Mark Nicholas: Headley family tree bears fruit for England (24 July 1997)

Thursday 24 July 1997

Headley family tree bears fruit for England

By Mark Nicholas

`I MET George once, when I was 11. He was only a small man but there was an unforgettable aura around him, like he was touched by something special. Pity I couldn`t have known him better."

That is Dean Headley, Kent and now England`s impressive seam bowler, on his grandfather, George Headley. George, known as the `Black Bradman`, was an astonishingly versatile Jamaican batsman who averaged more than 60 in Test matches and would have been second in the list to Bradman himself were it not for the little matter of Graeme Pollock`s 0.14 of a run.

"Initially my father Ron was happy for me not to play cricket, but then I started to watch him play for Old Hill in the Birmingham League and we`d all sit around in the bar after play and listen to him talk cricket till midnight. These days he`s never off the phone. Drives me nuts." That is Dean Headley on George`s son, Ron, the Worcestershire batsman who played twice for the West Indies against England back in 1973.

"The West Indies Board of Control faxed me from the Caribbean on the first morning in Manchester just to say well done. They faxed Dad, too, to congratulate him and said, jokingly, that his boy should be playing for them! Until about the age of six I used to say I wanted to play for the West Indies, but never since, always England," says Headley, who was tickled pink that the WIBC recognised his selection and flattered that they bemoaned his birthplace.

It is some legacy, and Headley wears it well, with pride and reflection rather than with ball and chain. He was born in Stourbridge 27 years ago and might still live there, so specific is his Black Country accent.

He does not, of course. He has been around the houses since the Old Hill days, first on the staff at Worcestershire, who sacked him; then to Middlesex, whom he sacked, and now to the Garden of England, where the nasal twang and the long vowels natter away with the Australian vowels of Martin McCague, the middle England of Mark Ealham and the upper crust of Matthew Fleming.

They are an odd bunch, still flattering to deceive, but as Headley says, they are very ambitious. "We`ll get there in the end. John Wright is keen to stretch us further than Lord`s finals and Sunday League success. He wants to build a team that can compete in any cricket with anyone. He`s tougher than he appears and will be good for us."

Wright says Headley is a must for England and cites as his strength his ability to bring batsmen forward to make them play at the ball. "He doesn`t waste much and his skiddy, quick bouncer shocks the very best players. He`s a nice kid, innocent in a way, honest and not shy of hard work. If he gets his outswinger more consistent and keeps bowling simple in the way that he does now, he could be quite something." Mark Taylor and other Australians will testify to this.

Two fantastically successful A Tours - one to Pakistan two years ago, where he took 25 wickets at 15 apiece on dead pitches, and more famously last winter to Australia - helped to set up the skill and self-belief that enabled him to take eight wickets on his debut at Old Trafford. He says he could not have bowled worse in the game at Fenner`s prior to the Test and that his form all season has been pretty patchy.

"Funny really, it might have helped. Though I wasn`t as nervous as in the one-day internationals - I think they are the toughest cricket to make your debut in - I wasn`t at all sure of my form, so I de- cided to stick with basics and concentrate solely on hitting the top of the off-stump.

"Bouncers and yorkers were out, at least until I relaxed, and I was lucky to bowl at Taylor and Elliott because I`m comfortable against left-handers. I try not to bowl wide of off-stump and to make them play across the angle and was pleased to get Taylor with a couple of good ones."

Only when you bat against Headley, an imposing 6ft 5in, do you really understand his effect. He bowls from his full height, standing tall at the crease and whipping his uncomplicated action towards its target.

There is nothing in the run-up to confuse you, nothing in the delivery stride to alarm, nothing in the rock of the upper body to suggest a bowler who is other than medium pace. But does he hit the bat hard, jarring into the splice from a good length and, in Manchester, causing Steve Waugh to pull his bottom hand from the handle in surprise.

"At the moment I`m just looking to hit the seam around about off stump," says Headley. "If I don`t know which way it`s going the batsmen won`t." Fair comment, partly reflected by the number of occasions Waugh was committed to play when he might have chosen not to have done, and most clearly reflected in the three hat-tricks he took last year against Derbyshire, Worcestershire and Hampshire.

Even the hard noses, the likes of Chappell, Greig, Trueman and Willis, were surprised by Headley. No medium-pacer they said, an unaffected straightforward sort of bowler who could ruffle feathers with his dramatic changes of pace.

"It went well at Manchester but I`m not stupid enough to think it will always be like that," he says. "The mark of a good player is coping with the bad days and minimising the damage. I can deal with the workhorse role, 30 overs on a flat one, and am happy just as long as I`ve got the chance to prove as much."

So is his father, of course, as the 8am phone calls keep reminding him. And so, for sure, would George have been.

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