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| Hauritz defies doubts to turn his career around |
By Peter Roebuck |
NATHAN Hauritz's rise from the pit into which Australians routinely consign humdrum finger spinners to his new-found status as authentic Test tweaker has been the surprise of the summer. It is a tale of a born-and-bred cricketer blessed with modest ability who refused to go away. It is the story of an insecure man who dared to put himself in the front line, an audacity he periodically regretted. Hauritz does not fit the caricature of the Australian cricketer. Most locals develop layers of self-belief that can survive mutterings and buffetings.
Contrastingly he comes across as sensitive and secretly angry soul sceptical of his own powers and vulnerable to every sleight.
Somewhere along the way Hauritz learned to believe in himself. Somehow he convinced his harshest critic, himself, that he had a part to play in the scheme of things. Gradually he stopped measuring himself against Shane Warne and history.
Somewhere along the line he learned to take setbacks and barbs and sixes in his stride. By nature studious and steady and sensible and several other unsuitable things, he began to harden, began to find the spark sought in these parts.
Initially few observers thought he could make the grade. Hauritz was polite and gentle and thoughtful. For a librarian, it is praise. For a bowler it is belittling. Worse, he was an off-spinner, a bunch regarded in this neck of the woods with all the fondness reserved for cane toads, parking inspectors and other fast-breeding pests. Australians regard crabby openers, orthodox spinners and medium-pacers as anti-cricketers hell-bent on destroying the game.
Nothing in Hauritz's early work suggested that he was going to break the mould. Called up to play 50-over cricket, he kept a length but seemed incapable of making the ball turn. By general reckoning his bowling lacked venom. Still, his figures were respectable and he held his place. At least he did not drop his head or send down any rubbish. In hindsight his qualities were underestimated. Australians like their spinners to rip the top off bottles. He did not fit the bill.
Aware of his limitations, Hauritz continued working on his game. His ears were always open, his mind was always sifting and searching. From afar his technique hardly changed. In fact, he was constantly making minor adjustments to wrist, grip, arm and fingers. It was not so much ambition that drove him on. He loved the game that tormented him. Most of all he wanted to become a top-class bowler, and that meant Test cricket.
Accordingly he tried to add to his attacking weapons. To that end he concentrated on bowling slower and spinning the ball further. Ironically, these changes almost ruined his career. Given his first Test cap on a crumbling pitch in Mumbai, he tossed the ball up and was carted. Michael Clarke took a bagful with exactly the sort of flat tweakers required to meet the occasion. Observers scoffed. Hauritz did not look the part. And still he refused to go away. Instead he moved from Queensland to Sydney, regarded as the home of spin, and pressed for a regular place in the NSW team.
Shane Warne's retirement and the prompt withdrawal of several other tweakers created another opportunity. Now Hauritz arrived as an experienced spinner more aware of the different paces and lines required by different pitches and opponents. If not exactly the complete package, at least he was no longer a basket case. Hauritz and Jason Krejza vied for the spinning position, a struggle between mainstream and maverick. Everyone wanted Hauritz to be more like his rival and vice-versa.
Eventually the Queenslander prevailed. Krejza was too wild a card. Before the first Ashes Test, Ricky Ponting announced that he'd play the spinner in Cardiff and most likely elsewhere.
But Hauritz was not yet ready to accept cricket's embrace. He took wickets in Wales but could not take his team to victory on the final afternoon. Once again success and failure rubbed noses.
Never collared and never imposing, Hauritz kept his place till the fourth match, did not play in Leeds and missed the Oval dust bowl mostly because he looked hangdog. Ponting wanted more from him.
Hauritz' career had reached another turning point. Upon returning home he decided to attack. As much could be told from his dashing batting at the Gabba. It was time to stop trying to impress the world and to take it on.
His bowling reflected his changed attitude and increasing confidence. He began to vary his pace and try a more aggressive line. Far from going into his shell, he accepted criticism and confronted weak points. Melbourne was the breakthrough. On the final morning he talked to Warne and emerged with head higher and shoulder action stronger. He took his first five-wicket haul. Most of his victims left shaking the heads. Several had tried to smite him out of the stadium.
Hauritz might not be unplayable but he did seem irresistible.
Finally the offie arrived in Hobart. Yesterday he took three wickets and deserved them. He removed Sarfraz with his first delivery, a precisely pitched breaker that denied the batsmen any second look.
Mansoor's wicket came with a faster ball delivered from around the wicket.
Umar Gul was lured into driving at a floater. Crucially, Clarke supported the bowler with sharp snares at slip. Hauritz put on a fine show. Afterwards, Mohammed Yousuf seemed nonplussed that his team had lost 18 wickets to an apparently guileless spinner. It's time to put away sentiments of that sort.
Persistence has paid off. The thinking has been rewarded.
Hauritz has earned the place he commands and the respect he craves.
TheAge
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