Will Macpherson talks to luckless Zafar Ansari who was injured on the day of his England call-up
Sometimes, it’s best to just let Kumar Sangakkara do the talking. “It’s been a great pleasure playing with him and watching him over the last season,” Sangakkara said. “And I think he will be great for England.”
The “he” Sangakkara was referring to was Zafar Ansari. Few have done it before, but Sangakkara is “sure” that his Surrey team-mate can thrive as a top order batsman and frontline spinner.
Eight months ago, the ECB were inclined to agree with the Sri Lankan great’s assessment. Ansari was called up to the Test squad to face Pakistan in the UAE, and was set to spend time honing his white-ball skills with the Lions later in the winter, when disaster struck. On the day of his call-up, fielding at point against Lancashire, Ansari fell awkwardly, landed on his thumb and, in his own words, “did just about everything you could do to a thumb. It was badly broken, had plenty of ligament damage, and an open dislocation”.
Two operations and a pin were to follow. When Ansari inspected it, the white of his bone was looking back at him. “It was completely at the wrong angle and just all over the shop. I looked at it once and then didn’t look again.” Quite right, too. Back to Sangakkara: “Zaf’s a pretty pragmatic guy. He looks at things in a very realistic manner and a practical way.”
Such a blow – his replacements Samit Patel and Liam Dawson played in a Test match and went to the World T20 respectively, remember – would irk most cricketers.
But Ansari, whose extra-curricular activities are well-documented, is unperturbed by the missed opportunities. The break, he said, was a good chance to relax, to spend time with his girlfriend, and to knuckle down with the dissertation he is close to completing for his MA at Royal Holloway, on self-defence in the Sixties civil rights movement in Louisiana and Mississippi.
However the injury has meant “he doesn’t have quite as much reach when playing the piano”.
Finally, though, Ansari can talk about cricket again. On Wednesday, he made his comeback for Surrey 2nds, and he is expected to make his Championship return against Durham on Sunday week but there is a refreshing honesty about Ansari’s approach to his return as he concedes to having some doubts.
“Getting back into bowling has been easy enough,” he said, “because it’s a matter of feel. But with the impact of batting and fielding, those things have been slower. It’s about building up confidence, especially with fielding.The idea of someone smashing a ball at me is one that’s going to take time to get used to, and it might be a process that happens going through the season and as I’m playing, getting that confidence back.”
Nevertheless, working out where he best belongs in the side – especially in a new division, to which Surrey were given an early rude awakening by Nottinghamshire in their opening game of the season – is Ansari’s priority in coming weeks.
“Bowling is about repetition, it’s about rhythm. It’s about doing it, so if you don’t do it for four or five months, then rust builds. That has an impact. But bowling was a thing I was able to get back into quickest and on the whole it’s been good – the consistency is getting there as I bowl more and the ball is still spinning.”
Ansari’s roles in different formats for Surrey are distinct, and in many ways remain uncertain. In Championship cricket, his role with the bat has tended to be the top order barnacle, while in white-ball cricket he is the finishing dasher, clearing the ropes and scuttling between wickets, stealing runs; at times it has looked like he has had first and fifth gear and little in between.
He spent 2015 relentlessly practising his left-arm orthodox spin and is developing rapidly from accurate and unthreatening to a wicket-taker to the point that captain Gareth Batty admitted at the end of 2015 he was Surrey’s first choice. There is, however, a reason few have thrived at the top of the order and as a frontline bowler – it is mighty tough.
“As an all-rounder, it depends on the balance of the side, and the pitches,” he said. “I’m happy to open, but also happy to bat in the middle order. I’ve always preferred opening – I think I suit batting against the new ball. The challenge is that I’ve never bowled as much as I did last year, and I felt there was no opportunity to switch off and rest.
“Maybe it might be better to slip down the order, but whether that actually suits my game is a different matter, though my only hundred last year came at No.6.”
Whatever his role, this will be a vital season for Ansari. Throughout his rehab, England assistant coach Paul Farbrace and ECB spin coach Peter Such were checking in with “the message being that if you keep doing the same sort of thing, then there are places up for grabs across all formats”.
“The challenge,” said Ansari, “is returning and maintaining that performance level, while going from Division Two to One, where the batting is deeper and the bowling quicker. All after having had six months not playing.
“I might be pushing the England stuff, and they have done very well in the last six months, but I need to make sure I can compete at this level for myself, then worry about all that after.”
This piece originally featured in The Cricket Paper, Friday April 15 2016
