Geoff Marsh views on Zimbabwe cricket

Zimbabwe national team coach Geoff Marsh has been with the side for just over a year now. He speaks to ZCO about his work and with special reference to the Pakistani tour just concluded. On the whole he is positive and upbeat, although occasional comments hint that he feels he has not yet accomplished all he hoped for at this stage.

"I had a phone call from Dave Ellman-Brown, in about July two years ago," Geoff says. This would have been during Zimbabwe's tour of England, after Dave Houghton's resignation as coach. "He asked if I'd be interested in coaching Zim. I had just finished coaching Australia and had two years off. I decided to come over and have a look around, then I went back, had a good think, had a good chat to the family, and took it on."

He began the job, taking over from Carl Rackemann, at the beginning of the 2001/02 season. Did the job turn out to be different from what he expected in any areas? He did his preliminary work well, so he knew what to expect. "Not really, because I was briefed pretty much by Dave and by Carl Rackemann, the coach prior to that," he says. "I think one of the biggest problems is that we don't pick our team from a lot of people, and that's one of the things that surprised me more than anything.

"There are a lot of young kids playing the game now, which is really good, but it takes a lot of time to get those kids through the system. But basically everything is what I thought I would be in for."

There would appear to be many differences between the approach of Australians and Zimbabweans to cricket. Both nations are very keen on their sport, but while Australians seem to exhibit total self-belief, the Zimbabwean culture tends to be more self-effacing and less confident. Geoff, however, feels that the differences are not that great.

"When you're talking about Australia, they have an enormous side at the moment at they're the best team in the world by a mile," he says. "I think our players do go out there to win, but it's difficult when you come up against sides like England, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Australia and others, they pick from an enormous number of players and a very strong domestic competition.

"You've got to remember that Zim has only been in Test cricket for ten years, and I think they've done very well. In those ten years they've been very competitive: coming from outside, when you come up against Zimbabwe in a one-day game or a Test match you know you're never going to get an easy game because they fight like lions. To say that they don't know how to win or to fight, I don't think that's true.

"We've only been in Test cricket for ten years, and Australia has been in for 125, so we've just got to give time and patience, and I'm sure that down the track with the numbers of kids now taking on the game, as long as we get a good structure in place, things will develop. This year we approached the Logan Cup and changed that around, but I think there are other things we need to sit down and discuss. You can learn a certain amount of cricket in the nets, but most of your cricket is learned by playing out in the middle and performing well out in the middle.

"It's very hard to compare Australia with any other side in the world at the moment because they've got a very good side, but I think our team is working hard on this matter. In India last season they won a couple of one-dayers and had a good series. In the ICC we nearly beat India in the first game, and we came up against Pakistan now. We all know what a good side Pakistan are when they get their full side back together.

"When they played Australia in the series before, they only had half the players that came here. Inzamam-ul-Haq and Yousuf Youhana didn't play against Australia; you take those two players out of their side when they play us, it's a different ball game. You look at how many runs those guys scored on the tour and it makes a big different. Wasim Akram didn't play against Australia, so we came up against a side that got a good hiding. They're probably the second-best side in the world, and then they come to Zim with all their players back and they're determined to get things right now. Our guys fought hard but it was a big ask. We're not saying we can't beat them but when you come up against the second-best cricket team in the world you know you're in for a big fight. The guys fought hard, and at no stage did they not believe they could win a one-day game or a Test match.

"I think the Zimbabwean players have a great attitude; they're very dedicated and they work very, very hard," Geoff says. "I think one of the things the guys need here is to strengthen our local domestic competition. I don't think you can question their desire and attitude when they're training, but we need to continue to strengthen the framework, our one-dayers and the Logan Cup.

"It seems to me there should be a grade competition where the guys play every Saturday, very similar to what they do in Australia, where they bat one Saturday and bowl the next Saturday, and they have to bowl sides out. I think that's one of the areas we need to look at."

The Logan Cup was revamped this season, so what are Geoff's views on that. "I think it's a lot better, definitely, with just four sides and strengthening the sides. I think the players are all very happy with it and there have been some good things come out of it. I think we need to play more Logan Cup games: I think just having the three early in the season and the three to finish off aren't enough. I think we need to go another three matches; the players who aren't in the Test or the one-day side find it very hard to play enough cricket to get themselves in form to force their way into the sides.

"That's an area I'm sure we'll be looking at for next summer. But as long as you're making ground every year and getting better, that's going to be one step in the right direction."

What has Geoff found to be the most encouraging part of his job? "The thing that I've enjoyed has just been the dedication of the guys," he says. "Andrew Flower is a great example to these guys, and I think a lot of the guys follow in his footsteps. He's a total professional, probably the most professional cricketer I've ever coached in my life. When you've got a role model like that and the younger players see the way that he works . . . the thing about Andrew is that he's one of those guys who works very, very hard but he gets results for what he does. When young players see that, they follow. We talk about having our own culture, and that is the culture of working hard and getting success from the work you do."

What has been the most difficult part of his job? Geoff only says, "The most difficult problem would be losing our four fast bowlers for the series against Pakistan. Any side in the world that loses their four fast bowlers during a series would find them very hard to replace. I think we struggled in that area because not only are they out for bowling, but they're also all-rounders. The guys who were in there fought hard, but a side that loses four quicks always struggles.

"I don't have a lot of disappointments; I've been here for twelve months, and it takes that long to get into a new country and to look at areas. The greatest thing is that there are some really good young kids coming through the system, kids who have watched the Andy Flowers and Henry Olongas over the last five years. For those young heroes who love the game and have played it in the back streets like we all played, and have grown through the Under-12s, the Under-14s and the Under-16s, and are now around the age of 16 or 17, it's going to take another few weeks for all that crop of Andrew Flower kids and Henry Olonga kids to come through the system.

"I'm sure that's why Australia is so strong, with the Lillees, Chappells, Benauds and those guys; every year they're churning out a champion, and when the young kids see him they just follow in his footsteps. That's what's happened here; it's just taking a little bit of time. We have to remember that we've only been in Test cricket for ten years, and in that time we've been on TV a lot more. So the young kids are seeing a lot more cricket now, and you see a lot of kids with a bat and a ball playing cricket, whereas if you go back ten or fifteen years it was pretty thin."

Does Geoff have any further views on the structure of cricket in Zimbabwe? "People are really keen to get things right, and we just have to work hard to do that and get a good pathway for the kids playing the game to come through."

What good came out of the hammering by Pakistan? "I think the players learned a lot, which is one of the good things. When you play against a side like Pakistan and get beaten, it's a good benchmark where you're at, and it's a good benchmark for people to look at and say, `This is where we've got to go if we're to get to the top.' While there were some good moments in the series and some good things coming out of it, there was a good warning that we have still a lot of work to do.

"It's very difficult when you have players like Travis (Friend) and Douggie (Hondo) who have been out for so long; trying to get them back in the side because they have to play cricket at that level, and they're never going to come back and bowl as well as they did when they left, because they haven't bowled for so long. It's a bit of a Catch 22 situation."

It is noticeable, though, that Australian cricketers seem to stay fitter on the whole than the rest of the world, and at the moment Geoff has not quite found the answer to that. "I think if you look at Streaky's accident, that was nothing to do with cricket, but it's an area we definitely need to look at. Blignaut hasn't played cricket for a while, and now he's come back and played a lot of cricket and broken down. Guy Whittall's calf is a worry, and Travis Friend's stress fracture . . . we're looking at that and we've got to get it right. We can't afford to have injuries."

Judging by the Pakistan series, even allowing for the absences of key bowlers, Zimbabwe have a lot of ground to make up if they are to be competitive with other Test-playing countries in the World Cup. So what will Geoff be concentrating on the most in the next few months?

"I think consistency is the thing we have to look at in our game. You look at someone like Mark Vermeulen who got that 79 against Pakistan, and then three low scores. We need to get more consistent good scores from everybody. Grant Flower had a very consistent series, and we need more players to have consistent series. We're looking at consistency in our batting, bowling and fielding, a good all-round solid game. The guys are working hard at it."

The national selectors have come in for a great deal of criticism recently, for their policies of ignoring certain players, selecting raw players and then dropping them, and chopping and changing the side. But Geoff is surprisingly positive about them although given the option to offer no comment on the subject.

"I think they're trying to pick the best side, that's it. At the end of the day the selectors can only put a certain side out, and then it's up to the players to perform. I think they've tried hard to get the same side on the park. One of their problems is that when you're coming up against a side like Pakistan and you've got your four best bowlers out, you try out some young kids, you give them a couple of games, let them go, but you don't leave them in there because you can actually do more damage by leaving them in. They put a couple in, they took a couple out; they didn't make wholesale changes but just changed a couple of guys each game.

"The selectors have got a job to do, but really the big job is the players out in the middle. They're the ones who've got to perform. People can always go back and blame other things, but at the end of the day when you get an opportunity you go out there and do your best."

There are four experienced players at the moment - Stuart Carlisle, Dirk Viljoen, Gavin Rennie and Craig Wishart - who have been left out by the selectors, leaving a big gap between the Flowers, Campbell and Streak (when fit) at the top and the rest young players at the bottom, and very little in the middle. Carlisle and Viljoen were given long runs in the side but lost form; Rennie and Wishart were never given long runs, but were in and out for a number of years, which did not help their confidence. Does Geoff feel that such players have a role to play?

"Craig has been out with a shoulder injury and is only just coming back this week, so he will be looked at. Gavin Rennie had a good Logan Cup series; in cricket you get some lucky and some unlucky decisions, but the whole thing is that when you get an opportunity you must take it; and if you don't take it then sometimes you have to wait a little bit longer. When I go through the averages and see how many games guys have played and what they have done, there's no one really who has missed out.

"We've just got to keep working hard, that's the big thing, and getting it right on the park is the big one. We just need to perform; we need more consistency."