Gooch and Gower
Three main questions occupied me in late pre-pubescence and early adolescence 1. why, with my tremendous banter, am I not extremely popular? 2. do I believe in god and if I do, what am I going to do about it? and 3. how can it be a just and sensible world when David Gower is not in the England cricket team and some people think that is a good thing?
Gooch Vs Gower is the defining sporting issue of my youth. It's a classic "two types of people" sporting debate, truer, really, than Messi/Ronaldo, Woods/Mickelson, Federer/Nadal.
It's an odd and dispiriting tale really, about a genuine falling out between friends, and about a bad time for English cricket, which set up an even more prolonged bad period.
For me personally, it is a good example of when I have imposed a "logical" argument on top of what was originally an emotive one, though occasionally it can be the other way round.
When I got into cricket, in 1984, Gower was a) called David b) left-handed c) England captain. He was already my favourite player before I saw him play. His 732 run Ashes-winning captaincy in 1985 sealed the deal for life.
1985 was the summer Graham Gooch came back from a 3-year ban from playing for England for touring apartheid South Africa. That will matter.
There are, I think, three reasons why I've been prompted to write about my original sporting faith. a) The piece I wrote recently about modern sporting rivalries was quite fun b) David Gower came up when I was writing about Ian Bell c) on a recent, very enjoyable facebook thread where people were prompted to share an "unpopular" opinion of theirs without fear of argument (one could only respond with emoji or agreement), I saw someone say that Gooch was the best England batsman of the modern era, and someone respond "how is that even controversial?". Well, thankfully, I could only post a rather pathetic angry emoji (my first, and hopefully, last ever angry emoji ...)
Because it's obviously controversial. Even if it's not flat-out wrong, it's obviously controversial (if you care in the slightest about these things ...)
But this high regard for Gooch is not uncommon. He came 4th, behind only Hobbs, Hutton and Hammond (hurricanes hardly ever happen) in a 2017 expert poll in Wisden to discover England's Greatest Ever Batsman.
The high regard is not precisely borne out by statistics - Gooch scored 8900 runs at 42.58. His protege Alastair Cook, who was 14th on the list, and has also had to shoulder the burden of opening and of captaincy, currently has 12,145 at 45.65.
Why do people rate Gooch so highly? Well, because Brexit ... (I'm finding in almost every post I put some glib reference to Brexit which is shorthand for "people in Britain mainly get things wrong in a way which reflects not only a lack of human warmth and romanticism but also, some might suggest conversely but actually not, a failure to grasp basic numbers" ...)
OK, look, let's not be a dick about this, David. Gooch, in his pomp, was a magnificent player. His prime began, roughly, with that comeback for the 1985 series, but really and truly existed from 1990 to 1993, the period that mainly coincided with his captaincy. He averaged an extraordinary 58.72 in 34 tests as captain and a perfunctory 35.93 in 84 tests when not captain.
And that might be the key to the perception of his greatness - he played some really great innings in a poor team then (most notably his 154* in a winning cause versus a great West Indies attack at Leeds in 1991 is rated as one of the greatest test innings of all time), seemed to grow with the responsibility of captaincy and carry the team. The English love that.
But, you know, that is just a phase. A relatively short phase in a long career which serves to vastly inflates his stats. People similarly rate Michael Vaughan (end average 41) very highly for his prime. Fair enough, but people rather pick and choose. Going back to Ian Bell, between 2010 and 2013, in 46 tests, he averages 53 and dominated in a winning Ashes and a key 2010 series where England defeated India to be the Number 1 team in the world. But, he is, rightly, not just judged on this prime. His overall test average is a solid not spectacular 42.69 - that is still higher than Graham Gooch's.
As is Cook's, Trescothick's, Pietersen's, Root's, Thorpe's, Vaughan's, Robin Smith's, Trott's ... and David Gower's.
Here's another little statistical trick - both men had one truly great summer, an aestas mirabilis - Gower with his 732 Ashes-winning runs as captain in 1985, Gooch with 1058 runs in 1990, which helped win series against India and New Zealand. Gooch was magnificent that summer, but besides a faded Kapil Dev and a still-potent Richard Hadlee, those were mediocre test attacks. And, in the history of English cricket, Gower's 732 mean an awful lot more than Gooch's 1058.
So, you know with sports like diving they take out the highest judges' scores. Well, let's take out those two summers and see what we have - the gap between the two is wider still - Gooch 7842 at 39.6, Gower 7499 at 42.3. Perhaps that's a fatuous test, but it reiterates for me that Gooch reached great heights statistically which elevate his overall record, whereas Gower's statistical heights are not as striking but of more value.
The great wrongness about David Gower is that he was a talented dilettante, who didn't make the most of his gift, who played wonderful cameos, a corinthian one-off who can't be measured by trifling statistics.
He can be measured by statistics. From the late 70s to early 90s, when test averages were in general lower than in eras before and after, playing for England, a team where the best players have lower averages than those like India who play on better batting wickets, he scored 8231 test runs at 44.25. That period and the period after saw a litany of talented batsmen with surprisingly poor records. Measure Gower against Lamb (36.09), Gatting (35.55), Hick, Ramprakash, Atherton, and Gooch.
Measure them as batsman and as man.
Gooch - the classic, solid, English yeoman, the hard worker, the leader of men, the trailblazing modern cricketer.
Gooch - unapologetic for abandoning his country in his putative prime and taking the apartheid dollar, Gooch the captain who would not accommodate difference, who shut out his only rival in talent and accomplishment, Gooch whose joyless reign set the template for a terrible decade of over-thought underachievement for the national team.
Gower served his talent and he served his national team. He had two or three good test years stolen from him by the Gooch regime's ill-considered exclusion. Neither was a great captain, of course, but it was Gooch, I truly believe, that did the damage in the 1990s, that created a system where talents like Ramprakash, Hick, Tufnell, Malcolm could not flouish. Maybe not, maybe I'm being emotional not logical, maybe it was Ray Illingworth or the powers-that-be or Ted Dexter. But spare me the Gooch-is-great stuff.
It seemd churlish at the time and even more so now. I'd respect it more if Gower, this supposed agitator, had been shut out for good at a certain point, never to return. But they played with his career. Discarded then brought back (to success with the bat, generally ...) over and over.
Gooch's dwindling-returns spell as England batting coach showed once again that he's a one-size-fits-all cricket man. Yes, yes, high backlift, we get it.
Actually, I don't mind about that stuff. Gooch wasn't an elegant batsman but he was enjoyable to watch, his punched drives through the on and off stay with me even now. He was a Shearer-like accumulator in county cricket. an absolutely committed, unapologetic run-getter, in the way that Gower wasn't.
Who's Gower if Gooch is Shearer (actually, now I'm veering towards Gooch as Gerrard ...)? Barnes? McManaman? Waddle? Beckham? Beckham's the closest I can get - mislabelled as a fancy dan, consistently committed and accomplished, dropped by a fucking idiot.
Well, there we go. It's sad, as I said, how a genuine animosity seemed to grow up and that affected England cricket. I'm sure Gooch is an ok chap and he did what he thought was right, but those are strong opinions, those teenage ones, and they don't disappear easily. I wrote a few years ago about the comparison between the Gower case and the Pietersen case, and how, as an adult, I came down on a different side of the argument.
But that. you see, was completely different ...
Gooch Vs Gower is the defining sporting issue of my youth. It's a classic "two types of people" sporting debate, truer, really, than Messi/Ronaldo, Woods/Mickelson, Federer/Nadal.
It's an odd and dispiriting tale really, about a genuine falling out between friends, and about a bad time for English cricket, which set up an even more prolonged bad period.
For me personally, it is a good example of when I have imposed a "logical" argument on top of what was originally an emotive one, though occasionally it can be the other way round.
When I got into cricket, in 1984, Gower was a) called David b) left-handed c) England captain. He was already my favourite player before I saw him play. His 732 run Ashes-winning captaincy in 1985 sealed the deal for life.
1985 was the summer Graham Gooch came back from a 3-year ban from playing for England for touring apartheid South Africa. That will matter.
There are, I think, three reasons why I've been prompted to write about my original sporting faith. a) The piece I wrote recently about modern sporting rivalries was quite fun b) David Gower came up when I was writing about Ian Bell c) on a recent, very enjoyable facebook thread where people were prompted to share an "unpopular" opinion of theirs without fear of argument (one could only respond with emoji or agreement), I saw someone say that Gooch was the best England batsman of the modern era, and someone respond "how is that even controversial?". Well, thankfully, I could only post a rather pathetic angry emoji (my first, and hopefully, last ever angry emoji ...)
Because it's obviously controversial. Even if it's not flat-out wrong, it's obviously controversial (if you care in the slightest about these things ...)
But this high regard for Gooch is not uncommon. He came 4th, behind only Hobbs, Hutton and Hammond (hurricanes hardly ever happen) in a 2017 expert poll in Wisden to discover England's Greatest Ever Batsman.
The high regard is not precisely borne out by statistics - Gooch scored 8900 runs at 42.58. His protege Alastair Cook, who was 14th on the list, and has also had to shoulder the burden of opening and of captaincy, currently has 12,145 at 45.65.
Why do people rate Gooch so highly? Well, because Brexit ... (I'm finding in almost every post I put some glib reference to Brexit which is shorthand for "people in Britain mainly get things wrong in a way which reflects not only a lack of human warmth and romanticism but also, some might suggest conversely but actually not, a failure to grasp basic numbers" ...)
OK, look, let's not be a dick about this, David. Gooch, in his pomp, was a magnificent player. His prime began, roughly, with that comeback for the 1985 series, but really and truly existed from 1990 to 1993, the period that mainly coincided with his captaincy. He averaged an extraordinary 58.72 in 34 tests as captain and a perfunctory 35.93 in 84 tests when not captain.
And that might be the key to the perception of his greatness - he played some really great innings in a poor team then (most notably his 154* in a winning cause versus a great West Indies attack at Leeds in 1991 is rated as one of the greatest test innings of all time), seemed to grow with the responsibility of captaincy and carry the team. The English love that.
But, you know, that is just a phase. A relatively short phase in a long career which serves to vastly inflates his stats. People similarly rate Michael Vaughan (end average 41) very highly for his prime. Fair enough, but people rather pick and choose. Going back to Ian Bell, between 2010 and 2013, in 46 tests, he averages 53 and dominated in a winning Ashes and a key 2010 series where England defeated India to be the Number 1 team in the world. But, he is, rightly, not just judged on this prime. His overall test average is a solid not spectacular 42.69 - that is still higher than Graham Gooch's.
As is Cook's, Trescothick's, Pietersen's, Root's, Thorpe's, Vaughan's, Robin Smith's, Trott's ... and David Gower's.
Here's another little statistical trick - both men had one truly great summer, an aestas mirabilis - Gower with his 732 Ashes-winning runs as captain in 1985, Gooch with 1058 runs in 1990, which helped win series against India and New Zealand. Gooch was magnificent that summer, but besides a faded Kapil Dev and a still-potent Richard Hadlee, those were mediocre test attacks. And, in the history of English cricket, Gower's 732 mean an awful lot more than Gooch's 1058.
So, you know with sports like diving they take out the highest judges' scores. Well, let's take out those two summers and see what we have - the gap between the two is wider still - Gooch 7842 at 39.6, Gower 7499 at 42.3. Perhaps that's a fatuous test, but it reiterates for me that Gooch reached great heights statistically which elevate his overall record, whereas Gower's statistical heights are not as striking but of more value.
The great wrongness about David Gower is that he was a talented dilettante, who didn't make the most of his gift, who played wonderful cameos, a corinthian one-off who can't be measured by trifling statistics.
He can be measured by statistics. From the late 70s to early 90s, when test averages were in general lower than in eras before and after, playing for England, a team where the best players have lower averages than those like India who play on better batting wickets, he scored 8231 test runs at 44.25. That period and the period after saw a litany of talented batsmen with surprisingly poor records. Measure Gower against Lamb (36.09), Gatting (35.55), Hick, Ramprakash, Atherton, and Gooch.
Measure them as batsman and as man.
Gooch - the classic, solid, English yeoman, the hard worker, the leader of men, the trailblazing modern cricketer.
Gooch - unapologetic for abandoning his country in his putative prime and taking the apartheid dollar, Gooch the captain who would not accommodate difference, who shut out his only rival in talent and accomplishment, Gooch whose joyless reign set the template for a terrible decade of over-thought underachievement for the national team.
Gower served his talent and he served his national team. He had two or three good test years stolen from him by the Gooch regime's ill-considered exclusion. Neither was a great captain, of course, but it was Gooch, I truly believe, that did the damage in the 1990s, that created a system where talents like Ramprakash, Hick, Tufnell, Malcolm could not flouish. Maybe not, maybe I'm being emotional not logical, maybe it was Ray Illingworth or the powers-that-be or Ted Dexter. But spare me the Gooch-is-great stuff.
It seemd churlish at the time and even more so now. I'd respect it more if Gower, this supposed agitator, had been shut out for good at a certain point, never to return. But they played with his career. Discarded then brought back (to success with the bat, generally ...) over and over.
Gooch's dwindling-returns spell as England batting coach showed once again that he's a one-size-fits-all cricket man. Yes, yes, high backlift, we get it.
Actually, I don't mind about that stuff. Gooch wasn't an elegant batsman but he was enjoyable to watch, his punched drives through the on and off stay with me even now. He was a Shearer-like accumulator in county cricket. an absolutely committed, unapologetic run-getter, in the way that Gower wasn't.
Who's Gower if Gooch is Shearer (actually, now I'm veering towards Gooch as Gerrard ...)? Barnes? McManaman? Waddle? Beckham? Beckham's the closest I can get - mislabelled as a fancy dan, consistently committed and accomplished, dropped by a fucking idiot.
Well, there we go. It's sad, as I said, how a genuine animosity seemed to grow up and that affected England cricket. I'm sure Gooch is an ok chap and he did what he thought was right, but those are strong opinions, those teenage ones, and they don't disappear easily. I wrote a few years ago about the comparison between the Gower case and the Pietersen case, and how, as an adult, I came down on a different side of the argument.
But that. you see, was completely different ...
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