SPIN’s 2009 review, part I: Tresco, Mongoose and Mathews’ high five…

Taken from the 2009 Review issue of SPIN, in shops now, and featuring interviews with Andrew Strauss, Michael Vaughan and Stuart Broad, the debut of Andy Caddick as our star columnist and the full Top 50 countdown. Not to mention Hawkeye’s review of the year and Garry Sobers on why he still trusts Sir Allen Stanford.

50 Marcus Trescothick, champion batter (All year)

There are few precedents for one of the world’s best batsmen dominating county cricket with no prospect of an international recall. Ramprakash and Hick’s Test capabilities remained forever in dispute. Geoff Boycott opted out of Tests for three years in the mid-’70s but came straight back in when he chose. 

Leaving aside, too, the likes of South Africans Barry Richards and Jimmy Cook who tore up county cricket when a bigger stage was denied them, Marcus Trescothick is close to a unique case. His reputation as a batsman has only grown since he played his last England game, as long ago as November 2006, not just because of England’s ODI woes in his absence, but through the sheer weight of runs he has scored for Somerset. 

Eight centuries and 1817 runs in the County Championship this season – plus a batting masterclass of 56 off 32 balls on Twenty20 finals day to finish off Kent, the tournament favourites – helped prompt a media campaign for Trescothick to be called-up for the Ashes decider at the Brit Oval. That was always, England insiders confirm, far-fetched. But Trescothick said – at least publicly – that he saw travelling to India for the inaugural Champions League with Somerset in October as a dry-run for bigger things. His early departure from the event, with a recurrence of his stress-related illness confirmed that the IPL, as well as any lingering talk of an England comeback, must now be forgotten for good, leaving Trescothick to dominate county cricket for as long as he chooses. 

49 The tiny bat (May)

With a blade six inches shorter than a conventional bat – and a handle six inches longer – the Mongoose, launched at Lord’s in May, attracted blanket publicity, from BBC Breakfast to the Today programme to the Daily Telegraph. It represented, claimed inventor Marcus Codrington Fernandez, the first major change to the basic design of cricket bats for 200 years, perfect for an era where scoring off every ball rather than merely surviving, had become the primary purpose of batting. 

Chatroom cynics rubbished it, but soon it was making inroads into the pro game. The flagship product – said to give batters extra ‘whip’ and an increase batspeed of 20 per cent – had attracted the media interest but it was the modified version – still shorter than standard, still with no visible splice – that took off among the pros. 

“It can be tricky establishing a new brand,” Codrington Fernandez told SPIN in November. “But we’ve sold more bats in six months than we had planned to in the first two years. Dwayne Smith winning the Twenty20 Cup for Sussex with a Mongoose was a highlight and then we signed one of England’s most high-profile players – James Anderson – as well as Mohammad Ashraful of Bangladesh, who will be using it in Tests in England next spring. It’s been fantastic.” 

The Mongoose is launching in India next spring and Codrington Fernandez, ex-advertising cheese and lifelong club cricketer, has more up his sleeve. “We’re confident we will be signing one of the world’s top five players to use the Mongoose in next year’s IPL,” he says.

48 Angelo Mathews’ high five (June)

It’s a given that one-day cricket improved fielding and Twenty20 improved it even further. This year, it was taken to new heights – literally – with Sri Lanka’s Angelo Mathews showing the way in the ICC World T20 game against West Indies. With a shot from Ramnaresh Sarwan sailing over the boundary, Mathews ran outside the rope and leapt high, patting the ball back into play, volleyball-style. Commentators raised in the age where out-fielders only put down their newspapers in extreme circumstances, got very carried away and wondered if such a display of cricket-based athleticism was legal. The umpires said it was and so, after due deliberation, did the MCC.

47 Adil Rashid’s debut (June)

Rashid was only four months past his 21st birthday when he made his England debut in the ICC World Twenty20 but it felt as if he – and England supporters –- had been waiting forever. How long was it, though? The three years since he took 6/67 on his Yorkshire debut, three years in which his elevation to the Test side had come to be seen as inevitable? Or the ten years since the ECB brought over Terry Jenner, Shane Warne’s mentor, to establish their Elite Wrist Spin Development Programme? Or – possibly – the 58 years since Kent’s Doug Wright, the last English leg-spinner to take 100 Test wickets, last played? 

No pressure then. 

Rashid had been eased in as a non-playing member of the England tour party in India in December 2008, and then taken to the West Indies for the ride. After all that, his debut against Holland was slightly underwhelming – but the way he bounced back, bowling straighter and with more intent in the famous win over Pakistan, showed just how confident he was and how quickly he learned. 

In between Rashid’s T20 debut and his ODI debut later in the summer fell Andrew Flintoff’s Test retirement. England fans have some reason to hope the coincidence could prove significant.

46 ICL players return (April)

For two years, the issue of the rebel Indian Twenty20 league had hung over world cricket. Big names – Mo Yousuf, Shane Bond – were banned from Tests; the ECB formally tried to stop ICL-contracted Kolpaks – Andrew Hall, Ian Harvey – from playing county cricket; counties let go senior players – Stuart Law, Saqlain Mushtaq – because of their ICL links. 

The unedifying attempt to stop ICL-affiliated players from earning a living in official cricket was the one issue that proved world cricket was, one way or another, in the pocket
of its wealthiest stakeholder, the BCCI. 

Then, with the ICL apparently having come to a dead end and cricket boards having tired of fighting legally hopeless cases, the power struggle was off. The amnesty, announced by the BCCI, was typically shambolic. ICL ‘rebels’ would supposedly still be banned from international cricket for 12 more months – yet Abdul Razzaq was back playing for Pakistan within a fortnight. ICL rebels could, however, play domestic cricket – yet at England’s (domestic) Twenty20 Cup finals day, Northants were cut out from the chance of appearing in the Champions League (for domestic teams), because they had three ex-ICL players in their team. As clear as mud, then. But teams can now pick who they like. Probably.

Taken from the 2009 Review issue of SPIN, in shops now, and featuring interviews with Andrew Strauss, Michael Vaughan and Stuart Broad, the debut of Andy Caddick as our star columnist and the full Top 50 countdown. Not to mention Hawkeye’s review of the year and Garry Sobers on why he still trusts Sir Allen Stanford.