Paul Collingwood: My 2008

Your 135 against South Africa at Edgbaston in August came just in time to save your place. How aware were you of all the talk about your Test future?
The thing is you don’t need the press to tell you what the situation is. Usually, it’s all doom and gloom when you read the press and they make it seem a lot worse than it really is. But on this occasion I knew exactly the situation I was in [Collingwood had scored 43 runs in his previous six Test innings] and I knew pretty much 100 per cent that if I didn’t perform in that second innings, that was going to be it for a little while. So it was a tough situation to be in but I’ve been in it before and come through it. It was amazing how it turned around, really.

You’d had a bad decision in the first Test at Lord’s, out for 7 off a bat-pad-that-wasn’t. How did you react to that?
When you’re in bad form, you can start to think everything’s against you. I’d genuinely felt probably for the first time all summer that I could make a big score. I started off pretty well; Morne Morkel was throwing some short stuff at us and I took him on right from the word go. It was the first time I felt I’d got myself into a little bit of a system – I know I didn’t score many but it was disappointing. You don’t bear a grudge against the umpire: they just got it wrong on the day.

When your Test career is on 
the line, can you step back and say to yourself, ‘Well, I’m a professional cricketer, my life is actually pretty good’ and get things in perspective?
To be honest, cricket is my life. It’s very easy for people from the outside to turn round and say ‘You’ve got a great life.’ But how happy you are is down 
to how you’re doing on the cricket pitch. Family life is an important part of it but our lives are cricket and playing for England and there’s a lot of pressure involved in that.
When you’re in those situations you feel as though the whole world is on top of you. And the only way to get out of it is to actually score the runs. It’s amazing that it gets to the point where it’s so bad that you think you’ve got nothing to lose. It’s so frustrating. You know you’ve still got the ability and that your technique hasn’t changed much and you know it’s only the mental side. But the ultimate thing is that you get confidence back from getting runs in the middle.
The turning point? The decision to give up the one-day captaincy, which I made the night before, the Thursday. Mentally, that was a weight off my shoulders. I didn’t actually release that decision until the Saturday night when Vaughany decided to resign the Test captaincy after we’d lost. But that was a bit of a coincidence.
I’d rang my wife up on the Thursday: I hadn’t got any runs then I’d had a bad day in the field which was very unlike me. I always tend to do a job with the ball and catch my catches. But I’d dropped a couple of catches and got panned in my two overs and it was a real case of ‘This is as low as I can get’. And I remember speaking to the wife on Thursday night and saying, ‘Listen, it’s time to give the captaincy up, the last thing I want to do is lose my place in the Test squad.’
The other crucial factor was that it was last-chance saloon. And I’ve always had the character that I’d rather go down fighting and play in my natural manner. So if I was going to get out I was going to get out attacking. And it was amazing once I’d got into that frame of mind – switching 
from survival to taking the attack to the bowlers and trying to score runs.

So the one-day captaincy was a pressure for you, even during a Test series?
Of course. Captaincy doesn’t finish the day the one-day series finishes. There’s still issues behind the scenes, big decisions to make. The run out situation [against New Zealand at the Oval] was still playing on my mind. All these things mentally drain your energy.
I’ve always said that I need 100 per cent of my energy just to stay in the side and perform at the best of my ability. And the captaincy seemed to take too much energy away from my overall game.

Were you surprised at what a big deal the Grant Elliott run-out became?
I was a little surprised at some of the comments coming from parts of the press, especially people who’d played the game. Captains that I’d played under: 
I knew exactly what decision they’d have made.

You’re thinking of Nasser Hussain…
I’m not naming any names. But I was a little disappointed at the time. I thought: ‘I played under you. I know what you would have done.’ It hurt us a lot. That decision and the whole reaction to it took a lot of energy out of me: that was a gut-instinct decision, that was how I felt and after all the reaction I thought: ‘If that was my gut instinct and it was so bad then…’. You start getting doubts. Are you the right captain?
I looked into it afterwards. Steve Waugh had done it in 1999 in Barbados. Apparently, Brendon Julian pretty much rugby tacked Sherwin 
Campbell to the floor and then Waugh told him to eff off on the way out! So by those standards, I was quite happy with what I’d done. But Steve Waugh turned out to be a legend and a tough captain and I turned out to be… nothing.

Then you had the four-match ban for the slow over-rate. Did you feel that was harsh, that the captain should take such personal responsibility for that?
No, we know the situation. The rule’s there. As captain, you know the situation. I was on a level 2 warning from the game against India at Bristol last year. We were very slow. It happens 
in the really tight games. As captain you have to give yourself more time to make decision and get your field in exactly the right place.
That game at Bristol they scored 320-odd runs: we were fetching the ball back from the stands most for the time. That was my argument. And then this game at the Oval got so close; it took a long time to get everything right. And when I came off, having had the run-out situation, I obviously wasn’t in a position to defend everything that had gone on out there. It’s funny but I think everyone thought that the ban was for the run-out.

How do you look back on your year as England one-day captain now?
It was such a hard decision to give it up. I was enjoying parts of it. Leading the boys out on the pitch is something you’re always going to miss. And the win in Sri Lanka – especially without Freddie, who plays a massive part in the balance of the side. You think, ‘Not many teams could do that.’ I honestly think we were heading in the right direction, and making strides as a team. I mean – we still are, don’t get me wrong! So I’ve got fond memories of doing it. But there’s times like the run-out situation where you look back and you’re glad it’s gone.

Being back in the ranks is a weight off your shoulders…
Course it is. I’ve grown up from being a young lad with an ambition of wanting to play cricket for England. I never really, to be honest, had ambitions to captain. When the opportunity came along, I had to take it. You can’t miss opportunities like that: I had a place in both sides and I thought it was the right time.

One odd moment of your captaincy this year was the New Zealand tour: the team stormed the Twenty20s, then suddenly looked very meek in the ODIs. What happened?
New Zealand are a funny side to play against. They have match-winners who can blow you out of the park. And Brendon McCullum was going through a real hot streak. But you’re right. They didn’t have Vettori or Oram in the T20s. Our performances were 100 per cent, from planning to performance and we looked really strong. But they missed the likes of Vettori.
They’re a dangerous side; they’re not that high up in the rankings for nothing. They gave us a cricketing lesson in how to approach one-day cricket: when you’re on top of a team, you make sure you nail them. And they pretty much did that. They stick to their plans really well. And as a team we were still developing in that direction.

Overall, do you look back on 2008 as a good year or a bad year – or a slightly strange year?
I guess it’s been a disappointing year in the fact that I resigned as captain and I didn’t score as many runs as I would have wanted. But the positives – at the back end of that summer, it was massive. I truly believe that during the 60-odd I scored – and the 20 knocking the runs off in the second innings – in the last Test against South Africa I played better than in the hundred I made in the third Test. I truly believe those last two innings of the summer were the best I’ve ever played. So to get there from where I was takes me into a new chapter, I think. So, a disappointing year – but not disastrous.

And your county, Durham, became champions – though you must have felt semi-detached from all that?
Yeah: to be honest, I had very little to do with it. The games I played I didn’t contribute too many runs. But it’s a phenomenal achievement for such a young county. I’m just so pleased for Don Robson and Geoff Cook: they had a dream and a belief in what they could build so to get that ultimate prize and to do it so soon is a great achievement.


Paul Collingwood uses Slazenger bats and equipment

The day Durham won the title

The LV County Championship title went to the wire. Going into the last round, Nottinghamshire were top and had to hold their nerve against Hampshire to take the title. But, as Notts lost their way at Trent Bridge, Durham were sweeping Kent aside at Canterbury.

“We worked our knackers off to get that win,” says Durham keeper Phil Mustard, who started the season getting axed by England but made up for it by enjoying the most successful season in Durham’s history. “The party started once we got passed 400 [a lead of 175] because we knew Notts were struggling. When it came to the Saturday, we needed five wickets to clinch it. Once we got Justin Kemp out early doors, we knew we could finish it by lunch, and that’s when it really kicked off.

 “We got on the coach when Notts were about five wickets down, chasing 452, and one of the guys piped up on the bus and said, ‘This is what’s gonna happen: every time a wicket goes down you’ve gotta finish the drink that’s in your hand’. When it came to it, the last five wickets went down in quick succession – and we were drinking cans, not half-pints or anything like that. So by the time the ninth wicket went we’d had four downs in quick succession. There were a few people struggling.

“What made it even worse was, just as Tahir appealed for the last wicket, we went into the Dartford Tunnel and lost our signal. So for about three minutes we didn’t know if we’d won or not. It turned out we hadn’t, but as soon as we got out of the tunnel Shreck top-edged it and that was it. The party was just hotting up nicely then.

“It’s been great around town since: people have let us into pubs, they’ve let us do whatever. We had a members dinner on Monday night, and about 1000 members turned up just to see us pick up the trophy.”

Many of the 17 seasons since Durham were admitted to first-class cricket were spent propping up the table. That first year, 1992, a team of past-their-best big names finished bottom and it wasn’t until 1998 that the county even finished above 16th. Another veteran, David Boon, helped raise the county’s fortunes briefly in the late ’90s, but it was only with the promotion of 2005 that Durham finally become a force to be reckoned with.

Whatever the contributions of Durham’s canny signings in recent years, success has been based around a gang of local lads who came through their academy system, including Paul Collingwood, Steve Harmison, Graham Onions, Liam Plunkett and Mustard himself.  “We’re very close,” says Mustard. “We always go out together for a bite to eat and stuff. We’re just a young bunch of lads who enjoy a good time and share the bad times as well.”

Not that there were too many of those this year. Durham reached the semi-finals of the Twenty20 Cup and the Friends Provident Trophy and then clinched their first title. “It was great for people like Paul Collingwood and Steve Harmison – all the lads who played through the tough times, when we were getting beat every single week,” says Mustard. “Harmy’s a tough guy, but watching how beautiful it was and how much it meant to him was fantastic.

“The people of the North-east love their sport so much. We get a lot more newspaper coverage now, because we are the most successful team in the North-east. Newcastle aren’t doing very well. Sunderland have been up and down.

“You’ve gotta put a lot down to Geoff Cook. He’s a brilliant one-to-one coach, who understands exactly what people need. That’s how he got the best out of Stephen Harmison this year. Geoff knows exactly how to treat Harmy.”

Harmison was the star of the county season, taking 60 championship wickets, after being dropped by England in the winter. “Every time Harmy’s come back to Durham he’s bowled fantastic,” says Mustard. “He’s always enjoyed being here; he likes to get home and be with his family, and it’s same here: we’re like family to him. He enjoys it: he doesn’t get pestered by the media or by coaches. People just let him get on with what he’s got to do.

“There’s times where you’ll look at Stephen and you’ll think he’s not gonna get a wicket. You think, Harmy, have a break and come back later on. That’s happened a lot: he’s come back and been devastating in his next spell. The big one was against Yorkshire against Michael Vaughan: he came back and bowled a 14- or 15-over spell with serious pace, and he got Vaughan out. He knows that when we need a wicket he can produce it for the team.”

Not that he can do it on his own. The support of the seam-bowling pair of Callum Thorp and Mark Davies was crucial as the pressure mounted towards the end of the season. “They build pressure. That’s partly why Steve’s got all these wickets, ’cos those two have chipped away at the other end.”

So how did the biggest day in Durham’s history end? “We got back to Durham about 9.30,” says Mustard. “What state were we in? Er, not a very good one. After that, we had a table at one of the bars in Durham; it was a fantastic night.”