Cricket: Sidebottom Takes Chance Arnie Didn't Get

If Duncan Fletcher had still been England’s coach there would have been no first Test wicket for Ryan Sidebottom. There would have been no excited shaking of curls straggly enough to befit a heavymetal star, and no opportunity for the Headingley crowd to wallow in an occasion of Yorkshire pride.

Instead Ryan would have been stuck for ever, like his dad, Arnie, on one Test and Sajid Mahmood would have been sprinting down the hill from the Kirkstall Lane End, seeking to prove Fletcher’s conviction that he had all the attributes to become a fully fledged Test bowler.

Mahmood, after all, took four wickets in an innings against Pakistan at Headingley last summer, provoked into his best Test figures by jibes of "traitor" from the British Pakistanis in the crowd. And it was Mahmood who Fletcher was convinced, however inconsistent the evidence, possessed the physical attributes, and most tellingly the pace, that he deemed essential in a Test fast bowler.

Sidebottom is not fast. But he has always been persistent, always disciplined, and in Leeds he has added the missing ingredient. He has proved the assertion of his Nottinghamshire captain, Stephen Fleming, that after his single Test, against Pakistan at Lord’s six years ago, and his subsequent desertion of Yorkshire, his native county, in frustration at a stalled career, he can now be regarded as a swing bowler.

Mick Newell, Nottinghamshire’s director of cricket, shares out the credit, hailing two visits to the fast-bowling school in Madras, some occasional coaching from Phil DeFreitas and wise words from an old salt, Mark Ealham.

Arnie bowled his finest, shrewdest overs for Yorkshire deep into his career, even though his rigid frame and anguished expression suggested he was about to lose a body part at any moment. Ryan, at 29 and with figures of four for 42 behind him after skilful use of a breeze angling in from longleg, has now had the second opportunity that Arnie never had. Arnie missed seeing it because he was managing Rotherham Town in the Yorkshire League. "We were thrashed by Barnsley - I'd have been better at the Test," he said.

Fletcher, who overlooked Sidebottom for 78 successive Tests after his wicketless debut, will not feel his stance has been invalidated. He stoutly resisted horses for-courses selections and he could cite Ed Giddins’ five cheap wickets against Zimbabwe at Lord’s in his first summer in charge - England felt obliged to retain Giddins against West Indies that summer but matters were less in his favour and he finished wicketless.

Any success gained by Sidebottom at Headingley, he would argue, might be counter productive. Better to have retained Mahmood and let him learn the art of bowling where Fletcher, contentiously, felt it should be learned: at Test level. But Sidebottom’s accuracy allows him to fulfil a stock bowler’s role if the ball does not swing, unlike Giddins, and continuity was not possible anyway, with Matthew Hoggard and Andrew Flintoff ruled out through injury.

Peter Moores, Fletcher’s successor, has taken a different tack. "Ryan’s success was quite a fillip for county cricket," he said, words that would never have passed Fletcher’s lips. Moores countered suggestions that Sidebottom was a Headingley specialist. "The fact it was Headingley was a bonus because he has a very good record over a long period of time. He was selected because he is a controlled bowler who has learned his trade."

Sidebottom may yet survive into the third Test at Old Trafford. Hoggard’s torn groin will prevent him from bowling until the end of the week; Flintoff will not play against Leicestershire at Grace Road today, even though England gave permission for him to play either yesterday or today. He will play - and try to bowl - in Lancashire’s four-day championship match against Sussex in Hove on Wednesday.