Despite being inextricably linked to Shane Warne’s devilish ‘Ball of the Century’, Mike Gatting is recognised as being one of England’s finest players of spin.
The former England captain averaged 35.55 from his 79 Tests, but his figures were far better against teams from the subcontinent. Gatting came of age on England’s tour of India in 1984-85, compiling his first Test century in Mumbai before smashing 207 in Chennai – his highest ever score in the five-day format.
On the 54-year-old’s profile on the cricketing website Cricinfo.com it proclaims that if a spinner was bowling against Gatting, “he probably wouldn’t be on long,” because Gatting “murdered them”. So, there probably aren’t many people better placed to comment on England’s recent tour of the UAE, where they overcame initial struggles against spin in a 3-0 Test series defeat to Pakistan, to win both the one-day and T20 series.
Spin king
According to Gatting, there is no real secret to playing the slower ball, it just comes down to practice and exposure. “I was very lucky at Middlesex I had three or four very fine spinners, probably the best in the world at the time which were Fred Titmus, John Emburey, Phil Edmonds and then Philip Tuffnel after that,” Gatting explains. “So, I was able to bat in the nets against them all the time and that’s what it all boils down to.
“Watching other people, like Keith Fletcher, watching some of the Indian players play it, watching good players play it and taking it on board and try to work on those things. It’s not rocket science at the end of the day, like anything if you practice enough at it and you have a good method, it should come good.”
On England’s resurgence in the shorter format, Gatting adds: “They have seen enough of them now to actually understand and learn, and it looks as though they might have done, which is good. The guys hadn’t played for three months and going to empty stadiums sometimes is very difficult to get your head round. If you don’t get your head around that quickly, then things happen. Look, I think what you have to say is Pakistan played very, very well, England didn’t play as well as they could have done but they came back strongly.”
Gatting, though, does believe the type of wickets used in county cricket have not helped matters, as sides have moved away from using more than one spinner in the English domestic game. “I suppose it’s something to do with our pitches, when we used to have uncovered wickets a lot over here then spinners were always in our game,” he said.
“Once the wickets began being covered then the spinners possibly started going out of the game a little more, but it’s a difficult one. When I started playing, you used to have two spinners in every team, you look around the counties now and it’s only just becoming again a thing that people think is important.”
All for a good cause
Gatting, who is in the UAE in his role as President of the Lord’s Taverners, a cricketing charity side who are playing two games against a Fly Emirates side on Friday and Sunday at 7he Sevens, took time to settle into Test cricket. Despite being given his debut as a 20-year-old, it took the Middlesex man 54 matches, and nearly seven years to score his first ton.
It is perhaps surprising therefore, that Gatting was not against the idea of dropping Eoin Morgan from the Test side after his travails in the UAE. “Players do need time but sometimes when you come out of the system and fight your way back in you learn some invaluable lessons and if you’re a good player you’ll come back again, that’s the way life is,” he revealed a few days before the ECB took the decision to drop Morgan for the tour of Sri Lanka.
“There are very few people who go through their careers without any ups and downs, even the great players, the likes of the (David) Gower and (Ian) Botham, they still had some ups and downs, some bad patches and bits and pieces. It’s something that happens, if you think you’ve cracked it, don’t, because something will happen that will bring you back to earth again.”
A lot of the work that the Lord’s Taverners do in the UK is concerned with engaging disadvantaged and disabled children through sport, particularly cricket. The charity have been especially involved in promoting disabled cricket, and Gatting was therefore delighted to see the success of the recent series between Pakistan and England in Dubai – even if the men in green helped themselves to a series whitewash.
“Over in the UK, a guy called Ian Martin, who runs our disability section has really pushed hard for this and has really been the leader,” Gatting said. “Pakistan have come in and really done a great job, they obviously did far too good a job as they beat our team 3-0 in the matches concerned. “It’s good to see disability sport, like the Paralympics, coming to the fore and we hope in our own way we can help that and I know now the ICC, obviously based in Dubai, have agreed to put it on the agenda, so that’s really a huge step forward for disability cricket.”
So, does Gatting see cricket being part of the Paralympics one day? “I think it will be, I think it’s inevitable,” he said. “It’s something I think that will get bigger and bigger because people unfortunately will still be disabled and we still have to provide for them. They are as passionate about sport as anybody I can assure you.
“We have a thing called table cricket in the UK, which is run by the Taverners and these kids can only just about roll balls down on a small table and hit a ball but they are so passionate about it. They feel like they’ve been engaged, they’re playing, they can do something and they really are passionate about it. You watch some of these guys play in the disability cricket and you’ll see the passion that’s there and we’d like to get more people doing it.”
