The Ashes 2021/22: Steve Harmison remembers infamous wide in 2006 Gabba Test
Former English paceman Steve Harmison can laugh now about his opening delivery of the 2006 Brisbane Test that went down in Ashes folklore for all the wrong reasons.
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He wasn’t laughing at the time, but Steve Harmison smiles now at the memory of the day he felt like Barmy Harmy at the Gabba.
It’s 15 years this month since Harmison, the lanky, likeable and at times dangerous English fast man, bowled one of the most famous wides in Test history at the Gabba.
What made it all the more dramatic was the ball, taken by his captain Andrew Flintoff at second slip after Justin Langer let it go, was the first ball of the 2006-07 series between Australia and England.
“I have never had a problem talking about it,’’ Harmison told the Cricket Collective podcast.
“My best mate, Andrew Flintoff, captain of England, gave me the ball and said, ‘Right, you bowl the first over’ and 25 seconds later I duly obliged by giving it back!
“It is one of them things. I tried too hard. Preparation is everything, but unfortunately my preparation leading up to that Test was shocking. I did not play in Adelaide the week before. I was nervous.
“I remember talking to Neil Fairbrother about it. He said to me he had never seen me nervous before, but the night before the Test I was as nervous as he had ever seen anybody.’’
The wide caused an instant flood of text messages. Golfer Lee Westwood said he texted Michael Vaughan with the message “what was that?’’ and Vaughan texted back “I believe in your game you call ‘fore’ for those ones.’’
Harmison
“I put the ball in Andrew Flintoff’s hands without Justin Langer getting anywhere near it. Matthew Hoggard was running at the fine leg boundary and started waving his hands around (thinking it was a catch) and could not understand why no one was cheering.
“Then he just kept his arms moving as if he was stretching because he was bowling the next over.
“My pride and joy of that series was that I never missed a Test. I played every single day.
“Can you imagine the abuse I copped? We were beaten 5-0. Australia were fantastic. We did not have the right side. Michael Vaughan was gone. Marcus Trescothick was gone. Simon Jones was gone. We were a shadow of the side that won the Ashes in 2005.’’
Old enemy warns against Cummins call
Former England fast bowler Steve Harmison believes Australia risks overburdening Pat Cummins by throwing him into the Ashes furnace as a new captain.
Harmison believes England would prefer Cummins captained the side ahead of Steve Smith because the extra responsibility of Cummins first series as captain could prove a distraction for his bowling.
Australia appears poised to this week anoint Cummins as its new captain and Steve Smith his deputy after interviewing both men on Wednesday.
Cummins is a standout as Australia’s best and most reliable bowler and Harmison feels maintaining a laser-like focus with the ball is more important contribution for Cummins than leading the team.
“I don’t think this is the Australia of old … it’s a big call,’’ Harmison told the Cricket Collective podcast.
“I think England would be happier with Cummins than Steve Smith. For me, if you put too much pressure on Pat in the Ashes that could prove the difference, because both batting units are frail and can be got at.
“I look at that decision being a big gamble for Australia. If there is nobody else, fine. I am not Australian, but I think if you had a natural leader there who has done the job before, you would have to go with him.
“If I was an Australian, I would not have a problem with Steve Smith coming back.
Harmison, who played in four Ashes series, including the iconic 2005 one when England beat Australia for the first time in two decades, said pace bowlers in Australia needed to be fully switched on to get as much assistance as the could from testing conditions when the ball is new.
“If Pat has more of an eye on the captaincy and is more worried about what is happening with his batting unit, he may not get the ball in the right areas.
“That Kookaburra ball … we know how dangerous it is for short periods of time. Those little margins could be the difference between England winning a Test.’’
If, as expected, Cummins and Smith are unveiled as Australia’s new leadership duo, it will be interesting to see whether Smith is considered the obvious backup option if Cummins is rested or injured, or if Australia keeps him as a permanent vice-captain.
Cummins will become the first specialist fast man to lead Australia in a Test since Ray Lindwall did it on a one-off basis in the 1950s, which, Harmison believes, is significant.
“There is always a reason why some things don’t happen and one of them is fast bowling captains.’’
Harmison’s wide, Brisbane 2006-07 pic.twitter.com/p0GVXvwFKS
— Andrew Miller (@miller_cricket) March 25, 2020
Cleanskin Pat will be worthy leader - but danger lurks
- Michael Atherton
Daily it seems, cricket is doing its utmost to uphold the reputation once ascribed to it by Richie Benaud as the “most controversial of all games”.
With English cricket undergoing an existential crisis, its biggest county, Yorkshire, on the verge of implosion and the game bereft of decisive leadership and authority, Tim Paine, the 46th captain of Australia, has stepped down in scandal and tears.
Paine became the second consecutive Australia captain to step down brushing tears from his eyes after his predecessor, Steve Smith. The difference would seem to be considerable: while Smith was removed for being a bad captain, having allowed the behaviour of his team to disintegrate, Paine stood down for being found out about sending text messages and explicit images to a female employee of the Tasmanian Cricket Association four years ago.
The story is less than straightforward, as these things tend to be. The messages and image(s) were sent on the eve and morning of the Ashes Test in Brisbane in November 2017, when Paine had been recalled as a wicketkeeper after a seven-year absence from Test cricket and predated his ascension to the captaincy.
At this stage the notion that Paine could be four months from the Australia captaincy was far-fetched. Smith, who was about to lead Australia to a thumping Ashes victory, had never looked more secure and the limit of Paine’s ambition was to get to the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne.
Then came the sandpaper scandal in South Africa four months later, and the sacking of a raft of senior figures, including Smith. Paine, now senior and unscathed and thought to be a safe pair of hands in more ways than one, was parachuted into the position with responsibility for cleaning up the mess.
He was considered to be worth his place in the team, and someone who could bring about a cultural and cricketing renewal at a time when Australian cricket was at its lowest ebb.
By common consent, he has done a good job in Test cricket since then, retaining the Ashes on English soil among his accomplishments.
When he was appointed, Cricket Australia (CA) did not know about the messages. It became aware of them months after his appointment, once a complaint had been made in 2018. The organisation held an internal inquiry in which Paine participated, and he was cleared of breaching the CA code of conduct.
Tasmania cricket did the same with the same result, noting the exchange was “consensual, private, occurred on one occasion only, was between mature adults and was not repeated”. What changed?
News Corp broke the story. Paine stepped down, citing actions that did not meet the standard required of an Australia cricket captain and CA did not stand in his way. Richard Freudenstein, the CA chairman, said the organisation did “not condone this type of language or behaviour”. They don’t when it becomes public knowledge, it seems.
Other things have changed, as well. CA’s officers are different from those in place when these messages were first brought to the organisation’s attention - CA has a new chief executive and chairman - and the climate of the workplace has changed irrevocably, too.
But Paine may wonder, as may the rest of us, what the point of a code-of-conduct inquiry is if the relevance of its conclusions varies according to whether conduct is in the public domain or not
All that said, Australia now find themselves without a captain less than three weeks before the opening Ashes Test in Brisbane.
Pat Cummins is the vice-captain and is almost certain to be given the job for the series. As well as being a brilliant bowler, ranked No 1 in the world in Tests and one of the fastest, Cummins is an intelligent, widely admired character, with an interesting hinterland that includes a business degree, and is someone who is expected to provide sound leadership off the field.
In an outstanding profile for The Australian, the cricket writer Peter Lalor described Cummins thus: “There’s every expectation that when England leaves us after the Ashes this summer, heads will nod in agreement around the board table at Cricket Australia and they’ll crown Patrick James Cummins as the 47th captain of the Test team. Australian cricket’s most marketable male is already the face of the team and jeez he’d look good in that captain’s jacket.
“The blue eyes, the handsome face, the beaming smile is the one every sponsor wants in their campaign. Power companies, shaving brands, clothing lines, energy drinks. The squeaky-clean image helps too. Here’s cricket’s cleanskin. No sledging, no arguing, no anger, no love-gone-wrong, no dust-ups, no bust-ups, just a business degree, a vision and the singular fact that he is the best fast bowler in Test cricket.”
Apart from much the same having been said about Paine and his squeaky-clean image, that Cummins’s rise to high office looks like coming sooner than Lalor imagined, his appointment is not without risk.
The last time an out-and-out fast bowler captained Australia in Test cricket? Go back more than six decades to Ray Lindwall in 1956. Cummins is sharp and intelligent, but fast bowling is ferociously hard work without the additional strain of captaincy.
Only 42 days separate the opening day at the Gabba to the end of the series, wherever that may take place: six weeks, five Tests and an incredible physical challenge.
While Cummins seems now to have got over the injuries that dogged him as a young man, he said recently said that he did not expect Australia’s feared pace attack - Cummins himself, Josh Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc - to play in all those five Tests. What then is Australia’s plan B if rest, rotation or injury strikes? England will view any potential upheaval to their advantage.
And Paine? What now for the 36-year-old? Will he still be considered for a place for the Gabba or will Australia look to the future, to Alex Carey, 30, perhaps, or Josh Inglis, the 26-year-old wicketkeeper-batsmen, both of whom were selected in the Australia A squad as part of the inter-squad Ashes preparation?
Paine had recently undergone a neck operation, has hardly played any cricket since the pandemic began and his place was always considered to be vulnerable without the captaincy.
Even more so than in England, the captaincy of the Australia team is a cherished position. It has been held by some of the greatest names in the sport. One of them, Steve Waugh, thought the Australia captain should be seen as a “benchmark of mental toughness and resilience”. As Paine might note, ruefully, he is held up as a benchmark of rectitude as well.
‘Teario, teario’: Barmy Army, UK press savage Paine
England is having a field day after Tim Paine quit in disgrace as Australian captain after a historical sexting scandal was revealed by News Corp on Friday.
The Barmy Army are among those from the United Kingdom to sink their teeth into the Australian cricket team after being embroiled in yet another scandal, with UK media outlets lashing Paine over his actions.
The UK Daily Mail’s back page read ‘AUSSIE CAPTAIN’S SEX TEXTS SHAME’, and the The Times went with a similar flavour, denouncing ‘PAINE’S SHAME’.
Meanwhile, the UK Daily Telegraph ran a broader headline ‘Australia in crisis’ on its back page and The Daily Star referenced his emotional press conference with ‘Teario, Teario, Teario’.
The Sun online declared ‘TIM TIME UP’, with the first line reading: “TIM PAINE has QUIT as Australia Test cricket captain over an explicit sexting scandal in the latest debacle surrounding the team.”
The UK Guardian remarked on its website that the English Cricket Board and Cricket Australia are “blundering deeper into crisis”, contending that they have handled revelations of racism and sexism poorly.
This comes after English county Yorkshire was accused of systemic racism after the damning claims of former cricketer Azeem Rafiq, with the dragged-out nature of the investigation and lack of forceful action on those involved drawing fierce criticism.
The Barmy Army woke to the news of Paine resigning over, as they put it, “ball tampering” claims, and posted a ‘spot the difference’ meme showing Paine, Steve Smith and David Warner after their ball-tampering confessionals and an Australian cricket fan all in tears.
🚨 BREAKING NEWS 🚨
— England’s Barmy Army (@TheBarmyArmy) November 19, 2021
Tim Paine has resigned over "ball tampering" claims 🤣#Ashes 🇦🇺ðŸ´ó §ó ¢ó ¥ó ®ó §ó ¿ pic.twitter.com/VeBtTmqLXW
Spot the difference... #Ashes 🇦🇺ðŸ´ó §ó ¢ó ¥ó ®ó §ó ¿ pic.twitter.com/MH0jCFKqDZ
— England’s Barmy Army (@TheBarmyArmy) November 19, 2021
They also took the step of assessing Australia’s captaincy candidates in their typically mocking and partisan manner.
On Steve Smith’s captaincy hopes, they remarked: “even by the Aussies’ standards, you feel it would be a step too far to reinstall him as the skipper.”
And in a further drive-by to Paine when putting forward Travis Head’s claims as captain, the Barmy Army said: “But heading into the series, there are question marks whether he’s good enough to be in the team. Though to be fair, that never stopped Paine, did it?”
Tim!!!!!
— Jofra Archer (@JofraArcher) June 13, 2014
Jofra Archer’s infamous out-of-context tweets from the past even got dragged into the mix, with the Barmy Army among those to retweet his take from June 2014 saying “Tim!!!!!”
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