A GENIUS WHO’S THE MASTER OF HIS CRAFT

WHEN you have the privilege as captain of handing a young player his first England cap, as I did Jimmy Anderson more than 17 years ago, you have no idea how far he will go. It would certainly have been ridiculous to think he would play 156 Tests and take 600 wickets. But what you do know, if you have any kind of gut feel, is that you have a highly-skilled cricketer on your hands and I quickly realised I had never seen a young English bowler quite like Anderson. He was unique in being able to swing the ball so late and in both directions. Almost immediately he would bamboozle our batsmen in the nets and he quickly bamboozled the Pakistan batsmen in Cape Town in that 2003 World Cup. What I didn’t know then was how Jimmy would progress and where he has had a bit of luck is that he has stayed pretty much injury-free apart from that early period when it was suggested to him by the England hierarchy that he change his action to be preventative. That backfired and he did get injured, but once Anderson went back to the action that came so naturally he has pretty much been fine. What we haven’t seen is all the hard work and training that sees him still, at 38, a perfect physical specimen for bowling. Anderson remains a master of his craft. He will set up a batsman brilliantly by bowling length, length, length and then producing a full delivery they will nick off. At Sky, we will do a pitch map and ask why Jimmy is not bowling fuller but then we will realise that he is waiting to lure a batsman into a big booming drive that proves to be their downfall. When England’s old bowling coach David Saker said Anderson was the most skilful bowler in the world a few years ago people raised their eyebrows because Dale Steyn was at his peak and No 1 in the world but Saker knew exactly what he was saying. Even Steyn himself, when he came on one of our podcasts during lockdown, said for the first time how much he admired the skill of Anderson. Everyone talks about the importance of the wrist to a great bowler but with Jimmy the way he gets his fingers behind the ball and delivers with the seam up is pure magic. This really is an incredible achievement. Jimmy is so far ahead of every other seamer in Test history. How long can he go on for? Well, I’d keep him going for as long as possible because we will never see his like again.