Favourites from the start, Dhaka’s win came as no surprise to many, but that does not mean it was an easy ride to the title

Mohammad Isam10-Dec-2016Tournament overview
Everyone expected Dhaka Dynamites to win the BPL. But as their captain Shakib Al Hasan and coach Khaled Mahmud said after clinching the trophy, it was never an easy ride.With expectations come pressure, and Dhaka had a lot of that this season. They had the squad for every situation and all conditions but to pick an XI was a nightmare at times.If they hadn’t won the trophy, there would have been more questions about their ability but with so many match-winners in their team, Shakib managed to get everyone together and become a successful unit.Dhaka had Dwayne Bravo and Andre Russell together towards the end of the tournament while Evin Lewis, Kumar Sangakkara, Seekkuge Prasanna and Matt Coles provided thrusts whenever required. The local players, led by Shakib and Mehedi Maruf, gave important performances too.Mosaddek Hossain, Sunzamul Islam and Mohammad Shahid made handy contributions while Nasir Hossain, Alauddin Babu and Abu Jayed chipped in at times.Kumar Sangakkara scored a 33-ball 36 in the final for Dhaka•Daily StarHigh point
Dhaka’s batting stumbled in the final but Sangakkara made sure they passed the 150-mark, which was always going to be a safe score in a night game in Mirpur. Their bowling and fielding did not relent as Rajshahi Kings were bowled out for just 103. The team effort that Shakib insisted was quite evident as they dominated a big final.Low point
The only time in the tournament that Dhaka Dynamites disappointed was when they couldn’t defend 182 against Rajshahi in Chittagong. For once their bowling fell apart, against Samit Patel’s big-hitting.Dwayne Bravo assisted the captain Shakib Al Hasan and was the tournament’s highest wicket-taker•BCBTop of the class
Dwayne Bravo was the tournament’s highest wicket-taker, and Dhaka’s best bowler on most days. He took three wickets on four occasions, with his variation always posing a problem at the end of an innings. Bravo now has the most wickets in a calendar year in T20s.Under-par performer
Nasir Hossain started the BPL with a decent innings and a great catch but ended it with a whimper. He finished with 195 runs in 10 innings, without a fifty. His bowling was irregular throughout the tournament.Tip for 2017
A similar team may be hard to put together, but Dhaka’s finances and overall resources could still see them building another championship worthy team for 2017.

Batsman Temba Bavuma has been busy practising his seamers this season. And that might come in handy given the quick turnaround between South Africa’s Boxing Day and New Year Tests

Firdose Moonda31-Dec-2016Temba Bavuma made history at the last New Year’s Test when he became the first black African batsman to score a century for South Africa, and he will reach another landmark at the venue this time around when he plays his 100th first-class match there. But this time he might have more to contribute than just runs.The No. 6 batsman has been working on his seamers and could help South Africa to increase their bowling options. “Temba is ready to go. He is in the back pocket, ready to cut loose at some stage,” Kyle Abbott said.Bavuma’s bowling made its debut in international cricket in November in Perth, when he sent down an entertaining seven overs that could have started with a wicket. His first delivery hit a crack and struck Usman Khawaja on the front pad. Khawaja would have been out, but Bavuma, whose delivery stride spans the crease, had overstepped. He then had a catch dropped at slip before picking up his maiden wicket – Josh Hazlewood – who sent a leading edge to cover.Novelty value aside, Bavuma bowled an impressive skiddy ball and even tossed in a beamer (surprise!) to prove himself handy as an alternative to the three quicks who Abbott described has previously described as being “fairly similar but with enough variation”.South Africa’s current attack consists of Vernon Philander, Abbott, Kagiso Rabada and a spinner in Keshav Maharaj, and they carried almost all the load at St George’s Park. JP Duminy was only used for three overs while waiting for the second new ball and Dean Elgar was not called on at all. While they worked well to different plans and took 20 wickets among them on a pitch that offered no pace, bounce or turn and movement only early in the match, on stubborn surfaces, South Africa might want to have a secret weapon in hand and that could be Bavuma.He does not have vast experience bowling on the first-class scene, with only 248 balls under his belt, but he has been honing his skills. In Australia, he was spotted several times working with bowling coach Charl Langeveldt and in the lead up to the Port Elizabeth Test he also did some bowling. All that practise may be put into play at Newlands where Abbott expects a “fairly similar” strip to what the teams got at St George’s Park, in that it will require toil. But he hopes it will deteriorate a little more.”I know Evan [Flint, the Newlands groundsman] is reluctant to leave a lot of grass out there. Hopefully reverse swing will come into play. We have seen it come in there over the last few Test matches and it’s crucial,” Abbott said. “We struggled to get it going this [Port Elizabeth] Test match, mainly because of the pitch. There was a lot of grass on the pitch and it wasn’t really allowing for the ball to get scuffed up. But we’re probably going to have to work as hard as we did over these five days.”The work will only feel harder on top of the 96.3 overs South Africa bowled in Sri Lanka’s second innings, which ended three days before the second Test starts on Monday. The early finish on the final morning gave them the afternoon off and what Faf du Plessis considered “enough time to get fresh legs” for the next match, but the quick turnaround could also mean Bavuma is also used to give the seamers breaks – although Abbott insisted they don’t need too many.”There’s 90 overs in the day and that’s our job. Between the four bowlers, we are going to cover those. The spinner is probably going to bowl a little more than the three of us but even when you start playing first-class cricket as a bowler, you know that your job is to bowl 20 overs a day, that’s it. There are no shortcuts,” he said. “It’s just our job at the end of the day. It would be nice to get a bit of a rest here or there but at the end of the day you know what you’re in for and you’re not waking up surprised that you bowled 20 overs yesterday.”

The DRS was once again in the spotlight on the third day in Ranchi, after TV umpire Nigel Llong upheld the not-out decision for an lbw appeal against Cheteshwar Pujara

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Mar-20170:27

Manjrekar: Smith did not mock Kohli

DRS watch
Was it pad first, or bat first? Did the TV umpire Nigel Llong notice the mini-spike on Ultra Edge? If he did, why didn’t he say anything on air during the review? Was it conclusive enough to overturn the umpire’s on-field decision of not out, or not?While such questions were hotly debated on social media after an lbw appeal – and subsequent review – from Steve O’Keefe against Cheteshwar Pujara, Llong himself had said from the cooler environment of the TV umpire’s box that he thought it “definitely looked like bat first”.Cricket Australia, though, were on hand with the screenshot to set off a thousand conversations.

Brett Lee asking on commentary if there was some pad before bat there.

Thoughts? #INDvAUS pic.twitter.com/tmM9Ys2sUN

— cricket.com.au (@CricketAus) March 18, 2017

Off the very next ball – from Nathan Lyon – umpire Ian Gould did his bit to stoke the fire, by not raising his finger to what looked like a bat-pad catch off M Vijay. Australia were all out of reviews, though.

And a big appeal for a catch in close given not out and the Aussies are all out of reviews #INDvAUS pic.twitter.com/djhJ6ejIIQ

— cricket.com.au (@CricketAus) March 18, 2017

Now, if only there existed conclusive technology that could help end the debate.Aggression watch
Virat Kohli had spent all of the second day off the field nursing a shoulder injury, but on the third morning he was seen in his whites, padded up and ready to bat at No. 4. When Australia reviewed that lbw decision, the cameras panned on Kohli, who applauded Pujara’s survival. Or was it Australia’s unsuccessful review he was taking joy in? As India scored at a fluent pace, captain and cheerleader Kohli was often seen clapping from the dressing room.Later on, when Kohli was at the crease, Glenn Maxwell chased down a Pujara flick near the midwicket boundary, and clutched his shoulder and laughed after he got up. The gesture was interpreted by some to be a mockery of Kohli’s injury. Kohli was caught by Steven Smith at slip the very next ball, and shortly afterwards there was flare up on social media because a clip had appeared that showed Smith also clutching at his shoulder – again thought to be aimed at Kohli – while celebrating the catch. Later, more complete images proved that it was Peter Handscomb’s hand on Smith’s shoulder, and the accusations of mockery were unfounded.Pitch watch
Australia’s spin consultant Sridharan Sriram, whose back-room advice had played an important role in sinking India in Pune, and O’Keefe spent part of the lunch break pitch gazing. Just like they did in Pune. They stood by the stumps, surveying the surface, as Australia sought to disrupt India’s run-making. This time around, he inflicted little damage after the lunchtime survey, as he finished with post-lunch figures of 20-6-50-0.For the second day running, Cummins and Hazlewood troubled India’s batsmen the most, getting a few deliveries to rise steeply. The strategy in the afternoon was to dry up the runs, though, with O’Keefe bowling over the wicket, hitting the rough outside Pujara’s leg stump. Pujara padded up to what seemed like a few million balls on that line.Earlier in the day, lawn mowers had been used to remove any rogue blades of grass that may have grown on the pitch overnight. None had dared. While quite a few balls zipped and turned, the bounce remained fairly even, and playing shots wasn’t hard.

The left-arm spinner, who has taken 107 wickets in the last two Ranji seasons, has played cricket at every level but the India call has eluded him. Still, his hunger hasn’t died

Shashank Kishore12-Jan-2017Fifteen years ago, Shahbaz Nadeem’s father, a police officer in Dhanbad, told his two sons only one of them could play cricket. He didn’t want both of them risking “a secure life” by chasing a game that didn’t guarantee a future because they hailed from Bihar. Assad Iqbal, the older brother and captain of the Bihar Under-15s, decided to step aside and give his small-boned younger brother – who was already playing U-19s as a 14-year-old – the chance to pursue his passion.It is this gesture which Nadeem, who finished the Ranji Trophy season as the highest wicket-taker with 56 wickets, remembers fondly every time his name crops up ahead of selection meetings. Today, Iqbal, an engineer and MBA, is well settled in Delhi and is happy that his younger brother – who has been in contention for selection for a while now – is nearly there, even though the India cap has remained elusive.Last week, Nadeem was hopeful as ever to be picked in the limited-overs squads for the series against England. Instead, a warm-up fixture for India A against the touring team is all he will get to present his case.The numbers back Nadeem. He is only the second man in Ranji history to top 50 wickets in a season twice, having taken 51 in 2015-16. He emulated Kanwaljit Singh, the former Hyderabad offspinner, who had also accomplished the feat in consecutive years, getting 51 wickets in 1998-99 and 62 wickets in 1999-00. These aren’t just cold stats. The numbers amounted to Jharkhand’s first ever semi-final entry in the tournament’s history, his 11-wicket haul in the quarter-final going with an unbeaten 34 to seal the qualification.”Over the last two-three seasons, right from the time we qualified [to the Ranji Elite group] for the first time, where I took 42 wickets, I’ve been hopeful of a call up, only to be disappointed. The chances will come sooner or later,” Nadeem told ESPNcricinfo. “I have played each and every format and at each and every level, except for India. It is always on the back of my mind that when I finish, I should complete the set. It doesn’t matter if I play only one or two matches for India. The quest for the cap keeps driving me.”The one misconception he is trying to erase. “It feels good when people say I’m a limited-overs specialist, but I wonder if they say that only because they haven’t seen me in the Ranji Trophy,” Nadeem said. “The selectors too have told me I’m a good limited-overs bowler since I finished as one of the most economical bowlers after Sunil Narine in 2012.”I knew I was doing enough in first-class cricket too, but somehow only the T20 performances were noticed. That motivated me,” he says. “In my team, everyone knows I can do well in all three formats, but perceptions were based on IPL performances. Even then I was doing well in the Ranji Trophy, which I take very seriously. It is here that you should be judged. For me, this is the finishing school. It shows how tough you should be mentally, and what level you are. As a player, it’s great to keep performing and help the team.”It’s Nadeem’s inquisitiveness to learn, he says, that has kept him going. He agrees the nature of the IPL leaves little time to interact and get to know foreign players better, but is full of warmth for Mahela Jayawardene – his team-mate at Delhi Daredevils who picked the spinner and kept him since 2011 – for his inputs. He says simply bowling for hours to the former Sri Lanka captain has been an education in itself.”In the short-format, you learn more from batsmen,” he explains. “If you learn their thinking, you can adjust and change accordingly. You’re not going to deviate too much from your basics, but understanding a batsman’s mindset is important. I make a note of all these small things. That’s where bowling to Mahela has really helped.”I bowl closer to the stumps in short formats and run in a lot straighter. I’m working on my chinaman delivery, which I keep for the short-format. I’m bowling the carrom ball too. I don’t think too many left-arm spinners have tried it. It’s a lot easier. In first-class cricket, the batsmen are not in a hurry. But in the short-format, they’re looking to score all the time, so it could make a difference there.”Amidst all the learning, it’s admirable how Nadeem has taken setbacks in his stride. His team-mates say the snub from the India A squad for the one-day tri-series in Australia last year spurred him to perform better. “It didn’t affect me mentally, but yes I did feel bad,” he says. “I came to terms with it and thought it’s okay if the selectors weren’t considering me.”His biggest satisfaction this season has come from consistently picking wickets on all kinds of surfaces. His next goal is to ensure Jharkhand remain competitive and finish among the top eight consistently.”Last year people were saying I was getting wickets only because of spinning tracks at home,” he says. “The general perception is you get only spinning tracks in the east. It’s more satisfying now because at neutral venues, our captain or management don’t have anything to do with the pitch. If I keep doing this, somewhere down the line my chance will come.”

Rising Pune’s bowling attack was all over the place at the start of the season, but they have improved significantly in their last seven matches

S Rajesh05-May-2017Ten days into IPL 2017, not many would have given Rising Pune Supergiant much of a chance of making it anywhere near the top of the table. After four games, not only had they lost three, but they had lost by handy margins – six wickets, 97 runs, and seven wickets, against Kings XI Punjab, Delhi Daredevils and Gujarat Lions; those weren’t the strongest teams in the competition either. Fifteen matches into the tournament, Rising Pune were at the bottom of the points table with a net run rate of -1.537.From there, their transformation has been remarkable. Six wins in seven games has taken them to right up to No. 3, and they have displaced Sunrisers Hyderabad from that spot, which makes the clash between these two teams even more highly anticipated.The key to Rising Pune’s resurgence has been their bowling attack, which has improved dramatically after a terrible start. On the other hand, Sunrisers’ bowlers have lost their way somewhat after a fantastic first five games.After four games, Rising Pune had taken only 19 wickets, averaging 38.15 runs per wicket, and 9.41 runs per over; since then, they have taken 50 wickets in seven matches – the most by any team in this period – while the average has dropped to 21.26, and the economy rate to 7.70. No other team has conceded less than eight per over in this period (from April 16).

Breaking it down further, the biggest difference has been in the Powerplay and the last five overs of the innings. In the Powerplays, the economy rate has come down from 10 an over to 7.40, thanks to Jaydev Unadkat (12 overs, 84 runs, ER 7), Washington Sundar (10 overs, 69 runs, ER 6.9) and Ben Stokes (6 overs, 32 runs, ER 5.33).

In the death overs, the difference has been even more dramatic. In the first four games, Rising Pune leaked 13 runs per over, the worst among all teams. In just four overs at the death, Ashok Dinda leaked 68, while Imran Tahir went for 50 in four. Ben Stokes started the tournament poorly, going for 45 in four overs at the death, while Adam Zampa went for 29 in two.In their last seven overs, Rising Pune have taken 21 wickets in the last five overs, the best among all teams•ESPNcricinfo LtdFrom those terrible numbers, Rising Pune have suddenly found the men for the job, and the results have been stunning. In the last 20 days of the tournament (from April 16), they have transformed from being the worst bowling team in the death overs, to being the best, in terms of wickets, average, and economy rate.

Jaydev Unadkat has been key to their improved wicket-taking ability, taking nine in the death overs at an average of 10.22 and an economy rate of 8.49. In terms of restricting the runs, Daniel Christian and Stokes have been outstanding, conceding less than 7.2 runs per over.

In fact, Unadkat is the second-highest wicket-taker in the death overs, next only to Bhuvneshwar Kumar who has 14. Saturday’s clash will thus also be between the two leading slog-overs wicket-takers in this tournament. While Bhuvneshwar has always been among the best in the death overs, Unadkat’s season so far has been a revelation.

On the other hand, Sunrisers’ bowlers have just lost a bit of their bowling magic in the second half of the tournament. In the first five games, they took 39 wickets at an economy rate of 8.08, but in their next five games (excluding the washout versus Royal Challengers), they have managed only 29 at an economy rate of nearly 9 an over. The outstanding form of David Warner and the addition of Kane Williamson to their XI have obviously bolstered the batting and made their top five arguably the best in the tournament, but the bowling has fallen away just a bit.

Teams have batted better against Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Rashid Khan in the last few matches, giving them far fewer wickets•ESPNcricinfo LtdBhuvneshwar and Rashid Khan remain huge threats, but opposition teams have chalked out better strategies against them. In the first five games, the two bowlers collectively took 24 wickets at an average of 10.54, but in the last five they have managed only nine wickets collectively. Rashid has taken three in his last five games after taking six in the first five, while Bhuvneshwar’s tally has dropped from 15 to six. Not giving away their wickets to them has allowed the opposition batsmen to attack other bowlers: Moises Henriques, for instance, has gone for 142 in 12.1 wicketless overs in Sunrisers’ last five matches.The batting has picked up the slack, though, ensuring that Sunrisers remain one of the hot favourites to make the playoffs this season.

South Africa in trouble, and Quinton de Kock saves the day with a fast-paced innings. It’s becoming an increasingly common problem for their opponents

Firdose Moonda in Hamilton26-Mar-2017Kane Williamson does not seem like the kind of captain who gets angry enough to shout, but this may be the series where it starts. Three times – three bloody times – New Zealand had South Africa cornered and three bloody times, they could not finish them off.In Dunedin, 22 for 3 became 252 for 5 and then 308 all out. At least Quinton de Kock did not have anything to do with that. But he had a lot to do with saving South Africa from 94 for 6 in Wellington, and just about everything to do with South Africa making 314 in Hamilton, after teetering on 190 for 6.No wonder South Africa were willing to risk de Kock despite his tendon injury. Faf du Plessis wasn’t exactly shouting it, but he made it clear that de Kock was considered too important a player to be left out of a crucial game, even though New Zealand were depleted and South Africa only needed to draw to win the series.Perhaps that’s a reason Williamson may keep his voice down when he analyses what happened at Seddon Park. Without Tim Southee and Trent Boult, New Zealand might have taken dismissing South Africa for 314. The disappointment will be that even with their second-choice attack, New Zealand had found a way through South Africa until de Kock stood in their way.They aren’t the only ones to suffer though. Sri Lanka, Australia and Zimbabwe were also unable to deal with de Kock, this summer particularly, and his performances have been damaging. Every time de Kock makes fifty or more, South Africa win. On all but one of those occasions – the 84 in the first innings in Perth last year – de Kock ensured South Africa topped 300, sometimes from positions where totals under 250 or even 200 seemed more likely.”These are innings under pressure and just shows the mental capability of Quinton de Kock,” Neil McKenzie, South Africa’s batting coach and de Kock’s former team-mate at Lions, said.The secret to de Kock’s thinking about the game, as his captain Faf du Plessis put it, is that he doesn’t. So de Kock does not approach his innings by reacting to a situation, he just plays it in the moment. As New Zealand’s bowling coach Shane Jurgensen put it: “Whether in T20, ODI and Test cricket, he bats the same way.” That makes it difficult to put pressure on him.Like any batsman, de Kock can start off a little shaky outside offstump. On the second day in Hamilton, he defended away from his body and almost chopped a good length ball from Matt Henry onto his stumps. Another batsman might have let that play on his mind, but de Kock struck a glorious straight drive off the next ball. A short memory sometimes helps.De Kock has also forgotten the problems he had against Jeetan Patel – four dismissals in four innings, remember? – and dominated the offspinner. His second ball was threaded through backward point, and a slog sweep and a conventional sweep followed, in the space of 18 balls. By the time du Plessis was dismissed, de Kock had found his rhythm, and though he only had the lower order to work with he did not change his approach.Quinton de Kock has drawn comparisons with Adam Gilchrist because of the way he impacts an innings•Getty ImagesSouth Africa’s tail can hold its own though. Kagiso Rabada notched up a career-best in Hamilton – and Morne Morkel had equalled his best in Wellington – and that gave de Kock the freedom to keep looking for runs and rotate strike.The comparisons to Adam Gilchrist abound and McKenzie added his voice. “Gilchrist used to do that. You know if he stays there for an hour, he is going to have 30 or 40 runs and in a partnership with someone else, you’re looking at 70 or 80 runs in that session.”He scores quickly, so it has to be about trying to get him out. I don’t think it is about getting him quiet. He has got too many options,” McKenzie said. “He knows his game really well for a young guy. He is very expansive and technically very gifted in terms how he hits the ball, which is very late through the offside.”In their search for wickets, New Zealand relied too heavily on the short ball and allowed South Africa to get further away. It was only after the second new ball was taken that de Kock began shielding Rabada from the strike, as part of a team plan for de Kock to face more of the new ball.That begs the question: if de Kock can navigate the second new ball so well, why don’t South Africa use him against the first one? For the same reason New Zealand don’t bat BJ Watling higher. Watling said the amount of concentration required for wicketkeeping necessitated a longer break than opening the innings would allow.”There’s not doubt he can move up but that could be a later question, if we were looking at an extra allrounder,” McKenzie said. “For now, it’s a very cushy No.7 spot for us. Seeing him walk in when we are in a bit of trouble gives the guys confidence.” And may even make someone as calm as Williamson seem to want to shout a little bit.

As a batsman, Matthew Elliott was unable to fulfil the expectations of many, but he hopes to help others do so as a coach

Daniel Brettig06-Jun-2017In 1997, Shane Warne released his first book, . Legend has it he fought tooth and nail with the publisher to ensure “Own” was included in the title. In it, Warne chose two names that would feature less prominently in any post-1999 publications. One was Steve Waugh, the other Matthew “Herb” Elliott.Of his fellow Victorian, Warne observed: “He has a simple, correct technique, time to see the ball and play his shots and an appetite for big hundreds. He’ll make at least 5000 Test runs for Australia. Fingers crossed.”Warne’s judgement was inked into the manuscript before the completion of that year’s Ashes tour, on which another bold prediction was made. Elliott’s 199 at Headingley was his second hundred of the series in challenging conditions, leading Ian Chappell to intone in commentary that the left-hander would make a Test 200 “very soon”. Elliott never did, playing only ten more Tests over seven years.Twenty years later Elliott sits in a Melbourne café and ponders Warne’s prediction, before laughing. “Goes to show he’s a poor judge, isn’t he, Warney! Nice words but I only fell about 4000 short…”It is in the gap between the prediction and the reality that Elliott’s value to Australian cricket now lies. Recently employed as a coach at the National Cricket Centre after nearly a decade at arm’s length from the game, he is intent upon using the lessons of his career to help others make as much of their talent as possible. He believes it should start with the ability to keep setting new goals at whatever level a player reaches.

“Once you go mentally, it’s a very difficult game because you spend so much time involved in it, playing, watching, training. Things start to go south pretty quickly”

“My goal was just to play for Australia. I think when you get there, it’s really important just to reassess a little bit on what you want to achieve and what you want to do,” Elliott says. “Getting there is an achievement, but it shouldn’t be the end goal. Playing for a period of time and testing your game out in lots of different conditions against lots of different players, I think that’s the ultimate challenge.”Maybe I was a bit naïve… getting there wasn’t enough for me, but I was just happy being in that dressing room, and I didn’t adopt that mentality I had playing for the Vics, that I really want to be a senior player here and set some standards. I was just happy to be there.”Happy and unhappy, as it happens. A fateful collision with Mark Waugh, at the SCG in his second Test, left Elliott with a wrenched knee and a legacy of pain and restricted movement. He rushed back to take part in the 1997 tour of South Africa, then barely made it onto the plane for the Ashes. While the joint settled down in England and he played the series of his life, by the time he got home, Elliott was not much fun to be around, and the runs dried up thereafter.”Physically I’d started to have some problems with my knees, and that really weighed me down a bit,” he says. “When you’re playing and you’re sore all the time, you become a bit of a pain in the arse to be around, and I probably was a pain to be around because it just wears you down, not only physically but mentally.”At one stage I wasn’t going to go [to England] because it was really playing up before we left. I got through the tour, came back, had both my knees arthroscoped at the same time after the tour, then probably came back way too quick into the Aussie summer, because you want to make sure you retain your place. That all happened quickly, and in the end I think I had about eight scopes on that right knee and it starts to compromise how you want to train.Elliott pulls one at Headingley during his 199 there in 1997•Getty Images”It wasn’t the only factor but it was one of the ones why I started to wobble a bit and unfortunately not achieve the things I wanted to when I was playing. Cricket’s one of those games where mentally you’ve got be as fresh as you can for as long as you can. Once you go mentally, it’s a very difficult game because you spend so much time involved in it, playing, watching, training, so when you start to struggle a bit mentally in terms of feeling that fatigue, things start to go south pretty quickly.”Memories of Elliott in 1997 tend to focus on his considerable panache – one flat pull shot off Allan Donald at the Wanderers that sailed over the boundary at head height, a flurry of shots at Lord’s for a first Test hundred, then many more at Leeds. But he was fortunate, too, dropped several times during the first hundred, then critically by Graham Thorpe early in the second. That luck was in shorter supply when he got home, and when he was recalled for the West Indies in 1999, where he was swiftly sorted out by Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh.That trip carried another lesson for Elliott, about battling his natural tendencies towards the defensive. “The sort of person I am, and was as a player. I needed to be more positive,” he says. “When I started to come under pressure and felt I was only one game away from being dropped, I needed to come out and play a little more aggressively. I tended to play within myself a bit, and that’s something I reflected on as an older person.”It was really important for me to not focus on the outcome, and stay in the moment, and from there I’d tend to play more positively. But that was me, and it’s easy to reflect now that when you’re in the moment, I just withdrew a little bit.”

“When I started to come under pressure and felt I was only one game away from being dropped, I needed to come out and play a little more aggressively. I tended to play within myself a bit”

At length, Elliott performed with great distinction for Victoria, and also made a handsome century in a Lord’s limited-overs final for Yorkshire. His time with Bushrangers taught him about how teams need to evolve.”It really had a lot to do with shaping how I coach teams and how I go about it,” he says. “We had some big personalities involved in Victorian cricket when I first started, and even to be in the room was a big thing. We had Deano [Jones], Merv [Hughes], Paul Reiffel and Warne, and all these other guys who played. So some strong characters in that room, and one of the things that’s interesting about Victorian teams is a footy culture thing.”It’s this notion that you’ve got to be best mates and all got to get along together for the team to function well, and I think it’s a myth. We struggled with that at times, that we had to develop this closeness to be able to operate well as a team. I call it the footy culture, and to me you don’t have to do that. The challenge is bringing those individuals together for a common cause, but also embracing some of their individual traits as well.”I don’t think we ever quite got that balance right, particularly early on. Over time different people came in and were able to influence how we started to operate. John Scholes had a huge role to play in terms of being able to do that. He was terrific at bringing a team together, and under John we started to have a lot more team success and started to push towards playing finals and being at the pointy end of seasons.”But by the time Elliott accepted an offer from South Australia, his knee was starting to make long innings exceedingly difficult, and after a brief sojourn to the Indian Cricket League, his playing days petered out. At that point there was no inclination to pursue a coaching career in the game.Shane Warne predicted Elliott would go on to make 5000 Test runs, but was proved wrong•Getty ImagesInstead, he followed a pathway opened up by a construction and economics degree at the University of South Australia. With his wife, Megan, and their young family, he went from Adelaide to Bendigo to Melbourne, where he settled into a four-year stint as a civil estimator for the construction firm BMD.It was a world away from batting, but in some ways echoed coaching and selection – Elliott had to make estimates on the costs and expected windfall of a given project, before handing his work over to the builders. “Hopefully,” he says, “you’ve estimated enough money for it that you’re able to turn a dollar from it.”Family, rather than career, drew Elliott slowly back towards cricket. His two oldest sons Zach and Sam, play for Fitzroy-Doncaster in Victorian Premier Cricket, while his youngest, Will, is weighing it all up. “He had to come to me this year and we had a heart to heart, and he said, ‘You know what, Dad, cricket’s not my thing, I don’t love it’, and he plays footy, basketball and other things,” Elliott says. “We haven’t given up on Will coming back to the game just yet, the older boys and I flag that for discussion every now and again and see what we’re going to get.”When on annual leave from BMD, Elliott coached the Under-17 Victoria Country team at the national championships, ultimately leading to his applying for and taking the NCC job. The diversity of his own experience, as a cricketer, a civil estimator and a father, were all helpful factors in winning a role where he will be reunited with former team-mates like Ryan Harris and the national coach, Darren Lehmann.

“This notion that you’ve got to be best mates and all got to get along together for the team to function well – I think it’s a myth. We struggled with that at times”

Looking forward, Elliott is striving for balance, not only between cricket and life but also youth and experience – he notes how Harris evolved far later than he did. He also sees how a young cricketer has more time than he thinks to emerge as a quality player, but equally less than he might imagine to carve out his own niche after retirement.”In the end we can’t just want one thing from these guys,” Elliott says. “We want to produce talented players who come out and entertain us and be super skilful, but that’s only one part of the overall picture. I think it’s unfair to say, ‘Don’t worry about the rest of it’, because the reality is, only a couple of guys are going to come through and do that. I know for myself I got into that way too late, because you think you’ve got more time than you have. Time tends to slip away fairly quickly, and before you know it, you haven’t addressed some of these things.”These guys are certainly aware of that. The study and the effort they put in outside of playing and training is terrific. But it’s difficult – if it was easy, everyone would be doing it, so they understand the challenges. There’s an exciting group of young players about to emerge in Australian cricket, not only from this group but every year you see so much ability and talent around. The system is strong, we can always make it better, but we’ve got to be a little bit patient.”In this era there is impatience. We want them ready at 18 or at 20, but they’ve got a lot more time than they think. We’ve got to be patient in terms of not rushing them too quickly because there’s all sorts of things happening to them. You could have ten years, from 25 to 35, a wonderful international career. If that’s our model then these guys are only babies.”Elliott leaves the field for the last time in an Australia domestic match, in the Ford Ranger Cup in 2008•Getty ImagesElliott is an advocate for diverse and difficult conditions around the world. “Something I think that’s fantastic about cricket around the world at the moment is teams using their own conditions to advantage,” he says. “It should be hard to win away. What a great challenge to be able to take it to them in conditions more familiar to the home team.”For the game to survive, conditions need to be different and challenging. The first two Tests in India this year, every ball was a massive contest, people were hanging on, couldn’t look away for what might happen. I hope the message out of that is, if there’s a bit in the wicket – the worry is what that does commercially, if you don’t get the game going five days, but I’d much rather see a game go for four and be a real contest between bat and ball than drag on for five.”Commercial reality has affected that [in Australia]. They’ve got to pay for stuff, there are multipurpose venues with drop-ins, so having a centre wicket block is not ideal for them. Drop-in pitches are creating these very similar, beige conditions, in terms of what players are experiencing, so then when they are exposed to different things, naturally they’re going to struggle because they haven’t had that rounding. But that’s up to us to identify those things and provide other opportunities, because that’s not going to change.”After years of fighting his knee, meanwhile, Elliott is happy to relate that he has found balance in that respect also. “We’ve got a good relationship, my knee and I,” he says. “If I don’t do too much, it doesn’t give me much grief. As long as I don’t go running or doing anything stupid, we’ve got a good relationship.” Similarly constructive relationships with Australia’s young batsmen may mean that Elliott becomes responsible for players who actually do make it all the way to 5000 Test runs and beyond.

James Faulkner’s eclipse as a member of Australia’s top echelon parallels that of Simon O’Donnell, another allrounder who found himself suddenly out of the picture

Daniel Brettig24-Apr-2017In the bowels of the MCG following a Sheffield Shield match, Simon O’Donnell’s voice wavered as he came to terms with his omission from Australia’s 1992 World Cup squad. Less than a year before, he had seemed indispensable, after being judged International Cricketer of the Year for a string of powerful displays, despite not playing Tests.But an ODI series won without him in the West Indies was followed by a niggling shoulder problem, and all of a sudden O’Donnell found himself dealing with the effective end of his international career. Having played in the same Shield game, players like Merv Hughes and Mark Taylor celebrated their own Cup inclusions within earshot. Hughes would go on to tag himself and Taylor “the Kon-Tiki brothers” for barely playing a part in the Cup.Twenty-five years on, it appears that James Faulkner, perhaps the cricketer most like O’Donnell in how he has contributed to Australia’s limited-overs cause over the past four years, has similar reason to wonder if his international days are over. Little more than two years ago he was accepting the Man-of-the-Match award in the World Cup final at the MCG, arguably one of the very first players picked for both that team and the squad it was drawn from.Now, however, Faulkner has been handed the news of losing not only his place in the ODI squad but also his offer of a Cricket Australia contract. The board’s recent rhetoric about domestic players “not contributing to financial returns” will cut particularly deep with Faulkner, for who else over the past four years has brought more Australian ODI crowds to their feet than he has?Right now Faulkner is taking part in the IPL for Gujarat Lions, though to date he has played only one match. O’Donnell was 29 when the curtain fell on his career, and Faulkner is only 26. But what is he to make of Moises Henriques and Marcus Stoinis, two players both comfortably older than he is, slipping into his Champions Trophy spot?Not so long ago, James Faulkner was Man of the Match in the World Cup final at the MCG•ICCIt was at the same ICC event, in the same country, that Faulkner first rose to prominence in 2013. Tough-hewn from playing club cricket as a Launceston teenager, he won a committed ally in Shane Warne with Melbourne Stars, and at the Champions Trophy that served as Mickey Arthur’s final gig as Australian coach, Faulkner stood out for his composure with both bat and ball in an otherwise woebegone campaign. He also showed the sort of combative streak that led one team-mate to term him “a great bloke, if he’s on your side”. As Faulkner put it during the tournament: “I suppose you can say it is easy to puff your chest out on the ground. I’d say the good players can do both. They can puff their chest out and play good cricket. There’s no point puffing your chest out and not playing good cricket, because you’re going to be looked at as a bit of a dill.”For the next 20 months, Faulkner did both in spades. With the ball he offered left-arm consistency and variation built on his teenaged infatuation with wristspin, which made back-of-the-hand slower balls a strong weapon after the fashion of O’Donnell, Steve Waugh and Ian Harvey, while also lessening concerns about his lack of a classical inducker to right-hand batsmen.With the bat he offered the power of Andrew Symonds but also the calculation of Michael Bevan, never better shown than in a pair of heists: in Mohali against India and then at the Gabba against England. A sobriquet of “The Finisher” was grandiose but fitting, and a Test appearance at The Oval earned him a baggy green. Six wickets and useful runs merited further chances, but Mitchell Johnson’s whirlwind left him 12th man throughout the home Ashes.By the time of the World Cup final, Faulkner’s was quite a startling ODI record. Though he was not required to bat that day, his seamers and slower balls clogged up New Zealand’s middle order to such effect that he earned the match award, then took a central role in Australia’s rowdy celebrations – much as O’Donnell had done in 1987. To that point, Faulkner had churned out 814 runs at 42.84, and 60 wickets at 30.08 in 44 ODIs, figures made all the better by a propensity to deliver when most required. He was still a young cricketer but played like a senior one.All things being equal, Faulkner should have expected to at least double all the aforementioned tallies. But as with many things in life, they were not. The sociable streak led to a drunk-driving offence while playing T20s for Lancashire, and summary suspension from Australia’s next limited-overs series in England. This seemed a most inopportune time to be missing, as the team was in transition. By the time Faulkner returned, he was no longer a young cricketer in an old side but a mature player in a new one.Despite a bad knee, Faulkner’s bowling numbers have improved ever since his return from injury•AFPWhatever the effect of losing ODI team-mates like Brad Haddin, Johnson, Shane Watson and Michael Clarke, another factor was starting to hurt Faulkner, in this case literally. A chronic knee problem required constant management, and scratched him from assignments in New Zealand and South Africa. When he did manage to get back to fitness, Faulkner’s training seemed geared as much towards preserving his body as pushing it – an “old-school” tendency increasingly at odds with CA’s increasingly high-performance direction.All these elements seemed to contribute to a loss of confidence with the bat in particular. Certainly his performances since the suspension went into free-fall: 174 runs at 17.4 with a top score of 36 in 23 matches are not the returns of a No. 7 or 8 batsman, even if his bowling performances – 35 wickets at 29.8 – actually showed marginal improvement over the corresponding period, bad knee and all. Faulkner himself seldom showed signs of being perturbed by this, putting it down mainly to a lack of chances for long innings.Most hurtful to his chances of going to the Champions Trophy, though, was the fact that in recent times his inclusion has not led to victories. His two most recent limited-overs outings for Australia, in New Zealand and then at home to Sri Lanka in T20 matches, resulted in series defeats. At Eden Park, an Australian collapse offered Faulkner the chance to bat time and mount a rearguard, but it was Stoinis who did so instead.Four years before, Faulkner had shown clear-headed prescience in summing up his value to the national team. “Every time you play for Australia, you’re playing as a team, and I know personally I’m not looking at how well I go,” he said. “The ultimate goal is to win games of cricket. I don’t look at it as keeping my spot, I just want to do as well as I can and the end result will be keeping your spot.”Those recent defeats thus opened the door for others, including Stoinis, Henriques and John Hastings, all of whom have eyed the consistent opportunities Faulkner became used to. In the wash-up to Australia’s failed 1992 World Cup tilt, many pined for a bit of the old O’Donnell magic. Faulkner, and the selectors who cut him, will now wait to see whether the 2017 Champions Trophy squad moves on more effectively.

Fresh off his coaching and playing stint with Hong Kong, Ryan Campbell is now hoping to help Netherlands get their ODI status back

Peter Della Penna21-Jun-20175:20

‘Have to make Dutch cricket more professional’

“Coming from being involved with Australia, I didn’t even care about Associate cricket back then, because I didn’t know it.” These are the words of a man who now wears his cricket heart on his orange-coloured new Dutch sleeves.Ryan Campbell is just over two months into his tenure as Netherlands head coach, after having spent several years as part of the Hong Kong national set-up. Even with his team four months out from their next one-day fixtures in the WCL Championship, he’s on the road in Edinburgh, getting a look at future opponents Namibia in their one-day series against Scotland. Netherlands have four games left in the competition, against Kenya and Namibia towards the end of the year. If they win them all, they will clinch the title, and with it ostensibly a return to ODI status. (The ICC said earlier this year that the winner will be included in the proposed 13-team ODI league for 2023 World Cup qualification.)The last three years have been trying for Dutch cricket. They have had to expend energy to reclaim the ODI status – and the funding that goes with it – that was lost at the 2014 World Cup Qualifier. But Netherlands are on the cusp of accomplishing the targets they have been craving and Campbell has been tasked with seeing it through.”By winning these four games [in the WCL Championship], we can leave a footprint in Dutch cricket for the next decade, I have no doubt,” Campbell said during his scouting assignment in Scotland. “Then we’ll tackle the next hurdle and get a structure and blueprint that can push Dutch cricket forward for the next ten years, not just the next one or two.”I think that’s what happens in Associate cricket. Everything’s a short-term fix because you don’t quite know what’s going to happen, because the cycle is four years for ODI status. If you’re at the qualifiers and you advance, you get your status and funding and away you go. If you lose it, you’re in trouble.” It’s something Dutch cricket knows all too well now.For Hong Kong, Campbell served as assistant batting coach, and he subsequently made his debut for them as an opening batsman during the 2016 World T20.Campbell had been living and coaching in Hong Kong for several years in his role as the head coach at Kowloon Cricket Club, one of two anchor clubs on the Hong Kong domestic scene. He had also been serving as an assistant coach with the national team, and though he was content with life in Hong Kong, he was in search of a challenge and wanted to see how he could do leading a side as “the main man”.

“Our season in Holland is four months. If that means sending players to Australia, New Zealand or South Africa, or if an Australian with a Dutch passport is playing in Australia, I’d be stupid to say we’re not going to pick him”

Campbell felt strongly about representing Hong Kong because of his ancestral ties to the country; his paternal grandmother was a Chinese woman born in Kowloon. Campbell’s wife was born and raised in Hong Kong, but to Dutch parents, and both he and his wife had Dutch passports.He says he kept tabs on Dutch cricket going back to former batsman Michael Swart’s stint in the national side, something partly set in motion by Campbell.”I had always had a close eye on Netherlands cricket from way back, because I think it started when I was living in Perth and I owned a management company. I did the deal to get [former batsman] Michael Swart to the Netherlands,” Campbell said. “So once he started playing, obviously I kept a close eye on how he was going and met some of the players and knew how they were going and had a bit of a background. In Perth cricket circles, there’s lots of ex-players, the Tim Zoehrers and Michael Dightons, who had always spoken about Dutch cricket.”Campbell said he first applied to be Netherlands coach in 2014 but was passed over in favor of Anton Roux. Last year, the Netherlands board (KNCB) called on him to fill the vacancy left by Roux when he left.When Campbell made himself available for Hong Kong selection heading into the World T20, he had a conversation with coach Simon Cook and director of cricket Charlie Burke in which they asked if he would be available to help out for WCL Championship fixtures through the end of 2017. The top four teams in the eight-team competition would clinch spots in the 2018 World Cup Qualifier.Campbell’s availability for away tours was limited due to his primary job with Kowloon, and he had to withdraw himself from selection for the WCL Championship tour of Kenya last November. However, he was in line to be picked for the home series against Netherlands in February. Just when he was going to make his one-day debut for Hong Kong, he got a call regarding the state of his application for the Netherlands job.”They were in Dubai at the time, at the Desert T20, when I was told that I was going to be the coach,” Campbell said. “The funny thing was, I actually was told by Charlie Burke that I was going to be selected to play for Hong Kong against the Netherlands. Obviously without officially telling them that I was going to be the coach, I withdrew from my ability to play.Journey man: Wicketkeeper Campbell played two ODIs for Australia, three T20Is for Hong Kong before taking on the coach’s role with Netherlands•Getty Images”Look I don’t think I needed to play. I think Hong Kong cricket is getting pretty strong in their batting. As we’ve seen the Anshuman Raths have come forward, but I think Simon wanted that experienced head just for Babar Hayat to talk to during games. We don’t have Jamie Atkinson all the time now, we don’t have Mark Chapman all the time, obviously Irfan Ahmed’s not playing anymore [under ICC suspension]. So there were holes, I guess, and until the youngsters, Shahid Wasif and those ones, can step up, I guess the theory was, let’s have an experienced head in the camp.”Whether he was needed or not as a player, or an assistant coach, Campbell’s departure continues Hong Kong’s brain drain of 2017. Burke departed after seven years, while chief executive Tim Cutler resigned not long after the conclusion of the acclaimed Hong Kong T20 Blitz. Campbell admits that the departures do not leave a good impression on the public, though he believes Cook and Mark Wright, Burke’s replacement as director of cricket, are on track.”In some sense Hong Kong were very lucky that they had such a wealth of talent to go to because the two big clubs, Hong Kong CC and Kowloon CC, happened to hire Simon Cook and me,” Campbell said. “So Charlie had at his access blokes that could help, and obviously he formed a very strong bond.”Tim Cutler came in and did a fantastic job, in my opinion, for the time he was there, and Max Abbott made it very professional and was striving forward with the Blitz having 12 million hits. So yes, it was very successful. Everyone leaving, it’s not perfect. I’m, to be honest, pretty disappointed with some of the stuff that’s gone on.”Obviously Charlie has been such a great person for Hong Kong cricket. Maybe he had gone through enough of the cycle. He needed to probably take a step back and relax. I’m not convinced Tim Cutler should have been outed or left, whatever you want to call it. I just think he is that passionate person that could drive them forward and had views of where they needed to go. It is tough, and I just hope that the board find their way. In the last two or three years, it’s one of the stories that we look at with such fondness because it’s such a success story.”The Hong Kong experience is in the rear-view mirror now. Campbell has settled in the western Amsterdam suburb of Haarlem. In his short time in the job, he says he has made increased use of technological tools a point of emphasis with players. Every player has installed a series of apps on their phone, including one that helps track improvements for daily training and fitness by logging inputs for each session. He has also laid out new mandatory weekly training sessions for Netherlands-based players in an effort to enhance team chemistry.

” I keep saying to the Dutch board, we don’t need 20 or 50 of them to come out at once. We only need two or three quality players in the next five years to bolster the numbers”

“I’m a big believer that the cap that you wear represents more than yourself, and I’ll always push my players to understand that when you play for the Dutch, you bleed orange,” Campbell said. “You give everything. You give your heart and your soul to that cap, that shirt on your back. That’s how we need to be seen.”The Dutch, we don’t have a million brilliant players but we have some battlers who will fight and fight and fight. You just have to look at our captain [Peter Borren] to know that when he crosses that line, mate, he goes to war, and we need ten blokes to go in with him. So we’ll always strive for that and push and push and work as hard as we can.”The first opportunities to demonstrate that are against Zimbabwe this week in a series of one-dayers. Netherlands will also be hosting UAE soon after for 50-over matches, and then heading to Ireland in August for an Intercontinental Cup match. Campbell said he is hoping they may be able to schedule 50-over matches with Ireland too, particularly since Ireland’s proposed series against Afghanistan was called off. The benefit of most of these fixtures is that unlike the four WCL Championship matches with Kenya and Namibia, ODI status isn’t at stake.”Against Zimbabwe, Roelof van der Merwe and Timm van der Gugten will only play the first two games,” Campbell said. “So in that last game there’s going to be names that people haven’t seen very much before. That’s a great opportunity for me to expose them.”You’ll see the Zulfiqar brothers, a young Tobias Visee, a lot more, Fred Klaasen a lot more, Shane Snater will be bowling a lot more. That’s what I’ll have to do to prepare us for the next stage.”As much as Campbell wants the younger players to step up, he is fully aware that when the 2018 World Cup Qualifier comes around, he has no choice but to pick his best eligible XI. As such, he has no hesitation in casting a wide net to find more Dutch passport-holders who may be open to suiting up for Netherlands.”I’m a big believer that the cap that you wear represents more than yourself”•KNCB”We have guys in New Zealand now as well who are pushing their case,” Campbell said. “Our biggest issue for me is that our season in Holland is four months. I need to basically send them all over the world to get them playing a lot more. If that means sending them to Australia, New Zealand or South Africa, or if an Australian with a Dutch passport is playing in Australia in the best competition, I’d be stupid to say we’re not going to pick him.”Despite the team’s position at the top of the WCL Championship table, Campbell said they are far from a polished outfit. They need to find a more consistent opening pair, for instance, before the 2018 Qualifier. However, he thinks the fast bowling unit – spearheaded by van der Gugten and Paul van Meekeren – provides them a legitimate shot at competing with Ireland, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, and most likely West Indies, for one of the two qualifying berths available for the 2019 World Cup.”Can we beat those teams? We’ve seen in the past [Netherlands’] record against England in World Cups is quite amazing. What we need to do to be successful is that consistency, and that’s what I’m striving for, so day one we play exactly the same as day two, three and four. We just need to prepare accordingly to get our player stocks ready to go and expose our youngsters to high-octane cricket.”The West Indies, they’re vulnerable because a lot of their players want to play IPL, so that sucks out a lot of their talent. Afghanistan are a great story. I think all the success stories have been the ones with great supply lines. Ireland, people say they might be slipping, but I still see them as one of those benchmarks, because again, they have a supply line. They have massive numbers playing cricket. Scotland is the same, they have good numbers.”Our test is always going to be the numbers of people playing. I keep saying to the Dutch board, we don’t need 20 or 50 of them to come out at once. We only need two or three quality players in the next five years to bolster the numbers.”The next year or two is going to be very exciting for Dutch cricket. We are at a stage where we want to take the game forward, for Netherlands to be left in a better position than it is now for the next generation of Dutch players and hopefully get more playing.”

Joe Root will be cheered on by his home crowd at Headingley while for his opposite number the challenge is to make England work harder than last week

Alan Gardner24-Aug-20171:42

‘Through hard times we have to stay together’ – Holder

Yorkshire, and Headingley in particular, is a pretty good place in which ponder captaincy – a pretty good place in which to ponder most matters cricketing, the locals might add. The ground of Hutton and Close, Illingworth (with a grudging nod to Leicestershire) and Vaughan will this match fete the latest member of a proud lineage when Joe Root leads England out for the first time in a Test on his home ground. However well he does – and England will seal the series if they can win for the fourth time in a row – he can expect plenty of feedback.Root has probably already passed his probation, with England’s response to their defeat by South Africa at Trent Bridge last month providing solid evidence for the appraisal. Tougher challenges await, not least a looming winter in Australia, but Root is beginning to shape this England team to reflect his own moods and disposition. The nerves of Lord’s have quickly been replaced by the steel that tempers his batting.The man opposite him at the coin toss on Friday is striving admirably to do the same thing – though Jason Holder, Root’s junior by ten months, has been doing the job for almost two years. His struggles are more of a reflection on the systemic problems that have bedevilled West Indies cricket for the last 20 years but Holder could be forgiven for wondering if there were more rewarding furrows to plough.He has been offered feedback at every turn for the last week – whether wanted or not – and knows what to expect if West Indies cannot lift themselves above the low bar they set at Edgbaston. For Holder, playing Test cricket was a childhood dream and captaining the side is a calling that he won’t shirk. Like Root, he is a softly spoken young man trying his damnedest to fashion a group of players in his own hard-working image.”It’s not easy,” Holder said. “We haven’t had the best results over the last few years but I enjoy it. I don’t shy away from it and I don’t think I’d ever give it up. There might be a situation where people want to move on from me but I can’t control that. The one thing I can control is trying to get the best out of each and every individual in the dressing room and I try my best to do that. One thing I’ve said to myself is that when I leave here just leave some kind of mark on it. So far the guys have been quite receptive and helped me out tremendously. It is a young group, we’re trying to learn as fast as we possibly can under the circumstances we’re faced with.”Jason Holder ponders the challenge ahead•Getty ImagesWest Indies have battened down the hatches in the days since Edgbaston, working with the team’s sports psychologist, Steve Sylvester, and trying to “understand our games a bit more”. On Tuesday, they visited Bramall Lane – no longer a Test ground but the home of Sheffield United (coincidentally the team Root supports). The knives may have been out but the Blades were more welcoming.”I don’t really hear it,” Holder said of the criticism. “I can’t change it or control so it’s a waste of time worrying about it. We’ve taken a fair bit of criticism from West Indians and English and everybody else to be honest. That’s something that inspires or motivates some people and it breaks some people. But for us we’ve got to stay together as a side for people who might not necessarily be able to handle it. For the people it motivates that must drive them to get the best out of themselves.”While Holder and the coach, Stuart Law, attempt to rally a dressing room that has experienced far more dales than peaks in recent times, England are in no mood to offer mercy. Root gives the impression that some traditionally Yorkshire straight-talking was required after England followed a resounding win over South Africa at Lord’s with pusillanimous defeat a week later and he wants the team to continue honing a harder edge at Headingley.That also comes with a tacit admission that there are future battles to prepare for. Chris Woakes’ return in place of Toby Roland-Jones – a man who Root said had “not done a lot wrong” – suggested they are edging closer to their preferred XI ahead of the Ashes. Root’s demand of his players “mentally being ruthless and at no point easing off the gas when we get into a position of strength” seems to have been reflected in selection.”It is important to make sure we win this series,” he said. “After a strong performance last week it is vitally important that we back that up. Earlier on in the summer at Trent Bridge we didn’t play as well as we could have after a really strong start to that series against South Africa. Having that mentality of going out and backing that up and trying to gain some momentum and consistency moving ahead is really important.”It’s alright saying things and asking the guys to do it but when they go out there and back up performances it makes it really pleasing that the message is getting across and we are capable of doing those things. So for me it’s just another opportunity to go out and gather that momentum and gain some more consistency.”Words from a captain are only so important as the responses they provoke, of course. England’s other selection issues revolve around opener, No. 3 and No. 5 – currently Mark Stoneman, Tom Westley and Dawid Malan – and Root had straightforward advice. “I think the only message for those guys is to go out there and take this opportunity. It’s another week of hard Test cricket, where of course guys are under different pressures wherever they bat in the batting order. If they want to nail down those spots they have to deal with that and, if they get in, make it really count.”Root’s family will heading across from Sheffield “in their forces” to watch on, as English cricket’s heartland prepares for an outpouring of pride – Jonny Bairstow’s advice on Twitter was for Yorkshire folk to “get your hands in your pockets and get here”. For Holder and a West Indies side bowed by the weight of history and their current diminished circumstances, pride must come from within.