Beneath the helmet, Harry Finch is taking his second chance

NICK FRIEND: Released by Sussex at the end of last season, Finch turned up at late notice as part of Kent's emergency County Championship squad to make a hundred on debut against his former county, all while wearing a taped-over Sussex helmet

Harry Finch is no longer on social media but when he woke up on Thursday morning, his phone was inundated with messages from friends and former teammates in Australia.

News of his fourth first-class hundred had travelled rather further than anticipated, reaching the other side of the world via popular podcast The Grade Cricketer, who shared a tweet composed the previous evening by the author of this piece.

It documented the exceptional circumstances of Finch’s milestone: a century on debut for Kent against Sussex, the county from which he had been released last autumn. So hastily arranged was his selection that Finch put together his match-saving century while wearing his old Sussex helmet, with the club crest covered up but the outline of the county’s iconic martlets still visible through the masking tape. “Harry Finch alphaing his former team. Perfection,” went The Grade Cricketer’s caption on its Facebook page.

Until the Saturday night beforehand, when it became clear that the vast majority of Kent’s first-team squad would have to self-isolate for 10 days, Finch had no reason to believe that he would be involved.

Instead, he was bemoaning the manner of his dismissal for Hastings Priory, his club side, earlier in the day. But a check of his WhatsApp messages revealed a text, telling him he was on standby, before a 9pm phone call confirmed his spot in an emergency County Championship team. After hurrying through paperwork and sorting his kit, he was on the road at 5.30am for a game unique in the history of the competition.

Finch and Dan Lincoln were roped in, having left counties at the end of last season, while Joe Gordon, Harry Houillon, Jas Singh and Bailey Wightman – a second-day Covid replacement – were making professional debuts.

“It was the best thing because I probably wasn’t thinking about the game,” he tells The Cricketer of a manic rush that gave him no time to summon any nerves. “I was trying to get everything else sorted. It has been a bit of a strange week.”

^{Finch made his Sussex debut in 2013}

At this point, he remains a trialist, having initially been offered the chance to represent Kent’s second string in April by Michael Yardy, the club’s batting coach and an ex-colleague from their time together at Sussex.

Four evenings after the formation of their motley crew, however, Kent would be toasting a hard-fought draw, with the 26-year-old batsman at its centre on the back of 115 off 212 deliveries – an effort that spanned 79.3 overs and clinched a quite remarkable result. A victory followed on Friday night in the T20 Blast over Middlesex, with Kent fielding a similarly makeshift team. Head coach Matt Walker tweeted: “I don’t think I’ve felt as proud as I feel tonight.” Finch was at the fore once again, this time with 47 off 35 balls. He was given a Kent helmet for the occasion too.

For Finch, this has been a glorious whirlwind; safe to say, there is no good time to be released as a professional cricketer in your mid-twenties, but there are especially bad times – and being let go from your childhood club while an ongoing pandemic squeezes budgets throughout the county game would certainly qualify as such.

“I think you do question yourself at times when you keep on getting knocked down and then you do get released at 25; it’s a bit of a crossroads moment,” he admits. “It’s like: ‘Right, am I going to keep giving this a go or am I going to go into the real world and get a job?’ The passion was still there for me and I still felt like I was good enough, but at times you do question it – like over the winter when things weren’t going the right way.”

As a batsman with more than 50 first-class appearances under his belt, Finch found himself in an unusual position following his departure from Sussex. For a start, it was an exit that slipped under the radar amid a wider, higher-profile clear-out at Hove: Jason Gillespie, Danny Briggs, Laurie Evans and Luke Wells all left at the end of 2020.

Finch’s exit, by comparison, was quieter and perhaps more surprising, given the way in which the county have looked to rebuild this season with a young, homegrown squad under “great man” Ian Salisbury. So different are things now that Finch only knew a small portion of the opposition on a personal level: with an average age of 21 years and 69 days, Sussex’s was the youngest team ever fielded in the County Championship.

And as Sussex have moved on in their own way, so has Finch. Finding new employment in the professional game has been more challenging than usual; trialist opportunities for willing net-bowlers are far more common than for wannabe net-batters, while the Covid situation through the early part of the off-season meant that counties were hardly able to train in any case, making it harder for those in his position to stake a claim.

Pretty cool story, this. Released by Sussex at the end of last season, only to turn up at late notice as part of Kent's emergency squad to make a hundred on debut against his former county, all while wearing a taped-over Sussex helmet. https://t.co/QX4xV8qInQ

— Nick Friend (@NickFriend1) July 14, 2021

He is philosophical though: “The winter was tough for everyone, not just me. I’d be fairly deluded to think that. I think with the way that the world was, it put things into perspective. Touch wood, all my family are healthy and stuff. For me, that’s what was quite important.”

It’s the same kind of approach that he took in this unexpected chance to play professional cricket once more, walking out with a carefree attitude and a determination not to burden himself as he did at Sussex.

“These are the things you learn,” he explains. “I’m 26 now and the last year has been a massive learning curve for me. The biggest thing I’ve learnt was how intense I used to get about my cricket; it didn’t help me at all.

“I used to put so much on it and that was my main thing going into this week: firstly, that’s how I don’t want to be; secondly, how do I want to be? Well, I want to make sure that if this is the last time I get to play a first-class game, then I want to embrace it and do what I do best. I just wanted to enjoy it and express myself.

“In the past, I’ve got it wrong by being way too intense and wanting it too much. The guys who are most successful at the moment are the guys who go out there and are fearless and enjoy it and express themselves. If you back off and you’re timid, I think you struggle. It’s easier said than done, but you have to keep on reminding yourself that it is just a game and that we’re incredibly lucky to do what we do.

“A lot of people said I was potentially quite unlucky to be released but, to be honest, I haven’t really looked at it like that. If you start doing that, you don’t really knuckle down and focus on what you can do next. Ironically, I’d say it’s probably the best thing that’s happened to me.

“It’s really accelerated my learning; you get forced into a position that’s uncomfortable, so it’s made me realise a few things I was doing wrong in my time at Sussex. It’s nice to have a fresh start, whether that be at Kent or wherever that is.”

^{Finch made 47 on his Blast debut for Kent, with the club's first team still unavailable}

It was Yardy’s call that changed things: Finch’s arrangement with Kent came after conversations with other counties had led to dead-ends; following a run-a-ball century against Northamptonshire during a second team game in May, it was loosely agreed that he would turn out for them for the rest of the year, with no further guarantees let alone what has since transpired. “To be honest, this week has been a complete bonus,” he laughs. “It just shows that you really don’t know when you’re going to get an opportunity and you just have to stay ready, really. You just don’t know what’s down the line.”

The goal for this season was – and remains – the Royal London Cup, hopefully with Kent: he averages 37.5 in List A cricket. After that, a contract somewhere to get back aboard the county carousel. “I technically am a trialist,” he says. “I guess I’m not the same as someone out of university; I’ve played a lot of cricket now, so counties are either going to be interested in me or they’re not going to be interested in me. I don’t really know what I am; I just know that I’m going out there to enjoy playing and giving my best.”

On the side, he has been working as a coach at Hurstpierpoint College, where former teammates George Garton and Tom Haines were educated. “I couldn’t just sit around doing nothing,” he knows. “I had to be earning some money. And if cricket doesn’t work out, I need to know what I’m going to do after.”

He adds: “Ironically, it has really helped my cricket this year; I’ve been as consistent as I have been ever, and quite comfortably so. I think it has just given me a better perspective; it has made me realise that if cricket doesn’t work out, then I’ll be fine. When I was younger at Sussex, it was the be-all-and-end-all.”

There was plenty of emotion in his celebration after reaching three figures on Wednesday, though not directed – he insists – at Sussex’s decision-makers. “I don’t really play that well when I get too angry, so I had to try to keep restrained from that,” he says.

“Also, I haven’t got anything to prove to them – it’s more to myself and to whichever county I’m trying to play for and impress. My main focus really was just trying to get a draw for Kent; that was really it.”

As well as from the podcast world – “I’d like to say it was my dream since I was a kid to be mentioned by The Grade Cricketer, but I’m not sure I can!” – there was an “overwhelming” number of goodwill messages waiting as he left the field, including several from his ex-colleagues at Sussex, where he was a junior throughout the age-groups.

“When I did get that hundred, there was quite a bit of emotion in it and there was quite a big celebration. It did mean a lot.

“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t nice to go and do that and, in some way, show them not that they’d made a mistake, but I felt at times potentially it’s dangerous to judge players really early when they’re still relatively young. I don’t think as a cricketer you get to your best until you’re in your late twenties or early thirties. There is still a lot of learning for me to do, and I’m only really coming towards my best years. But I’ve got no hard feelings towards them at all.

“I think as a sportsman, you just have to take it on the chin; it’s part of the game. It’s obviously quite unlucky with Covid, but sport is ruthless, isn’t it?”

Finch has learned that the hard way, but when a chance presented itself out of the blue, he made sure to take it, his mind relaxed and uncluttered beneath the helmet of his former employers.