I WAS WASHED UP. I HAD NO ENERGY
England’s BEN FOAKES says the treadmill had worn him down ...but when cricket returns he will be raring to go
BEnFoakes has revealed the ‘mental burn-out’ that led to him losing his passion for cricket — before an extended break ahead of his England recall saw ‘the fire come back’.
The gifted Foakes is one of the unluckiest cricketers in England, having been restricted to only five Tests and a single oneday international because of the batsman-keeper brilliance of Jos Buttler and Jonny Bairstow.
But behind the positivity of Foakes’ return to the England squad in Sri Lanka, where he made a Test century on debut only 18 months ago, lies a cautionary tale of the demands on top-level cricketers that forced one of the best glovemen in the world to the brink.
‘I’ve been getting to the start of each season over the last three years thinking, “How am I going to get through this?” Foakes told Sportsmail. ‘When you’re on central contracts you know when you’re going to have a break but I was in the middle where I was playing for Surrey in all formats and then going on tour with England or the Lions.
‘If you are in an England squad but don’t play you can get sent to a Lions tour in the middle. It all built up to the point where I was just trying to get through every game and three years was a long cycle to be in that mind-set.’
It is a brutally honest assessment of the often unseen demands on England players that were not even eased for Foakes when he made that stunning player-of-theseries introduction to Test cricket as a replacement for Bairstow in Sri Lanka. Only two Tests later, when England were struggling against West Indies in the Caribbean, Foakes was dropped.
‘Finally getting into the England side, doing quite well and going out of it again added to my confusion and the mental pressures of it,’ said Foakes, 27. ‘I did feel it was harsh and I was frustrated. Before I played for England that was my drive, my one goal, and when I was struggling to get through games that kept me going. Then not knowing where I stood with England played a part in adding to that mental burn-out. It was tough.’ Foakes’ problems came to a climax last season when the batting of a man who averaged 41 in his five Tests — 60.75 against spin — declined at Surrey to the point where he averaged only 26 in the 2019 championship.
‘I’ve always been able to mask the way I felt with good performances,’ said Foakes. ‘But last year it went further and when I walked out to play I just wasn’t with it and couldn’t put any energy into my game. It was impossible to get myself up for it. I felt so washed up.’
The solution came when Foakes was left out of England’s tour of new Zealand this winter and then told the selectors he did not want to go to Australia with the Lions.
‘I just got away completely because I’d reached the stage where I didn’t even want to see cricket,’ he said.
‘A couple of months off was exactly what I needed because I hadn’t had more than a 10-day break for years and however much you love the game it can get on top of you.
‘It’s helped me get that fire back. Just having a bit of time away from the game reignited that passion and made me get my head clear.’
He was fresh when he went back to where it started for him in 2018 in Sri Lanka. ‘It was amazing to be back there and the England squad is such a good environment to be in,’ said Foakes from his mum’s home in Essex where he is spending the enforced lockdown.
‘So when we were told we were coming back from Sri Lanka I was pretty gutted. You want to prove yourself even though it looked unlikely I’d play.’
The man described as the best keeper in the world by his Surrey director of cricket Alec
Stewart knows batting holds the key to his hopes when cricket finally returns.
And that means silencing concerns about his ability against short-pitched bowling at the highest level that were revealed by Sportsmail ahead of the Sri Lankan selection.
‘I did see the article and I know there are differences between county and international cricket in terms of pace but in domestic cricket the pull is my strongest shot so to hear that from inside the camp surprised me,’ added Foakes.
‘If there’s a reason why a player is not being picked they should be told so they can work on it.
‘If that is something that’s felt then I should hear it from whoever feels that way. There’s never been any suggestion of it to me.
‘Last year I didn’t have the season I wanted but my record is still pretty good and now I want to get big hundreds.
‘Hopefully this break will give me the best chance of doing that when we can play again.’