'I must have shut down half my brain'
With a prison sentence behind him, former England allrounder Chris Lewis tells the BBC he is keen for a fresh start and hopes to work with youngsters in communities in the future
ESPNcricinfo staff
23-Jun-2015
Earlier this month, Chris Lewis, the former England allrounder was released from prison after serving six years of a 13-year sentence for drug smuggling. In an interview with the BBC, Lewis, a gifted cricketer, looks back on the spiral that led to his imprisonment and his plans to help youngsters in the community, following his release.
Lewis, you suspect, inhabits similar psychological sporting territory as someone like a Flintoff - or a Paul Gascoigne. Sportsmen who can genuinely entertain, relying on instinct and genius rather than technique, discipline and drills, but who then struggle to replace the adrenaline and excitement once their playing days are over.
One should not feel sympathy for Lewis. The families of those affected by the kind of drugs he was trying to import will tell you he deserved all he got. His actions were as dim-witted as they were deplorable. But for a cricketer who always came across as slightly troubled, it is easy to see how it all unravelled once the bright lights of his sporting career faded.
"There was perhaps a touch of anger, maybe a touch of disillusionment at the time," Lewis says. "In order for me to take certain actions like that, I think I must have shut down half my brain."