When Jofra Archer faced Gloucestershire's second team: "For a young player, it couldn't be any better"

NICK FRIEND: England's talisman is back in second-team action for Sussex against Surrey as he steps up his recovery from injury. Two years ago, he faced Gloucestershire's inexperienced second string. This is the inside story from a surreal occasion

The scene was set at Blackstone Cricket Club for Sussex and Gloucestershire – typically a low-key affair, as is often the case on the second-team circuit.

But then Jofra Archer arrived, and a tent was erected for a huddle of journalists, whose interest in an occasion like this was a significant rarity, with a global megastar the odd one out among a pair of teamsheets otherwise housing an array of promising, relatively untried youngsters.

The World Cup had come to its climax three weeks earlier and England were in the midst of an Ashes series, already one match down after losing to Australia at Edgbaston and without James Anderson through a calf problem suffered early in the first Test.

Arguably, Archer’s stock had never been higher: it was his super over that clinched glory at Lord’s and, still to make his red-ball debut at international level, he was seen as England’s saviour-in-waiting, especially once Steve Smith’s twin centuries in Birmingham had shown the need for an X-factor.

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So, his presence in a Sussex side captained by Luke Wells but predominantly made up of the next generation making their way up county cricket’s food chain was an eye-opener. Archer had been troubled by a side strain through the World Cup and subsequently missed the one-off Test against Ireland, instead returning to Barbados for a brief period of rest and rehabilitation.

This – an August Tuesday in 2019 – was his first multiday game for 11 months, and the message was simple: prove your fitness, come through unscathed, bowl fast.

“I was standing at square leg next to the umpire for Jofra’s first ball, and I promise you – I didn’t see that thing,” recalls Jordan Shaw, a Sussex trialist during a match that ultimately lasted just two days.

“It left his hand and it hit the keeper’s gloves a split second later. There was so much media around – I think our wicketkeeper got interviewed about keeping to him.

“Especially in the second innings, he bowled thunderbolts and very little in the batsmen’s half. All credit to the Gloucestershire players – especially the younger guys, they handled him very well. They showed some serious courage.”

^{Archer bowled Gloucestershire out before lunch on the first morning}

Archer finished the first morning with figures of 6 for 27 and ended the same day having smashed an 84-ball hundred in reply. Helmets were hit – 18-year-old Matt Brewer was pinned twice – and Sussex spinner Jack Carson, now a first team regular, split the webbing on his left hand in taking a slip catch.

It is a story relevant once again now, with Archer’s recovery from an elbow problem and a finger injury – sustained when a glass fishtank shattered after he dropped it into his bath – leading him to a four-day encounter at Hove against Surrey’s second string.

For Gloucestershire, who quickly became collateral in the circus of two summers ago, it was an invaluable exercise and an opportunity like few others to play in an atmosphere surrounded by such hype.

They had been in action against the MCC Young Cricketers a week earlier when news trickled through that Archer would be their next opponent. “Chris Dent was playing in that game,” remembers Ollie Price, who made a half century in the second innings at Blackstone. “He suddenly said: ‘Look at Sky Sports, Jofra is going to play in the second team next week.’ And we were like: ‘Oh God, who have we got next week?’ And someone just went: ‘Sussex.’ It was a bit of a surreal moment and no one really believed it was going to happen until he turned up. It was a crazy week, it really was.”

Jofra Archer returns to action for Sussex 2nd XI today

Surrey are the opponents

We know Jof enjoys a run-out in the 2s...pic.twitter.com/mwOPFxsrPm

— The Cricketer (@TheCricketerMag) May 4, 2021

Having been blown away for 79 in the first innings, they dug in for 83.4 overs when they batted again before being bowled out for 279 – with Archer taking just a single wicket.

While social media lapped up clip upon clip, a young side comprising seven teenagers and just two players over the age of 20 were giving it all that they had.

“When you step back from it, it’s cool,” says Price. “But you’re still trying to win a game of cricket, and it’s an important game for a lot of people. You’re still trying to compete.

“Also, you’re all aspiring professional cricketers and then you look at Twitter and there was a comment saying: ‘It looks like a bunch of schoolkids have won a prize to play Jofra Archer.’ That’s not quite what we were going into the week hoping for. It would have been a very good game for someone to step up in. If someone scores a hundred against that attack, you’re doing pretty well.”

^{The scene at Blackstone Cricket Club, where the action took place in 2019}

“For a young player, it couldn’t be any better,” explains second team coach Owen Dawkins, reflecting on the potential benefits for anyone capable of producing something special in one of the most high-profile second team games on recent record.

“We told them that this was a great mental test and that they had to play the ball, not Archer. In the first innings he did go through us – he bowled quickly and he bowled well. But in the second innings, we managed to play the ball and not the bowler, which is always the next step up for any player – understanding that it’s still red and round.”

The Blackstone pitch was a hybrid surface, complete with consistently steep bounce. Dawkins recalls the second delivery of the match flying over Sussex wicketkeeper Joe Billings and careering into the sightscreen, while Price later upper-cut Archer for six over third man.

“I remember that he had one ball left in the over at that point and I was concerned at that point about what was going to come down,” he jokes. “Actually, he went very full and very straight, but I managed to keep it out. In hindsight, it was a really cool moment.”

Moments like those proved Dawkins’ point: if you can manage against a world-class barometer like Archer, you can do it against anyone.

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He speaks with pride about the efforts of his youthful charges over two surreal days and points to Price and his brother Tom, who faced the first ball of the match, both of whom have gone on to secure professional contracts since. Of course, their deals were not based alone on a willingness to stand up to Archer’s pace and reputation; rather, they were reward for years of hard graft. But the character shown by the young Gloucestershire players spoke volumes for the mindset pushed by their coach.

“It was that mental side,” adds Dawkins. “If you can deal with facing Archer, then you can deal with anything. That’s the theory – doing it consistently is always the hard part. But very much the approach from us was that if you got the mental side of that game right, then you’d give yourself half a chance. If you worry about playing Archer, then you might as well not go out to bat.

“Ollie Price got the hook out against Archer. You’re just thinking that even if he gets it wrong, it doesn’t matter. Actually, that gives him a lot of credit – even though he’s missed the ball and it’s whooshed past him, he’s standing up to him. He’s come around the wicket to take him on. That character trait that you’re looking for – a lot of what I look for is character development and how they’re going to react around the senior players if you throw them in the team. How are they going to play Archer? How are they going to play Darren Stevens? They might be two ends of the scale, but they’re two quality performers.

“Most of those academy lads would have done a lot of short-ball work, but it’s so mental when you play against guys like that. If you think playing Archer is a big thing, you’re going to get out to him anyway.”

^{Archer made 35 off 46 balls against Surrey's second team on Tuesday}

Greg Willows, then 20, had already made his List A debut earlier in the year against a touring Australia A side and was dismissed by Josh Hazlewood. Two months later against Sussex, he recorded scores of 38 and 39 – evidence of the growing self-belief that comes from mixing it with the best.

It is why Dawkins, in his role, has designed activities specifically aimed at bringing his players outside their comfort zones. Those challenges have included taking high catches on the boundary rope at the innings break of first team T20 Blast matches next to the rowdiest, booziest sections of the crowd, and getting established pros to watch academy hopefuls in action. He has previously run Dragons Den-style pitches to get his youngsters presenting themselves to more senior players and members of staff. “Does that take you to facing Archer? No,” Dawkins clarifies, “but it’s putting you in uncomfortable situations that you can then reflect on.”

At a club with an emphasis on bringing through local talent – an ethos that Dawkins has helped to oversee for 15 years – he has encouraged his players to re-watch highlight packages of their battles with England’s talisman to build their confidence, “even if it’s just a defensive shot against Archer or playing his bouncer well. It’s just a couple of clips, but every time you see him on television or going at the IPL auction, remember that you’ve played well against him”.

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That message was one of the fundamental takeaways from the week. Even after losing inside two days, Gloucestershire returned to Blackstone on what should have been the third morning, using the ground to debrief and train ahead of a one-day game against Surrey two days later. “We sat there and we went: ‘How do we feel about that?’ The opportunity to reflect on it and use it as a catalyst to kick people’s games on was perfect. Ultimately, when you play against people like that, this is what it’s all about.”

Among the youngsters involved was Buckinghamshire-raised Dom Goodman, the 20-year-old seamer who became the latest product of Gloucestershire’s academy to make his County Championship debut when he was selected last month against Somerset. Two years earlier, he was one of six players to fall to Archer’s pace on the first morning.

“The most useful thing I found from it personally – and I’m sure some of the other lads would say the same – was that I’d never faced bowling as fast as that at that point,” he says.

“To be able to play against it – I faced a few overs and blocked a couple back – it was like: ‘I should be able to compete against this now.’ Once that level had been raised, I think that helped me with my batting to be able to go: ‘Right, this is the expectation of how I should be playing against certain bowlers.’”

^{Ollie Price signed his first professional contract at the start of 2020}

As it happens, Goodman has been dismissed just once in 108 deliveries so far in first team cricket, batting at No.11 to defy Hampshire in clinching a tense draw during his second appearance after the historic win over Somerset a week earlier.

“[Facing Archer] gave me a bit of confidence that I could actually compete at that level. I guess it’s a cliché that every time you play, you either win or you learn. In that game, there was a lot of learning. I feel like it was a more significant learning than other games that I played, setting a lot of us up for where we are with our cricket now.

“It was really exciting. I think, as a young player, when you’re coming up against someone who you idolise, that’s what you dream of really. The overriding emotion was just complete excitement. It was a huge learning experience – if you compare the way we played the whole Sussex attack, but in particular Archer, in the first innings and the second innings.

“One of the big learnings was that whoever you come up against, they’re not super-human. They’re human too. Once you start to do that, you’ll have a better chance of competing. That was one of the learnings from that game.”

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He has carried that thought process into his fledgling first-class career.

“Probably the thing that I’ve found going up the levels is that you always have that little bit of doubt about whether you can do it as you go up.

“But the fact that I’ve got Ryan Higgins at mid-off or Dan Worrall, Josh Shaw or David Payne alongside me giving me tips as I’m bowling, it’s the most enjoyable learning that you could ever have, just getting little bits of gold-dust the whole way through games to learn from. I think the thing for me bowling-wise is that the top of off-stump is the top of off-stump. That is never going to change at all, no matter who you come against. You always have that bedrock – in red-ball cricket especially. If I hit that as many times as I can, then hopefully I’ll be all right.”

Price concurs: “The great thing about it was that afterwards, you then could go: ‘Well, that’s what international players are like.’ It was quick but it’s not a different planet; you’ve been able to negotiate someone who causes a lot of people problems. Definitely the quickest bowler I’ve ever faced and probably the hardest, but that was a nice thing to take away from the week.

^{Archer was proving his fitness ahead of the Ashes Test at Lord's}

“I think we turned up against Kent the next week and they had a couple of first team bowlers; but you could then think back to having coped with Jofra Archer.

“You’ve faced quick bowling before, but you have no idea – and you can’t really prepare for – what it’s going to be like to face someone, almost more mentally, who you know is one of the quickest bowlers in the world. For all the training you do on bowling machines, it’s very difficult to recreate that feeling.

“The hardest thing about it in many ways was getting mentally prepared to play the cricket rather than focusing on the guy who you’ve watched on TV in the summer winning England the World Cup. You had obviously faced a lot of cricket balls beforehand, but I don’t think it was anything that anyone had too much experience of beforehand.”

Price was the only Gloucestershire player not to face Archer first time around, having fallen to Abi Sakande – not slow himself by any means – between the England man’s spells. But after coming to the crease at 120 for 5 on the second afternoon, he made 57 off 107 balls, including survival through a particularly hostile period from Archer, who knew he was coming towards the end of his allowance for the match.

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And so, there was some irony in Price’s dismissal – bowled by the part-time off-spin of Scott Lenham having seen off Archer. Likewise, Brewer, who was run out shortly afterwards, having made 32 in partnership with Price. “We were sat in the changing room with our head in our hands, going: ‘What have we done here?’

“If we could rewind to that point and go on to make really big scores, we could have made a real good game of it. That would have been the narrative of the three days. We had the chance at that moment to do something pretty cool, but that’s just how cricket works: you get through one moment and get done by the next.”

For Shaw, it was a learning curve as well. He was on trial, having been asked on the previous day during a T20 match on the same ground against Surrey whether he was available for a three-day game against Gloucestershire in the second eleven championship. He was told there and then that Archer would feature alongside him in the bowling attack: he rolled into the ground in a red Range Rover and Shaw remembers him as an “effortless” footballer and bowling “decent left-arm spin” in the warmup.

Given the hysteria around the game, it would have been understandable had Shaw lost focus and simply gawped in the direction of his new teammate. In the end, though, he took four wickets and believes the experience helped him: “I knew that I had to do my job: hit the stumps and don’t give them anything to hit, basically. If I bowled a bad ball, they’re putting me away every day of the week after facing Abi and Jofra. I actually had to dig deep, be very meticulous and back my own skills.”

^{Dom Goodman has impressed in his first three County Championship appearances}

And what about Archer’s pace?

“It was kind of sobering,” Shaw laughs. “When I play club cricket, I feel like I can be top dog – I bowl 80mph on a good day. Even in county stuff, I’m not the slowest. But watching him bowl that quickly was a moment of clarity. It was insane. I knew he would be quick; I knew he would make it look as effortless as he does when he bowls. But it was a different level.

“It made me realise that Jofra is his way: he’s quick, he’s a specific kind of bowler. I tried not to compare myself towards the end. I’m a different kind of bowler who nibbles it around. It made me realise what kind of bowler I should be at a county level if I get there. It was amazing. I’m not going to be able to bowl rapid bouncers at a county player like he can, so I have to be smart. It was good for me.”

For Gloucestershire’s youngsters, the sentiment was similar. Former club captain Gareth Roderick contextualised what they had come up against in a post-match team talk, describing Archer’s spell as among the three quickest he had ever faced – a token of reassurance for anyone who wondered whether he had simply been trotting into the crease.

From Dawkins’ post-match discussion, one line has stuck with both Price and Goodman.

“He told us to make sure that this wasn’t the highlight of our cricketing careers, which was quite a poignant thing,” says Goodman, for whom that is perhaps more meaningful now than ever before, as part of an unbeaten Gloucestershire side at the top of their County Championship group.

“It made me think that, yes, this was cool, but it shouldn’t be the thing that is the absolute utmost of your cricketing time.”

Price adds: “It was an important game for a lot of people and that’s not really what you’re aspiring to, even if it is obviously a really cool moment to play against one of the world’s best. You want to make that the norm.”

Two years on, the circus remains a unique shot in the arm for their development.

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