Last night I awoke from a dream – one of those that seems fully realistic at the time – in which Lord Botham was opining in the Upper House. The dream was so vivid that I was able to recall it in detail immediately afterwards.
Sir Ian Botham was making one of his infrequent appearances in the House of Lords since his inauguration in October 2020. In this dream, he began by putting forward a motion for debate that this House believes the England and Wales Cricket Board has replaced an inherent gambler with a big gamble of their own. This being the appointment of Mr Stephen Fleming to the position of Head Coach of the England men’s Test cricket team.
In introducing the motion, Lord Botham observed that Mr Fleming – whilst having been a fine batsman and relatively successful captain of the New Zealand Test team, securing 28 wins along with 27 losses from 80 matches – has never coached an international team. Not a Test team, nor even an ODI team. Neither, not once!
There are a number of informed observers, he told the House, who view Stephen Fleming as having been highly effective with two of the four T20 competition teams he has coached, including one in the Indian Premier League. Continuing by saying:
However, that doesn’t cut it for me, I’m afraid! Maybe I’m being myopic, but I really can’t see much in common between T20 matches and Test cricket.
I also gather that Mr Fleming has never taught in a school. This void – not having been a schoolteacher – is of particular relevance in respect of Kindergarten and Junior School children, as I am sure my fellow Lords will appreciate.
Laughter cascades from the banked rows of noble Lords.
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The Speaker of the House (Lord Forsyth of Drumlean): I now turn this motion over to the members present for debate.
Lord Heskeith: I understand that Mr Fleming has chatted, over drinks, with certain Test match coaches since his appointment. This impressive list includes those who have overseen squads of cricketers representing Ghana, Germany and Ireland. I expect this will have been of considerable – if not immense – value.
Lord Dumbarton: Robert Kee and Richard Gould at the ECB are, no doubt, at the bottom of this unfortunate appointment. If I may introduce a Freudian interpretation, it occurs to me that both these drastic under-performers have a predilection for ensuring that individuals of distinctly inferior ability lie below themselves in the pecking order – so that they themselves may be seen in a shining light!
Lord Quinsail: An astute observation, if I may say so, by my good friend Lord Dumbarton.
Clapping and the noise of stamping of feet emanate from the public gallery, lasting for fully one and a half minutes before the Speaker restores order.
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Lord Dacre of Glanton: I would like to ask “Beefy”, as he is affectionately known, about his views on the recent re-appointment of England’s captain.
Lord Botham: I shall preface my remarks by saying that most suitable captains I played under in all my first-class cricket career have been John Michael Brearley – known as “Brears” – in Test matches from 1977 through to 1981, who chided me and it worked; and then David Gower – that “endangered species” – in Tests from 1982 through to the end of the 1980s.
Gower realised that the type of training to be done, its frequency and duration had to be tailored to each individual. For someone such as Phil Tufnell, a cigarette between sending down some overs in the nets was an essential requirement. And Gower got up to some amusing, harmless pranks. One of which being to hire a Tiger Moth biplane and buzz the play at 150 feet during the England-Queensland match at Carrara Oval, this occurring in January 1991 – killing time after his innings. Gower’s attitude to it all being diametrically opposed to that of the subsequent Test captain, Graham Gooch.
Goochie’s problem – apart from obsessing about his batting technique and fiddling around with it like an apprentice female mechanic in a truck workshop – was a total lack of empathy. In my mind, he became a dictatorial psychopath.
I spot him in the visitors’ gallery,
(pointing)
there…in the third row up on the far left… demonstrating his leave to a fast bowler.
To come to the matter raised by Lord Dacre: I think re-appointing Joe Root as captain is a backward step and fraught with danger. This is so because Root has recently displayed his previous habit of going into a brain fade when making bowling and fielding changes to confront tail-end batsmen. The old adage remains true: if conventional deliveries and field settings are good enough to dismiss the specialist batsmen, then they are good enough to dismiss tail-enders.
For some difficult to fathom reason, Root seem to think it an affront to the whole team when a tail-ender manages to score a few runs from conventional bowling. Then comes the knee-jerk reaction: intimidation with hostile short-pitched deliveries which the less able batsmen either fail to connect with or play streaky shots, usually in an uncanny fashion landing in vacant areas.
Lord Kinbar of Edinburgh: May I ask Lord Botham of his solution to this vexed question of a suitable replacement for Mr. Stokes.
Lord Botham: I advocate the adoption of the Ryder Cup golfing format, with a non-playing captain deciding strategic matters before play and during the intervals, while a captain on the field deals with fine-tuning of tactics within a session of play. Now the best person to be the non-playing captain is, in my view, Mike Brearley who continues to provide psychotherapy and psychoanalytical services that keep his mind so incisive.
The Speaker, nodding in the direction of Lord Aldenham to speak next.
Lord Aldenham: Perhaps Sir James Anderson might come under consideration as the on-field captain? I know he’s been doing sterling work as captain of Lancashire this season – a strong and inspirational leader of the team.
Lord Botham: He would be a splendid choice, though it would require the removal from the ECB of henchmen Robert Key and Richard Gould; and probably also the Chairman, Richard Thompson, who seems joined at the hip to Gould. I don’t mean to suggest this would be impossible, but it would take something out of the ordinary.
As an aside: I referred to Richard Thompson just then as “Chairman” when his official title is actually “The Chair”. I ask each of you to think whether you have heard a dining or kitchen room chair speak?
Lord Demonia of Blackpool: I dreamed one time that I was a wooden chair and a most talkative one at that.
Lord Botham: May I suggest you had been reading one too many Franz Kafka novels –
The Metamorphosis perhaps tipping you over the edge.
Lord Demonia: Very droll…I must say!
Lord Belhaven: Perhaps you, yourself Lord Botham could have a word with King Charles. I gather he is a great admirer of your talents, both on and off the field of play.
Lord Botham: Yes…I think King Charles might well be agreeable to this idea and use his constitutional powers to advise. In this instance, to suggest to the trio mentioned that they leave the ECB forthwith, accompanied with a veiled threat of a spell in the Tower of London if they prove stubborn.
Lord Darcy de Knayth: I had a guided tour of the Tower recently, and I can assure the noble Lords present that the torture devices are all in sound working order – including the dreaded Rack.
Cries of “splendid” …“marvellous to hear”…“serve them right” …emanate from the banked rows of the chamber.
Lord Fortescue: Gould for the Rack!
Lord Belhaven: And Key for the Stocks. Pelt him with rotten eggs and tomatoes.
Lord Botham: I shall be happy to take further questions after the break for refreshments.
Trolleys are wheeled into the Chamber laden with oven-cooked turkeys and potatoes roasted in duck fat, along with heaps of Brussels sprouts.
A whole, substantial-sized, turkey is put on a plate for Lord Botham who tucks in after removing the legs to be a second helping. Two bottles of wine are placed by his plate. One of these being from Château Haut-Brion – a rich and complex blend of Sauvignon Blanc and Sémillon – the other a cabernet sauvignon based Pauillac from the distinguished Château Latour.
Lord Botham samples the former, swilling half a glass around his mouth and pronounces favourably on it….
Drawing on David Gower’s autobiography
The substance of this charge that Graham Gooch became a “dictatorial psychopath has been said at considerable length, in print, elsewhere. Most emphatically, in a number of dimensions, by David Gower in his candid autobiography of 2013, titled “An Endangered Species.”
As Gower and Botham were, and still are, big mates and knowing of Botham’s character and attitude to life, the latter would no doubt (in private) largely share the former’s views about Graham Gooch as England’s captain. And, in any event, in a dream views can of course be transplanted.
The meaning of a dictator/dictatorship is well known; the meaning of a psychopath centres on a personality pattern marked by low empathy, shallow emotions, and a lack of remorse.
The relevant page references for David Gower’s book are given below.
- Middle p17 – Mention of a humourless dictatorship under Gooch as captain of England (coming after Gower’s own stint as captain, with a stint by Mike Gatting in between).
- p18 – Gooch talking rubbish and being wholly negative about prospects during a match.
- End of p24 – Total lack of empathy displayed on an important matter on which Gower consulted Gooch (and regretting doing so immediately afterwards).
- p16, 18/19 – An inquisition following Gower’s episode in a Tiger Moth plane and the imposition of the maximum feasible fine, this for a harmless bit of fun – with no remorse later on about having treated Gower this way.
- p129, 217/18 & 292 – An inflexible mono-culture and training regime: treating all England players as having the same needs regardless of their actual differences.
- p22/23 – Gooch misleading Gower about his expected selection for a winter tour of India (1992/93 season). And not just being economical with the truth, but blatantly lying to him.
Fortunately, Graham Gooch is still living and so Lord Botham of the dream cannot be accused of criticising someone who is already in the grave.