Peter Handscomb says he has learnt to block out the noise to improve his form
Victorian captain Peter Handscomb says the form that has allowed him to return to the Test squad is due to a change in mentality about criticism and trolls, not a change in technique.
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Peter Handscomb has opened up on his private battle with social media trolls and commentator criticism, as he fights to win Test cricket’s mental war.
Few players have had their technique so brutally critiqued, with Shane Warne declaring in Handscomb’s last summer for Australia that selectors were sending “a lamb to the slaughter” by picking him.
That was four years ago, but Handscomb’s return to the Test fold for Australia’s tour of India next month is proof of one thing – cricket is a game played in the head.
It’s not to say Handscomb hasn’t worked on some technical changes, but the 31-year-old believes it wasn’t his quirky batting style that was setting him up to fail, but the fact he was letting the vitriol around it infiltrate his mind.
Handscomb always presented as a self-assured cricketer during his 16 Tests for Australia.
But behind the curtains he felt himself engulfed by negativity, both from ex-greats on television commentary and faceless keyboard warriors.
Handscomb leads the Sheffield Shield run-scorers this summer with two hundreds including a mammoth 281 not out, and feels primed to seize his comeback chance in India if selectors throw him back into the fray.
The most significant breakthroughs Handscomb made during his exile was to delete Facebook and Twitter and engage two psychologists to reclaim control of the all-important mental game.
“I really struggled with not listening to all the comments and all the media comments that come with playing Test cricket. And also the extra 30 or 40 cameras that are now on you and picking up little technical things you’re doing that you didn’t even know you were doing that get evaluated to the enth degree by the commentators,” Handscomb told News Corp.
“I was listening to that. I was watching that. And that was getting into my head.
“Then when I was going out and playing I wasn’t playing with a free mind and a clear and present thinking pattern.”
Handscomb made a strong start to his Test career, scoring a hundred in his second match and another ton by the end of his first summer.
But under the pressure of home series against England and India, Handscomb admits he struggled with being put under the microscope by commentators – and cricketing heroes – like Warne.
“It was definitely tough at the time, because I’d never really had anything like that before,” Handscomb said.
“Everything had been quite positive, albeit my technique was always different … and then as soon as you start going down the other side and you’re not making runs it all turns pretty quickly.”
While it makes sense how copping flak from your idols would sting – fans find it harder to comprehend why athletes care what faceless trolls say about them on social media.
What is easy to dismiss though is the lonely nights cricketers spend in hotel rooms on tour, without family and their usual support networks to rely on for perspective.
Handscomb found himself getting rocked by abuse from strangers.
“It was like random ones on Twitter where you just get tagged in someone’s comments and you’re like, ‘I didn’t need to read that.’ Someone you’ve never met before just having a red hot crack at you,” Handscomb said.
“Social media has changed so much. Players are so easily accessible from the general public – from people that want to say anything.
“You can switch your phone on after a game and there will be some nice messages, and then there’s always the random bad message that you get, and for some reason that’s the one that always sticks in your mind.
“I think it’s tough for the younger players coming through to be able to push those bad messages to the side.
“It was just a culmination of that and then the extra pressure that comes from playing for Australia and the extra cameras. It’s just easier to get rid of it all and not read it.
“Twitter and Facebook were the two I deleted. They seemed to be the ones where people could get the most direct access to you and also where stories were coming up on.”
Former Australian great Shane Watson released an outstanding book over the summer called Winning The Inner Battle, where he highlights the new age crisis that affected Handscomb so deeply.
Watson insists even the most iron-willed cricketers are vulnerable to the perils of social media abuse.
“I was having a conversation with one of our (IPL team’s) world class overseas players and giving him my thoughts on how to use social media for the betterment of myself,” Watson wrote.
“I was telling him about not reading any of the comments … and not letting any of the potential negative comments infiltrate your state of mind.
“This guy said that he reads all of the comments, as the negative ones actually motivate him and provide that fire in the belly to prove those doubters wrong.
“ … A few days later I bumped into this guy in the lift on the way to training in the lead-up to our next game and he said, ‘that conversation we had, you were right. My last game wasn’t my best and I started to read the comments and a few in particular really hit me hard.
“’I was pretty vulnerable … and before I knew it, I got to a very dark place and found it really hard to get myself out of the hole that was very, very deep.’”
Watson warns people only have a certain amount of mental energy every single day, and Handscomb has taken that advice on board to fuel his second coming to Test cricket, more so than the technical adjustments he’s made with Victorian coach, Chris Rogers.
“Since I got dropped (January 2019) I’ve been working on a one step backwards to take two steps forwards (at the crease),” said Handscomb, who is still very much a back foot batsman, but with a renewed ability to counterpunch off the front foot.
“That takes a bit of time. It feels in a good place at the moment.
“I guess it’s combining something like that with a lot of mental work.
“I see both the sports psyche and a clinical psyche to help me with my game, to make sure I’m in a good space on and off the field.
“I have things in place to help me if I’m in a tough spot on the field. Then also, I’ve got some things to do off the field to make sure I’m ready to go for game day and I’m not completely drained with everyday life.”
Handscomb also brings brilliant catching ability close to the bat and skills as a back-up wicketkeeper to the table in India as well as a proven solid record on the subcontinent which includes a gutsy 82 not out scored in oppressive heat in Bangladesh where he lost over 5kg at the crease.
Michael Hussey’s Test career only began at 31, his coach Rogers’ got a second aged 35, and Handscomb, with a tidy Test average of 38, believes his second coming can be more successful than his first chapter.
Just hours after receiving a call from George Bailey last week to say he was going to India, Handscomb copped a nasty knock to his hip in a club game and immediately feared the worst.
“I was a bit worried as I was limping off the ground that the last few years of work might have been for nothing if I wasn’t going to get on the tour,” Handscomb said.
“But it all seems OK now. It’s coming along. I did some running Monday and Wednesday and I’m starting to get some speed into it now.
“I’m ready to go if required in the first Test, but the top seven including Alex Carey have been batting unbelievably this summer.
“If an opportunity does arise at any stage throughout the tour then I’ll be making sure I’m ready to go.”
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