Driving Ambition - My Autobiography

by Andrew Strauss

My celebrations were briefly interrupted by a telephone call. I answered, expecting it to be a friend or a family member. Instead, I heard the following: ‘Mr Strauss, this is the Prime Minister’s office. He would like to offer you his congratulations in person. If this is OK with you, he will be ringing you shortly.’

  I considered trying to freshen myself up a little and was concerned that it was going to be obvious that a few drinks had passed my lips, but in the end I really wasn’t bothered. What else would the Prime Minister expect? He had surely heard about the visit to 10 Downing Street after the 2005 Ashes …

  Finally the call came through, and I thought it was a fantastic gesture from David Cameron. He was enthusiastic, sincere and obviously really pleased that we had managed to vanquish the Aussies. I passed on his congratulations to the lads and got back to the serious business of enjoying the moment. A couple of hours later, we all found ourselves sitting together on the outfield of the SCG.

  I take a look at the group of individuals around me. There are people from all walks of life. Some were born abroad, in faraway climes. Others had hardly set foot outside the UK until cricket came a-calling. Northerners and southerners, private schools and comprehensives, young and old, tweeters and non-tweeters – all sitting together. As well as the cricketers, there are the coaches, a physiotherapist, a doctor, a psychologist, an analyst, a media-relations expert and a masseur. Everyone has taken a very different path with their lives, only for us all to end up here together, on a cricket field in Australia, having been through an extraordinary shared experience.

  One of the people who would have least expected to be sitting in the circle is Eoin Morgan. A prodigiously talented Irishman, he probably had dreams of playing rugby or some other sport for his country at a young age. Although he has played no part in the series, he has been a very popular member of the touring squad. The conversation in the huddle has stopped momentarily and, after a short period of silence, Morgan starts talking about his favourite moments of the tour. Once he has finished, David Saker, the bowling coach, follows with his memories and before long all the players and support staff are recounting what they remember about the remarkable seven weeks we have all been through. The combination of emotion and alcohol combine to make this moment particularly poignant. You can hear a pin drop as we go from person to person.

  Perhaps a little caught up in all the nostalgia, and trying to nail my one abiding memory of the tour before my turn comes, I cast my mind back to what we have all been through, and immediately some incredibly vivid recollections come back to me, each one linked to an Australian city.

  Hobart

  I am sitting in the dressing room with Alastair Cook, Andy Flower and Paul Collingwood, beer in hand. It is not long after lunchtime and we have just completed a ten-wicket victory against Australia A. Our final warm-up game is now finished and tomorrow we will be making our way to Brisbane for the first Test. In fact, our main bowlers, Anderson, Broad and Finn, are already there, getting used to the stifling humidity that is so different from the more temperate conditions in Tasmania. Conversation turns to the match that we have just played.

  So far, everything on the tour had gone exactly according to the long, elaborate and meticulous plan that we had put together as part of our preparations for the tour. In the months leading up to the 2010–11 Ashes, we had set ourselves the challenge of being the most thoroughly prepared English team ever to leave these shores in the quest to win the Ashes. Eighteen months of work had gone into the process, involving a number of different ECB departments, alongside myself, Andy Flower and the rest of the management team. Hugh Morris had been especially busy, making sure that the tour itinerary allowed us enough time to prepare properly for the start of the series, while, probably for the first time ever, we had also involved the players fully in the preparation process.

  Under the excellent tutelage of Steve Bull, the previous psychologist to the England team and now a corporate consultant and leadership mentor, we had arranged a number of pre-Test dinners for the players during the summer of 2010. The idea was to create an informal environment for them to start thinking about the Ashes series, as well as getting their hugely important input about how best to prepare for the series. Over the course of those dinners, we covered a lot of ground. All sorts of issues were thrown around, from the relative strengths and weaknesses of the two sides, to what the unique challenges of an Ashes series were likely to be and our potential responses to those challenges.

  Some of what we got back from those meetings we expected. However, there were issues and potential solutions that we would perhaps never have addressed if we hadn’t involved the players. As a result, we gave a lot of thought to how best to get away from the pressure of the series between games, as well as how to approach the warm-up games and how to handle the Australian public. Suddenly, the prospect of touring Australia became much more real. An added benefit was that as the players had been part of the preparations, they were far more likely to buy into our methods. We all knew what lay in front of us and how we were going to deal with it.

  One thing that was agreed on was for us to treat the warm-up games like a mini, three-match Test series. We decided to make sure that we won that series, so as not to fall into the trap of starting a tour on the wrong foot, something that had caused problems for so many England teams in the past. Now, that victory in Hobart against Australia A, following a thrilling run chase against Western Australia in Perth in the first match of the tour, had given us a 2–0 victory in the mini-series. It was just what we wanted. All the batsmen had got runs and the wickets had been shared evenly amongst the bowlers. We had no form worries.

  What had also struck us all by then was just how negative the Australian public were being about their team’s chances. Hours of planning had gone into how we should react to the Aussie supporters, who normally see it as their civic duty to get stuck into the Poms at every opportunity. However, our experience out and about in the early weeks of the tour seemed to confirm the growing suspicion that the Aussies did not rate their cricket team as they once did.

  For the first time, they genuinely thought we had a chance.

  Paul Collingwood takes a sip from his bottled beer. ‘Lads, we have just thumped Australia’s best young players by an innings,’ he proclaims in his thick Geordie accent. ‘You know what, we are 100 per cent ready for that first Test in Brisbane.’

  I nod my head in agreement and feel a warm, comforting sensation in my stomach. We are ready.

  Brisbane, Part 1

  I feel the ball make contact with my bat. The vibrations immediately tell me that it hasn’t come off the middle. In fact, the feedback tells me that, from my attempted cut shot, it has come off the top edge. I look up to see where the ball is going. There is a gap between the third slip and gully fielders and I desperately hope it has managed to find that opening. It is clear, though, that it is travelling straight towards the gully fielder, Mike Hussey, and I just have time for a frantic plea to the gods for him to drop it before the eruption of the crowd tells me all I need to know. I am out, caught Hussey, bowled Hilfenhaus for 0. It was the third ball of the Ashes series.

  Our arrival in Brisbane for the first Test marked the end of the phoney war. Even in my time in the England cricket team, the pre-Ashes hype has increased dramatically, with news vans and interviewers now camping outside hotels, looking for any scrap of information to feed the voracious appetite of the twenty-four-hour news cycle. All of this makes it particularly hard for the players to keep their minds on the job.

  The final hours before the start of the game were like purgatory. Although we were completely prepared for what was to come, the combination of adrenalin continually pumping through our veins and the importance of the match in Brisbane meant that everything, from eating to sleeping, was a struggle.

  The bus ride from the hotel to the ground was quiet. Players were lost in thought about how they were going to fare on the day. I wasn’t worried, though. It was ent
irely normal. Immediately on arrival at the ground, the vibrant atmosphere of the occasion lightened the mood. A lap around the ground as a planned part of the warm-up routine allowed us to take in the impressive spectacle. With more than an hour to go before the start of the game, the ground was close to full and the boos and whistles that came in our direction from every section of the crowd told us all we needed to know. We were on enemy territory.

  Minutes later, I was in the middle, shaking the hand of Ricky Ponting, the Australian captain, and getting ready for the toss. This was definitely one I secretly would not mind losing. There was a tinge of green in the wicket, but with Nasser Hussain having made the fatal mistake of inserting Australia in 2002, only to see them rack up nearly 500 runs, I had made up my mind to bat first regardless. The coin came down in my favour. We were going to bat, and my attention had to change quickly from captain to opening batsman.

  I felt in wonderful form going into the match. Two hundreds in the warm-up games, scored with great fluency, told me that my mind and technique were both in a good place. Also, as captain, I was determined to get out there and lead the guys on what is always the toughest day in an Ashes series. Setting the right tone, with so many nerves around, is very difficult, especially when you are batting. This was one of those moments when it was vital that the captain led the way. As Cook and I made our way to the middle, I experienced a feeling of grim determination. This was my moment.

  For a second, I am completely shell-shocked. I cannot believe what has just happened. I look up towards the Australian fielders, who are all huddling together in celebration. Slowly I become aware of the severity of the situation. Four years after Steve Harmison bowled the first ball of the 2006–07 Ashes series straight to second slip, I have just set exactly the same tone. The captain has succumbed to the pressure and England are 0–1 in the first over of the series. I trudge back to the dressing room, knowing that I will have to rely on my team-mates to change the story. My part in the opening salvos is over.

  Brisbane, Part 2

  Again, I look up to see where the ball has gone. I have just played my favourite cut shot, this time off the spin of Xavier Doherty. It has gone fine of the backward-point fielder and immediately I know that it is going to race away for four runs. I let out a totally spontaneous guttural scream of relief, before punching the air. Alastair Cook makes his way towards me to offer his congratulations. I take off my helmet, raise my bat and just for a moment allow myself to wallow in the warm glow of an Ashes hundred away from home. All of this only three days after my first-innings duck.

  The game in Brisbane did not follow our carefully planned script in any way. After my first-over dismissal, a semi-recovery was shattered by a hat-trick by Peter Siddle. Even though we were on the receiving end, it was pure cricketing theatre and it was a fitting way to justify the unbelievable hype that surrounded the fixture. At the end of play, we all knew that our eventual first-innings score of 260 was nowhere near enough. Fortunately spirits were still reasonably high. Along one bench in the subterranean dressing room sat Matt Prior, myself and Stuart Broad. All three of us had been dismissed for 0, and in total we had faced five balls between us. The fact that three ducks were sitting in a row was not lost on our team-mates, who seemed to enjoy our bad fortune in a way that only cricketers who have been through similar disasters can understand.

  Australia went on to score 481, largely courtesy of Mike Hussey. Ironically, he came into the game under serious pressure for his place in the side and his first ball dropped agonisingly short of third slip. If the ball had carried a foot further, it may have spelled the end of his international career. Such are the small margins in cricket. However, it didn’t, and he proved once again just what a fine player he is with his 195. I don’t think there is anyone out there, with the possible exception of Rahul Dravid, who could concentrate for as long as Hussey. With our game plan largely based on suffocating opposition players, he was one of the few in world cricket whose patience consistently outlasted that of our bowlers.

  With our backs suddenly against the wall, we knew it would take something very special for us to escape the game with anything other than a heavy defeat. The task facing us was to bat for almost two days, albeit on a wicket that was flattening out.

  After an initial scare, when the first ball from Hilfenhaus came alarmingly close to completing the dreaded pair for me, Alastair Cook and I undertook the task with real gusto, knowing that simply trying to survive would not get us in the right mindset. After I departed, shortly after lunch on day four, having scored 110, Jonathan Trott and Cook then set about producing the sort of partnership that an English fan could only dream about. Australia tried everything to get them out, but to no avail. For over seven hours at the crease they could not be prised apart.

  The score of 517–1 will go down in folklore for anyone that was on that tour. Ever since, wherever we are around the world, a massive, blown-up picture of the scoreboard at Brisbane, with those figures, alongside the scores of 235 and 135, for Cook and Trott respectively, has pride of place in the dressing room.

  We had managed the great escape.

  Adelaide

  We are all huddled together at the Adelaide Oval, celebrating the wicket of Michael Clarke. I don’t think that any of us can quite believe the start we have had in the second Test match. In the space of the first thirteen balls of the game, we have dismissed Simon Katich, run out with a direct hit from Jonathan Trott, Ricky Ponting, caught first ball, and now Michael Clarke. This is the flattest wicket in Australia and we lost the toss. At last, James Anderson has got the rewards he deserves after bowling magnificently at Brisbane without much success. I am in the middle, urging the players to keep calm and not look too far ahead. Emotions can run away with you in these circumstances, and the last thing we need now is to give the Aussies a way back into the game. As the players sip on the isotonic drinks delivered by the twelfth men, we can all sense that this might be one of the pivotal moments of the Test series. Australia are on the ropes at home in an Ashes series for the first time in decades.

  In a situation that echoed the feelings following the Cardiff Test match in 2009, we had taken all the momentum into the Adelaide Test match. The Australians’ plight was not helped by having some very weary bowlers after their marathon second-innings stint in the field, as well as their selectors dropping Mitchell Johnson after an inconsistent display in Brisbane. Of all the contributors to the 2010–11 Ashes, the Australian selectors, in my opinion, performed the worst of everyone. You can never tell what is going on in an opposition dressing room, but by dropping Johnson after one Test, as well as jettisoning Nathan Hauritz before the series even started and constant chopping and changing throughout, their selectors did nothing to dispel the impression that there was panic in the Australian ranks. It reminded us of the worst days of English selection, decades earlier.

  In the huddle before taking the field, I got James Anderson, the leader of the bowling attack, to speak to the players. He went on to stress the importance of staying patient, trying to go for less than three an over and building up pressure. We all knew that we had a long day ahead of us on a very flat wicket.

  Our early breakthroughs, though, completely changed the complexion of the game. We had the Aussies by the jugular and we had to press home our advantage. Bowling them out for 245, despite another rearguard performance by Mike Hussey, represented a complete triumph for our bowling attack and set the game up perfectly for our batsmen to take advantage on day two of the Test match.

  This time it was the turn of Kevin Pietersen to take centre stage, scoring a blistering 227 in the manner only he can. Alongside him, Alastair Cook was looking as if the Aussies would never dismiss him. His hundred really took the sting out of the attack. We had the Australians by the scruff of the neck, and Bell and Prior added the final insult with a partnership of 52 in just 33 balls before I opted to declare, with a score of 620–5.

  Only ten wickets and a forecast that warned
of heavy rain on the last afternoon of the game stood in the way of a redeeming Ashes victory in Adelaide, and despite some excellent resistance from Michael Clarke, who was ironically dismissed by Kevin Pietersen in the last over of the fourth day, the Australians were unable to stem the tide. Graeme Swann took his fifth wicket of the innings to bring the game to an end shortly before lunch on day five. Within an hour, the ground was completely under water, drenched by the anticipated rain.

  The ghost of Adelaide 2006 had been laid to rest.

  Melbourne

  I grab my England blazer and cap from their hooks above my seat in the dressing room and put them on. I walk through the great labyrinth of tunnels and roads underneath the enormous superstructure of the Melbourne Cricket Ground and make my way out to the ground for the toss. On my way, I am met by James Avery, our media-relations man, who gives me the two team sheets that he has printed for me to hand to Ricky Ponting and the match referee. As I step onto the outfield, it is bathed in sunlight, showing the splendour of the MCG, with its 90,000 seating capacity, in all its glory. Briefly, the hairs at the back of my neck stand up as I appreciate the enormous size of the ground and the significance of the day’s cricket ahead of us.

  This is Boxing Day, the most important day in the Australian cricket calendar, and with a full house expected, we could be seeing one of the largest crowds ever for a game of cricket. In addition, after Australia’s emphatic win in Perth, the series is locked at one a piece. With so much expectation, anticipation and emotion around, today has the potential to be absolutely pivotal in deciding the direction of the Ashes series. Quite simply, this is the most important day of cricket in my life.

  After exchanging pleasantries with Ponting, the match referee, Ranjan Madugalle, and Mark Nicholas, the presenter for Channel 9, I wait for Ricky Ponting to toss the coin. It goes up. I call ‘heads’ and wait for it to fall. Finally it comes to rest. Heads it is.