Crane feels the pain of being a ‘forgotten man’
Injuries have dogged the young leg-spinner after his only Test, but he hopes his fortunes are on the turn
‘You almost feel like you’ve lost a lot, and the world’s just moved on – everyone’s moved on. And it’s tough to deal with.”
In the year that he made his England Test debut as a 20-year-old leg-spinner, Mason Crane should not feel forgotten. But the brutality of professional sport can do that. And so, after a spell marred by persistent injuries, Crane could only look on from afar during England’s series in Sri Lanka. England’s three spinners were underpinning a thrashing; Crane was just waiting to be able to bowl in the nets again, and leave his back injuries behind.
“In January, I’m probably looking at it and I’m thinking this is going to be a really good year for me, and hopefully if I perform well, the sky’s the limit,” Crane reflects. Then came two back fractures – the first prevented him from touring New Zealand with the Test team; the second ended his summer after, with the aid of injections, Crane helped Hampshire win the Royal London Cup final in June.
“I was really starting to feel like I was back and ready to attack, and attack the red-ball game as well and try and get back to where I was. But, then another injury, and I’ve not done very much that last five months. So, that’s the up and down of sport, isn’t it,” he says.
Since then, there have been “dark days, and the days when you really feel like you just want it all to be over”.
How far removed it all is from Sydney in January. It was there, amid the debris of an Ashes campaign long since lost and well into the high season of Pom-bashing, that Crane made his Test debut, becoming England’s youngest specialist spinner since 1928. Crane endured a couple of false starts with his action and ended up with figures of one for 193 but, in the most inauspicious circumstances for an England Test debut, did not give the impression of a man overawed.
“I would just say it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done. I’m so happy I was given the opportunity to go on the tour in the first place. Secondly, to get a game was just amazing. It was a really special few days.
“I guess I bowled OK. Obviously, there were balls I’d love to bowl again. But there are other balls I was really happy with, and there were spells in the game where I felt like I was bowling really well, and I think the numbers would never reflect that,” he says, pre-empting reference to conceding the most runs in a debut Test innings. “I really don’t care about that at all. I felt there were times in there that really gave me encouragement. I know if – hopefully when – I play Test cricket again I can do it.”
Crane’s subsequent injuries have allowed him his first proper time away from the game since he made his Hampshire debut in 2015. But Crane could not resist attending the Test at the Ageas Bowl – and a portrait of what might have been.
“I probably started to feel down when I was watching the Test matches against India. And you know, ‘Rash’ [Adil Rashid] is a wonderful, wonderful bowler, and he’s playing, and you think, ‘Well, had I played in New Zealand I’d have done well – could this be me, could that be me bowling out there, could I be playing a Test match at the Ageas Bowl?’ That was the moment – it was probably the lowest, when I was at the Ageas Bowl watching that Test. And I just thought it could be me.
“In a different world that could be me out there now. But again I use that as motivation now, to think, ‘Next time there is a Test here, I want to be playing it’.”
Since Sydney, Crane has had the “odd text” from Paul Farbrace, England’s assistant coach, but is yet to speak to national selector Ed Smith.
For that to change, his most fundamental task is to stay fit. He has made a mature decision this winter to choose a slow rehabilitation, allowing for a full pre-season, over entering himself for T20 leagues, where his pedigree would have been enticing for franchises.
He says: “I’d rather get it right and never have to go through this again, and any sort of risk at this stage is a big risk. Hopefully in a couple of years’ time we can almost forget about this.”
Crane is the sort to see the good in every situation. Slow rehabilitation has allowed him to focus on improving his batting, so crucial for leg-spinners in the age of three-dimensional cricketers, and time to take stock.
“I’ve watched the videos of when I feel like I’ve been at my best, when I’ve been at my worst. And yeah, I think there’s a couple of things to work on, but generally the trend is the more I bowl, the more games I play, the better I get.
“I’ve grown up a lot this year. It’s been a really big year for me in that sense – I’ve learnt a lot about myself, I’ve learnt a lot about what I want to do – and I think in the long run that’s really going to help me, because I’ve probably got an accelerated growing-up process, and hopefully I’ll come back next year a bit wiser.”
Time out has reminded Crane of how addictive leg-spin is. “I’m sure all leg-spinners have had games where you just land every ball and you’re almost sad that you’ve run out of wickets to take – because you want to keep bowling, you feel so good.”
This sense of what he will soon feel again has sustained Crane through all the lonely sessions in the gym and toil of returning to full fitness. Those memories of his solitary Test are still fresh, but Crane is eager to encounter Test cricket’s multifarious challenges again. “It’s an amazing experience and I just wish I could live it all again just to feel like I did then,” he says. “It gives you the motivation to think, ‘If I can get through this, I can get back to that’.”
‘I was watching the Test and just thought that in a different world that could have been me out there’