Interview ‘Run in and bowl fast – that flipped the switch’
Kyle Jamieson set out to make his name as a batsman but the 6ft 8in paceman is a key part of New Zealand’s attack today
Kyle Jamieson pauses for a second. “The perfectionist in me is trying to get things as good as they can be,” he says. “I chase that vision that I have for myself, for my career down the line. Sometimes you try to obtain it too quickly and get caught up a little bit.”
Perfectionism is not uncommon in any walk of life; in elite sport it is prevalent. And it is an attribute that has arguably served Jamieson well: the early throes of his Test career for New Zealand have brought 66 wickets at 18.72 in 14 matches.
Jamieson’s first day on the job brought the wickets of Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara, and he dismissed the former India captain twice in helping New Zealand to the inaugural World Test Championship title last year.
If all that suggested Test cricket was rather less exacting than its name suggests, last winter was the equivalent of a chilly shower: in two drawn series with Bangladesh and South Africa, Jamieson’s 14 victims cost 28.71 each. Still respectable, but perhaps slightly underwhelming.
“I’m my harshest critic,” he says, when asked if perfectionism blurs his outlook. “I need to get around that a bit better. A number of times in the last six months I’ve been a bit up in my head and people have said, ‘Look, it’s actually coming out pretty well, Kyle’. But when things are going well you have a little more self-compassion. You understand things ebb and flow and you have a great perspective on the game. I’m always trying to do things that allow me to be in that space more often”.
Jamieson, 27, cites a love of the outdoors, he and his partner using it “to get away from the hustle and bustle of what our lives tend to be”, but with Test cricket’s schedule as it is, a new challenge is never far away. Sure enough, today will pitch him into a new battle against England.
At 6ft 8in, Jamieson is a natural candidate for a fast bowler but it took Dayle Hadlee, a former New Zealand international and Richard’s elder brother, to recognise his potential ahead of the 2014 Under-19 World Cup.
“I always hung my hat on my batting,” he explains. “My old man batted in club cricket and like most kids you try to follow your old man’s path. Eventually, Dayle saw my height and said, ‘Here you go, run in and bowl fast’. That flipped the switch in my mind. I fell in love with it, and it’s been like that ever since.”
It is clear that love and cricket are inextricably linked for Jamieson. It would be easy in his position to get so caught up in the magnitude of his task, and the pressures of Test cricket, that the enjoyment fades, but he is able to retain a sense of perspective which should come in handy at Lord’s today.
“There are a lot of external factors trying to pull you away from that mindset, make you focus on the outcome, on how you’ve been and performed,” he says. “But to have the baggy cap on your head, to have the fern on your chest: all those little things that when you’re a kid you’ll give anything for… it’s trying not to lose sight of that, and really enjoy that moment.
“You don’t know when that thing is going to get taken away from you. If you can do that, you tend to go a bit better as well.”
It helps being in a side who excel on the field: New Zealand have reached the latest final in each of cricket’s international formats, and begin this latest skirmish with England as firm favourites.
“I count myself incredibly fortunate to have come into the group at the time I have,” he adds. “For the first few games, I was just like ‘wow’. The trust factor, the enjoyment factor, that this team has around the game was something I hadn’t been exposed to. Often, I step back and think about times where I wanted things to happen a little quicker, or to have played a little younger.
“But I wouldn’t change it for the world now. I’ve gotten to play with guys who are greats of the game. And I’ve been able to be a sponge in a way and soak up all the information and experience this team has.
“Just to sit in that changing room has been pretty special, and to sit here now on the eve of another Lord’s Test is pretty cool.”