Ed Pollock goes back to basics to smoke one of the hundreds of the season

Merchant Taylors' School (third day of four): Middlesex 188 & 240, Worcestershire 191 & 238-3 - Worcestershire win by seven wickets

Scorecard

Sometimes, all it takes is a day of stripping everything back.

Late in April, Ed Pollock was not out on 77, in striking distance of a century before lunch on his second appearance for Worcestershire, having already reached three figures on debut, and the decision to up sticks from Warwickshire back to where it all began on the age-group pathway at New Road looked like one of the moves of the winter.

Then, he was caught by Tom Clark off the medium pace of Tom Haines, and Mother Cricket turned against him. Ravi Shastri spoke about Jonny Bairstow's "respect for form" during the recent Test at Edgbaston, praising not so much his shot-making as the ability to sustain it in such fashion across a Test summer.

Until today, Pollock, similarly cavalier, hadn't passed 32 in a first-team game since that cameo against Sussex: a stretch of 18 innings – not in the County Championship, in which he remains a novice, nor in the T20 Blast, in which he first established his reputation for Birmingham Bears five years ago. It was the last time he'd faced 30 balls in an innings.

He was dropped in mid-June for the high-scoring draw with Durham, a red-ball fixture in the middle of a torrid Blast campaign in which Worcestershire were woeful and Pollock managed just 103 runs in 10 games, none of which squared with his talent or skillset.

But last weekend, he turned out for Barnt Green, his childhood club in the village where he grew up, and smashed 158 in 177 balls. On the other side were Manraj Johal, the Warwickshire seamer, and perhaps more pertinently, Kadeer Ali, Worcestershire's second-team coach but also a major presence among the senior side during a crucial week for a team that had before today won just twice in 16 matches across formats. Kadeer bowled 17 overs at him, during which Pollock opted not to play a single shot.

It was fitting that he should rediscover his rhythm in amateur league cricket, given the long road he took in the first place to reach the professional circuit – released by Worcestershire at academy age, rebuilding his reputation as a triallist and forcing his way back in through that most competitive back door.

^{Pollock brought up his hundred in just 67 balls at Merchant Taylors' School (Michael Steele/Getty Images)}

One June a few years back – in search of a contract that wasn't forthcoming – he played cricket on 28 days, representing the second teams of Warwickshire and Durham, turning out for Herefordshire and Unicorns, returning to Barnt Green each weekend and pitching up in MCC games. He was on the road the whole time, other than when he stepped out of his car to bat. That journey brings with it an appreciation that the game is never generous, that nothing ought to be taken for granted.

So, the back-to-basics nature of an afternoon in the familiar surroundings of Cherry Hill Road, Barnt Green's home, was a reminder that it's still a game as much as it's a job.

Following that century with an outground fixture – on a school pitch with the ambience of a club venue – was the ideal, a chance to play his natural game without second thought. He concurred afterwards. "It just felt like playing school cricket again," he told The Cricketer. "And probably, school cricket was when I was at my freest because I had no intention of ever playing professionally at that stage, and I just wanted to whack it."

Because, in a game that ebbed and flowed on a surface that was lively throughout and featured one of the best seam attacks in the country, Pollock – a bona fide Bazballer – produced one of the knocks of the summer that ended in the 29th over, by which time he'd smoked 113 runs – a career-best – in just 77 balls and, excluding a break for lunch, little over an hour-and-a-half.

"It felt like I was playing club cricket, and that's where I've done these kinds of innings before."

His first fifty took 40 balls, his second took 27. There were seven sixes, courtesy of Middlesex's insistence on bowling short and into the body, with three boundary-riders stationed between square and fine leg. He was struck on the helmet by Tom Helm, but that was a single moral victory. Otherwise, everything came out of the screws – having peppered the legside in his inimitable style, he carved through point and drove past cover to bring up one hell of a hundred.

Worcestershire's travelling party were huddled into a single marquee either side of the pavilion and the media gazebo, but the cacophony of goodwill that greeted his milestone – only the third of his career in any format – recognised the toil of recent months.

^{Pollock made mincemeat of a challenging target on a lively pitch (Alex Davidson/Getty Images)}

"I owed the team and the coaches a lot of runs," he admitted. "I had a lot of making up to do.

"But they've all said to me during these two months that they back me, even when a lot of the time I probably didn't back myself.

"I went into some of those T20 games really not backing myself, and it probably showed with my performances. But this morning, a few of the guys just said: 'If you bat for however-long, we're going to win this game.'"

Indeed, there was something in what Ben Stokes said recently about his Test team – how it's no longer about the runs you score as an English opener, but the manner in which they come.

That's not to say Pollock went out there, with 238 runs to chase, and considered himself a rapid ton away from international contention. This was his modus operandi long before BazBall was christened. His maiden first-class hundred took 113 deliveries and, at one point in time, nobody in the world could match his strike rate in T20 cricket; through his Blast career, he has hit a boundary every 3.96 deliveries. In his fledgling first-class exploits, that figure rises to once every 8.33.

Even so, perhaps those words from Stokes, the game's national figurehead, came as reassurance for someone who plays like this, giving clarity to his method in a year when it hasn't come easy. There is a trademark to a Pollock century in red-ball cricket; his three in the Second XI Championship – separated by six years – have been carbon copies of one another: all much quicker than a run a ball.

"Playing second-team cricket, this is how I've played when things have gone well," he said. "But I let things drift during the T20s – I was almost trying to hit the ball before they'd bowled it. The clarity behind it for me is just watching the ball and reacting; with most of the sixes I've hit, I had no intention of doing it."

Confidence and clarity go a long way in a game as volatile as opening the batting, and so does self-doubt. He reflected after being dropped for the final two games of Worcestershire's Blast campaign that he "needed to sort this out" and, ahead of this week, "I was asking myself if I should really be picked".

^{Pollock scored just 101 runs in the T20 Blast and was dropped for the last two games of the competition (Stu Forster/Getty Images)}

He acknowledged ahead of this summer that some learning on the job would be required – he played five seasons in the Blast for Warwickshire but never made a red-ball appearance – but also vowed to stay true to his white-ball instincts.

The chance to test himself like this was chief among his reasons for leaving, but there is something extremely admirable about wanting not to change his approach to fit accepted norms. His first scoring shot was a clip over midwicket, his second a six over long leg. Once he'd bedded in, he slog-swept Tim Murtagh and took Luke Hollman's leg-spin over extra cover.

For many reasons, English red-ball cricket is in an interesting place – not only because of the uncertainty around its domestic future, but also because of the way in which Stokes and Brendon McCullum want it played.

"It's been interesting to see guys doing it in a Test match," he admitted, "but I can honestly say I don't think it's had much of an impact."

It's for Worcestershire now to understand what they've got in Pollock – a rare, valuable fearlessness at the top of the order, who will mix periods of inevitable famine with days like this, where he strips everything back and makes it all look rather easy.

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