Bowling first, leaving out two members of their decisive pace quartet, reviewing poorly (they would have come to the Oval 3-0 up but for poor use of the DRS): the urn-holders looked like a team only half in this game.Around the Oval concourses the scene was more louche. The lads had to buy an extra freezer to keep all of the meat they had to eat. I remember winning the Championship with Yorkshire at Trent Bridge in 2014, and it was a really emotional time for Jonny. Above all, there is a need to shift something heavy at the heart of this team, the clog that has mangled the late middle-order, the sense of some well-established, even rather sharp‑elbowed parts that refuse to find their own perfect fit.Stare at the parts long enough and Bairstow is probably the key to balancing this team; albeit not in the way he might hope.
He’s batting beautifully, and that 150 at Cape Town really settled him down. No doubt this will be factored in when the final divvying up is made on a drawn series. “I’ve kept wicket for Yorkshire now for a long time – if I didn’t want to keep wicket I wouldn’t have put myself through the pain and hours of practice.There was brain to go with his brawn. EXCLUSIVE BY JONNY BAIRSTOW: First, the bare, stark fact. We’ve both got a bit of fiery red in us, and we can both be grumpy and not want people to talk to us and stuff but he’s definitely mellowed.”Their connection with Yorkshire through their fathers means the Headingley crowd have always had a soft spot for Sidebottom and Bairstow. He was born on 26th of September 1989. He wants to bat at seven, keep the gloves and retain the comfort of a dual-role place in the team, leaving others to struggle with the more stark challenges of the middle order. England needed him to keep. “I think rugby teaches you a heck of a lot about yourself and about teamwork. The ethics of it are fantastic for young people to get into.”Sedbergh School. He has, in fairness, probably earned a drink.As the shadows crept across the pitch Wade and Jofra Archer tended to some unfinished business in that final session. Obviously they were eating a heck of a lot, and I used to get a bit jealous looking at them eating it all, but it was all right because Craig Hampson, who used to play cricket for Yorkshire schools too – a wicketkeeper – was about the same size as me, so it wasn’t too bad!”Jonny Bairstow is talking about Steve Irwin and Ray Mears. Sidebottom says there have been changes over the last 18 months.Bairstow adores rugby, and spends plenty of his downtime watching Leeds Rhinos. He wanted to open. “I said to Jonny when he’d got his hundred in Cape Town that he’d grown up a lot,” he says. “I don’t really talk to him about the game, it’s more stuff away from the game – keep going, don’t get down when things aren’t going your way, keep working hard and don’t forget where you’ve come from, and always have a smile on your face, rather than getting down and getting angry with yourself.”If you enjoyed this story, please share with your fellow cricket fans and team-matesEngland will face Pakistan behind close doors next Wednesday at Old Trafford.At Trent Bridge in May 2011, Bairstow finally reached three figures.
“It was very special,” says Sidebottom. “I enjoyed the physical side of it: it’s part and parcel of it and was great fun,” he says. Bairstow is a brilliant cricketer, and arguably England’s best ever one-day international batsman (look at the numbers; and look where his hundreds took England this summer).Meanwhile, Jos Buttler has yo-yoed up and down the late middle order. Cricket, it appears, is his own bubble.“People will keep speculating for years to come I’m sure, but we’ll leave them to do that and we’ll just get on with our jobs because, at the end of the day, they’re paid to have an opinion. Jonny Bairstow’s role in the middle order is key to England’s future ... it must be said Australia approached this match like a hungover house-guest with a train to catch. He is nicknamed Ron Weasley, after the Harry Potter character. 2 It was natural hand-eye timing – he wasn’t a big strapping lad who could bully the bowling, it was always down to natural timing and he kept everything really simple – it was see the ball, hit the ball, and see the ball, catch the ball.”Bairstow’s early academy success with Yorkshire and Leeds United didn’t turn him into a big cheese around the school. By contrast Bairstow has to a degree dictated his own terms. Company No. If somebody hit a six, Jonny would want to hit one bigger.
Not just for me, but for all the Notts guys.”Bairstow is a little tetchy when talking about keeping wicket – a role he says he enjoys because it is similar to being a fly-half in rugby: always in the mix, always reading the game.
871 457 112. “It’s a diverse group of people, and it was great fun. A soggy, boggy pitch following heavy rainfall. He wants to do well, he’s really aggressive, and he doesn’t take a backward step. “People who ask me that generally haven’t come to very many county games,” Bairstow says.
“When we were in the middle we briefly spoke about it being father and sons and we had a bit of a chuckle about it.” Sidebottom’s father, Arnie, and Jonny’s father, David, were great mates and Yorkshire favourites throughout the 1970s and ’80s (Ryan still gets called Arnie on a regular basis).“He had to be involved, otherwise he got bored – and a bored Jonny is not what you want!” says Dews.
He plays domestic cricket for Yorkshire team.