Technics 1210
Test Debutant
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2019
- Runs
- 15,485
Eoin Morgan was the coolest, calmest person at Lord’s last Sunday as he led England to their first World Cup triumph. But now the captain renowned for his clear-headed logic is struggling to make sense of the incredible match and is even agonising over whether the long-awaited victory was fully deserved.
In an extension of the good spirit in which the game was played, Morgan, 32, and his New Zealand opposite number, Kane Williamson, have been in constant contact as they try to comprehend what happened in a match that was decided by the finest of margins on the final ball of the “extra time” Super Over.
“I’m not sure winning it makes it any easier,” says Morgan as he sits in a lounge at Lord’s. He is friendly and chatty and on the way into the famous pavilion has exchanged hugs and warm words with members of staff he has known for years. But this thoughtful, self-effacing captain is clearly physically shattered and mentally burdened by the enormity of what he has achieved and how the match was won.
“I don’t think it’s fair to have a result like that when there’s very little between the sides. I don’t think there was one moment that you could say: ‘That actually cost the game there.’ It was quite balanced.
“I’m black and white. I’m normally going: ‘I know. I was there, that happened.’ [But] I can’t stick my finger on where the game was won and lost.”
Is he troubled by the fact that he won? “A little bit, because there’s no defining moment that you’d say: ‘Yes, we thoroughly deserved it.’ It’s just been crazy.” Only at the end of the conversation does he concede: “It would be more difficult to lose, of course.”
Dealing with the aftermath has “been quite mixed really. I spoke to Kane over the last couple of days on numerous occasions and none of us has come up with a rational explanation as to the various times we gave them the game and they gave it back to us. Like me, he can’t get his head around everything.”
The most controversial moment came in the final over of England’s innings, when Ben Stokes inadvertently deflected the ball to the boundary with his bat while going for a second run. England were awarded six runs, which helped tie the match. Examination of the rules suggests they should have received five runs.
“I actually feel more comfortable about it having watched all of the game now,” says Morgan. He points to a wide that was given when England were bowling in the Super Over and then a misfield that gave New Zealand another vital extra run.
Morgan agrees that it will go down as the greatest cricket match. “By a long way. I can’t think of a game that’s come close. Madness. I should be cheery about it, shouldn’t I?” he says.
He is going to Italy next week with Tara, his Australian wife. “I’m planning to go just to get out of the bubble. It’s actually taken a lot more out of me physically and mentally than I thought it ever would.”
On the evening of the game the players lingered for hours in the changing room at Lord’s and then went down on to the pitch, with their families and the New Zealand team. “It was great. New Zealand turned the Long Room into a bit of a disco.”
The players and their families repaired to the team hotel. “We stayed in the bar just talking the whole night. And then I went to go to bed about 5am and I couldn’t sleep.”
A meticulous diary keeper, he couldn’t put pen to paper. “I haven’t touched my diary yet. Not sure what to write.”
Who had the worst hangover? “Liam Plunkett hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol for five and a half months, so I imagine his was probably the worst. I felt fine. I didn’t drink that much.”
Morgan loved meeting school children at the Oval the day after and then taking the team to Downing Street. Some team members had to be told by the skipper to stop singing “Allez Allez Allez” at Downing Street. “The guys were a little bit excited. It didn’t seem appropriate walking out the door singing.”
A repeat of the antics after the 2005 Ashes victory, when Freddie Flintoff roamed No 10 and someone urinated in the garden, was not on the cards on Morgan’s watch. “I think that’s just unacceptable, I’m afraid.”
As a limited-overs cricket specialist, Morgan won’t compete in the Test matches this summer. England will be led by Joe Root. Morgan said he swapped notes with Theresa May, who will leave No 10 next week, on passing on the captaincy. “I said it’s quite a handover and she said the exact same thing. Joe’s taking over next week. Politics though: brutal.”
Morgan was born and grew up in Ireland and voted Remain in the referendum but won’t be drawn on Brexit. “It opens a lot of Irish questions about the border.”
He is underwhelmed by the prospect of either Boris Johnson or Jeremy Hunt in charge. “It’s not filling anybody full of confidence that, is it?”
Nor is he impressed by Jacob Rees-Mogg’s attempt to politicise England’s victory by claiming that “we clearly don’t need Europe to win”. Mr Rees-Mogg’s tweet prompted many to point out that the captain was Irish.
“Oh wow,” says Morgan. “It’s his opinion. I don’t think that’s accurate given where the guys come from. There are six or seven of the guys who weren’t born in England and that sums up the country we live in and the different generations of migrants. As a team we embrace it because our fans are diverse as well. I think we’re all very respectful of guys that come from different backgrounds.”
Just before the Super Over, Morgan gathered his players into a huddle. “In a very tense situation, the outcome was to try and make the guys smile . . . the idea of it was: ‘We’ve come all this way, the fact that we’re going to a Super Over is amazing. We said we would smile throughout the tournament no matter what happened.’ And the lads starting laughing.”
He handed the ball to Jofra Archer, the fast bowler from Barbados who only became eligible to play for England in April. “I didn’t see it as a big risk. He’s our best yorker bowler. He’s an extremely confident young man. Never seems to doubt himself.”
After the match the players ribbed their peers over mistakes, including the throw from Jason Roy that made it awkward for Jos Butler, the wicketkeeper, to run out Martin Guptill at the death. Stokes has been teased about the final ball of normal play, when he tried to make two runs to win. “He got a ball that nine times out of ten he’d hit for six.” Did he ever think the match was lost? “Never ‘lost.’ More: ‘We’re in trouble.’ ”
Someone who works in the Lord’s pavilion told him afterwards that a spectator had a cardiac arrest in the closing stages. “The Super Over had started and he refused treatment until the Super Over had finished.” The fan is recovering OK.
Morgan became captain shortly before the disastrous 2015 World Cup. He worked to gain the trust of players. “Any relationship that you’re trying to change, when it’s quite drastic, it’s a rule of life that you need to gain trust with a person in order for them to buy into what you’re trying to do.”
Confidence was gained because he and coach Trevor Bayliss were slow to drop players and developed three core team values: courage, unity and respect. He scrapped most team meetings — “I hate them” — and encouraged aggressive play and taking risks.
His own risk-taking? “I enjoy horse racing. I gamble. Not big gambles, but I enjoy a little bit of risk.”
Andrew Strauss, the former England captain, who was the director of cricket when Stokes was involved in an affray outside a Bristol nightclub in 2017 that led to him missing the subsequent Ashes series, warned this week that the all-rounder will have to learn to cope with the adulation that will follow his man-of-the-match performance in the final.
“I think Ben, with the journey he’s gone through, has become a different person,” says Morgan. “He’s a responsible guy who’s learnt from his mistakes and is very conscious of the role that he plays in cricket and off the field.”
Morgan, who has an English mother and Irish father, grew up on a housing estate in Rush, north of Dublin. He was one of six children and the fourth generation of a cricket-playing family.
As a teenager he never made any secret of his desire to play for England, which he says was understood by most people in the Irish cricket world but not always non-cricketers. Who will he support when England take on Ireland in a Test match at Lord’s next week? “I will be here supporting everybody.”
Morgan honed his skills playing down the side of his childhood home. “We used to break windows and get in a lot of trouble.”
On his holiday he will reflect on whether it is time to retire as captain or carry on until the T20 World Cup next year, or even until the next World Cup in 2023, when he will be 36. “It’s a huge commitment to go for another four years or even next year, particularly with the injury I had coming through this tournament. You can’t lead a team and commit to something if you’re constantly worried about your back falling out. It will be a difficult decision.”
As we walk through the Lord’s pavilion we pass portraits of cricket legends from W G Grace to Sir Ian Botham. He looks embarrassed when it is suggested that one day his portrait will hang here and mutters that it won’t happen.
Hopefully by the time the first England cricket captain to win a World Cup is honoured in oils he will have stopped worrying about how he did it.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/...n-t-fair-to-have-a-result-like-that-cgfcgmvvw
