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English cricket has a lot to thank Zimbabwe for. The two coaches most
responsible for transforming England into one of the best teams in the
world over the last decade and a half, Duncan Fletcher and Andy Flower,
hardened their characters and honed their philosophies in southern
Africa and now another young leftie with a Zimbabwean lilt could be
asked to solve one of the more enduring problems within the current
set-up: the No. 6 Test spot.
Gary Ballance,
of Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Mid West Rhinos and, some years ago, Zimbabwe
Under-19s, was the Ashes bolter who caught the eye when England's squad
to tour Australia was announced. A powerful batsman, the 23-year-old
has been capped once by his adoptive country - making a two-ball duck in
the ODI against Ireland earlier this month - having qualified through
residency, and could become England's first Ashes Test debutant in
Australia since the Lancashire wicketkeeper, Warren Hegg, in 1998.
It is often said that a strong Yorkshire makes for a strong England, and
Ballance played a full part in the county's tilt at the title this
year, scoring 995 Championship runs as they finished second. He may not
have mastered the accent but Ballance will happily band together with
his friends, team-mates and fellow tourists, Joe Root and Jonny
Bairstow, in England's young Yorkie club.
"I've played at Yorkshire for four to five years, I don't think you get
more English than that," was his unequivocal response to being asked
about his allegiances. "I feel 100 percent English."
There will be those that prickle at the claim, as well as England's
recruitment of another foreign-born player to their ensemble. Indeed,
upon announcing the Ashes squad the national selector, Geoff Miller, had
to defend the selection of yet another player drawn from non-English
roots.
But Ballance was not inveigled away from his homeland. Like soon-to-be
team-mates Kevin Pietersen and Jonathan Trott, who both came through the
South African system, Ballance left with a clear goal in mind.
Born in Harare to parents who ran a tobacco farm, Ballance played
several sports but knew early on that a career in cricket might be more
fruitful - and stable - overseas. A family contact, in the form of the
former Zimbabwe captain and coach Dave Houghton, then in charge at
Derbyshire, was able to assist. Houghton is married to a cousin of
Ballance's father and was happy to be involved in bringing the teenager
to England, putting him up for a period before he took up a sports
scholarship at Harrow.
"His father and mother came to see us on one of my trips back to
Zimbabwe," Houghton recalls. "I knew Gary was a decent player, we're
quite close as a family. They said to us, 'He's 15, what do you suggest
we do? He wants to play cricket as a profession and he's got a British
passport' I said, if he can get to England, we'll happily look after
him."
Ballance described his Ashes inclusion as being "quite a shock" and his
parents, who are currently in England, were the first to be told. Their
farm was among the many confiscated by the Zimbabwe government, shortly
after Ballance left home, but they remain in Zimbabwe and involved in
the farming industry, making periodic visits to watch their son play.
Asked about the challenges of starting a new life in another country at
such a young age, Ballance answers with a clear-eyed sense of purpose.
"I don't think it was as hard as people might think, it was in the
interests of my career and wanting to play cricket," he says. "It came
down to that. I knew if I wanted to play cricket that England would be
the best place to do it. I got help from my parents, when I came over
here I got a lot of help from Dave Houghton and that made the decision a
lot easier.
"Since I moved over it's been my dream to play for England. I moved to
Yorkshire, to the academy there, they've treated me very well and I've
had a great time there. I've always dreamed of the opportunity and I'm
really looking forward to it."
| A solid, muscular presence, Ballance looks like a bit like a svelte Rob Key and has a similarly cheery disposition, indicating there will not be any animosity should he and Bairstow, a one-time room-mate, end up in competition to bat at No. 6. | |||
Observant Sky Sports viewers would have caught a glimpse of the future
in 2007, when Ballance smashed a century for Derbyshire club side
Ockbrook and Borrowash in the televised national T20 cup, and it wasn't
long before Ballance attracted the attention of a bigger county in
Yorkshire, whose academy he joined at the end of that year.
Ballance learned his cricket in Zimbabwe, where he went to the
independent Peterhouse boarding school, and his batting idol was Sachin
Tendulkar rather than Michael Atherton or Graham Thorpe (though Michael
Vaughan's personal Ashes mirabilis of 2002-03 made an
impression). He returned in 2010-11 and 2011-12 to further his
development in the first-class Logan Cup competition but has since
become one of England's track-suited, talent-identification generation,
through the Lions and Performance Programme squads.
He impressed with the Lions in Australia over the winter, his only
previous visit to the country, and although his one-day debut "didn't go
as well as I'd hoped", he has now overleapt the likes of James Taylor and Ravi Bopara for Test selection.
A solid, muscular presence, Ballance looks like a bit like a svelte Rob
Key and has a similarly cheery disposition, indicating there will not be
any animosity should he and Bairstow, a one-time room-mate, end up in
competition to bat at No. 6.
And what of his prospects if called upon to fill the position, which has
chewed up numerous candidates since Paul Collingwood's retirement three
winters ago? Could Ballance provide just that and offer Flower,
England's made-in-Zimbabwe coach, a made-in-Zimbabwe solution? Houghton
has further words of encouragement.
"His business is scoring runs. When he gets in, he gets hundreds and he
has got hundreds at every level he's played at - plenty of them. And I
don't expect that to change once he gets into Test cricket."
Alan Gardner is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo. He tweets here
Feeds: Alan Gardner
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
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