Australia’s cricketers, Langer included, have had a complex relationship with our game. They are hardwired to see their own four-day state competition, and its ruthless Darwinian culling of the inept, the soft and the lazy, as superior to the County Championship. Yet, given the scarcity of first-class opportunities there, many have also recognised that nothing quite beats the day-in, day-out experience and variety of county cricket as a finishing school.
The careers of the five Australia captains before Tim Paine reflect this uncertainty. Mark Taylor never played county cricket; Ricky Ponting hardly bothered, playing only a handful of matches, seven in all, for Somerset and Surrey; Michael Clarke signed for Hampshire for one year, encouraged to do so by Shane Warne, before the 2005 Ashes, while Steve Waugh and Allan Border had significant stints as overseas players for Somerset and Essex respectively, during which their games became more rounded.
Waugh acts as mentor to this Australia team, and so found himself at Edgbaston alongside Langer and Graeme Hick, the batting coach. That’s a lot of first-class runs and knowledge of the English game: Waugh averaged 78.76 for Somerset in 1987-88; Langer, in two stints for Middlesex and Somerset, made more than 7000 first-class runs. Hick? How far does your abacus stretch? More than 31,000 runs and more than 100 hundreds for Worcestershire before you add in Tests and other sundry matches.
Langer’s association with English cricket is fascinating. He is remembered for a scathing “dossier” that he once compiled before the 2009 Ashes, which found its way into the public domain. England’s greatest bowler, James Anderson, was described as a “pussy”; Andrew Strauss was “conservative”; the players “shallow”, “lazy” and “comfortable”. “Aggressive batting, running and body language will soon have them staring at their bootlaces rather than in the eye of the opponent — it’s just the way they are built,” he wrote.
Phil Tufnell once told an anecdote about Langer’s time with Middlesex that laid bare the Australian’s frustrations with the county game. Coming back into the dressing room after a long and unsuccessful day in the field, Tufnell and his fellow Middlesex players dived for the chocolate eclairs. Langer exploded, threw the tray of eclairs against the wall and berated them for not caring enough about the score and their performance.
Yet Langer also loved county cricket for the impact it had on his game and his life. He published From Outback to Outfield, a fond remembrance of a season with Middlesex in 1998, and in his autobiography, Keeping my Head, he looked back on his time with Somerset as “the best three years of my life”. He said the standard of cricket at times was as good as any first-class cricket that he played, recalling a game against an Andrew Flintoff-inspired Lancashire that was as intense as a Test match. He held up Mark Ramprakash, because of an ability to churn out runs daily, as his batting inspiration.
His gratitude is clear, even as he saw the dangers that could arise from the grind. So, it is no surprise that the number of Australian cricketers in the county game is on the rise again under his stewardship. The majority of this Australia team have played county cricket, to a greater or lesser degree, but the advantage of recent first-class preparation was best seen in the discipline and readiness shown by two of three-man pace attack at Edgbaston, Peter Siddle and James Pattinson.
While Mitchell Starc was busy pounding away in the World Cup, Siddle was enjoying a spell with Essex and Pattinson with Nottinghamshire and the Australia A team. Both looked in good order. In Siddle’s case, his eight matches in the championship (34 wickets at 20.08) probably clinched his place ahead of Josh Hazlewood. Pattinson’s stints in two of the past three seasons with Nottinghamshire (40 wickets at 15.52) have helped his return to form and fitness.
Most of all, though, it is the younger Australian players who will benefit from time here, from the requirement to grow up, be self-sufficient and take responsibility as a senior player and overseas pro, with all the expectation that brings. Cameron Bancroft took on the ultimate responsibility at Durham this year, captaining the county, while Marnus Labuschagne enjoyed success time in Division Two at Glamorgan.
While England were obsessing about the World Cup — understandably — you sensed that Australia had more than half an eye on the Ashes, of which these placements were just a part. As long as three years ago, the decision was made to introduce Dukes balls for a portion of their state competition; an A team came over during the World Cup, providing first-class opportunities for, among others, Travis Head and Matthew Wade, and the final first-class match was not against a weakened county team, but among themselves. A semi-final was probably the extent of their ambitions in the World Cup; not returning with the Ashes will be seen as a failure.
It is wise not to look too much into one match. If James Anderson had not suffered a recurrence of his calf injury after only four overs, England might have won the game — who knows? — and the post-match narrative would have shaped differently. The absence of Anderson was crucial, as was the performance of the best batsman on either side, Steve Smith, but it is also true that compared with a normal modern-day tour, Australia were, relative to their opponents, extremely well prepared.
When, at the end of the last Australian summer, Paine was asked when he might turn his thoughts to the Ashes, he replied: “Six months ago.”
It is normally the touring side who are underdone, the home team better prepared. Not this time. Under the driven and meticulous Langer, someone who holds England dear but hates to lose to them, that is no surprise.
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Six years ago, in India, Justin Langer was asked why Australia had struggled to win in England. This was after the defeats of 2009 and 2013, before another in 2015, and long before he would become head coach. His answer carried an interesting perspective, given the scorn Australians generally hold for English county cricket: “Most of our young players don’t go and play county cricket any more,” he said. “Their learning time is diminished.”