Angus Fraser on tour: Duty calls - there's no rest for the wicket (25 October 1998 )
IT WAS fun while it lasted but all good things come to an end
25-Oct-1998
25 October 1998
Angus Fraser on tour: Duty calls - there's no rest for the wicket
By Angus Fraser
IT WAS fun while it lasted but all good things come to an end.
Four weeks of supposed rest at home without touching a cricket
ball has not exactly made me go cold turkey but, in a way, it has
been something of a relief to get here to Perth and be playing
cricket again.
The last month has been frantic to say the least, rushing around
like a headless chicken trying to make sure there is nothing left
outstanding before I depart. In trying to please everyone the
last person you look after is yourself, so it is nice to get away
and be able to concentrate on my cricket. To those I have failed
to contact I can only apologise.
Once again, saying goodbye to the children was hard. It does not
get any easier, especially as they begin to realise how long you
will be away. Touring is a magnificent opportunity and something
I thoroughly enjoy. As I have said before, the good points far
outweigh the bad but each winter I feel more guilty about leaving
them.
This year seems to have been, cricket-wise, the busiest I can
remember. At the end of it all I will have slept in 50 different
beds, with my longest continuous spell in one being 19 nights in
Trinidad last February. And, in total, I will have spent only 115
nights at home. Yes, surprisingly, I am still married. It is only
when I am at home that the arguments start. I would love to find
out who upsets Denise while I am away!
Several hours of the journey to Perth were spent in transit in
Dubai and Singapore which meant the duty free shops did well out
of us. The boys bought plenty of gadgets which in a week's time
will no doubt seem to have been a good idea at the time. A couple
of hours were killed in the Raffles lounge at Singapore airport
chatting to the South African cricketers who were on their way to
Bangladesh to play against our other team in the Wills
International Challenge.
The most animated our party became on the journey over was when
an edition of the cricket video Cover Point came on the
television and immediately showed highlights of last summer's Old
Trafford Test, notably my 'heroics' with the bat in keeping Allan
Donald out and helping secure the draw. Each delivery from Donald
to me was greeted with laughter and howls of derision from my
friends about my batting technique. Thanks lads!
Our arrival at 1am was pretty low key even though quarantine was
very obliging. They cleaned our boots as we came through customs
to stop us bringing any unwanted fungi into the country.
Rummaging through our bags is just what you need after 28 hours
travelling. Darren Gough asked them whether they could iron his
shirts while they were at it but they did not see the funny side
of that.
Everywhere we tour these days there seems to be an England player
returning to a country with which he has strong links. On the
last tour it was Dean Headley returning to Jamaica. This time it
is Alan Mullally's turn to return to his home town. Alan appears
to be going to play quite a big part in this winter's cricket
with there being plenty of talk of us playing five bowlers.
So far he has not been given any real stick from the locals but
even if that does come his way I feel that he is strong enough to
brush it off with a smile. He has had to wait quite a while for
another opportunity, his last Test match being played against New
Zealand in January 1997. Since then he has worked hard at his
game, shortened his run-up and now appears to be a better and
more consistent bowler than he was two years ago.
By playing and bowling well for us this winter he will offer us
greater variety with his left-arm seam and the foot-holes he
creates on his follow through should bring our off-spinners into
the game. As a character he is someone I feel I will spend quite
a bit of time with this winter. He is easy-going, likes the group
U2 and should be able to find the beaches he failed to locate
when someone asked him where he was going one day in Zimbabwe.
The Australian media are up and running and have already given us
no chance of winning this winter. Mike Atherton has been their
first target, Dennis Lillee suggesting he is having nightmares
about Glenn McGrath following his article about him in these
pages last week. Perhaps they chose to forget the contest he
overcame successfully this summer against Allan Donald but there
again they are the most one-eyed, sorry, patriotic press you will
ever come across. It is now up to us in the coming months to make
them eat their words.
The attitude of everyone in the party has been to get straight to
work. We trained on Friday afternoon, had nets yesterday morning
and fielding practice in the afternoon. With Graham Gooch and
Alec Stewart in charge until David Lloyd gets here from the
one-day tournament in Bangladesh, there is one thing they will
not be able to describe us as and that is lazy.
The facilities over here have so far been excellent, as is to be
expected. The weather is sunny and comfortable and the nets at
the WACA are as good if not better than any I encountered in
England last summer.
At the moment then it is so far, so good. Let's hope it
continues.
Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)