Alex Blake: The surprise star of the second-team circuit

For Alex Blake, who has spent the early weeks of the season taking the second-team circuit by storm, validation came from Josh Cobb, a cricketer at a similar stage of his career.

Cobb has played two first-class games in the last three years – two more than Blake, the Kent left-hander – and is gearing up to lead Northamptonshire in the T20 Blast. So, perhaps it was a surprise for both men to find one another at the Polo Farm Sports Club in Canterbury, taking part in the Second XI Championship, a rarely-covered competition of four-day games in which – at this stage – no one has come within 200 runs of Blake's April burst.

They shared a chat in the nets about their motives and agreed that this – more specifically, keeping on top of their red-ball game – is the way to get the best from their careers as predominantly short-format batters. "He said exactly that," Blake explains. "When he plays red-ball cricket, everything else looks after itself. If you can face the red ball, then the white ball is easy, isn't it?"

He has never prepped like this before, but now on a limited-over-only contract – the only such player at the county but one of an increasing number nationwide – constructing the best possible preparation period is a new challenge.

Without a Hundred deal, having not been retained by Oval Invincibles, Blake's summer currently looks like two blocks: the T20 Blast, then the Royal London Cup. Should Kent not make it out of their 50-over group, his schedule will begin on May 25 and end on August 23. "My season's three months long now," he says, "which is a bit strange."

Which is why this conversation is taking place. While much talk has been devoted to the golden starts of Shan Masood and Ben Compton, Blake has flown out of the blocks for Kent's second string: five innings, two double hundreds, 509 runs, averaging 101.8. The first of those big centuries – 213 (off 215 balls) out of 312 – came against Sussex and went viral, given none of his teammates passed 27 and only five reached double figures. The second, a fortnight later, was faster: 239 off 233, with Essex this time on the receiving end.

"Albeit Sussex didn't have the greatest team, it was a tricky pitch and I had to work pretty hard," says Blake, caveating any suggestion that he simply strode out and inflicted carnage on a batch of teenagers. "I think it's a little misleading in terms of my strike rate for the first hundred: I actually got my head down, worked pretty hard and scrapped. But once I was there, I accelerated quite a bit."

^{Blake hasn't played a first-class match since 2019 (Alex Davidson/Getty Images)}

That, he reflects, has always been a feature of his batting – and a quirk he has never quite been able to comprehend. "With every man on the boundary, my only option was to go aerial," he adds. "So, I then moved on pretty rapidly and got to 200 in no time. Same thing last week: I came off at lunchtime after getting a hundred and had messages from people saying: 'Well batted, can't wait to see how quickly you get this next hundred.'"

This comes after autumn surgery on a broken arm that ruled him out of T20 Finals Day – he could only be in the crowd at Edgbaston owing to dressing-room Covid restrictions – and a pre-season spent with his County Championship teammates in the marquee at Canterbury. He didn't hit a ball before Christmas and trained on a couple of days each week through January and February. Gradually, that number increased, but with an understanding from those at the top of the club that Blake has different deadlines to hit.

He was dropped by Kent after a run of low scores in last year's Blast – a blow that Blake describes as "a bit of a shock" and, he admits, "a wake-up call" for someone solely focused on the white-ball game, who'd put a decade into winning the tournament but then missed its business end – so he spent the off-season working out how best to ensure he's "in a better place for the start of that campaign".

Interestingly, it was Kent's psychologist with whom Blake devised this particular plan; one idea was to look abroad, but the block reserved for the Indian Premier League means there's not a great deal else ongoing.

So, Blake approached Paul Downton, the county's director of cricket, with the proposal of leading Kent's second team in the early throes of the summer. It was very much an offer rather than a demand, coming with an appreciation "that it'd be absolutely fine if they wanted to play the youngsters". Downton was keen, however, recognising the benefits of Blake finding his touch and asking him to bat at No.4 as a guide to the younger players. Blake understates the arrangement's success: "It seems to have gone all right, to be fair."

And while it would require discussions around the wording of his contract, it still isn't beyond the realms of possibility that it could spark a red-ball revival.

Blake explains: "Before I played these games, I spoke to Matt Walker and he said everyone was noticing how well I'd been hitting the ball, which is interesting because it's probably as well as I've ever hit the ball in preseason, funnily enough.

"He said it isn't a closed book; he just told me to enjoy it and see where I'm at. At the moment, I haven't got intentions to play, but I'm not closing the door on it."

^{Blake hasn't been retained by Oval Invincibles for this year's edition of The Hundred (Harry Trump/Getty Images)}

Kent are due to face a Sri Lanka Development XI later this week, which might have represented a decent chance to throw him in, but Blake is not believed to have been included in the squad. With no more four-day games for the second team at this moment – and white-ball cricket soon to take over – it seems unlikely that anything imminent is set to come of this second-coming.

Ironically, then, this month has left a lingering sense of bugbear at never having quite cracked the first-class game. One regret is that he no longer bowls his part-time seamers, which might have snuck him into more teams, "but because I never stamped my authority on the No.5 or No.6 spot, I was the easiest one to leave out, I guess". The result was a single century in 46 matches and an average below 23.

Why so low? "I still haven't quite put my finger on it, to be honest. I gave it a good go for a number of years, but I'd go through patches where I wouldn't score many. I'd like to have played more and have a better red-ball record. It's just the way I've funnelled my career a little bit, and then we came to the agreement that I'd just play white-ball."

As well as skippering through the last month, he helped out Mark Dekker, Kent's second-team coach, who would usually be on his own for these games but instead has had Blake at his disposal to sling balls at youngsters and act as a secondary mentor.

This level of cricket is a curious beast, with so many different agendas at stake: there are those like Blake, senior pros playing to keep their eye in with no realistic chance of promotion; others, like Kent teammates Harry Podmore and Fred Klaassen, were featuring after being left out of the first-team squad, seeking a way back in; George Ealham, son of Mark, is learning the ropes at the start of his career; some use it as a warmup after injury.

"It's been a few years since I played in it," says Blake, "so it's about getting accustomed to it again. When I played, it was three days, but now they're four days, so it's more like a proper match and you don't have to declare as much. It's different from what I've been used to because when I previously played in the second team it was to try to get back into the first team.

"But knowing I wasn't really going to get back into the first team, I was quite relaxed really. Whereas the others are pushing their case. I was just there to have a bat. It might be the reason I've done so well."

^{Blake was left out of Kent's T20 side during last season's Blast and then broke his arm ahead of Finals Day (Jacques Feeney/Getty Images)}

That sense of relaxation also comes from having more on his plate than simply batting: along with former teammates James Tredwell and Rob Ferley, he is overseeing the Bromley area underneath the main county age-group programme, which comes with its own lessons for a young coach. "Today, I've been doing loads of stuff on invoicing, which has given me a different perspective," he laughs. "Kent are happy with me doing it; because I'm only contracted to white-ball, I have a reduced salary, so I have to earn elsewhere to make up for that."

Another factor might well be the impact of Sion Thomas, the sports psychologist who works with Kent, as well as Charlton Athletic, Crystal Palace and Harlequins, among others. He and Blake met fortnightly through the winter "just to talk about my game", initially on the advice of Tom Moody, Blake's head coach through The Hundred, who took him out for a coffee in Birmingham and posed a frank question.

"He just said: 'I just want to talk to you a little bit, I want to understand your career. I watch you bat in the nets and you hit the ball better than anyone; there's nothing you can't do with the bat. So, what is it that's held you back in terms of being better than you have been over the years?'"

He doesn't quite know the answer, but there is something fascinating about the situation in which Blake finds himself: a 33-year-old domestic stalwart relearning his game in the latter throes of his career. "I'd have liked to have got to this point a few years ago," he admits. "It's taken me a bit longer than a lot of people to get comfortable with where my game's at."

Confidence is key. "When I'm up, I'm really good. When I'm down, I find it hard to get back. I think that's what happened last year – I got a couple of low scores and then plummeted and lost confidence. I wasn't wondering where my next run was coming from, but my chest wasn't as pumped out as I know it can be.

"My highs and lows are a bit too far apart for me, but I've always wanted to do well, so it probably comes as a result of that. I can be a match-winner for Kent, and they still think that. I just need to get back to that."