Simon Hughes: Lack of care means a paceman`s lot is not a happy one (8 September 1997)

Monday 8 September 1997

Lack of care means a paceman`s lot is not a happy one

Simon Hughes Beyond the Boundary

"WHAT we need," said Mervyn Hardy JP, Durham`s most vociferous (and ardent) supporter, "is someone who can bat, bowl or field like Boycott`s mother". When otherwise engaged at Peterlee Magistrates Court, Mervyn can sometimes be seen wincing having just read the Durham (or England) score on a scrap of paper slipped to him by an usher. At least both his beloved teams have, this year, crept off the bottom rung. This doesn`t, of course, persuade him to be more lenient towards shop lifters.

On the field England could do with one or two really highclass smash and grab artists. Since the knees of Bob Willis, our last genuine spearhead, finally gave way in the early 1980`s, England have used 40 different seam bowlers in Test cricket. The reasons: injury, inadequacy and ignorance.

Some broke down or had to be rebuilt (Dilley, Foster, Fraser, Lawrence), others weren`t good enough (Radford, Igglesden, Paul Taylor, Mike Smith.)

None had a distinguished, full-time bowling coach to call on in adversity, a woeful oversight that has never been rectified.

Fast bowling is the most complex of the game`s essential arts, as unpredictable and moody as an intricate love affair. Depressed husbands often declare their wife doesn`t understand them.

Bowlers just substitute the word `wife` with `captain`. Silly little anxieties or blunders can destroy a bowler in the same way as they might a relationship, something only those who have actually been there can rectify.

Yet of those 40 tried and tested England pacemen, only two - Neil Foster and Arnie Sidebottom - are coaching at first-class level. The majority of the others are either in the media or still clinging on to their playing careers.

Only one current county captain (DeFreitas) is an opening bowler, and only three county coaches have been. Foster, coaching Northants, is highly critical of general levels of advice, spotting a number of basic errors, such as the wrong grip on the ball and suggesting that the way English cricketers practise rarely benefits bowlers. Nets are often ropey, run-ups are short and footholes have become ankle-ripping trenches which quickies avoid by over-stepping the front line, which encourages bad habits.

"The best practice for a pace bowler is in the middle, using his full run-up, with an umpire and a batsman," Foster says.

The rule of thumb in baseball pitching - the nearest sporting equivalent to fast bowling - is for a virtual one-to-one relationship between pitcher and expert coach and the same ought to eventually happen in cricket.

David Lloyd accepts he doesn`t understand all the machinations of pace bowling and is open-minded enough to consider having a specialist on board for the winter tour of the West Indies.

Angus Fraser`s name cropped up in discussion, and having him or Foster in the Caribbean as bowling-adviser would make enormous sense.

Both are young enough to comprehend modern techniques and mentalities, are respected by the players and Fraser would be a valuable standby should there be an emergency (and could provide fortifying banter with his old sidekick John Emburey, Lloyd`s assistant).

His presence might also allow the inclusion of a rookie, Melvyn Betts of Durham, for instance.

Betts, 22, bowled very fast 10 days ago to record the best figures of the season, nine for 64 at Northampton, and has made great strides since intensive work with Geoff Arnold (who also occasionally coached England) last year.

His tendency to no-ball hampered his rhythm and confidence, and he is now the only bowler in the country to mark out his run with a tape measure, which eradicated his no-balling and transformed his talent. He`s also nine inches taller than the late Mrs Boycott.

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