• A limited-edition picture disc version of the music used by the BBC as its cricket theme hit the record shelves in 1987. Part of a boxed set of ten iconic singles released by the Stax record label, Booker T and The MGs’ 1968 classic ‘Soul Limbo’ features a picture of a cricket ball on one side and cricket cards and bails on the other. The B-side of the single is ‘Heads or Tails’.
• The late British glam-rock star Alvin Stardust made an appearance in a cricket-inspired musical in 1986 that was commissioned to celebrate the Queen’s 60th birthday. Stardust – who had top ten hits with ‘My Coo-Ca-Choo’ in 1973 and ‘Jealous Mind’ the following year – was a member of the cast in the Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber mini-musical Cricket.
• One of the sons of Caribbean reggae legend Bob Marley was named after West Indies batsman Rohan Kanhai. Bob Marley’s uncle Robert Cecil Marley played first-class cricket, appearing in seven matches for Jamaica between 1928/29 and 1946. An opening batsman, his highest score was 40 against MCC in Kingston in 1929/30.
• During their tour of Australia in 2010, Irish rock band U2 made mention of the Ashes tour at their concert in Perth. Bono, the group’s frontman, spoke of the Australia-England Test which was being played at the same time at the WACA.
• Chris Jordan, who made his Test debut for England in 2014, went to the same school in Barbados as pop star Rihanna. Jordan attended Combermere High School in Bridgetown where he studied alongside the soon-to-be global singing sensation: “I remember Rihanna well. I guess she was always a good singer at school. I like her songs very much and they’re on my iPod, but I don’t think she has much interest in cricket.
When I go back to Barbados we see each other and stuff. She’s a very humble girl and I’m just glad everything worked out well for her.”
• After attending an American Major League baseball match at the SCG in 2014, Australian singer Marcia Hines fired off a tweet after meeting a former Test captain. Hines – an Australian Queen of Pop – tweeted a photo of herself and Ian Chappell, but with the caption: “Look who I bumped into at the baseball – the one and only Tony Greig.”
• Ageing rock star Ronnie Wood contemplated joining a Surrey cricket club in 2010 to help him stay fit and sober. The Rolling Stones guitarist came up with the idea after taking a walk in a local park: “I went for a walk and the cricket team asked me to join. Now I’m getting notes through the door asking me to be the new batsman. I said I’d love to if I had the time. I’ve been practising my bowling too.”
• Three club cricketers from the UK featured in a musically-themed dismissal in 1979 when Martin Mendelssohn lost his wicket in a game for the Northwood club. Mendelssohn was caught Wagner, bowled Haydn.
• Tom Chaplin, the lead singer of the UK pop band Keane, was once described by former England captain Bob Willis as a “massive cricket nut”. Chaplin was a handy junior cricketer, playing for Sussex until the age of 15.
• Australian cricketer Ellyse Perry was immortalised in song in 2014 with a recording by a four-piece band from Tasmania. Brandish initially released ‘The Ellyse Perry Song’ on YouTube, later receiving radio airplay across the nation.
• It was estimated that some 5,000 fans turned up on a rainy day in 1982 to watch the inaugural cricket match staged by the charity Bunbury Cricket Club. The brainchild of David English, a former manager of The Bee Gees, the match attracted rock music icons Bill Wyman, Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and Phil Collins, who kept wicket.
Rock legend Eric Clapton
• One of the originators of Jamaican ska music recorded a famous song in celebration of cricket. ‘West Indian Test Cricket’ by Laurel Aitken was released as a single in 1964 and is included on a best-of album, Anthology: Godfather of Ska. The flip-side of his single is a tribute to West Indies legend Frank Worrell, ‘3 Cheers for Worrell’.
• Record-breakers Dennis Lillee, Rod Marsh and Doug Walters all share an unusual musical distinction. In 1972, the trio was part of the Australian cricket team that recorded a single, ‘Here Comes the Aussies’, to coincide with the Ashes series in England. A top-40 hit in Australia, all three players were later celebrated on vinyl, with a variety of commercial singles released in their honour – ‘Lillee’ by Steve Bailey, ‘Dennis Lillee’ by The Wozzers, ‘The Hero of the West (A Tribute to Rodney Marsh)’ by Australian country music legend Smoky Dawson and ‘Dashing Dougie’ by New Zealand Maori singer Nash Chase.
• Australian country-pop singer Mike McClellan honoured Mark Taylor’s historic Test innings of 334 not out against Pakistan with a song called ‘The Mark of the Man’. The 1998 CD single also includes ‘An Enigmatic Man’, a tribute to Don Bradman whose Australian Test-record innings Taylor equalled in the Peshawar Test of 1998/99.
• During the 1990s, an Australian jazz musician who bears the name of an Australian Test captain played with the resident band on Channel Nine’s Midday Show. During an interview with Mark Taylor, the host turned to the band and brought saxophonist Mark Taylor into the conversation asking what it was like to have the same name as the former Test captain: “I simply explained that I used it to my advantage as regularly as possible and with great results … restaurant bookings, flight upgrades, first-class service … amazing such a famous name can open doors! Later in the show, Tubby and I reversed roles. He grabbed my alto sax for a blow and me his cricket bat for a few practice drives.”
Saxophonist Mark Taylor and cricket player Mark Taylor swap their tools of trade on the set of Channel Nine’s Midday Show in 1996
DAN FORSHAW’S DREAM TEAM
Graham Gooch (E)
Alastair Cook (E)
Mike Atherton (E)
Brian Lara (WI)
Mark Waugh * (A)
Andrew Flintoff (E)
Adam Gilchrist † (A)
Shane Warne (A)
Courtney Walsh (WI)
Allan Donald (SA)
Glenn McGrath (A)
British jazz saxophonist Dan Forshaw
• Famed British conductor John Barbiroli undertook his first tour of Australia in 1950, lured by the prospect of Test match cricket. Said to be unavailable previously for such a tour, Sir John agreed when told that his concerts would be arranged so he could attend two Tests of the 1950/51 Ashes series.
• A cricket-loving Indian dentist recorded an album in 2011 in honour of Sachin Tendulkar. Prior to its general release, C.V. Ranjith presented a copy of the album Shan-e-Hindustan to his hero: “It was my dream to give the first copy to Sachin.” The video album features the dental surgeon singing in 20 different languages: “The main reason to come out in 20 languages is to make it easy to understand among the public that Sachin has thousands of fans across India and abroad.”
Indian artist Arnie B also paid tribute to Tendulkar in song in the same year penning a number to coincide with the World Cup. ‘Master Blaster’ followed Arnie B’s ‘King of Spin’ that celebrated Shane Warne.
THE SHANE WARNE JUKEBOX |
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‘Shane Warne’ |
Greg Champion |
1995 |
‘Bowlin’ Shane’ |
Haskel Daniel vs Sideshow |
2000 |
‘Horny Warnie’ |
Horny Warnie & The Whites |
2003 |
‘The Shane Warne Song’ |
Kevin “Bloody” Wilson |
2003 |
‘Shane Warne’ |
Handsome Young Strangers |
2007 |
‘The Shane Warne Song’ |
Paul Kelly |
2007 |
‘The Tale of Warne’, ‘Shine Like Shane’, ‘What About That, Shane?’ |
|
|
|
Shane Warne: The Musical |
2008 |
‘Jiggery Pokery’ |
The Duckworth Lewis Method |
2009 |
‘King of Spin’ |
Arnie B |
2011 |
• Set to the tune of a Jennifer Lopez hit, a radio duo from Sydney came up with a song in 2011 lampooning Shane Warne. Breakfast show hosts Ryan Fitzgerald and Michael Wipfli wrote ‘Get with Shane Warne’ based on J-Lo’s ‘On the Floor’: “Shane Warne/In your car/Beep your horn for Shane Warne.”
• Robert Nicholson was a baritone singer of some note who also played cricket, taking part in a legendary Australian match in which Don Bradman scored a century off three overs. Nicholson opened the batting for a Lithgow team against Blackheath in 1931, for which Bradman and a New South Wales team-mate Wendell Bill were guest players. On his way to a massive 256, Bradman savaged his opponents by hitting 33 runs off an over, followed by 40 off the next and 27 off the third, an effort lauded as a world record. Nicholson sang at a post-match concert, impressing the Don who invited him to perform at his wedding. He later sang with the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
• Campbell Burnap, an internationally-acclaimed jazz trombonist, was a big cricket fan who was once employed as a ball-by-ball commentator of County Championship matches. A member of MCC and the Derbyshire County Cricket Club, Burnap was a playing member of The Ravers, a cricket team originally made up mainly of jazz musicians. On stage, he was a long-time member of the Acker Bilk band and led a jazz group called Outswingers that performed at Lord’s during the lunch interval of Test matches.
Music at lunchtime at Lord’s
• The grandson of an England Test legend released a debut record in 2014. Julius Cowdrey – whose grandfather Colin and father Chris both captained England – put down the album Shoot Out To Me, replete the lyrics written by his cricket-playing brother Fabian: “I can be playing the piano in one room and he’ll come in and say ‘that sounds quite good’. Then ten or 15 minutes later he’ll come back with the lyrics to go with the song. Usually they’re bang on.”
• Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh turned singer in 2013. His debut recording was a Punjabi song, ‘Ek Suneha’.
• Top-selling Australian singer Clare Bowditch has a lucky cricket ball. While overseas one year, and having what she described as “one of the worst days of her life”, Bowditch bought herself a present from a second-hand shop in London: “I needed a symbol of hope and there it was. She was just sitting there … tucked away in a little corner … she had the most beautiful seams and reminded me of home, so I bought it and have carried it with me ever since.”
• In the year of his retirement from Test match cricket, Australian fast bowler Brett Lee set off on his first overseas tour with his two-man outfit White Shoe Theory. With Mick Vawdon on lead vocals and Lee playing guitar, the duo undertook a mini tour of India in 2010.
• England spinner Graeme Swann lent his voice to an album of children’s nursery rhymes in 2013, recording a version of ‘Dingle Dangle Scarecrow’. Swann and his rock band Dr Comfort and the Lurid Revelations put down the track for a CD released to raise money for charity.
• Singer and comedian Harry Secombe played in a benefit match for Glamorgan stalwart Don Shepherd in 1960. Best known for his role in the BBC Radio series The Goon Show, and for a string of Top 40 hits, Secombe scored 15 batting at No. 5 in the one-day match for Glamorgan against North Wales at Colwyn Bay.
• Australian and Chennai Super Kings fast bowler Doug Bollinger made an appearance at a concert in 2012 when he joined singer Katy Perry on stage during a performance in the Indian city of Chennai. In a show marking the opening of the Indian Premier League Twenty20 tournament, Bollinger taught the American pop sensation how to hold a cricket bat while using her microphone.
Former England opener Geoff Boycott meets US pop star Katy Perry in 2014
• England batsman Alastair Cook, a former choirboy at St Paul’s Cathedral, once sang with the internationally-renowned opera star Kiri Te Kanawa. Proficient at the saxophone, clarinet and piano, Cook performed a sax solo that was included on the soundtrack for a BBC children’s programme in 2008.
The Bedford School’s grade seven clarinet group, featuring future England captain Alastair Cook (right)
• Thomas Beecham, who was associated with leading orchestras such as the London Philharmonic and the Seattle Symphony, said he only became a conductor because of cricket. An accomplished concert pianist, Sir Thomas decided to pick up the baton after playing a game of cricket: “I kept taking wicket after wicket, in fact, I think I almost established a record. And that night, when I sat down to play at my concert, my fingers were so stiff. So I gave up the piano.”
• UK pop singer David Essex and lyricist Tim Rice once played together in a charity cricket match for the Lord’s Taverners XI in Los Angeles. Despite the songwriter boasting a career average of around seven, Essex – who enjoyed a string of top-40 hits in the 1970s – rated Sir Tim as quite a handy bat: “He can play well, he bats very solidly.”
• Australian rock legend Jim Keays, who fronted the top-selling band The Masters Apprentices, was a fast bowler at his school in Adelaide. The Scotland-born Keays once took 10-40 in a match for Norwood High.
JIM KEAYS’S DREAM TEAM
Don Bradman * (A)
Sachin Tendulkar (I)
Viv Richards (WI)
Greg Chappell (A)
Brian Lara (WI)
Adam Gilchrist † (A)
Ian Botham (E)
Shane Warne (A)
Dennis Lillee (A)
Jeff Thomson (A)
Wes Hall (WI)
Jim Keays, who fronted the legendary Australian rock band The Masters Apprentices
• An album released during the 2013 Ashes featured an iconic image of a streaker at Lord’s on the front cover. In 1975, Michael Angelow – a 24-year-old seaman – got his gear off for a £20 bet with Australian fans attending the Ashes Test at the home of cricket. His antics received worldwide attention and nearly 40 years later, the image, of Angelow hurdling the stumps, was resurrected for the front cover of the Sticky Wickets album by the Duckworth Lewis Method.
The Irish band’s second album, some of the songs included are ‘Boom Boom Afridi’, ‘It’s Just Not Cricket’, ‘The Umpire’, ‘Third Man’, ‘Chin Music’, ‘Out in the Middle’ and ‘Line and Length’.
• A song on the 1986 album No.10, Upping Street by the British group Big Audio Dynamite includes a reference to two England Test captains. ‘Ticket’ – the second track on side two – mentions W.G. Grace and Ian Botham: “Botham is cool/Selectors are spaced/England’s losing again/W.G. Disgrace.”
The 1973 album Vagabonds of the Western World by the Irish rock band Thin Lizzy includes a line about cricket on the track ‘Little Girl in Bloom’: “Little girl in bloom/You watch the men play cricket from the window in your room/See the ball go from bat to wicket/Pass away the afternoon.”
• One of the big new names to emerge on the UK music scene in the 2010s featured cricket in the video for his debut single under his stage name King Krule. Londoner Archy Marshall is seen holding a cricket bat in the official ‘Easy Easy’ video, a song taken from his debut album 6 Feet Beneath the Moon released in 2013.
• Lancashire batsman David Hughes, who also played first-class cricket for Tasmania, was the subject of a song recorded in 1972. ‘Ballad of David Hughes’ by The Twelfth Man appears on the flip-side of ‘Red Rose’ sung by members of the Lancashire county cricket team.
• Iconic British DJ John Peel once made a deal with a producer that upon Peel’s death he would arrange to play Roy Harper’s classic cricket song ‘When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease’ at his funeral. Although John Walter’s death preceded Peel’s, the BBC announcer played the song in memory of Walters: “I always expected that John, despite his illness, would outlive me because he was absolutely determined to be at my funeral in order to deliver the eulogy which would have been enormously long but very, very funny and I suspect would have reflected a great deal of credit on him and not nearly so much on me. But one of the things he was determined to do was to play at some stage of the ceremony Roy Harper’s record ‘When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease’. I’m sorry you didn’t have the much longer innings you deserved.”
Roy Harper performs ‘When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease’ live on the BBC’s Test Match Special
• Australian singer-songwriter Greg Champion recorded an album in 1995 dedicated to cricket. His CD Everybody Loves to Watch the Cricket includes a number of tracks honouring top cricketers such as ‘Big Merv’, ‘Take Me Home Jonty Rhodes’, ‘(The Kiwis are not the Same Without) Ewen Chatfield’ and ‘Our Don Bradman’.
On the eve of the 2010/11 Ashes series, he teamed up with singer David Brooks for the CD Cricket Chants: Songs for Singing at Cricket Matches: “These are songs to rival the Barmy Army. They constantly out-sing our supporters.” In 2008, Champion had recorded a tribute to Don Bradman – ‘I Was a Mate of Don Bradman’ – with Australian crooner Kamahl.
THE DON BRADMAN JUKEBOX |
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‘Old Fashioned Locket’ |
Don Bradman |
1930 |
‘Our Don Bradman’ |
Art Leonard |
1930 |
‘Bradman’ |
Paul Kelly |
1987 |
‘The Tiger and The Don’ |
Ted Egan |
1990 |
‘Sir Don’ |
John Williamson |
1996 |
‘An Enigmatic Man’ |
Mike McClennan |
1998 |
‘I Was a Mate of Don Bradman’ |
Kamahl & Greg Champion |
2008 |
• Two singles recorded by British bands in the late 1970s had cricketing songs on the flip-side. The B-side of The Shadows’ 1977 single ‘Another Night’ was ‘Cricket Bat Boogie’; the B-side of the 1979 single ‘Save Me’ by Violinski was ‘Cricket, Bloody Cricket’. Each track was also the opening track on albums by the two groups – Tasty by The Shadows and No Cause for Alarm by Violinski.
• When the British heavy metal band Iron Maiden performed at Bangalore in 2007, concert posters promoting the gig featured cricket. It was the group’s first-ever concert appearance in India.
• Upon the death of American soul singer Percy Sledge in 2015, speculation was revived as to whether his name had given birth to the cricket term “sledging”. The BBC’s Pat Murphy believes it originated when players had sung his No. 1 hit ‘When a Man Loves a Woman’ during a Sheffield Shield match in the 1960s: “My understanding is that it came from the mid-60s and a guy called Grahame Corling, who used to open the bowling for New South Wales and Australia. Apparently the suggestion was that this guy’s wife was [having an affair] with another team-mate, and when he came into bat [the fielding team] started singing ‘When a Man Loves a Woman’.”
• Two members of the US rock band Good Charlotte performed at the Australia Day Twenty20 international in Sydney in 2012/13 as part of a marketing campaign for the KFC food group. Twins Joel and Benji Madden also appeared in a number of cricket-themed ads for KFC over the summer, which also featured Australian captains Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke and George Bailey.
Joel and Benji Madden from the US rock group Good Charlotte try their hand at cricket during a promotion for KFC in Australia in 2012/13
• Left-arm spinner Tom O’Dwyer, a member of Western Australia’s Sheffield Shield-winning team in 1947/48, was known as the “bowling baritone”. After making his first-class debut against MCC in 1946/47, he claimed nine wickets (7-79 and 2-47) in a match against Queensland at Brisbane in the season that WA lifted the Shield at their first attempt. O’Dwyer appeared in a number of musicals in Perth and sang in his church choir for seven decades.
Barry Richards (SA)
Lance Cairns (NZ)
Viv Richards (WI)
Neil Harvey (A)
Garry Sobers * (WI)
Kapil Dev (I)
David Gower (E)
Rod Marsh † (A)
Dennis Lillee (A)
Ewen Chatfield (NZ)
Ross Edwards (A)
Bass player Andy Kent from the Australian alternative rock band You Am I
• Fresh from a performance at the Glastonbury music festival in Somerset, the Dalai Lama’s Gyuto Monks of Tibet visited Lord’s ahead of the 2013 Ashes. Fresh with a new album – Chants: the Spirit of Success – the cricket-loving monks performed a special blessing at the famous ground.
• During the Rolling Stones tour of Australia in 2014, frontman Mick Jagger and drummer Charlie Watts met Don Bradman’s son John, who gave the cricket-loving rockers a private tour of the Bradman Collection museum in Adelaide. The Stones later played at the Adelaide Oval in front of some 50,000 fans. Watts was able to fit in watching some cricket in between concerts, attending a Sheffield Shield match and a Twenty20 international between Australia and South Africa at the MCG.
Mick Jagger holding the World Cup trophy on the eve of the Rolling Stones concert at the Adelaide Oval in 2014 and at the 1972 Ashes Test at The Oval (right)
• When asked to name the best celebrity to have played for the Bunbury charity cricket club, founder David English plumped for McFly drummer Harry Judd. He said the worst was American pop singer Donny Osmond: “Lovely bloke, completely uncoordinated … when I was at Barry Gibbs’s house in LA, I did persuade Michael Jackson to turn out the next season, even though he didn’t have a clue what I was on about. Unfortunately, though, he died.”
A talented cricketer at school, according to the 2005 Wisden, “Harry Judd, who scored 252 runs last season, left Uppingham to become a full-time drummer in the pop group McFly. The summer ended well for the side, with four wins in the last five matches, but even better for Harry Judd: McFly topped the UK singles chart twice, with ‘Five Colours in Her Hair’ and ‘Obviously’.”
• In 2001, England batsman Mark Butcher made a guest appearance on the BBC’s Jamie Theakston Cricket Show. Armed with his guitar, Butcher played an acoustic version of The Stranglers song ‘(Get a) Grip (On Yourself)’ with the band’s former frontman, and cricket enthusiast, Hugh Cornwell.
Mark Butcher’s debut album – Songs from the Sun House – released in 2009
HUGH CORNWELL’S DREAM TEAM
W.G. Grace * (E)
Moeen Ali (E)
Hashim Amla (SA)
Mohammad Yousuf (P)
Viv Richards (WI)
Yusuf Pathan (I)
Jack Blackham † (A)
Daniel Vettori (NZ)
Kane Richardson (A)
Malcolm Marshall (WI)
Merv Hughes (A)
Hugh Cornwall, of the UK band The Stanglers, and his “facial-haired” XI
• Former Pakistan superstar Wasim Akram made an appearance on a pop music video in 2008. The “Sultan of Swing” is featured throughout the video for the song ‘Soona Soona’ by Pakistan rock group Fuzon: “He loved the songs and wanted to be part of the album. When we were working on the song, which is a sad love song, we thought of him.”
• West Indies all-rounder Andre Russell turned pop star in 2014, releasing two hip-hop singles. Russell collaborated with Grammy Award-winning reggae star Beenie Man for ‘Sweat Whine’ and backed it up with a solo single called ‘Sweetheart’: “The same way I put my all on the field is the same thing I will be doing to my music career because the sky is the limit.”
With ‘Go Gyal Go’, national team-mate Dwayne Bravo also released a debut solo single in 2014. Bravo had also previously recorded a song with Beenie Man, in 2011: “Music is a passion and a way of life for me. Had I not carved out a career as a cricketer, I would have ended up in the entertainment industry.”
• When the Texas-born singer-songwriter Stephen Stills based himself in the UK he embraced all things British including cricket. A member of the groups Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, he appeared as a guest on the BBC’s Test Match Special in 2010.
Mike Atherton * (E)
Geoff Boycott (E)
Denis Compton (E)
David Gower (E)
Joe Root (E)
Alec Stewart † (E)
Ian Botham (E)
Andrew Flintoff (E)
Graeme Swann (E)
James Anderson (E)
Fred Trueman (E)
Andy Scott – guitarist and vocalist from the iconic 1970s glam-rock band The Sweet
JOEL QUARTERMAIN’S DREAM TEAM
Gordon Greenidge (WI)
Matthew Hayden (A)
Don Bradman (A)
Sachin Tendulkar (I)
Viv Richards * (WI)
Garry Sobers (WI)
Adam Gilchrist † (A)
Shane Warne (A)
Wasim Akram (P)
Dennis Lillee (A)
Malcolm Marshall (WI)
Joel Quartermain from the Australian rock group Eskimo Joe
• A tweet from a member of the British boy band One Direction noting the death of Australian batsman Phillip Hughes in 2014 generated some 95,000 retweets. Harry Styles was in Sydney for the ARIA Awards when Hughes was felled by a bouncer at the SCG: “RIP Phillip Hughes. What an incredibly sad day. Thinking of him and his family.”
• An England cricketer revealed in 2013 that Elton John had saved his career after joining him on a four-week concert tour of Asia. The cricket-loving pop star (pictured) had contacted Surrey’s Steven Davies after learning of his depressive state following the death of county team-mate Tom Maynard in 2012: “It was crazy when he got in touch. He’s a lovely guy, really kind and generous. He knew that I was struggling with stuff so he invited me over. It was exactly what I needed. If I’d gone on another [cricket] tour I felt like I would have given up the game.”
• A leading exponent of calypso music released an album in 1976 that included a song about Viv Richards. The album Ghetto Vibes by King Short Shirt contains the track ‘Vivian Richards’, a song featured in the 2010 documentary Fire in Babylon that traces the rise of West Indies cricket in the 1970s and 80s. Four decades later, Sir Viv was the subject of another song with INXS drummer Jon Farriss recording a debut single called ‘Smokin Joe’. Richards provided spoken-word vocals for the song released in 2015.
• Two of the fastest bowlers of all time received a musical salute in the mid-1970s with the West Indies’ Michael Holding and Australia’s Jeff Thomson both commemorated on vinyl. Jamaican DJ I-Roy’s ‘Tribute to Michael Holding’ appears on his 1976 album Musical Shark Attack, while the 1975 single ‘We Got Thommo’ by Smith & Weston became a minor hit in Australia the following year.
• An Australian dancer with Britain’s Royal Ballet was signed up by the England and Wales Cricket Board to give aspiring international coaches a pep talk. The cricket-loving Alexander Campbell trained with the Academy Ballet school in Sydney before being appointed as a soloist with the Royal Ballet in 2011: “I can’t remember a time when I didn’t have a cricket bat or ball in my hand. I had to choose between ballet and cricket, and I struggled with the decision for a long time. But my love for ballet, and the opportunity to do something that seemed so unusual for a kid from Sydney, was enticing.
“I’m not sure my ballet teachers would tell you that cricket improved my ballet training, but I certainly think it helped. I developed all sorts of skills – hand-eye coordination, timing, sharpness, explosiveness, agility – that perhaps wouldn’t have developed in the same way had I just been trained as a dancer.”