Fine blend of spice and steel: Sue Mott talks to Nasser Hussain (8 Nov 1997)

8 November 1997

Fine blend of spice and steel

Sue Mott

THE England cricket squad are in Lanzarote this morning preparing, like swallows, for their winter's migration. Not long after Christmas, they will fluff up their feathers (not white ones, hopefully) and flap off for the Caribbean where hawk-eyed birds of prey with huge wingspans (known to the RSPB as Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh) lie in wait. Sue Mott talks to Nasser Hussain.

"There are two different ways you can go. You can prove you've got the inner strength to stay out there or you can think: 'It's probably a bit easier to be back in the pavilion'." This is your England vice-captain speaking, Nasser Hussain, who does not favour the rush-back-to-the-nest approach and ruffled a good deal more than feathers this summer when he announced that county cricket was soft. It was his hard luck that almost instantly Mark Ilott and Robert Croft were trading blows with their handbags over a darkening wicket in a NatWest semi-final.

More grist to his image. To the green-eyed mirage of a temperamental upstart was added a vein of uncompromising nastiness. Nothing, nothing could be further from the truth. Nass, according to the Daily Mirror's guide to cricket crumpet anyway, is little short of an angel in human form. "King Nass is to cricket what Prince Naz is to boxing - devastating!" said the susceptible tabloid.

He is, undoubtedly, a good bloke. Despite chronic jetlag that stemmed from his holiday in India and Mauritius, he sat patiently in a room at the Essex cricket school last week and subjected himself to a series of nasty accusations.

One, that you are a disciplinary nightmare. "But I don't consider I've had any bad scrapes. I've been disciplined twice by Essex but only for silly little arguments. I didn't really see eye-to-eye with Neil Foster and once he had a go at me on the pitch. When we went in the dressing room I sort of kicked my cricket case across to Mark Ilott and it scratched his leg. So he stood up and I stood up and before long . . . "

He is telling this story beneath a handwritten sign on the wall that reads: 'Listen To Each Other. Respect Others' Opinions. Work As A Team. Keep A Positive Attitude. Be Punctual.' Well, he was punctual.

Two, that you sink into a childish rage when given out. "It does mean a lot to me, my batting. It's not just a job and I hate giving my wicket away. For two or three minutes I come in, I kick my case or something and everyone has to leave me alone. Then it's out of my system and I'm just as happy as ever.

"It's very much a character thing. When Graham Gooch was out, he just came in, took his gear off, watched the video and went and answered his post. Whereas when Mark Waugh [ex-Essex] was out, we used to sit there counting the F-words he came out with. I think he got up to about 18 once."

And three, that you showboated quite unnecessarily upon scoring 207 against Australia at Edgbaston. "But there was so much in my mind at the time. I'd never got 200 before and this wasn't 200 against Oxford or something, it was 200 in an Ashes Test match. And all through the innings I was thinking - it sounds a bit corny - this is huge. In the offices and pubs all over the country, they're talking about The Ashes. There are so many people watching and willing you to do it. I really wanted to see it through."

Arms outstretched, bat upraised, helmet off ("because you get letters of complaint if you don't") he stood bathed in the rapture of the crowd as a Warne flipper sped to the boundary. Mark Waugh came over and said: "Well played, now f*** off and get out because we've seen enough of you." Shortly thereafter, Nass nicked one from Warne. Show over.

He lay on the massage table afterwards, the team physio doing one leg, the dressing room attendant doing the other, which is a scene the Daily Mirror crumpet correspondents can ponder for a while, and when he leapt, or crept, off again he was a different man. Recognised.

"That week was absolute chaos. I've never had so much press in my whole life. There were five press people at Hove when I went down for our match against Sussex, and Brough Scott," - which may not sound like a day in the life of Liam Gallagher to you, but is a big deal in county cricket.

Always the possessor of a fancy face - a remarkable confluence of those slanting, feline emerald eyes, nose like a Himalayan promontory and a mouth like the one Jerry Hall's been kissing all these years (Wisden meets Mills & Boon) - now it is a face that gets noticed. "I was surprised, very surprised in India. It had been absolutely ideal for me to go away for a month and not have anyone recognise me at all. But when I got to my brother's flat in Delhi the kid downstairs had put up a poster saying: 'Welcome Nasser' and he wanted to play cricket in the garden with me.

"And just going around the Taj Mahal with Karen [his wife], quite a few little kids came up to get a photo taken with us and stuff. It was quite an eye-opener, being all the way out in Agra and still being recognised."

SO, nearly 30, he has made it. He has proved himself against the Australians, intense, competitive, sledge-buster that he is, and now all he has to do is repeat the performance against the West Indies. It has not been his happiest hunting ground. In his first tour, aged 21, he broke a wrist playing tennis - unbeknown to him - and underachieved with the bat. In his second tour there, his wrist stayed intact but only to carry the drinks tray. He is hopeful of improvement.

"It's a great place. Your training is a bit of swimming or running on the beach. The crowds carry music systems about half the size of this room. People dressed in drag are dancing around. And, obviously, the cricket is great fun." If this sounds like Ian Botham in pre-tour mood, do not be deceived. Where once a Caribbean tour seemed to consist of smoking joints the size of a rolled up newspaper, drinking a string of seething cocktails from a coconut shell and getting to know the locals, the new breed of England cricketer has no such extra-curricular agenda.

"We enjoy our moments. When we win Test matches and stuff like that Ath is very keen on everyone going out and having a good time as a team. We all get drunk and end up on a beach somewhere. But I think, really, the game has changed. There's a bit more money coming into it. It's a bit more competitive. After a day on the field, you go back to the hotel, find a few team-mates and go out to dinner. Then you're either sad and watch the cricket highlights or watch a film or something.

"The highlight for me last summer was Thorpey knocking on my door with a bottle of red wine saying: 'Let's play cards'." This from a man to whom David Gower was a hero. A hero but not a role model. "David would rather be at a Hunter Valley wine-tasting than in the nets and I do like the nets. It's a bit boring but it's the influence of Gooch and Fletcher at Essex. What keeps me going is that I don't want to say: 'What if?' I want to make the most of my ability."

THE influence of his Indian father, Joe, is profound in this regard. He was determined that Nasser would be an educated international cricketer. Now Hussain is the England captain once-removed with a degree in geology from Durham University. Despite his Anglo-Indian background - he was born in Madras and removed to England at the age of seven - Nasser has no difficulty is swearing his allegiance to the crown.

"It's a difficult subject, but basically it's where you've been educated, where you've learned your cricket. When I was younger there was only one side I wanted to win and that was England," he said. "I consider myself very, very English. I'm proud of my Indian background but cricket-wise, I'm one hundred per cent English.

His Indian streak, he reckons, is only evident in two areas. "I eat a lot of curries and I've got that Eastern fiery temperament, that fire-burning-within sort of thing." Which could be connected, when you think about it. (He did have an Indian takeaway the night before his double-century.)

So is he the captain-in-waiting? Not, he insists, as long as Ath is in place. But in the fullness of time? "Being England captain would be just the greatest feeling. I captained England last winter for a one-day international in Auckland and just to walk out with the team behind you and all the England fans cheering, it's a wonderful feeling. But you do have your ups and downs. You've got be be strong. You have to have this inner strength and stubbornness that Athers has."

And see off your rivals as well. "Alec Stewart is the senior pro and has played a lot of cricket, so he comes into the frame. Adam Hollioake has done very well this summer." Don't you just hate him? I wondered. "Ha. I can't say a word," he said. "He's my team-mate."

Possibly Hussain is still smarting from the Daily Mirror's opinion that Hollioake is the England team "heart-throb", not to mention Australian. "No comment," he said but he was smiling. If Hollioake swashbuckles to a double-century in Jamaica, Hussain will be one of the first to offer profound congratulations. Just don't expect him to offer to massage a leg.

'Ashes Summer' by Nasser Hussain and Steve Waugh is published by Collins Willow on Tuesday at £15.95.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)