As I watched Ollie Pope’s superb, match‑changing innings in Hyderabad at the weekend my mind kept going back to 2017, and a tour to India with an England Under‑19s side that included three players who have since broken into the senior Test set-up in Pope, Harry Brook and Will Jacks. Ollie really struggled on the trip: he averaged 21.5 in the two Tests, and got out sweeping many times.
Watching the Indian players, the consensus was that they played brilliantly with a straight bat, shots with low risk but potentially high reward, or they got away from the ball and punched off the back foot into spaces on either side of the crease. Only if the ball was going down the side of the wicket would they consider playing a sweep. For England’s players, often against left‑arm spinners looking to bowl wicket-to-wicket, the sweep was a really dangerous shot, because if you miss you’re lbw or bowled. That became almost the mantra of the trip, but Ollie bucked the trend and was punished for it.
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I remember being in Brisbane once during the Ashes, and I happened to be standing on the viewing area near the players’ changing rooms towards the end of lunch when Alastair Cook and Kevin Pietersen were about to resume England’s innings. Cook was in the zone and not really talking to anyone, but KP came over and we chatted for a couple of minutes. I told him I was about to go to Sri Lanka with England Lions and he said: “Oh, spin. You’ve just got to pick the length and that’s it.” And with that he put on his helmet and his gloves and went out to face Mitchell Johnson. I loved the certainty of that statement, and it has always stuck with me.
When you’re facing spin, if you see the ball go up out of the bowler’s hand you have two choices: you can get down the pitch, meet it on the full and take control that way, or you can get away from the ball, give yourself more reaction time and play off the back foot. That’s what we’d been working on, but Ollie saw things differently. By that time he’d already played a bit of first-team cricket so was one of the senior players in the group, and perhaps it was that, or the expectation he put on himself, or the unfamiliar conditions he was facing, that caused him to struggle.
And of course that experience went through my mind as he turned the first Test on its head , and I saw the confidence he showed and the enjoyment he was having at the crease.
Pope is often very frenetic at the start of his innings. Sometimes he seems excessively energised, almost playing his shot before his feet are in position and setting off for runs before he’s hit the ball. But if he can get through that period he can really thrive, particularly in a team such as this England side where the emphasis is on looking to score no matter the situation, which suits him perfectly. A lot has been made of the reverse sweeps and reverse scoops, but equally there were a lot of good shots where he came down the wicket and used his feet, and that was crucial because it rattled India’s spin bowlers, forced them to vary their line, length and pace, and Pope then exploited that brilliantly.
Of course you don’t make 196 without playing a forward defensive, but he found a wonderful balance where he mixed an array of defensive shots with that mindset of wanting to be proactive all the time, trying to get down the pitch, or get back in the crease, or using his variety of sweeps. He has one reverse sweep where his front foot goes back, his back foot comes out and he turns his body so he’s almost like a left‑hander, and in doing so goes far down the wicket that when he then extends his arms to bring the bat through in a big sweeping motion he reaches the ball on the full toss and almost takes the pitch out of play. It’s such a technical shot, because it is very hard to keep your balance and keep your head still while all that movement is going on, and a lot of work must have gone into perfecting it.
From that under-19s trip to what I saw last weekend, Ollie has made remarkable improvements to his game. I’d like to think that, even if it was hard for him at the time, he would have learned a huge amount on that tour. His performances would have been a big disappointment to him, but he went away and got to work. And I saw quite quickly after that, even within a couple of years, how he matured both as a man and a player.
Despite that I was surprised when he was made England’s vice‑captain last year, not because of any issue with his character – he’s always been very mature and very likeable, and I have no doubt that he’ll be very popular in the group and be a link between the more mature players and the younger generation – but because I wasn’t sure he’d quite done enough to establish his place in the side.
If you make someone vice‑captain you’re saying: ‘You’re in the team, whatever happens’, and I think a lot of people in the game were not convinced he had earned that position. Hyderabad has put those concerns to bed. He has made big scores before but this was a new level, in difficult and unfamiliar conditions against a great side and with his team in a perilous position. The challenge of course is to repeat it, but Ollie’s ability to perform at the highest level and on the biggest stage is no longer in doubt.
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