Читать книгу The Botham Report - Ian Botham, Ian Botham - Страница 11

‘The problem as I saw it was that he [Gooch] didn’t understand that one man’s meat was another man’s poison.’

Graham Gooch’s period as captain of the England side was not without its successes. Indeed on that first winter trip to the West Indies in 1989–90 they were unlucky to lose the series 2–1 to Viv Richards’ side. Against all the odds England produced a wonderful performance to win the first Test at Sabina Park, Jamaica, and had the rain not fallen to wash out their hopes of victory in the third Test in Trinidad, they would have taken a 2–0 lead and earned at least a share of the series. In fact, victory at Port of Spain might have been decisive. Several of the players who had made West Indies such a great force in international cricket over the previous decade were coming towards the end of their careers. Gordon Greenidge and Malcolm Marshall were under particular pressure. And in certain quarters it was even being suggested that Richards would also have to make way for younger blood.

Had England won in Trinidad it is almost certain that big changes would have been made and I doubt whether West Indies would then have been able to turn things round in the way that they did, winning the last two Test matches at Barbados and Antigua to take the series. Even then England were only denied a share of the spoils by a magnificent spell of bowling from Curtly Ambrose in the fourth Test at Bridgetown.

England also had success in the 1990 summer series against India and New Zealand, winning both series against reasonable opposition by a single Test. Our 2–2 draw with the West Indies at home in 1991 which I had the pleasure of securing with the winning hit in the final Test at The Oval, the 2–0 victory over New Zealand on the winter tour of 1991–92 in New Zealand, and the second place we achieved in the 1992 World Cup were all positive results.

There was plenty to admire in the way Gooch went about things on a personal level. His ability to lead from the front was unquestioned. And his hundreds in the 1991 series against the West Indies may well have proved the difference between a successful and unsuccessful summer. I also marvelled at the fact that Gooch’s batting seemed to get better with age. He had made the positive decision to try and prolong his career by getting himself as physically fit as he possibly could, and his intensive training routines worked well for him. No one could doubt his determination and commitment, not to mention his skill with the bat.

The problem as I saw it was that he didn’t understand that one man’s meat was another man’s poison. And this led to a tension in the relationship between him and David Gower that was not only contrary to the best interests of the side, but which I believe ultimately cost him the respect of the cricketing public as well as the England captaincy.

Gooch’s methods encapsulated a more scientific approach to preparation for tours, namely, rigorous fitness assessments at the Football Association’s National Human Performance Centre at Lilleshall and programmes devised by the assessor John Brewer, designed to make England’s players as fit at the end of a day’s play as they would be at the start.

Gooch felt that these programmes would not only make the players physically stronger, they would also encourage them to be mentally tougher. But the issue was confused by the re-entry to Test cricket of David Gower during that summer of 1990 and later, by my return to the side at the end of the summer of 1991 prior to the World Cup trip.

When Gower was recalled for the first Test against India in 1990 after an absence of seven Test matches, he was very much on trial for his place on the 1990–91 tour to Australia. He did nothing out of the ordinary in the first two matches at Lord’s and Old Trafford but he lit up the third match at The Oval with a sublime 157 not out in the second innings, and prepared to pack his bags.

Gooch and Gower were England’s top run-makers on that unsuccessful 1990–91 Australia tour, but that apart they had very little in common throughout.

Having achieved a measure of success in the West Indies a year previously with his new fitness methods, Gooch was understandably keen to implement them for this particular trip as well. And when Gower turned up at Lilleshall for the pre-tour fitness assessments he came face to face for the first time with Gooch’s fitness guru, a certain Colin Tomlin.

Tomlin had worked with Kent and Essex on an unofficial basis, and had a reputation for pushing players to their physical limits. He certainly did in Gower’s case on this first occasion. For the workload he imposed on Gower left the laid-back one laid-out.

To my mind, having picked Gower for that winter tour to Australia, Gooch should have left it up to him to decide how he was going to go about things. Instead of relying on Gower to make sure he didn’t let his immense talent down, Gooch tried to mould him into his idea of a ‘team man’. But he totally misread the situation. One of David’s terrific strengths is that he has always been an individualist. There is no way you could harness him and his talent by trying to boss him about. But that is exactly what Gooch and Stewart tried to do on that Australian tour. And on occasions they ended up treating Gower like a naughty schoolboy.

It had all been so different from the approach taken by Mike Gatting, Gooch’s predecessor, on the 1986–87 tour to Australia. Then Gatt had allowed the senior players a certain amount of latitude. He wasn’t concerned with what we got up to off the field and he certainly wasn’t interested in having the whole team run around the outfield incessantly or spend hours and hours in meaningless fielding practice. Gower knew what was right for him. He didn’t need Gatting, and certainly not Gooch, telling him how to run his life, or prepare for his cricket. What you saw is what you got with David and trying to alter his basic approach to the game was bound to end in disaster. In fact, Gower outbatted everyone on that tour with the possible exception of Gooch himself; his hundred in the second Test at Melbourne enabled England to make 352 and take a first innings lead. But the second innings collapse from 103 for one to 150 all out meant England got what they deserved, a beating by eight wickets. And his wonderful 123 at Sydney followed by some excellent bowling from Phil Tufnell and Eddie Hemmings put England in with a chance of actually winning that third Test.

Gower was doing the business at that stage but Gooch just couldn’t leave well alone. Gower’s refusal to turn himself into a robot for Gooch’s pleasure and convenience left Gooch bewildered and angry. Backed up by Stewart, whose ambivalence toward Gower had turned into open and mutual animosity during the 1989 summer, Gooch made his displeasure at Gower’s lack of co-operation quite obvious to public and players alike. And when Gower tried to lighten the mood in the now infamous ‘Tiger Moth’ incident at Carrara during the match between England and Queensland, Gooch and Stewart quite rightly saw it as a massive two fingered salute to them.

Gower and his England colleague John Morris, who had made 132 in England’s first innings, hired a pair of 1938 Tiger Moths and to greet a century by Robin Smith they persuaded the pilots to buzz the ground at low altitude. They were both fined £1,000. According to Wisden, ‘For all their dereliction of duty in leaving without permission a game in which they were playing, it was a harsh penalty for an essentially light hearted prank, reflecting all too accurately the joyless nature of the tour.’ Sadly Gooch, Stewart and tour manager Peter Lush suffered a collective sense of humour failure and it cannot be coincidence that Morris never played for England again.

The fact that Biggles and his mate had returned to the airfield after close of play and happily posed for photographs had not helped their cause, nor was Lush best pleased to realise that he had unwittingly lent Gower the money to hire the Tiger Moth in the first place. But such heavy-handedness was always only going to exacerbate the problem, raising Gower’s resistance to what he saw as a far too regimented approach to the tour.

When the series ended in defeat at Perth, Gooch made no attempt to hide his dissatisfaction at Gower’s contribution. He indicated that he was far from happy with the performances of some of his colleagues, and that many of them had a lot to reproach themselves for in terms of attitude, commitment and effort. In his book Captaincy, Gooch reflected: ‘David Gower represents my biggest failure of man management since I’ve been England captain. I struggled to get through to him. I must bear a lot of responsibility for that, because I’ve always wanted us to be on the same wavelength ever since I became England captain. We are, after all, in the entertainment business and David Gower has been a fabulous entertainer since he first played for England. When you consider the free way he bats, his record at Test level is marvellous – all those beautiful centuries … an average way over 40 (and a good deal better than mine). Who wouldn’t want a guy like that in the side? Yet on that Australian tour, I had more meetings with the management about David than anyone else and I’m sad to say that I felt more at ease with him out of the England team in 1991. I was very keen to have him in Australian because of his class and experience and no one was happier than I was when his big hundred at the Oval against the Indians justified his inclusion … I still have total respect for him as a player. Yet we don’t see eye to eye on what I expect from a senior player. I need a lot more from him than just seeing his immense talent flower on occasions in a Test match … To me his lethargic attitude can rub off on some of the others, those who admired and respected him.’

Gower put his side of things in his autobiography: ‘There were elements of truth in my feeling uncomfortable with the way the team was now being run, but in broad terms I was willing to fit in with almost anything to carry on playing Test cricket. I certainly felt under pressure when the tour party gathered at the initial fitness training, partly because I had not managed to drag myself onto the roads five times a day, and would not quite be up to the sort of gruelling routines I knew they had in mind, and partly because I felt that the hierarchy would be fascinated to see how I performed there. I didn’t do too badly, without looking the picture of happiness throughout it all, and the gentleman appointed to put us through our paces did manage to get a certain amount of vomit from me on the football field. I blew up at him more than once, although this again could have been perceived wrongly in that I’ve always needed a certain amount of anger to drive me on through hard physical exercise. The mission down under did not get off to the best of starts, either in terms of performance or team morale. You can defend the work ethic in terms of what you put in, you tend to get out, and Graham is the best example I’ve ever played with who would leave nothing to chance, either physically or technically. It does not suit everyone, however, and there was a lot of early niggling about the way we were preparing. Days off appeared to be out of the question, and a non-playing day seemed to follow a regimented pattern; down to the training ground, a longish session of physical fitness training, followed by nets, middle practice, and back to the hotel some time in mid-afternoon. Where the build-up was going wrong was the management’s attitude of telling everyone what to do. The more you relieve people of individual responsibility, the more master-slave the relationship becomes and the more resentment creeps in. The thing was being run like a puppet show. No one expects to be handed a questionnaire to fill in every morning. What would you like to do today? How do you want your eggs done? What time would you like a net, sir? I’m not saying that at all. There has to be a basic team discipline, and indeed conformity. But each touring side develops an atmosphere. Get the emphasis right, and it will be a good one; get it wrong, and it won’t.’

There had to be some common ground, and Gower was worth making the extra effort for, but I simply don’t believe Gooch did enough. Instead, he hid behind the parade-ground mentality that he and Micky Stewart had developed, and battered away at Gower until even after it became obvious it was a pointless and futile exercise.

What also did not help team morale was Gooch’s insistence on referring back to the team spirit that he had engendered in the West Indies the previous winter. More than one player told me how much those who had not been in the Caribbean resented being told by those who had, how much better things had been there. This was the ‘in my day’ syndrome being taken to a ridiculous degree. After all the ‘in my day’ in question was less than 365 days previously. I believe Gooch became obsessed with the Gower situation and he allowed it to cloud his judgement in many issues. To him, there seemed to be a right way of doing things and a wrong way and nothing in-between. He was right, Gower was wrong and that was that.

Even when Gooch tried to have it out with Gower when the squad moved on to New Zealand for a series of one day internationals after the Ashes series was over, the tenor of their conversation was very much along the lines of how Gower had failed to give Gooch what he wanted. Gower couldn’t really accept what he was hearing. After all he had given his captain two Test hundreds, as well as highest score in England’s first Test match in Brisbane, 61 out of a paltry first innings of 194 and 27 out of an even more paltry 114 in the second.

Gooch was not helped on that tour by an injury to himself which meant he missed the first Test at the Gabba where defeat set the tone for the series. But I believe he would surely have had better success had he understood and accepted from the start that Gower was not going to be bossed around by him and that rather than trying to impose his will on the left-handed batsman, he should accept him for what he was, and just let him play.

It’s quite extraordinary to think now that Gower’s record of 407 Test runs in five matches at an average of 45.22 including those two hundreds counted for nothing when Gooch started to consider his plans for the following summer series against the West Indies in 1991.

To my mind one explanation for Gooch’s treatment of Gower lay in the captain’s close relationship with a certain Geoffrey Boycott. Boycott had grown closer and closer to Gooch over the years. When Boycs shouted, Gooch jumped and he was grateful to the Yorshireman for his help in fine-tuning his batting technique. But their closeness extended to a distrust of Gower. Some observers believe that the real reason behind Boycott’s negative attitude to Gower was that he feared for the safety of his Test batting record.

In fact, following England’s return from Australia, Gower didn’t play Test cricket again for more than a year, when he made his belated comeback at Old Trafford in July 1992, making his 115th Test appearance, passing Colin Cowdrey’s England record, and then overhauling Boycott’s record England aggregate of 8,114 Test runs with an exquisite cover drive to the boundary, a fitting shot to make him England’s most prolific run scorer.

Gower made his comeback almost exactly eighteen months after that ill-fated Tiger Moth expedition. An awful lot of time in the wilderness and an awful waste of time. By that stage I had made my own return to the international arena, and had seen at first hand precisely the kind of things Gower was up against.

My dealings with the Gooch/Stewart regime left me about as impressed as Gower had been. Having been omitted from the party for the previous two winter tours and with no immediate prospects of a change of heart, I had decided to make my own arrangements for the winter of 1991–92, and this included a season of pantomime. I hadn’t been one of those placed on a year’s contract to secure my exclusive playing services and there had been no concrete commitment by the England selectors that I would be recalled, so I decided I had to be open to commercial offers for the sake of myself and my family rather than wait until September to see if I’d be picked for the tour.

Although I made a return to the Test side for the final match of the series against the West Indies at The Oval it was not until after the end of that match that Gooch indicated he wanted me on board for the 1992 World Cup the following February. Gooch said he wanted me in New Zealand for at least a part of the first section of England’s winter plans, and after negotiations BBC television agreed to reschedule recording dates for a series of A Question of Sport programmes which would allow me to make it out there in time.

It was not envisaged that I would take part in the Test series against New Zealand although I eventually did as a result of injuries, but I needed no encouragement to get myself fit for the tournament. To give Gooch and Micky Stewart their due, we had at least come up with a plan for our World Cup strategy, something that was sadly lacking in 1996, namely, that I should be used in what later became known as the ‘pinch-hitter’ role. And Gooch and Micky, were sensible enough to give me a certain amount of leeway when it came to getting myself fit for the job in hand. But there’s no doubt in my mind that England lost the World Cup that year because we simply ran out of steam.

Gooch’s insistence on nets and physical training that Gower had come across in Australia on the tour of 1990–91 was very much in evidence when England toured New Zealand prior to the World Cup and this perpetual grind took its toll. What is more I don’t recall a single day off in the entire tournament. As soon as the New Zealand series had been completed what we should have done was go off to the Gold coast or some other resort for a week of rest and relaxation in order to repair the minor injuries that had been collected against the Kiwis, recharge the batteries and take our minds off cricket.

Instead we all trolled over to Sydney for a week of nets and mickey-mouse practice matches against each other. By the time the crucial games came at the end of the tournament, although we were the best team on show, we were physically incapable of raising our game and this became obvious in our final defeat by Pakistan at the MCG.

Nevertheless, reaching the World Cup Final was an achievement that should not be underestimated and it was certainly the high point of our performance under Dexter, Stewart and Gooch.

Within a little over a year, however, all three had been replaced. And the common-link in their overthrow was Gower.

England’s summer series against Pakistan in 1992 has passed into history as one of the most acrimonious on record. At the heart of the controversy lay the conviction of myself, Allan Lamb and several other England players, not to mention Micky Stewart, that the Pakistan bowlers Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis and Aqib Javed tampered with the ball throughout. I remain convinced to this day that all three of them cheated by contravening the laws of the game. I refer specifically to the laws of cricket 42.4 and 42.5 governing unfair play.

Law 42.4: Lifting the seam. A player shall not lift the seam of the ball for any reason. Should this be done, the umpire shall change the ball for one of similar condition to that in use prior to the contravention. Law 42.5: Changing the condition of the ball. Any member of the fielding side may polish the ball providing that such polishing wastes no time and that no artificial substance is used. No one shall rub the ball on the ground or use any artificial substance or take any other action to alter the condition of the ball. In the event of the contravention of this law, the umpires, after consultation, shall change the ball for one of similar condition to that in use prior to the contravention. The law does not prevent a member of the fielding side from drying a wet ball, or removing mud from the ball.

In my opinion the actions of Wasim, Waqar, and Aqib Javed were in clear and direct contravention of those laws. Using their fingernails they made such an unholy mess of the ball at times that a ball that had been in use for 40 or 50 overs looked as though a pack of dogs had chewed it. Although most of us in the England dressing room had complained privately about what was going on, the real facts did not start to emerge until the fourth Texaco trophy match against Pakistan at Lord’s.

Lamb was a central figure in the controversy. In the end, by speaking out publicly over what happened, he made himself persona non grata as far as the England selectors and the TCCB were concerned. But it was not until more than a year later when a libel case brought against Lamb by the former Northamptonshire and Pakistan pace bowler Sarfraz Nawaz revealed publicly the real reason why the ball used in that Texaco trophy match had been changed, that Lamb and I were vindicated over the matter. Suffice to say, the acrimony and controversy overshadowed almost everything else that happened during that summer.

It also, at first, obscured the appalling treatment of David Gower by Gooch, Stewart and Ted Dexter.

On England’s return from their winter tour to Australia in 1991 it was clear that Gower no longer figured in Gooch’s long-term plans for England. Gooch stuck to his guns throughout the 1991 home series against West Indies and it was no surprise at all when Gower missed out on selection for the 1991–92 winter tour of New Zealand and the World Cup that followed. Gower just didn’t fit into Gooch’s idea of what was required by a team man, and the captain turned his back on one of the greatest talents the English game has ever seen.

It was not until halfway through the summer of 1992 that Gower was allowed back into the fold. Gooch had seen the way the wind was blowing during the first two Tests of the series. Although England had made 459 for seven declared in the drawn first Test at Edgbaston with fine centuries from Alec Stewart and Robin Smith they had done so on a belter of a pitch and in the absence of Wasim Akram, Pakistan’s most penetrative and dangerous bowler. But by the time England had finished the second Test at Lord’s, and lost by two wickets, it was clear to Gooch that England’s batting was fragile. They managed just 255 in the first innings and 175 in the second and although England might have won had Wasim and Waqar not come together for the match clinching partnership in Pakistan’s second innings, Gooch had seen for himself how devastating the Pakistan attack had become by this stage and he wanted Gower back to help deal with it.

Gooch had kept Gower out of the side for so long on what was basically a matter of principle. It’s funny how principles can become blurred when the need arises. Gower was not complaining. He was delighted to be back, not only to be given the opportunity to overtake Boycott’s record, but also to resurrect a career he believed could continue for at least a couple more years.

Gower needed to be at his very best at Old Trafford. Pakistan had racked up 505 for nine wickets declared in their first innings thanks to a double century from Aamir Sohail and England were 93 for three in reply when Gower strode to the crease. How ironic that he was welcomed there by the man who had kept him out of Test cricket for so long. The Manchester crowd had to wait until the Monday morning of the match to see the prodigal son return with a bat in his hand. And as Wisden reported, ‘What followed was Gower in spades: a squeeze through slips, a superb cover drive, a delightful push through mid wicket, a head high chance to first slip, and finally, only 31 minutes after he arrived at the crease, a cover drive to the boundary, a fitting shot to make him England’s most prolific scorer in his 200th Test innings.’

Gower went on to make 73, helping England to avoid the follow on, and although his effort was overshadowed by more aggro on the field involving the Pakistan acting captain Javed Miandad, the umpire Roy Palmer and Pakistan bowler Aqib Javed, nothing could dampen the delight of the English cricket public at seeing one of their favourite sons back where he belonged.

If Gower’s contribution had been to enable England to avoid defeat at Old Trafford, his batting in the fourth Test at Leeds helped England win by six wickets and square the series. Gooch himself was magnificent in that match. England managed to bowl out Pakistan for only 197, then Gooch withstood everything a typical Headingley seamer’s pitch and one of the most potent attacks in world cricket could produce, making 135 on the same ground as he had produced a majestic 150 to help England beat the West Indies the previous season. The value of his seven-hour innings was put into perspective when, after he was bowled by Mushtaq Ahmed’s last delivery before lunch, nine England batsmen fell for just fifty runs. As had happened so often before, a ball which had hardly deviated became a swinging hand grenade as England plummeted from 270 for one to 320 all out. Waqar Younis took all five of his wickets for 13 runs in just 38 balls, leaving Gower high and dry on 18 not out. More good bowling in Pakistan’s second innings which produced just 221, meant England needed just 99 runs to win the match. And this is where Gower came into his own.

According to Wisden, ‘England’s supposedly simple task turned into a three-hour trial of skill, nerve and self control. Reduced to three front line bowlers by an injury to Aqib, the tourists remembered Imran Khan’s famous entreaty to act like “cornered tigers”. Waqar, Wasim and Mushtaq bowled with magnificent, legitimate hostility, backed by a fierce gale of appeals for this that and the other. Rejection by umpires Palmer and Kitchen brought several displays of theatrical astonishment by fielders, as well as three invasions by Pakistani spectators. The pressure increased when Atherton and Smith both fell to Waqar at 27 but, thanks to Palmer’s unwitting help, Gooch clung on for two hours before he was caught at silly point off Mushtaq, soon to be followed by Stewart. Gower also stayed two hours, making an equally ice cool 31, after Latif’s cap-throwing act failed to convince either umpire he had been caught behind. With some late assistance from Ramprakash, Gower finally inched his way to the target which squared the series.’

By his standards Gower did not have a great match in the deciding Test at The Oval. And he did not paint the prettiest picture when, in England’s second innings, he shouldered arms to a ball that came back off the seam from Waqar Younis and was bowled for one, leaving England 59 for four and still 114 short of avoiding an innings defeat.

Pakistan duly completed the job to win the match by 10 wickets and the series 2–1. Afterwards Micky Stewart added fuel to the fire of the ball-tampering controversy when he announced at a press conference, his last before retiring as manager to be succeeded by Keith Fletcher, that he knew how the Pakistani bowlers managed to swing an old ball more than a new one, but was not prepared to reveal the secret.

The reaction to that was nothing compared to the outrage that followed the announcement that Gower had been omitted from the winter party to tour India. In fact, the row over the absence of Gower, Jack Russell and Ian Salisbury rumbled on for months.