moddershall CC's newsletter, 'Barnfields Buzz':

BB01: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener… | On club loyalty

BB02: The King and I | Early forays in the press box and meeting IVA Richards 

BB03: Chris Lewis: Still out in the Cold | The coldest cricket match I ever played 

BB04: Sam Kelsall: Role Model | How a 15-year-old's standards inspired a team to the title
BB05: Astle la vista, Baby | Surrealism and hypocrisy with a NZ star

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ASTLE LA VISTA, BABY (BB05)

The championship-winning season of 2008 was, as you might expect, an exhilarating ride. At least, it ended up that way. Moddershall had finished the previous two seasons grateful to have survived a relegation struggle and the prospects for the following summer were not helped by the loss of the team’s best two cricketers, Iain Carr and Richard Holloway, as well as very capable all-rounders in Darren Carr and Joe Woodward.

I had stepped into the captaincy from the outside, after a two-year stint in Nottinghamshire, so, initially, was unaffected by the pessimism about the place. Even so, I wasn’t convinced we had the ammunition even to stay up, let alone do what we did. But I wasn’t yet wholly gloomy about things. However, the irate reaction of Andy Hawkins after the Chris Lewis game – the season opener against Porthill Park when, in Baltic winds, we were denied a certain win by (the umpires’ interpretation of) the light – brought home both the severity of the task (why get so het up about a few points unless every one was seen as gold dust?) and the mood in the camp.

Our problems, it seemed to me, could be boiled down to two: batting and bowling.

The batting was either inexperienced or, well, a bit too old. Bowling-wise, we had lost 73.16 % of the previous season’s first team’s overs, which would rise to 79.08% with the departure of Martin Weston one game into the second half of the season, and to 96.47% (NINETY-SIX POINT FOUR SEVEN) two weeks after that, when Moose had a one-tonne electronic control panel fall on him, shattering his femur. Ouch! But the cupboard was fairly bare to begin with. Indeed, after our second league game – a draw away to Longton (more of which in a moment) – I asked Dave Edwards and ‘Taffy’ Kenvyn, old sparring partners (not literally, because I’m not mental) not known for their charity, whether they thought we had enough to stay up. They may or may not have chuckled in response – the memory fails – but I do recall them saying: “No chance. Immy will definitely win you a couple of games”. Which was kind of them.  

It was true: we had Immy – Immy! – also returning to Modd after a two-year hiatus. And as the ancient Greeks used to say: “Where there’s international class leg-spin, there’s hope” (although, having said that, going into the fifth game he had 4 for 236 at an average of 59…). 

However, an almost equally important job was done that year by a couple of other twirlers (if that’s not too extravagant a word for them): SLA Matt Stupples, who subsequently left for what he thought would be the green pastures – well, the dustbowl-a-rama – of Stone and now languishes up at Swynnerton; and Cheadle refugee Roger Shaw, who went into the season fresh as a daisy after his hip op (coincidentally, his favourite genre of music), a procedure that definitively put paid to him taking up the wicket-keeping gloves again. No, after a twenty-odd-year first team career with the mitts on – lazy feet, great hands – he’d now be grazing. And tweaking (more of which in a moment).

If Imran Tahir would be the obvious and clear favourite for our season’s Best Actor Oscar – speak to any of Leek’s paid amateurs that year and they’ll suggest that, like Eddie Murphy in Nutty Professor, he pretty much did everything – then Stupples and Shaw were pleasantly surprising nominees for the Best Supporting Actor gong. In fact, it’s almost no exaggeration to say that Rog’s bowling success that year – its origins a winter-net hunch born of desperation – gave me more pleasure than anything else all summer. Almost. I’m pretty sure he was in the top ten of the Premier League averages until the latter stages, before you needed 20 wickets. It certainly provided a kind of gleeful, slightly delirious pleasure for our team, seeing this keeper-for-life tie up or dismiss several decent players (his 14 burgled scalps included Staffordshire players Rob King, Paul Goodwin, Darren Long, Ross Salmon, Dave Fairbanks and John Hancock). And a team that laughs on the field is a healthy one.  

Anyway, the toss at Longton was the first time I’d come face to face with Nathan Astle – “probably the biggest name the league’s seen since Mushtaq Ahmed”, parped Nigel Davies the previous year (before being ousted by him as skipper – that’s gratitude! – and heading for Nantwich. Again). The pitch was as green as spinach and we lacked the tools to exploit such conditions. So, not particularly logically, I shoved them in. 

Moose – who (possibly only accidentally) had beamed Astle the previous year, a delivery which I’m led to believe hadn’t been that well received (or played) – is generally an overhead conditions man, and both he and Baggers went for over 5 runs per over on a wicket they should have enjoyed. Immy, meanwhile, was neutralised and toiled away for figures of 27-6-89-1. So, with 40-odd overs gone and Longton already close to what I felt was par, I brought on Rog the Dodge for a first ever bowl in the top flight (which, coincidentally…). 

It wasn’t a complete surprise to him. I’d already primed him at winter nets. He laughed at the time (“dunner be bozzuk”), but wasn’t really the nervous type, so, come the Big Day – he hadn’t been required first game out – the gamble didn’t seem that great. Sure enough, out rolled his offies, slow and accurate, just gripping a touch on the tacky surface, and he returned a cheeky little 4-0-14-2 (the victims: Edwards and Kenvyn, neither of whom, bizarrely, mentioned him as a potential factor in our likely survival). Still, Longton scored 238-8, declaring after 56 of the game’s 110 overs. 

Now, bearing in mind (a) Moddershall’s struggles the previous two seasons, (b) the opposition’s reasonably strong seam attack (Edwards, Kenvyn, Astle, Tom Oakes, Dan Cumming, Grant Thistle) and (c) the lush, green pitch, I felt the target was beyond us, so instructed the batters to aim for 175 and full batting bonus points, reckoning that banking some confidence would be useful down the track. This approach seemed vindicated when, after the very first scoring shot of our innings, a block through extra cover for two, Astle removed his second slip in order to plug that hole.

Unsurprisingly, the game petered out to a draw. Amer Siddique – whose self-confidence is best summed up by the fact that, the very day he met me, he described himself as “the best-looking Asian in Britain” – grafted hard for 60-odd. After the match, the captains met to discuss the game and mark the umpires, who, also oddly, were sat there with us as we deliberated, a new gimmick introduced that year that was presumably designed to promote more harmony (in the end, however, this ‘transparency’ simply meant captains went through the motions with their marking). 

Astle, kindly, told me that he was “surprised we didn’t take the chase on” (kind to take the time, not the way he said it). I told him that I was surprised he didn’t declare earlier, that he batted on at least three overs too long, perhaps because he didn’t really know the strength of our team or state of our confidence – our narrative arc. He then told me he thought we were “a bit negative” and that we should have “gone hard up front, maybe for a couple of wickets, then re-assessed”. I told him he might have kept a few more catchers in – you know, beyond the second over… In truth, the pow-wow wasn’t excessively hostile, although, with me focussing less on his stature as a player and more, y’know, on the soundness of his argument, neither was it particularly amiable. We signed the forms, shook hands, and went our separate ways – us to the title, them to a slightly flattering third-placed finish.

Over the following weeks, Longton’s celebrated skipper appeared frequently in the local rag, The Sentinel, invariably bemoaning the “negative cricket” being played. Said paper seemed quick to trumpet the notion that the champions of 2003, ’04 and ’05 were playing “a positive brand of cricket” despite little evidence to support it. By the time we played them again, we were on a streak of 131 points out of a possible 147 (given the decision at the toss, whether 20 or 25 points were on, plus an abandonment for rain that yielded a fixed two points). The only game in which we hadn’t taken the maximum available haul was against Audley, which finished with them hanging on, nine down. 

This time round, then, we were a different animal – confident in both our ability and our gameplan. Also, I was reasonably sure the pitch wouldn’t be quite so green as the one at Trentham Road had been. This deck might well have started out that way – y’know, four or five weeks earlier, before the first game on it – but now, perhaps some eight or nine games into its remarkably long and incident-packed life (and it still had a couple more to go!), it had a slightly beige, sandy hue, like the outmoded suit of a clutch of wrongly-convicted 1970s terrorists waving outside the High Court some time in the early 1990s, post-appeal. Oh, and before we’re accused of trying to gain an unfair advantage, you have to bear in mind that, two weeks after this game, the 5’ 3” batsman Sam Kelsall would be our second seamer...

The game? We had been batting first, almost exclusively, and I had no hesitation in doing the same when the coin again fell in my favour. After I’d wiped the dust from it, of course. I cannot say Mr Astle was particularly frosty at the toss, but the only thing that was cordial thereafter was ferried out in two big jugs. First, Dave Edwards complained about the footholes and was ‘forced’ to go around the wicket very early on (I have to admit that I sympathised with him here; it wasn’t ideal and I wasn’t aware they were quite so bad…). The guy with 75 Test caps for New Zealand didn’t appear all that chuffed, either. 

We chiselled out 184 all out, which they’d have 51 overs to chase down. It was turning. Oh, it was turning (they had no spinner!). And big. But – and I think this is very important to stress here – six years earlier Astle had blasted the fastest double-hundred in the history of Test cricket and so constituted a considerable x-factor in my declaration calculations (rendered obsolete by a fine spell of round-the-wicket yorkers from Eddie, ironically enough) and subsequent tactics.

Anyway, an over before the aforementioned cordial was ferried on, twenty-five overs into their reply, Longton had made just 46 for 2. Nathan “I think you should have gone hard up front” Astle was fighting hard as the ball spat viciously from a surface that was more Mumbai than Moddershall. Mike Longmore was showing considerable skill but struggling to score, despite at times having four close catchers plus ‘keeper for company. But with them requiring another 139 from 26 overs, 13 of which would be bowled by Immy, I thought I’d try and entice a few shots: two skilful, well-set batsmen munching the next eight to ten overs would probably kill the game, so I asked Roger Shaw to have the last over before drinks.

Astle was on strike and, to my amazement, played out a maiden, showing all the sprightly intent of a student stoner deep into the second week of the World Snooker Championships. As ever, Dodge shuffled in to the wicket, as though in carpet slippers, and, predictably enough, dropped it on the spot. But he was hardly putting monster revs on it. Still, The Man With The Fastest Double-Hundred in Test History (TMWTFDHITH) – a man who, as I may have mentioned, had advocated us “going hard up front” in conditions tailor-made for his attack – declined to do anything rash before the refreshments. Not against a man who, ten weeks earlier, had never bowled a single over in first XI league cricket. Oh no. 

True, Rog had racked up some thirty-nine first-team overs by this stage of his career (averaging a Muralitharanian 9.76). And they do say a spinner reaches their peak in their 40s. But still, it was all quite baffling. Even more so when you consider that the only man fully back on the boundary for TMWTFDHITH was on the sweep, while both mid on and deep mid-wicket were ten yards off the edge – something of a concession on a club-sized ground for a man who smote eleven huge sixes that day in Christchurch. Off Flintoff and Caddick. (Just to give you the full picture of the potential runs available for the hypothetical Adventurous Batsman, the other fielders were the 45 man, square leg, straight mid-wicket, slip, point, and mid off.)

Now, I have to confess that, during the drinks break, I was starting to bristle at it all – partly because I wanted Astle gone, but mainly because I felt he was being a hypocrite, not practising what he preached. It certainly appeared he’d had something of a u-turn on his “go hard up front” ethos. So, upon resumption, I kept Rog on, only I now slid square leg into short leg – short leg! – with the express instructions to start gently sledging Mr Astle. I had the perfect candidate for Radio Chirp, too: thick-skinned Lancastrian Mick ‘Rick’ Astley, in for his first game that year. He’d earlier grafted out a not-pretty but pretty useful 27 at the top of the order and in 2004 had received – and withstood – some fearful sledging from the Longton hyenas as his unbeaten 46 got us over the line in a low-scoring game.

Rog – who, I think I’m right in saying, still hadn’t developed a doosra by this stage – floated out his next over, short leg now in place, yet still TMWTFDHITH played him from the crease, patting back a second maiden (or perhaps getting off strike with a leg-bye toward the end). It was all starting to become a tad surreal (at one stage I’m sure I started to hallucinate Rog bowling in massive wicket-keeping gloves, trying to impart spin on the ball yet failing due to giant sausage fingers). Meanwhile, Astley chirped Astle and I briefly and sheepishly (for me) started to slow handclap, saying (stealing a sarcastic line I’d been on the receiving end of a few years earlier): “Really bringing the crowds back, this is…” He glared at me.

Anyway, as victory drifted away from us, TMWTFDHITH at least went up a couple of gears, smearing a straight six off Immy before falling for 43 a little later while attempting the same shot, skying to mid-off with the score on 117 and just over eight overs left. Longmore fell in the same over, but a few late blows took them to 158-6, only 27 short (that’s 85.87% of the required runs, compared to our somewhat pathetic 81.93% at Longton). I walked off in the direction of Astle, standing at the head of a line of players, for the customary hand-shake, and – momentarily distracted by how incredibly crooked one of his fingers was – heard him say: “don’t ever f**king bag me out on the field again, mate”. Oh, right.

I sat in the dressing room a while, briefly de-briefed the team, then went for a beer and to fill out the various forms. I was told by the umpire – the then League Chairman, who presumably had a part in the new lets-all-sit-down-together-and-hug-it-out marking procedure – that Nathan had already filled out his bit. Oh, right.

TMWTFDHITH’s great friend, Chris Cairns, had a motto in cricket: Go hard or go home. Naturally, therefore, I assumed Astle had done an Elvis and left the building. He hadn’t. 

So, having taken care of the necessaries, I went over to where he was holding court (with a team that, I later discovered, had only good words to say about him), tapped him on the shoulder – “this aggression will not stand, man” – and asked: “Nathan? Excuse me, Nathan? Nathan?I’m not being funny but what, exactly, was the difference between what we did at your place and what you did today?” 

He told me, curtly, that we had a world-class spinner playing – I assumed he wasn’t referring to Rog, who finished with an average of 13.86 that season, at a superior strike rate to Immy – and refused to discuss it any more.

Oh, right.  

Previous columns for Moddershall CC's newsletter, 'Barnfields Buzz':

BB01: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener… | On club loyalty

BB02: The King and I | Early forays in the press box and meeting IVA Richards 

BB03: Chris Lewis: Still out in the Cold | The coldest cricket match I ever played 

BB04: Sam Kelsall: Role Model | How a 15-year-old's standards inspired a team to the title

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SAM KELSALL, ROLE MODEL (BB04)

After the dust had settled on our 2008 title-winning season, I was asked by Nottinghamshire to write a captain’s report on Sam Kelsall. It was a pleasure to do so, and, reading it back, it’s no surprise to me to now see him coaching at winter nets, turning out at Weston in the Talbot Cup, and generally cheerleading for the club. Top bloke about whom I couldn’t speak too highly, and yet almost did… 

When I left Moddershall CC at the end of the 2005 season for what turned out to be a two-year stint in the Nottinghamshire Premier League, I was only faintly aware of a precociously talented 12-year-old racking up the runs in the junior section of the club. So, returning to the area to captain the 1st XI in 2008, I knew that a now 15-year-old Sam Kelsall, in and out of the side the previous summer, would be one of my charges and was a player that I was keen to witness at close quarters having heard a number of glowing reports.

Our first encounter was at the winter nets, where I briefly developed a mistaken first impression of him as, well, a bit downbeat. I quickly came to realize, however, that Sam’s occasionally sullen mood was always a direct result of the lack of intensity of the sessions, the absence of a challenge, invariably caused by poor attendance from the senior bowlers (not that we had many of them, but that’s another story). Time and time again over the summer it was apparent that he set very high standards – both in practice and on match days – and was quite rightly irritated when he felt that those standards weren’t being catered for or matched by others. This attitude, from our youngest team member, was not lost on me and provided much impetus toward us quickly getting our act together in terms of preparation, so that, thankfully, we never saw that dissatisfaction again.

As we moved outdoors and into the early weeks of the season, Sam made a patient 50 on a slow turner in the Cockspur Cup, yet failed to reach double figures in the first four league games (although he did handle a certain Mr Tino Best well, and he definitely isn’t the type of bowler to cut back his pace and float up charitable half-volleys to youngsters!!). So, in the fifth game, with rain having reduced our innings to 39 overs (from 60) and with me convinced that his game was suited neither to the situation nor the conditions, Sam was demoted from his usual position of number 4 to number 7. He entered the fray at 96 for 5 with around 12 overs remaining and proceeded to flay 47 off 41 balls, getting out in the last over having completely transformed the complexion of the game. The knock included a pair of near-identical upper cuts for six over cover off the opposition’s pacey Sri Lankan professional – truly outstanding shots, in both their conception and execution, but all the more impressive to me when I found out that, the night before, the wee man had gone through two bags on the bowling machine fine-tuning that specific stroke. Anyway, it was definitely a lesson learnt for the skipper!!

This innings was a platform for a spell of very solid, consistent performances, a period in which the sun came out and the pitches firmed up and all the hallmarks of Sam’s batting became apparent, not least the speed with which he judged line and length. In conjunction with his general balance, this quality almost always left him in great positions – and with plenty of time – to deal with the bowling. Ally this to the easy timing of a natural ball player, an exceptionally calm demeanour at the crease, and a devotion to his craft, and it was now evident that he was quite a player.

A one-over cameo against Juan Theron (from South Africa’s Warriors franchise), bowling with good ‘heat’ and carry on a quickish pitch, epitomised the talent in our midst. With everyone else scoring almost exclusively behind square, Sam, recently arrived at the crease, took guard at 80-odd for 2 with Theron trying to blow the game open for his side. The first ball was back-of-a-length, a shade outside off stump, and nonchalantly allowed through to the ‘keeper, as if to say “you’re not going to trouble me out there…” The second ball was a similar length, but straighter this time, and was tucked off his hip for four. Next ball, Theron over-compensated and was driven firmly back down the ground to the boundary. He then offered up a wide length ball that was scorched through covers on the up, the diving fielder getting a full hand on the ball to half-stop it yet unable to prevent a comfortable two runs. The penultimate ball was again pitched up, but rolled out slower, as an off-cutter; Sam’s footwork was slightly undone by the lack of pace, but his hand-eye co-ordination was still good enough to get his hands through the hitting area and send the ball back over the bowler’s head, comfortably clear of any fielders, for a one-bounce four. As you’d expect, Theron decided to drag his length back for the final delivery and Sam got into a position to hook but bailed out, deciding to eschew the risk and take one on the shoulder. Scintillating cricket.

All in all, I can’t praise Sam’s attitude and application highly enough and it was no great surprise to hear how well this humble and dedicated young man had done when given the opportunity for Staffordshire under-17s, England under-15s, and Nottinghamshire 2nd XI. His composed and skilful batsmanship against bowlers of international calibre played a significant part in our against-the-odds Premier League title success, as indeed did the professionalism that his striving for high standards engendered in our team culture. His fielding was always alert and, as the season wore on, he proved to be a very effective seam-bowling option; always nibbling it about, his accuracy (and lack of pace) allowing his skipper the incredible luxury of only having to defend two-thirds of the ground. Moreover, he also showed himself to be an excellent judge of ‘par scores’ in varying conditions, a sure sign of an intuitive cricket brain that is almost always lacking in young players and, for me, clear evidence that he will develop into a shrewd captain in time.

But of all the qualities that Sam exhibited this year, by far the most notable and impressive – certainly one that marks him out from many cricketers, young and old – can be summed up as an appetite for the battle. Whether bowling, batting, or taking responsibility for catches, there was never a situation or a challenge that Sam shirked, never a time when his eyes betrayed anything less than an utter relish for the task facing him. This obviously speaks of a deep and genuine core of self-belief, which, in addition to the attributes already outlined, suggests to me that he has a very bright future in the game.

Scott Oliver,

Moddershall CC, 1st XI Captain

Previous columns for Moddershall CC's newsletter, 'Barnfields Buzz':

BB01: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener… | On club loyalty

BB02: The King and I | Early forays in the press box and meeting IVA Richards 
BB03: Chris Lewis: Still out in the Cold | The coldest cricket match I ever played 

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