Ashley Giles
Monday August 29, 2005
The Guardian
As England wickets tumbled I was sat in the coach’s room with Duncan Fletcher and Troy Cooley. There were a few nerves around. I had a thigh pad on, Jonesy was in next and my pads were lying by my side.
Fletch didn’t say much but, when he did, it was to suggest that it was a lot better being in my shoes – I could at least go out to the middle and do something about it.
“Like hell it is,” I said. “I would rather just watch. You go out there and get on with it.”
They were right, of course. To go out there and get the winning runs was awesome. I’ve never been so grateful for a chip through midwicket. I’ve repeated myself in endless TV and radio interviews and I’ve given my mum a hug in front of the pavilion. Everyone is calling: “Well done, Gilo.” I’m dying for a cool beer.
None of us said it would be easy. For one thing Australia are not in the habit of surrendering. And we make a habit of finishes like this. Whether we win or lose, we relish creating a bit of an arse-nipper.
It was a reminder for me of our victory against New Zealand at Trent Bridge last year when I was batting with Thorpey at the end. He got a century and we put on 70 to win the game by four wickets. It’s useful to call on memories like that but this was 10 times more pressurised.
As we lost wickets I was thinking: “This can’t be happening to us, we don’t deserve this.”
We have dominated the series since losing the first Test at Lord’s and we were half an hour away from Australia retaining the Ashes and Ricky Ponting waving a stump in celebration on the pavilion balcony.
You never have a right to win a game, no matter how much you have dominated it, not when you have someone as talented as Shane Warne spinning the ball at you in the fourth innings and Brett Lee reverse swinging it at 95mph.
In the coach’s room I tried to knuckle down, to plan ahead. I tried to assess how Lee and Warne were going to try to get me out.
I felt more relaxed in the middle. There were a few verbals – “Let’s get him falling out of his crease” and “Let’s get him nicking another one” – but nothing major. Those guys were tense, they’re professional and they get on with the job.
Jonah tried to play the shot that would break the game. I had a feeling at the non-striker’s end that he would play a big shot.
Thirteen runs to win and a boundary takes it under double figures and you are almost home. Unfortunately he didn’t quite get it right.
I crossed when Jonah was out, so Hoggy came out to face Lee for the first ball of the next over.
“Come on, let’s you and me get it done,” he said, with a bit of a smile.
“It’s reversing at about 95mph,” I told him. I thought it was best that he knew.
I have played with Hoggy for about six years and I have never seen him drive a seam bowler through extra cover. It was quite extraordinary.
Whether it was a full toss or not, at that pace, with that much reverse on it, to get it through that gap, and so technically sound, something fell in our favour there.
It was down to two to win when I faced an over from Warnie for the last time. I thought that he was trying to set me up for the sweep, because deep square was open, and then to dismiss me with the slider. The sweep was the last thing I was going to play.
The third one, tossed up, arrived on the full toss. I thought “if I clip this through midwicket, we’ve won,” but it hit Simon Katich at short-leg and stopped dead. At least he didn’t catch it, because that’s the way things were going.
Everyone around the bat just smiled. Then came the chip to midwicket and the cheers. The rest is a bit of a blur.
These games are so tough. We have all aged about 10 years in the past three weeks. You don’t sleep well. Every minute of the day you are thinking about cricket. You wake up in the night and you are thinking about cricket. It’s not healthy but that’s the Ashes. I’m sure the Aussies are feeling just as tired.
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Greatest No. 11
I think i’ve been pushing my whole career to get out of the No. 11 spot and to finally have the most runs at 11 in the history of the game.
– Glenn McGrath
