To one side, Mark Boucher was chuckling away, and said to Pup, ‘I’m glad I’m not playing with him, he’s way too intense!’ All of a sudden I got paranoid. Everyone’s going to think I’m the most intense person going around.
The last game of a tight series was in Johannesburg. They’d smashed us at Centurion and Cape Town, and we had our backs to the wall before fighting back for a gritty win at Port Elizabeth and then a miraculous victory, nine wickets down, at Durban, with Stuart Clark and Mick Lewis bringing it home.
All through the summer beforehand, Australia’s coach, John Buchanan, had kept on saying, ‘With the talent in this team, you guys can make 400 in a one-dayer.’ We didn’t believe him. No chance. He said, ‘What if one day you just let go of that belief? Maybe that’s the only thing that’s holding you back.’
The Wanderers pitch looked amazing, without a crack. The bounce was very even, and there was no swing. The outfield was like glass. When you know that, all you have to do is time the ball, not force it, so you get into better position. At altitude, the ball was flying further through the air. Every factor seemed to be working the batsmen’s way. It was a great seeing day, very clear and sunny: in short, in every way a perfect day for batting.
Ricky, moreover, was playing at his all-time peak, and we approached the last 35 overs as if they were the last 10. I was promoted to number four, so we had a left-hander in, as there was a short boundary on one side. I said to Ricky, ‘I’m going to have a go at everything.’ He said, ‘If you see it, back yourself.’ We still had Damien Martyn and Andrew Symonds in the sheds, so with nothing to lose, I took them on, and ended up with 81 off 51 balls. My effort was about half of Ricky’s: he got 164 off 105 balls, one of the best one-day innings anyone has ever seen.
I got out with a few overs to go and sat in the viewing area. When we got to 400, we were yelling and screaming with excitement. Buchanan had this knowing grin on his face. We totalled 4/434, a world record by almost 100 runs. Incredible! We were so elated after the beltings we’d taken early in the series and the fightback to get to parity, and now we were going to win!
At the change of innings, just before we went out, Ricky pulled us in and said, ‘Take the score completely out of it. Let’s pretend we’re defending 200. Don’t think you’ll coast through.’
Nathan Bracken got a wicket in the second over, which brought Herschelle Gibbs in. We were staying in the same hotel as the South Africans, and the night before, we’d gone out for dinner at 6.30pm. Herschelle was at the bar when we left, seemingly sloshed already, with a glass of wine in his hand. When we came back at about 9.30pm, he was still there. Just before I went to bed an hour later I looked over the railing outside my hotel room and there he was, still in that spot. At least he was a free wicket.
Well, we weren’t able to defend 200. In fact, South Africa got to 200 in about the 24th over with two wickets down. Herschelle played without any fear. He played like they said Doug Walters used to do when he was hung over. Herschelle and Graeme Smith managed to find a four or six every over, and the rate was eight, nine, ten runs an over. We couldn’t stem the flow. The scary thing was, the comparisons kept going up on the board, and they were always 15 or 20 runs ahead of us. Batting without any hope of winning was such a dangerous thing. They had complete freedom. I thought, Far out, they’re going to win easily.
Then, with about 100 needed off the last 13 overs, they seemed to start to think too much. They obviously saw that they were a chance to win, and the fear shifted back onto them. We got right back into the game, mainly thanks to Nathan Bracken, who took five wickets. He was the best one-day bowler in the world at the time. He could swing the new ball and get the early wicket, and then, in the middle section, he came on and bowled what were almost left-arm spinners. Finally, he was one of the best death bowlers, knowing exactly where he was landing the ball. And he was a good thinker under pressure. He took five wickets and may have been man of the match but for Herschelle, whose 175 off 111 balls outdid everybody.
When it all hung in the balance, Boucher came in and finished us off. In the dressing room, the South Africans were going off their heads. In our room, where we could hear all the shouting and yahooing, everyone was reacting differently. I was just empty. I couldn’t believe it. Ricky was kicking chairs and throwing shoes. Buchanan was philosophical, saying, ‘Amazing, that, wasn’t it?’ Gilly was stunned. Poor Mick Lewis, whose figures were 0/113, was devastated. We were all going over and saying, ‘Bad luck mate, we’ll have a beer and forget it.’ But I think it affected him for a long time.
The selectors made some changes for the Test series, which was starting at Newlands in Cape Town a few days after that unbelievable one-dayer. It was hard for everyone to come down to earth. McGrath was injured, and to my great delight Stuart Clark had been brought into the team to play a similar constrictive role. We often spoke about that night in Pakistan when we’d wondered if we would get a chance. He was a fantastic bowler and it would have been a travesty if he hadn’t played Test cricket. He was a very nice guy, intelligent, and like me, had had to wait a long time for his chance.
In the batting order, the selectors seemed to be acknowledging that they’d made a mistake in dropping Damien Martyn after the 2005 Ashes. He had been extremely unlucky in that series, receiving three lbw decisions that were clearly not out. It would have been hard to take, being scapegoated for the loss. For all his flamboyance, he would have taken that to heart. But he was the complete player. He played spin and reverse swing very well, and was one of the best timers you can imagine. Teammates still talk of him as one of the best players they ever saw. The history books may not indicate that, but his peers rate him in that league. Unfortunately for Brad Hodge, he was the one to make way.
Newlands is a beautiful ground, with Table Mountain in the backdrop, but it’s definitely not one of my favourites. Whenever I batted there, the ball nipped around and eluded me. I heard stories of it being a great batting pitch, but I never saw it. It was quite wet on the first day and the bowlers took divots out of the pitch, which, as they dried, caused the ball to dart all over the place. Haydos, Ricky and Simmo were the only players to make half-centuries, and the man-of-the-match was Stuey Clark, who cleaned them up in both innings. We only had to chase 95, and I was with Marto. My shot to score the winning runs was typical for me in Cape Town: a sweep that ballooned off my glove and went over leg slip. Winning that match, my first away Test win, in three days was great, but batting was hard work.
Although I was missing Amy, Jasmin and Will, I loved the touring life. I got on well with nearly all of the guys, and didn’t belong to any particular clique. After training or play, someone would say, ‘What’s everyone doing for dinner?’ I’d go with whichever group was eating the type of food I felt like. So I ended up spending time with almost everybody. If I had close mates, there was Simmo, and I stuck close to Gilly and Magilla, having known them for so long. I got on well with Ricky, though he was very busy. The newer guys also tended to stick together, and I still considered myself one of them, so I hung out a lot with Stuart Clark and, during the one-dayers, Simon Katich and Shane Watson. I’m not really a strategic person when it comes to friendships, so I guess I went whichever way the wind was blowing.
The one off-field matter I’d struggled with since the start of my international career was stopping my mind from racing as I tried to get my non-negotiable eight hours of nightly sleep. I was discovering that the biggest mental hazard in Test cricket is that it leaves you with too much time to think. When you’re waiting to bat, there’s too much time to wonder what can go wrong. When you’re out cheaply, there’s too much time to relive it all and worry about what the selectors are going to do. When you’re in the field, there’s too much time to stress about your next innings and the stage of the game. And when you’re back at the hotel trying to get to sleep, you’re still playing out every scenario in your mind, a knock-on effect of all the doubts and clouds that have built up through
the day.
Sleeping was a something I found increasingly difficult. If I’d had a very good sleep, my thinking was straight, I could see the ball more clearly, and I could generally operate a lot better. When I hadn’t slept well or had a low number of hours, my mind was muddled, I wasn’t seeing the ball as sharply, and I felt stressed and tense.
I saw sleep as a controllable factor in my performance. I wouldn’t compromise on my sleep by staying out late, and I was now controlling it further by taking pills that were prescribed by the doctors at Cricket Australia. I wasn’t worried about the risks. I struggled with getting off to sleep so I took one.
There were other strategies. I began using meditation, relaxation and breathing techniques, but I certainly found that sleeping tablets were the most effective. I was pretty open in talking about it with teammates. Some of the boys joked that I couldn’t live without them. Other guys used them and thought they worked well. I didn’t care what other people thought. I knew they were good for me. I didn’t have a problem with them, which I knew because every time I went home, for however long, I never used them. I knew I didn’t have a dependency.
The second Test in Durban was Warnie’s hundredth, and Ricky was at the peak of his powers, making a hundred in each innings. I got 75 in the first innings but it was a real battle. My first twenty were very hard work, and then I was batting with the tail, which freed me up a bit, but I was streaky and a bit lucky, slogging a few at the end. I found Durban hard, and two years later it would leave me with some bruises I will never forget, courtesy of Dale Steyn. But to be honest, I found the whole of South Africa hard to bat.
In South Africa’s second innings, Warnie wheeled away forever. He didn’t have a great match in Cape Town and he was really pumped for Durban. Even at training he was working a lot harder. He ground away, hardly bowling a loose ball on a good batting wicket, and bowled us to victory. Towards the end it was getting really tight for time, South Africa looking like they might survive for the draw, and he bowled a wrong ’un that struck Ntini. It might have been going over the top of the stumps, but the umpire gave Makhaya out and we had a great celebration – we’d just beaten the team we considered our main challengers 2–0 and 2–0. It was a phenomenal feeling.
The Test pitch at the Wanderers was nothing like what we’d played on in the one-dayer. You needed a lot of luck to survive on a pitch that was both cracked and green. Ashwell Prince got 93 for them in dicey conditions. I thought it was going to be a nightmare chasing South Africa’s 303. Then, on the first ball of our innings, Justin Langer, playing his hundredth Test, turned his head and – Whack, it hit him flush in the head and bounced all the way back to the bowler, Ntini.
We were effectively 3/68 when I came in, but the pitch had settled down a bit, and I had good partnerships with Warnie and Brett Lee. If you could survive the first thirty-five or forty minutes, it was okay for batting. I felt pretty chuffed to make 73, because it was so difficult, but we conceded a lead, and after South Africa’s second innings we needed almost 300 to win.
Suddenly, with Justin having been in hospital with concussion, I was a Test opener again, in less than ideal circumstances. Haydos and Ricky had rare failures, and we still needed 260 when Marto joined me. I was extremely lucky, playing and missing repeatedly. Even Marto played and missed a lot and we both nicked a few. But we kept saying to each other, ‘Play every ball on its merits. If we get a jaffa and get knocked over or get beaten, that’s the way it is, so be it. Don’t worry about anything else.’
We looked ugly, but we got the job done until I was out for 89 and we still needed nearly 100 to win. Simmo slogged a few and tried to get it over with, but he, Gilly, Warnie and Marto all got out in a rush and the final twist was that Brett Lee and Michael Kasprowicz, who had fallen agonisingly short at Edgbaston in 2005, were left with 20 to get. They edged and swished and inched closer.
Meanwhile, there was great drama going on in the dressing room. Ricky walked in from the viewing area and saw Justin padded up to go in at number eleven.
Ricky said, ‘No JL, it’s only a game of cricket, don’t go out there.’
Justin glared at him. ‘No, mate, it’s not just a game of cricket, it’s a Test match for Australia.’ And it was also his hundredth.
‘No, you’re not,’ Ricky said. ‘I’m the captain.’
Justin looked him squarely in the eye and said, ‘If you don’t let me go out there, our friendship is over.’
I don’t know how seriously Ricky took that, but he was saying, ‘You’ve got a wife, you’ve got children, if you get another one in the head you might die.’ He went off and arranged for big Steve Bernard to stand at the race and hold both sides, to block Justin from going out. Justin, predictably, was having none of it, so that it was a Mexican stand-off of sorts.
Thankfully nothing came of it, because Brett belted one over point and we’d won the series 3–0. During the celebrations, I think Marto, who had virtually won the match with his 101, was the proudest he’d been in his whole career. He’d really set out to prove a point since his reinstatement. Some of the guys said later that he should have retired on that day.
Having played tough cricket for nine Tests and more than twenty one-dayers since November, we were all exhausted and looking forward to going home. But no – we had to get on a plane the next day and head to Bangladesh!
I know I’d had to wait a long time to play for Australia, and I wasn’t complaining, but still, it was a tough ask. Amy was juggling a toddler and a new baby, who I’d only seen for one day. The team was coming down from Johannesburg and the emotions of that win, and when we arrived in Fatullah we only had time for one training session, as the Test was starting the next morning. The Bangladeshis weren’t very high in the world cricket rankings, so it was natural for the motivation of the guys to come down a notch.
We got off to a horrendous start. Bangladesh were 1/144 at lunch on the first day, with the left-hander Shahriar Nafees belting us everywhere. It didn’t get much better for a couple of days, as we collapsed to 6/93 in reply to their 427. It took some pretty special individual performances to pull us out of the mire. Gilly made a great 144 in the first innings and rated it one of his best innings. He played differently from the usual Gilly. He was patient and responsible, still playing some big shots but constructing it as a batsman setting himself for a long innings. When all the others were out, he realised it had to be him. I wouldn’t have said it was his best innings, but it was one of the most crucial. Then Warnie, who had struggled on the first day, bowled superbly in Bangladesh’s second dig, and Ricky’s determination, his single-mindedness in not letting them get him out, got us through in the end. Even the way he defended the ball, he was sniffing it off the pitch, watching it so closely, such concentration and energy. His unbeaten 118 was inspirational.
Gilly spoke before leading the song, which he was doing in JL’s absence. He said, ‘I know we’re playing Bangladesh, but that’s one of the best wins I’ve had in my career, to pull ourselves out of that, we should be proud of ourselves.’ It was a really good speech.
Coming so close to losing was a big wake-up call. Our preparation had been inadequate and didn’t pay the proper respect to a Test match. You can’t drop your guard against a sub-continental team in their home conditions. They’re very difficult when they get in front, and we’d let Bangladesh dictate to us.
However, it was hard to get over the feeling that we were being flogged by the scheduling, being sent here by a program that itself didn’t properly respect Test cricket. If they wanted to pay Bangladesh the compliment of having a Test series there, the administrators shouldn’t have programmed it on the back of a six-Test series with South Africa and a big home summer. The result was pretty low morale off the field. Some of the guys were complaining a lot and certainly didn’t want to be there. Several guys were injured, including Marto. The strength in the team was that guys like Ricky and Gilly, the leaders, looked for the positives when things weren’
t going our way. That rubbed off on the others. I was pretty exhausted, having gone through my first full stint in international cricket and being away from home for a long time, but Ricky and Gilly were adamant about fighting our way through these Test matches and three one-dayers, and then there was light at the end of the tunnel.
We had a full day of travel to get to Chittagong for the second Test, and were very tired when we got to the hotel. I just wanted to lie down in my room. I sat on the bed. Uh-oh. It was literally like a table, it was so hard. I lay down and nearly bruised myself. I thought, It’s going to be a long week.
Better acclimatised than in Fatullah, we bowled first again, and Warne, Gillespie and MacGill had them out for 197 on a pretty good batting pitch. Haydos was out late on the first day, and Ricky copped some stick for sending a night watchman in ahead of him. Dizzy Gillespie was the man, having been brought back into the team for the first time since the 2005 Ashes when many of our fast bowlers had broken down with injury.
If Ricky was worried that he’d given up the chance of scoring runs by sending Dizzy ahead of him, he was ropable when Dizzy ran him out for 52. Rain had disrupted the second day and we were all a bit toey, but when I walked out past Ricky on the third morning, after the run-out, steam was coming out of his ears.
Batting with Gillespie was quite an experience. He had always had a solid defence, but as a tail-ender the good ball would eventually undo him or he would lose patience. I honestly believe that on this day his application and concentration, in very hot conditions, were so impregnable because he was scared of going back to the dressing room and facing up to Ricky. When we went in at tea, I don’t remember Ricky saying anything to him, and Dizzy gave him a wide berth.
He kept going and going and going, and was hilarious to bat with, so relaxed and laconic. He kept saying, ‘If it’s on the stumps, I’ll block it. If it’s off the stumps, I’ll smash it.’ I said, ‘Yeah, sure mate, whatever you think.’
Underneath the Southern Cross Page 14
