Crane sets his sights high after making bright start to Ashes tour
● Young leg spinner is confident he could do a job for England in Test side
Mason Crane’s Ashes ambitions are at a level even he could scarcely have believed 12 months ago.
It is just a year since the legspinner, then still a teenager, arrived in Australia with a handful of professional matches on his CV hoping to impress and develop at Sydney’s Gordon Cricket Club.
His upward curve last winter took him far beyond that as New South Wales noted his progress sufficiently to break the Australian mould with a rare overseas drafting into their Sheffield Shield team.
Before Christmas, Crane was being mentioned in dispatches by England’s Australian coach Trevor Bayliss and, eight months later, was named in Joe Root’s Ashes squad.
Crane is not about to settle for that either, bold enough after his two wickets in the tour-opening draw against a Western Australia XI in Perth to pronounce himself ready to help retain the urn.
“Everyone’s main aim is to go home having won the Ashes,” he said. “Any way I can contribute to that, and play as many games as I can, that will be great.”
Crane was included at the WACA after first-choice spinner Moeen Ali injured his side, and, with the all-rounder still unavailableforthisweek’sdaynight match against a Cricket Australia XI in Adelaide, opportunity may knock again for the 20-year-old.
“I’ve got to be realistic,” he added.
“Mo is obviously a brilliant bowler and he bats a lot higher than I do. But I’ll keep working hard.”
He intends to put last year’s Australian adventure to good use too.
“I loved it out here,” he said. “It was great fun and I was very lucky to get a game under my belt as well for New South Wales at the SCG. I hope I can use that experience on this tour.”
Crane’s leg-spin education began when as a child he saw Shane Warne in the 2005 Ashes.
Although the Australia great played, like Sussex-born Crane, for Hampshire, he has yet to benefit from a full-on tutorial with Warne.
“I’ve met him in England, very briefly. He just said ‘keep spinning it’, like he does to most people,” Crane said.
“There has been a crack at trying to tee up [a longer meeting]. But he’s a very busy man and I’ve got to get used to that.
“I hope one day I can have a bowl with him.”
Crane demonstrated at the
0 Mason Crane bowls during the first tour match against a Western Australia XI in Perth. WACA that he lacks none of Warne’s confidence, twice dismissing batsmen intent on smashing him out of the ground.
“You’ve got to get used to it because that is the way Australians tend to play spin,” he said. “I know they are going to come after me so it is about holding my nerve and getting them out in the end.”
He has great faith, too, in his team-mates as they set out to erase the memory of England’s 5-0 whitewash defeat on their last trip to Australia four years ago.
“The confidence is high,” said Crane. “The batters are hitting it well and we know how good the bowling attack is, with Jimmy [Anderson] and Broady [Stuart Broad]. If we play well, like I know we can, I think we can win.
“We’ll just keep doing our thing and they can do theirs and we’ll just see them [at the first Test] in Brisbane.
“I’m very confident if I was called upon I could do a job. I hope one day that can happen but I probably wouldn’t be here if other people didn’t think so too.” Paul Foster and Alex Marshall both won their opening matches of the Cooperative Funeralcare International Open at the Dewar’s Centre in Perth, the WBT’S first ranking event of the season.
Each, however, progressed in totally different fashion. Foster, ranked four and the reigning world champion, last won the title in 2012, and has since lost in three finals, the most recent of which was against England’s Greg Harlow in the title decider last year.
He mainly had things his ownwayagainstaninjured Chris Gale from Blackpool and came through unscathed 9-4, 8-3 to set up a second round clash today against Gale’s Newtonhall clubmate Mark Dawes, seeded 12.
Marshall, on the other hand, met English qualifier David Bolt from Tyneside, and he was pushed all the way in a first-class exchange, hitting back after dropping the opening set to win the best of three end tie-break 6-8, 9-4, 2-0. He now meets Leicester’s number 11 seed Les Gillett tomorrow.
A third title in succession is the target for City of Ely’s Greg Harlow, the world No 1. He looked home and hosed when he took the opening set 9-0 with two ends to spare against US qualifier Neil Furman.
However, the American hit a rich vein of form in the second set win 9-4 to take the match to a tiebreak which went the full distance before a relieved Harlow won through 2-1.
Elgin’s Mike Stepney opens play today. He meets fellow qualifier Perry Martin for a place in Thursday’s quarter-finals. Marshall, Darren Burnett and David Gourlay continue their mission tomorrow.