Jack Haynes and the first of many

There is something extremely heartening about quite how many youngsters on the domestic circuit have their own Alastair Cook anecdote to tell: how a County Championship fixture against Essex carved out a spontaneous opportunity to talk batting with the best that English cricket has ever produced, and how those conversations have taken the form of eureka moments further down the line.

Jack Haynes wasn't even in Worcestershire's side when they spoke at the start of last year. He was 20 at the time and a veteran of the Under-19 World Cup a year earlier, who by then had already debuted in first-class cricket against the touring Australians, making 24 at a run a ball; his diminutive, teenage frame facing a new-ball attack of Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood – and holding his own.

It was an encouraging start, but Haynes' first couple of seasons were full of encouraging starts: 13 times in his first 16 red-ball innings, he fell between 17 and 51. In his seventeenth, he was run out for 87. Three matches later, he was three runs short of a maiden professional century when a rush of blood convinced him to get there in style against Matt Critchley's leg spin.

Suffice to say, he's learned from that skittishness. "I had to dwell on it for almost a year," says Haynes. "I think it's made me a better player in terms of just making me a bit smarter in certain situations. It took a bit of getting over just because I couldn't believe I'd done it – it was probably the worst I've felt about getting out for a long time."

He is speaking to The Cricketer now that the monkey is off his back, a place he has arrived at in some style: relaxed, confident and – like many churned off the Worcestershire production line – with a maturity that belies his years.

Haynes' talent has been one of the county game's open secrets for a few years now; there aren't many more elegant players beginning to establish themselves in the system, and none of those present at Chelmsford last July for his maiden List A hundred – 153 off 128 balls – would have believed that they were watching a relative novice at work go where he'd never gone before.

Three weeks ago, Haynes was still without a first-class ton, still bemoaning one moment's rashness. Since then, he has hit three in three weeks, and suddenly a set of statistics that were starting to worry him have a far more appropriate complexion. "I think it was 22 matches that it took me," he says. He wasn't counting but had an analyst tell him shortly after the first – in a high-scoring draw with Durham that, for other reasons, will stand the test of time. "I think if I'd looked at it, it would have felt even worse that it had taken that long."

^{Haynes has made three first-class hundreds in his last three matches (Nathan Stirk/Getty Images)}

He calls the feeling of getting over the line "a bit of relief more than anything". The second, in another draw with Derbyshire, was less relieving but just as special; plenty of professional cricketers will find their way to a first-class century, but fewer have the game to make it a consistent habit. "I suppose it shows it wasn't a fluke the first time," he reflects, "which had crossed my mind at one or two stages. It was nice to be able to reset and still get into the same mindset." A week later, he went again, against Leicestershire – and for the first time, in a winning cause.

At a club founded on famous families – Brett D'Oliveira, a clubmate growing up at Ombersley, was at the other end to celebrate the centuries against Essex, Durham and Derbyshire – Haynes' own father, Gavin, represented the county on more than 200 occasions. If there is a paternal rivalry at play, they are level for the moment: a List A hundred apiece, and three in first-class cricket. "I'll mention that to him when I hopefully get past him," he laughs.

You sense, though, that Haynes considers these heady days to be part of a collaborative effort: "He's been my personal coach since I started playing cricket, so he's had a huge impact on my game."

That has never stopped being the case; having come through the system at Worcestershire, the staff are all he knows, so Gavin – a teammate of Brett's father and coached by his grandfather – represents an external pair of eyes.

"I didn't do as well as I'd have liked in the first two or three games of the season, so we had a couple of chats," he says. "He just said that I needed to keep on trusting my game and knowing that eventually it would come good. I know that's easier said than done, but those little chats just calmed me down."

He recalls a particular conversation with his head coach, Alex Gidman, too: "He just told me that instead of worrying about not getting a big score to get excited about the feeling of being more ruthless and getting bigger runs."

Which brings Haynes back to Cook, who took the time to ease his concerns over the struggle to make the most of his starts. "I remember him saying that in his first year as a pro, he got a lot of starts but took a lot of confidence from that, and then in the following year he absolutely flew. If you can flip that rather than being annoyed that I hadn't done it, then I could use that in a positive way."

A mental shift, then, rather than anything in a technical setup that has earned admiring glances along the way. He speaks about adding patience to his game and biding his time. "I was probably quite guilty of going out and playing shots at most balls when I first started playing. I got a bit giddy."

^{Haynes made his maiden List A hundred at Chelmsford in 2021 (Jacques Feeney/Getty Images)}

So, when he raised his bat aloft at New Road, having reached three figures against a Durham side including Ben Stokes, Matthew Potts and Chris Rushworth, it marked the tangible evidence of his progress alongside its symbolic significance as the first of many. He has never faced more balls in a first-team innings.

It was the fifth of five hundreds in a crazy game that will be best remembered for Stokes' assault on Worcestershire's shellshocked bowling attack. For some, that will render Haynes' effort forgettable; for him, quite the opposite. More than anything else, escaping unbeaten after such a chastening couple of days demonstrated how far he has come. "The game situation required us to bat for a day and an hour, so we had to tick things off over by over, taking it in small chunks," he explains, matter of fact. "Eventually you get to the stage where you're like: 'We could do this.'"

Lesser teams – with lesser characters – might have folded in light of Stokes' onslaught. Haynes offers a half-gasp at its memory. Can he sum up the experience of witnessing it unfold before his eyes? "I found it quite surreal at times, I think. Obviously, you're disappointed as a player to be out there up against it, but it was ridiculous to watch." Mercifully, on the legside boundary, he took the catch to end it all.

Josh Baker, the 19-year-old left-arm spinner, had been at its epicentre, taken for 34 in a single over and left to go viral on social media as the victim of Stokes' hitting. Once upon a time in a not-too-distant past, Haynes was Baker's captain at school, two years his senior, and the pair have been on remarkably similar journeys: Worcester-born, educated at Malvern College, picked by England at under-19 level and selected by their home county via a prolific pathway.

"He doesn't need much protecting," Haynes insists, reflecting on his role in their relationship. "For his age, he has a pretty strong head on his shoulders, and nothing seems to faze him. He's come back brilliantly, to be honest. He's really good at blocking things out. Stokes will do that to a lot of bowlers – I wouldn't fancy my chances."

A week later, Baker – tall, with a solid action, and a useful lower-order batter – rattled through 44 economical overs for three wickets at Derby.

^{Haynes on his first-class debut against Australia in 2019 (Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)}

Asking him, though, about the response of his teenage teammate is a realisation of how the narrative has changed around Haynes: from a precocious youngster, he is becoming a player with a greater sense of responsibility.

Is he comfortable with that shift in perception?

"I think so," he says. "When you first come in, you're a bit of a rabbit in the headlights – you know the lads, but you don't know what it's like being a professional cricketer, you don't know what it's like being around the team and playing games."

For how he coped with those nuances, he credits his teammates with fostering an environment where he never felt much expectation despite the excitement around his potential. "I think I've tried to deal with it fairly well; I try not to put too much pressure on myself because cricket is a tough game mentally at times. Luckily, they've stuck with me and given me these opportunities, so I'm very grateful for that. Hopefully, I can pay them back in runs over the next however-long."

The Bob Willis Trophy helped in that regard; there were no overseas players and not much context. Haynes considered it gametime that he hadn't expected and simply revelled in the chance to play cricket at the end of a summer wrecked by the pandemic. Worcestershire viewed it as a five-match window in which to blood a youngster of promise.

Not that coming onto the circuit in recent years has been straightforward for inexperienced batters, so Haynes admits to feeling particularly fortunate with how these weeks have panned out. "There has been a lot of run-scoring," he says, knowingly, having done much of it himself. "It has been nice to play on some good pitches and bat for a long period of time."

Even more so, for having got to know Azhar Ali in the process. Haynes speaks in awe of the former Pakistan captain – "he's just a great man: extremely wise and fascinating to talk to" – and the pair shared a 281-run partnership stand in the win over Leicestershire. Haynes fell for 127, Azhar carried on for 225.

In amongst this, however, is an awareness that cricket holds an unbalanced obsession with landmarks. He thinks back to falling narrowly short last year and the emptiness it left: "It's weird how much two or three runs make a difference, not just so you can say that you got a hundred, but also confidence-wise. It sounds stupid, but that milestone gives you the little extra confidence that you can get there. It's amazing. It probably shouldn't help subconsciously, but it does."

And with that, Jack Haynes has never felt better about his game.

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