Saturday 12 July 1997
Crown remains on hold for frustrated Hollioake
By Mark Nicholas
FANCY Surrey losing that 60-over game to Nottinghamshire
earlier in the week, all that talent going down to all that
teamwork. It was thus since the Sixties, say the sceptics about
Surrey, and might forever be.
But it should not - and it is a nonsense. Anyway, we were under
the impression that Adam Hollioake, new captain and briefly new
hero of English cricket during late May, was supposed to
straighten things out. He led England A by example and with
tough definition on their storming mission through Australia in
the winter; surely the summer with Surrey against soft-bellied
county sides would not interrupt the lad's glossy progress.
Not so, for Surrey's indecent inconsistencies are eating away
at Hollioake the elder and the frustration is niggling away at
his game. He is within cricket's greatest dichotomy; to be
bowled or not to be bowled; to trust your instinct or to play
by the rules. It is from the result of these decisions that
special men and special teams arise to be crowned. During the
last year Hollioake has arisen, the crown is still waiting.
He is lucky, amid the wake and post mortem of Wednesday's
let-down, to have another chance to crown so soon. The Benson
and Hedges Cup is the hardest one-day competition and were
Surrey to triumph today - and especially against a nicely
gnarled and more likely looking Kent - Hollioake will deserve
the freedom of the Oval, just for a day or two, in recognition
of the mind job he will have done on his temperamental team.
These gifted and enjoyable cricketers must clear the decks of
depression and remind themselves that they must do the simple
and obvious well, before the complicated and glamorous can be
embraced. At least this is what Hollioake, a nugget of a
cricketer himself, must get through to them.
If you have not heard by now, the Hollioake family go back five
generations in Ballarat, the gold mining town outside
Melbourne, where great uncle Rex bowled out Tom Graveney when
the MCC were touring in 1955. The boys' father, John, was a
good club player who might have been rather better had he not
been so devoted to ensuring a smooth path for the boys, and
whose life as an engineer brought him to England, where the
boys settled.
Adam went to school at St George's, Weybridge, then,
eventually, to Millfield; all frightfully English. Our cricket
came from the English system, Adam has said, "and though my
blood may not be English, I feel a great pride when I represent
this country".
Which is fine and good to hear, but not the point. His blood is
the point, it is what makes him different. It is why he should
be playing for England now, not talking about it. He is a
terrific, potentially heroic cricketer because his blood is a
potent mix of Australian adventure and Australian
never-say-die.
His batting is a combination of free spirit and steely nerve;
his bowling a display of irresistible varieties. He is Steve
Waugh to Ben's Mark and is as good a batsman now, at 25, as
Steve Waugh was when the Australian selectors persevered with
him in the mid-Eighties, if not quote so advanced as the
24-year-old Waugh who scattered the English bowling here in
1989.
Two years ago, when he captained for the first time against
Hampshire, I thought him the most innovative, perceptive and
uncompromising captain, after Mike Brearley and Dermot Reeve,
that I had played against. Last summer he averaged 70 with the
bat and was the leading wicket-taker in the Sunday League. This
year he is nowhere near such form; don't say that the captaincy
of Surrey isn't getting to him.
"County captaincy is draining, and at first mentally
unsettling," says the chairman of selectors and manager of last
winter's A tour, David Graveney, "and all that ability at
Surrey not quite achieving what is expected of it will
frustrate Adam. He is a gambler by nature and the odd failed
gamble this summer may affect his captaincy confidence. I
suspect, too, that he has found it more difficult than he
imagined to turn from being one of the lads into being the boss
of his contemporaries."
Having said that, Hollioake is to lead England's 'sixes' team
in Hong Kong late in September and were Michael Atherton not to
go to Sharjah for the tournament before Christmas, Graveney
would almost certainly want Hollioake as captain. Premature
promotion, perhaps, but there is no point in this bold and
convincing talent being left to fester.
The routine of county cricket has put out the fire in many
professional cricketers; Hollioake is a different kettle and
Graveney is keen to see him boil.
First, though, he must ensure that Surrey do the boiling on
today's grand occasion and that they are a team behind their
captain, not individuals with a private agenda. For some time
now the game has labelled them the 'Surrey Strutters' and good
on them if they perform to their ability. If not their strut
will be covered by egg.
When Graveney told Hollioake that he was not playing in the
first Test at Edgbaston, Hollioake looked him square in the eye
and said: "The most important quality in an individual is the
way he bounces back from adversity." A revealing thought
indeed.
Date-stamped : 12 Jul97 - 14:20