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It’s more difficult for spinners to develop in England because the conditions are generally less suited.
But that means we should be trying even harder to do it.
Fingers crossed we can keep this up.
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England unearth their Murali
By Will 2 years ago, mid-September Leave a comment on this post
One of English cricket’s many failures in the 1990s was to find an English Shane Warne. It was understandable, given Warne’s total domination throughout two thirds of the decade - but that English cricket, then nearing crisis, could drum up a legspinner was shortsighted and completely ignorant. Worse still, our Warne-less attack simply provided the authorities (and captains?) an excuse for the run of defeats. We haven’t got a Warne, we haven’t got a hope. Luckily, Duncan Fletcher arrived to shake things up a bit and we gradually grew less sycophantic and needy.
As recently as this summer, Mike Atherton - himself a former legspinner - wrote of England’s blasé attitude to spin bowling, in particular legspin. Only when he first toured Australia did he realise how seriously it was considered, and how utterly ignorant English schools cricket was towards the art. Even I experienced this at school. This is changing, albeit slowly, and England now have their very own spin coach - David Parsons. The emergence of people like Adil Rashid from Yorkshire is only the start, but it’s a start the 1990s administrators could only have dreamed of.
Hot on the footsteps of Rashid comes England’s answer to Rubber Man himself, Muttiah Muralitharan. Come on down Sachin Vaja, a mystically named offspinner with an equally deceptive doosra. Matthew Pryor, son (or grandson?) of the spin machine Merlyn’s inventor, has the full story at tomorrow’s Times.
Tags: adil-rashid, david-parsons, england, legspin, matthew-pryor, muttiah-muralitharan, rubber, Sachin-Vaja, shane-warne, spinning |
7 Responses to “England unearth their Murali”
September 19th, 2006 at 9.30 am
September 19th, 2006 at 12.14 pm
Well, it wasn’t always so, Harrowdrive. From the resumption of cricket after World War II until Richie Benaud fully matured in the later 1950s - and leaving out of account the decidedly unathletic Jack Iverson, who made Phil Tufnell look normal - England’s spinners (of all types) were far better than their Australian opposite numbers. We didn’t have any pace (as opposed to swing) bowlers until Tyson burst on the scene in 1954 - our pitches were prepared to help the spinners, not unlike the way things were on the sub-continent until not so long ago.
Why did it change? Despite the (by modern standards) ridiculously high number of overs bowled each hour (20 was considered a minimum ) scoring was lethargic, and the cricket wasn’t attractive.
And name me one Australian spinner of any variety you like who was a matchwinner for them between 1964 and 1991 - they either had top class pace or a losing side…
September 19th, 2006 at 2.23 pm
Matthew Pryor is Henry (the inventor of Merlin)’s son…
Erstwhile Turnham Green CC colt and the year below me at school and club cricket.
JF
September 19th, 2006 at 8.03 pm
Uncovered pitches in them olden days though. Right sticky dogs I heard.
September 19th, 2006 at 11.56 pm
I think it’s generally a mistake to go actively hunting for a new Warne or a new Flintoff (Australia’s current mistake).
However, it is sensible to provide encouragement, opportunity and incentive for all the cricketing types so that emerging talents will have the opportunity to flourish. If they are good enough, then they will not be denied.
September 20th, 2006 at 1.40 am
Its a shame’s hes not in the academy, hes clearly an amazing prospect, as is his spinning colleaugue lawson up at yorkshire- players have been picked for less -in fact its a shame the academy isnt really an academy squad but purely an england B squad…although i appreciate we’ve got to have a few of them in perth on standby. How about other young players who’ve had good seasons?- shreck, newman, adams, foster? A waste of recources if you ask me.
September 21st, 2006 at 4.59 pm
Much of the problem in the 90’s was that once Gooch went, only Thorpe could play good spin.
Now the likes of KP and Freddie wallop Warne for 6 over deep square leg.
For the first time I can remember we actually have competition for batting places amongst a load of young test centurions.
Should be a good Ashes and England look overpriced at 4-1 to win the series.
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