Herding Cats Read online

  When a captain gets it right, cricket is the best of all games, bringing people together like no other. It could be the tailender giving the set batsman the strike, at the end of a testing run chase, allowing him to make a well-deserved century; or fielders chasing down the ball after a rare bad delivery from their star bowler; or a sensational diving catch to remove the batsman who was threatening to take the game away. Moments such as these bind sportsmen like few others and even the weakest player can feel that he made a vital contribution to the side’s fortunes. The captain seeks to minimise the tension between the overall performance and that of the individual as much as possible, ensuring that everyone has a role to play. The further the gap in performance between the best and worst, the less happy a team is. (It is no surprise that left-wingers like George Orwell and Harold Pinter loved cricket.) But a skipper is unlikely to be able to field a team of exactly the same ability – and why would he? Part of cricket’s charm is that there should be room for everyone: the stolid opening batsman who can’t hit it off the square; the spin bowler who doesn’t actually turn the ball, relying instead on batsmen’s folly to bring his wickets; and the specialist fielder, who isn’t terribly good at that side of the game either.

  But how does a captain win with these players? If we look at other sports, there are those that are “strong link”, in that the team with the best player will usually win. Basketball is an example of this. Football, despite its obsession with marquee players, isn’t, as the international careers of players like George Best and Ryan Giggs show. (Neither ever played at a major championship, with Northern Ireland or Wales respectively.) It is more of a “weak link” sport, in that if your team’s worst three players are better than the opposition’s worst three then you will tend to come out on top. Rugby is an even better example of this. Cricket falls somewhere between the two definitions but a team in which the talent range is narrow is unquestionably easier to manage than one in which you have both very strong and weak players.

  The wider the gap in ability between players, the harder the captain’s role becomes. The game becomes like chess. You match your best players up against the opposition’s strongest and the weaker ones can battle it out. The queen should not scythe down the pawns before they’ve had a chance to advance into the other half of the board. It should be held in check by the other queen and rooks. When a poor batsman walks out to the middle for the opposition, and doesn’t even ask for a guard, nor holds his bat properly, what do you do? You know that the first straight ball will get him. But who should bowl it? Ideally your strike bowler will bowl a foot outside off stump for the rest of the over, so the honest trundler at the other end can get his first wicket of the season. It rarely happens like that, particularly when the other batsman is trying to farm the strike against the weaker bowling. But I’ll trot over to Nick at cover to discuss how to deal with the weaker batsman, just as I would with a more gifted player.

  An amateur captain’s perfect day is not one in which his side wins effortlessly and each stratagem works. It is the game in which every single member of his team contributes, ideally towards a narrow victory. I remember one game like this, on a sunny day in June. It was the highlight of our season, being the game against the Actors on the Nursery Ground at Lord’s. Selection had been tricky – all those players mysteriously unavailable all season had suddenly got in touch to say that, yes, they could play in this particular match and were ready to bat at four and bowl first-change. But you don’t drop your two top-order batsmen who’ve played every single game, even if their combined age is 102, and they’re involved in 80 per cent of the team’s run-outs. Likewise your slip stays in the team, though he will need two knee replacements at the end of the season. And you keep the change bowler who recently took his first catch in 15 years. After all, someone needs to bat at 11. So the lobbying proved futile and the strong newcomers stayed on the sidelines.

  Happiness writes white, as many have said. The matches where everything goes wrong are probably more interesting to recount. So I’ll be brief. That day there was no single hero. No centuries, no five-wicket hauls, just good cricket as a team. The sun blazed down and everyone did something, with the runs, wickets and catches being shared about. Bowlers kept it tight, until the batsmen wilted under the pressure and hit out. The fielders took the catches in the deep and didn’t lose heart when one batsman kept depositing the ball on the roof of the indoor school. Eventually we got him when he skied one to long-off. When it was our turn to bat, the openers built a platform, blunting the opposition’s attack; the middle order accelerated when needed; and the lower order hit that flurry of boundaries at the end to remove all doubt. Afterwards we stayed by the side of the pitch for hours, happily drinking and dissecting the game. If we’d had a team song, no doubt we’d have sung it, like the Australians. One player was so exhilarated by the day that he left his entire kitbag in the changing room for me to lug home.

  It is only after the game that the captain can completely switch off. It may seem that you are spending the afternoon doing the same thing as the rest of your team but you stand out in that you have to concentrate, to think the whole time. For the rest of your team the game is a much-needed break from the trials of modern life. Players leave their children at home, switch their phones off and can focus on an afternoon of daydreaming and the occasional chase to the boundary. But as skipper you have much to ponder. Because in cricket things are usually about to go wrong. If they already are, you will be thinking how you should be rotating your bowlers and what field you should be setting to the batsmen. You’ll be asking yourself if they have any weaknesses that can be exploited. What type of bowling would they most and least like to be facing? And when will this agony all be over?

  Even when the game is going well and the wickets are falling steadily, the captain will still be fretting. Will the match finish too quickly? Will everyone get a game of sorts? Is now the time to bring on your worst bowler? Can you get away with a few overs of complete filth? If your team bowls the opposition out for under a hundred, unless you reverse the order you may well find that eight of your team don’t get a bat. And that, as much as defeat, is what you dread. The Sunday captain wants to win while involving the whole team, even the useless ones. Many have struggled with the double-think involved here. How to reconcile these opposing ideas is where the true art of amateur captaincy lies.

  What makes it hard for a captain to think?

  Captaincy in both the professional and amateur games involves a balance of on- and off-field decisions and duties. It’s when they combine that it is hardest to think sensibly. You hope that when you walk across the boundary rope you won’t have to worry about anything other than the match ahead. Before a game the England skipper might have to deal with the world press, answering questions about selection and what he’ll do if he wins the toss. But Alastair Cook has been trained to deal with this almost without having to engage his brain. He can talk mindlessly of the team hitting straps and executing skills, and of good areas, all while focusing on the game ahead – his tactics and own performance. And the journalists stay on the right side of the boundary rope. A Sunday captain’s concerns are more prosaic, however. You’ll be fretting more about the safe arrival of all 11 players – and the tea – rather than thinking of how you’ll deploy them on the field.

  A couple of seasons ago, we were playing the Vatican’s cricket team. This was a first for us obviously – our fixture list doesn’t usually include teams representing the world’s largest religions. St Peter’s CC had come over to play the Church of England in a historic game at Canterbury and we were lucky enough to bag one of their warm-up fixtures. The competition for places was high. We were playing at a beautiful National Trust house outside London and I arrived in good time to find a large coach already at the ground, with an ominously fit-looking team filing out of it and into the changing room. Not only was the Vatican side there on time, but they were smartly dressed in Wisden-yellow jackets. The team was co
mprised of ten young seminarians from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, training for the priesthood in Rome, and was led by an English priest, Father Tony Currer. As I chatted to my opposite number, I spied Tom wandering around the outfield. We were due to start in half an hour and at the moment were playing two versus 11. A text message came in announcing that five team-mates were in the pub having lunch. (Four of them claimed that the fifth had ordered a sizeable feast and they were waiting for his food to turn up. And the first pub they’d been due to meet in had been shut for several years.) The remaining players were en route, held up by what they described as the complete closure of the same motorway we’d driven up just a few minutes earlier. Meanwhile, the opposition started to warm up on the outfield, doing shuttle runs and other strenuous exercises. But you can’t intimidate an opposition if nine of them aren’t there.

  There are many nightmare scenarios for the amateur captain and one of the worst is walking out for the toss without everyone from your team there. If you call correctly, you must choose to bat, or field without the full complement. If you lose the toss you must throw yourself at the opposition’s mercy. Their captain might be generous, having been in this position himself. They might suggest delaying the start time by 15 minutes or lend you a fielder or two. If they had been in two minds over whether to bat first or not, they might even let your predicament sway them towards fielding first. But they will be judging you. There is no better test of the health of an amateur cricket club than the time the players turn up. Amateur captains are perfectly used to starting or finishing a game without 11. Brearley never had to deal with Botham leaving early to get to a party somewhere, nor the top order arriving late because traffic was bad and both Boycott and Tavaré had driven too slowly and dallied in the service station.

  As we walked out onto the pitch, I could see five sheepish figures hurrying past the pavilion and into the changing room at the side. This was the contingent from the pub, back from lunch. We were now seven and my phone was buzzing with traffic updates and apologies. I won the toss and paused. The obvious option was to bat first but I thought again and chose to field. I had a number of reasons for wanting to chase – I was pretty sure we were playing a stronger side and when your top-order batsmen are not known for scoring quickly, sometimes it is better if they know what’s required. There was also an unworthy part of me that wanted to make a statement. That wanted to tell those players just how much they’d let me down. If a latecomer sidles into the changing room as the middle order is padding up, he heaves a sigh of relief, mumbles an apology and accepts his demotion down the order. But running out onto the field, several overs in, he knows he’s let his entire team down.

  In football it is commonly said a team played better with ten men, after one was sent off. That day, we played heroically with just seven on the field. Our bowlers knew there was no room for error and kept a good line and length. Meanwhile, the fielders covered every scrap of ground – with only three fielders on one side and two on the other, we were a blur of perpetual motion. With only six team-mates, almost every ball might be yours to retrieve. One by one, the four missing players trickled on. But so much for making a statement. Three were suitably contrite but one didn’t realise he’d missed the first six overs. He ran on at the end of the over, thinking we’d just started and that he’d timed it perfectly, missing that boring warm-up. If he was surprised they only batted for 24 overs, while we had 30, he didn’t show it. I had to explain it to him afterwards through gritted teeth.

  We lost on the final ball. A boundary would have won it for us but Peter, our former Croatian international, couldn’t quite bisect the men on the rope. A game that had begun badly ended thrillingly and everything was forgiven, if not forgotten. Afterwards our opposition invited us to pray with them. As we bowed our heads in front of the pavilion, our thoughts turned to God’s infinite mercy.

  Choosing a Captain

  No amateur captain needs an ECB survey to tell them what they already know – that playing numbers are in decline. You face an incredible struggle to get a team out each week. The last game of the season is always the most important one for the amateur skipper. By then, up to half of your players will be deciding whether to play next year, whether they’ll put up with the aches, strains and (marital) strife that a full summer of cricket entails. A decent team performance can erase untold painful memories from earlier in the season and a good individual one will banish all winter’s doubts. You just have to coax enough runs or wickets from those players to ensure you have a full team next year.

  This is not a problem that the professional captain faces. Those at the pinnacle of the game can choose from the country’s 844,000 active cricketers – though realistically, only the last 1,000 are in the running. The remaining 843,000 of us are making up the numbers. And despite these numbers, many amateur skippers will struggle to put out a full side every weekend.

  It is perfectly normal for players to drop out on the eve or morning of a match. If this happens in Saturday league cricket, the first team takes the seconds’ star all-rounder but will bat him at ten and not bowl him. The seconds will plunder the thirds for their best batsman and probably won’t give him back. The thirds will reluctantly borrow someone from the fourths, hoping he won’t let them down too much. And the fourths will be short, again, and may have to find something else to do that afternoon.

  The role of the Sunday captain is harder. A few hundred years ago he would have been patrolling the taverns in a seaside town, pressganging unwary drinkers into going to sea. At risk were “eligible men of seafaring habits between the ages of 18 and 55 years”. The amateur captain is not in a position to be so fussy. I’ve recruited a number of players the night before a game, having never seen them play. I’ve found players using social media, at weddings, even once in the lift of our hotel. Other people make small talk, I cut straight to the chase. “Do you play cricket?” I ask. “What are you doing tomorrow?” On tour in India I recruited our waiter during breakfast. He took two steepling catches at long-on. At a game in the New Forest I enlisted the sole spectator – lending him the spare whites I always bring – and he duly lost us the game with the one over he bowled. Captaincy requires this heady mix of desperation and optimism. Everyone you meet is a possible convert. In the face of this struggle, you wonder why anyone would want to be captain.

  Why do so many players want to be captain?

  When playing cricket it is very hard not to captain in your head. Just as some people press an imaginary brake pedal when in a car’s passenger seat, so the amateur cricketer is making mental adjustments to the captain’s field. Imagine there were thought bubbles above each fielder, during a match. You would see that not all of them will be thinking about cricket obviously. It is a fielder’s right to daydream after all. But the thoughts of those focused on the game won’t be flattering. A number will be disagreeing with you and they may well be right. They’ll have seen that it’s time to make that bowling change, move square leg five steps in and wake midwicket up. Often they won’t say anything and will let you get on with your job. But when three shots have gone through a particular gap and still you haven’t plugged it, then one of them will trot over and gently suggest what everyone’s thinking.

  There’s no doubt that it’s easier to captain when you’re not actually in charge. You remember all the times you’re right and few of those when you weren’t. Your decisions and instincts aren’t held up to scrutiny, nor proved wrong. In real time, if you move a fielder, a good batsman often places the ball in the gap you just created. That doesn’t happen if you’re captaining in your head. What many players would settle for is being able to decide when they get to bat and bowl. And maybe setting the field when they’re bowling. That’s why you’re there, after all. Never mind the rest. Who gives up a whole day at the weekend to stand at mid-off and tinker with field placings, over by over, without any lapse in concentration for the entire innings? No, the fun is to be had in the middle, timing the ball all a
round the park, fielders following it to the boundary; or with ball in hand, making it go one way or another, before sending the batsman back to the pavilion, your name next to his in the scorebook. Who really enjoys standing around for 40 overs? Relatively few of us. The first hour is often fun and the last five overs can be tense. But those in the middle ... If you look around the field after 25 overs, the players’ body language will tell you everything about their state of mind. They are no longer walking in purposefully, ready for the ball to come to them. Square leg will be talking to the umpire, long-off will be sitting on a bench by the sightscreen and third man will be checking the Test score on his mobile phone.

  There are worse things for a captain than your team-mates’ lack of concentration, though. It is almost inevitable that a couple of your players will be sulking at any one time, usually because they don’t feel sufficiently involved in the game. Ideally you should ensure that one is on the off side and the other on the leg, in case they start to conspire. They may be angry with you, sometimes with each other. The obvious way to stop a player from moping around in the field is to let him bowl. But usually he’s cross because you’d taken him off after a particularly erratic spell and you just can’t afford to bring him back on for a second go. It’s too dangerous. So instead you summon him from the deep and place him where he’ll be more involved, at risk even, under the batsman’s nose. There is nothing like the prospect of injury and heroism to lift the spirits.