Cricket is a game that creates wonderful highs but, in my career, it’s also featured one dreadful, terrible low—the death of Phillip Hughes. I can still remember the events of 25 November 2014 as if they were yesterday, as they are etched on my mind, and I’m sure the same is true of everyone who knew Phillip and certainly everyone connected with cricket on that awful day.
It was day one of a Sheffield Shield match at the SCG, with New South Wales playing South Australia. I wasn’t playing in the game as I’d suffered a slight thigh strain during an ODI against South Africa, also at the SCG, two days earlier, and although the problem wasn’t serious, I was left out of the match to rest, receive treatment and ensure I was ready for the first Test against India that was due to start just over a week later, on 4 December in Brisbane.
I’d been in to the SCG in the morning, during the first session, to see the Cricket New South Wales medical staff, and while I was there I was able to watch some of the action. South Australia was batting, Phillip was playing like a genius and it looked like a case of perfect timing from him. He had been the reserve batsman on the recent tour of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where we played Pakistan in two Tests and, with Michael Clarke struggling with injury—something that had placed a question mark over his fitness to take part in that opening Test—Phillip appeared to be putting himself forward as the obvious candidate to fill that slot in the Test side if Michael wasn’t able to get himself right.
I headed home after lunch with the instruction to keep icing my injury through the afternoon, and that was what I was doing, lying on my couch, when I received a text message from Richie Callander, the son of racing legend Ken Callander and a good friend of mine.
The message was that Phillip had been hit on the back of the head and that the players were coming off the field. That was unsettling but I’d seen and heard of plenty of players getting hit during my years of involvement in the sport and that knowledge meant my first thought was: ‘I’m sure he’ll be okay’, rather than any major concern for his welfare.
But when Richie followed up by informing me that the matter was very serious and that I should get to the SCG as quickly as I could, I didn’t need to be told a second time and I was up off the couch like a shot and on my way back to the ground.
I was living just under ten minutes’ drive away but by the time I got there Phillip had already been taken away to hospital and the scene that greeted me in the New South Wales dressing room was one I never want to experience again. I looked around at the faces of the players and the colour had drained out of every single one of them. Everyone appeared to be in a state of shock and although I asked a few questions trying to get some more detail about what had happened, and whether there was any news of Phillip, no one was saying very much. Most of the players were just sitting around with blank looks on their faces and some were in tears. I stayed around in the room for a while but with no one really talking—there was an awful silence for most of the time—and with no one knowing what was going on, with the match or with Phillip, I headed back home trying to take in what had happened. What was clear from the reaction of the players and the fact Phillip was away from the ground and at hospital was that the situation was very serious. It was very hard to try and take it all in and I think my feeling was the same as everyone else’s—I couldn’t believe what had happened.
Phillip and I went back a long way and although he was playing for South Australia on the day the tragedy occurred, that switch had been a relatively recent event. He was in his third season based in Adelaide, having originally switched states to try and revive his international career after missing out on a Cricket Australia contract in 2012. But he’d played all his junior and state cricket up to that point for New South Wales and that’s how we met. Phillip was just over six months older than me and we first faced each other at junior level when I remember him scoring successive hundreds against my team. Even then it was obvious he was an exceptional talent as, although he was unorthodox, he seemed to pick up the length of the ball very quickly and was in position to play the shot he wanted almost before the fielders were ready. That ability to assess length rapidly is something the very best players have and Phillip certainly possessed it.
Our first time playing alongside each other was on a Cricket New South Wales under-17s tour of the UK the year before I went there to try and gain some experience as a club professional. We hit it off straight away. Our shared unorthodoxy as batsmen was something that drew us together, but we also shared a real passion for batting. Most youngsters like having the bat in their hands, but what drives players to the next level is that passion for the sport, almost bordering on an obsession, and that’s what Phillip and I both had, I think. His desire to be the best he could be as a batsman drove his move to South Australia and also his stints in county cricket for Middlesex and Worcestershire.
Because Phillip’s family lived a fair distance away from Sydney—Macksville is about 500 kilometres north and just as close to Brisbane—he would stay at my parents’ house when we were both making our way on the fringes of the Cricket New South Wales squad as juniors, and we would then head to the SCG together for training. He was a great guy to be around, quietly spoken and not brash, and we always enjoyed each other’s company.
When he died he was still taking his game forward. Right from the outset he was always strong through the off side and especially through the point region and the timing and placement of his cut shot was remarkable. He really was great to watch when in full flight and as a fielding captain you could have five fielders in the area square of the wicket and he would still be able to find the gap between them. The cricketing grapevine—together with video analysis of his game—meant sides eventually got wise to that strength and started to restrict him by tucking him up, not offering him any width. But as I saw first-hand in practice in the UAE during our series against Pakistan, and also during that morning session at the SCG, he had begun to develop a really good leg-side game. Now, when bowlers bowled straight to him, he was whipping them through the arc between square leg and wide mid-on.
I have to admit, though, the intricacies of Phillip’s game was the last thing on my mind at a meeting of players at the SCG the day after the incident. We were briefed that day by both Doctor John Orchard, who’d attended to Phillip out on the ground, and Doctor Peter Bruckner, Cricket Australia’s team doctor, and the fact John broke down in tears as he was explaining to us what had happened was a real hammer blow that told us all just how bad the situation really was.
What had happened was that Phillip had been struck on the left-hand side of the neck, just below his helmet, by a short ball and had gone down head first on the pitch. After John’s intervention he was taken to St Vincent’s hospital and had undergone surgery soon after arriving to relieve pressure on his brain caused by bleeding following the blow. But he remained critical, in an induced coma, and we were confronted with a very stark view of what would happen next. It was explained to us that it was believed Phillip was not expected to recover but, in the event that he did, he would be unlikely to be the person we had known because of the nature of the injury he’d experienced.
I still remember the moment I took in those words. I felt a mix of numbness and shock and it was a feeling that was shared by the entire group. It was like being punched in the stomach—the breath just went out of the whole room. None of us could believe what we’d been told.
I went to the hospital over the 24 hours or so that followed, along with not only all the players based in New South Wales, but also players and cricket officials from elsewhere, including national head coach Darren Lehmann, who’d flown in from Brisbane to be close to the situation and to offer what comfort he could. Darren had gone through a similar tragedy in 2004 when his mentor and mate David Hookes died from a blow to the back of the head inflicted during a night out in Melbourne, something, that like this situation, had come completely out of the blue. It meant that if anyone had experience of dealing with this sort of situation then it was him, but, in truth, I think he was just as stunned as the rest of us.
I think what really affected me—affected many of us players, perhaps—was the fact that this situation had arisen playing cricket. It wasn’t as if Phillip had been involved in a road accident or been the victim of an attack while walking in the street. The ball hit him while he was doing something all of us had seen, done and been party to countless times before. We’d all hooked short balls and hit them for four or six and the bowlers among us had all bowled plenty of short balls too. We were all aware of the dangers of such deliveries, but it wasn’t something that ever really entered our heads when we played the game. Yet here was a situation where a player we all knew—and a very good player too, not a novice who couldn’t handle himself at the crease—had been the victim of a freak accident that could have happened to any one of us. It was a confronting, sobering and frightening thought.
Despite being at the hospital for long periods over the time that followed Phillip’s accident, I didn’t actually go in to see him until it was time to say goodbye, after we had been told that his life-support machine was going to be turned off. Before then I just sat in the foyer, along with a host of others, including state teammates Daniel Smith, Stephen O’Keefe and Moisés Henriques, as a steady stream of people came through. It was difficult to know what to say or what to do; I just felt—and I think the same was true with others, too—that we should be there for our mate and his family, and also to offer each other whatever comfort we could in a shocking situation.
When I did eventually go in to see Phillip it was with Stephen O’Keefe. I would put it down as one of the toughest things I’ve ever done in my life. It made me feel sick, but I’m glad I did see him before he left us as it forced me to try and remember all the good times we’d had together beforehand.
The day after Phillip’s life-support machine was turned off, on Friday 28 November, there was a meeting of players at the SCG. Something that was crystal clear from that get-together was that no one had any stomach to get back on the field and play, certainly until after Phillip’s funeral. That meant a postponement of the first Test against India, but it wasn’t debated for a moment, as it was clearly the right thing to do for Cricket Australia and the Board of Control for Cricket in India when they discussed how to go forward.
From a personal point of view—and as someone who was obsessed with practice—I didn’t feel ready even for a net, or some throw-downs, and so the prospect of going out to play a Test match was the furthest thing from my mind. What those members of the Test squad—the likes of Shane Watson, David Warner, Nathan Lyon and Brad Haddin—who’d witnessed the incident first-hand must have been feeling as they took part in the first Test when it eventually got underway in Adelaide on 9 December I can’t imagine, and the same was true of all those who were present at the SCG on 25 November. Certainly, I found the whole situation a very difficult one to come to terms with.
In the days after Phillip’s passing and before the funeral I took comfort in joining with a few of the New South Wales crew, including players like Moisés Henriques, Stephen O’Keefe, Nic Maddinson and Ben Rohrer, spending time together at the Clovelly Hotel in Sydney, having a few drinks and telling stories, trying to celebrate Phillip’s life. I think all of us wanted to be with other players at that time rather than be alone because the whole nature of the tragedy was that we knew it could so easily have been one of us instead.
All of us had either faced or bowled countless short balls during the course of our careers and even when any of us had been struck there’d never been any lasting damage; now, here we were, reflecting on another short ball that had actually ended a player’s life. We had taken our sport for granted, forgotten about any dangers involved and just got on with things and now we had received a shocking jolt to let us know that it wasn’t just a bit of fun but could also result in someone’s death, even possibly our own.
But if I was feeling terrible about what had happened, I couldn’t begin to come to terms with what was going through Sean Abbott’s mind. Sean and Phillip had been friends—Phillip was still playing for New South Wales when Sean made his first-class debut for the Blues—and they’d been on tour together for Australia in the UAE just over a month earlier, so for him to have bowled the ball that ultimately led to the tragedy must have been like a 100-ton weight around his neck. Everyone at Cricket New South Wales and the cricket community in Australia was keen to rally around him, although it was difficult to know how best to do that. The message to him was that we all supported him and the fact he took 2–53 and 6–14 in his next match, against Queensland also at the SCG, spoke volumes for his strength of character.
I saw Phillip’s parents, Greg and Virginia, at the hospital as Phillip’s situation became clear, but I just wasn’t sure what to say or how to approach them. I mean, if it was tough for us as players and friends of Phillip to deal with, for his parents to go through that just goes beyond any words. And the fact that Virginia and Megan, Phillip’s sister, were actually at the SCG to watch him bat on the day itself makes it even harder for me to comprehend how the whole family must have been feeling and still feel to this day.
My memories of the funeral in Macksville on 3 December were of the immense sadness everyone was feeling, the intense heat of the day and also of the dignified way Michael Clarke carried himself. Michael, like me, had missed the match because of injury, but he showed his leadership qualities in the hours and days that followed by fronting up on behalf of the players to speak with media and delivering a heartfelt tribute to Phillip at the funeral itself. He was close to tears by the end of his eulogy and I know I was too.
The one thing that came through to me from that period between Phillip’s injury and our resumption of cricket with the first Test was the feeling that nothing, and certainly not playing, felt as important as it had done before the incident. Before Phillip’s death, when I was dismissed I would get upset with myself, but his passing was a watershed for me, and I’m sure for a lot of other players too, as it made me realise that, in the big scheme of things, losing my wicket was nothing in comparison to losing my life. I’m not saying it made me carefree or flippant in my attitude to cricket or to train with any less intensity after that time, but it certainly made me remember why I played the game in the first place—because I love it. It has its own pressures because I have responsibilities to myself, my teammates, my family and the cricketing community, but ultimately I’m thankful to be able to do something I have a passion for, and I’ve found that attitude has taken a weight off my shoulders in the years that followed.
I didn’t feel able to pick up a bat again and practise until we arrived in Adelaide ahead of the rescheduled first Test and when I did so I started very gently, with just a few throw-downs from batting coach Michael Di Venuto. Some players, like David Warner, didn’t feel able to bat at all—he just faced a few deliveries before he had to walk out of the nets and he ended up bowling instead—and the atmosphere around the group was one of apprehension. Our bowlers didn’t want to bowl a short ball and, as a batsman, I certainly didn’t feel like facing one. I remember the feeling that whenever a short ball was bowled it was much more of a big deal than it ever had been at practice beforehand. As time went by that feeling gradually settled down, but the memory of what happened has always stayed with us as players, to the extent that now, whenever anyone is struck in the head, then the first reaction is genuine concern. That was clear when Mitchell Johnson hit Virat Kohli in that Adelaide Test and also, in the following year, when Mitchell Starc landed a bouncer on the helmet of Eoin Morgan in an ODI in Manchester. Before that summer of 2014–15, there may have been more of a feeling of ‘Let’s let him have some more short stuff’, but now even though we are still determined to use the bouncer as an attacking weapon, we’re also far more mindful of the effect being struck by a short ball can have.
In the aftermath of the incident at the SCG, and again after Phillip’s passing, there were all sorts of views floated about on how to make the game safer. Any ban of short-pitched bowling was an obvious non-starter for me, because it’s part of the fabric of the sport, and the game would suffer in its absence, as there are few more thrilling sights in cricket than a batsman hooking a fast bowler in full cry. Even if a ban had been considered, the issue of how to enforce it would have been another issue. Bowlers have to bowl different lengths depending on the type of pitch they play on in order to get a ball up to head height—a short ball in Dubai, for example, on a relatively docile surface would have to be much shorter in length than a short ball in Perth to get up to a batsman’s head height.
The answer for me has always been in improving the quality of protective equipment and we’ve now seen that with the adoption of British Standard helmets across the game at the highest level. The main features of them are that the grille is now fixed and can’t be adjusted manually as was the case in the past, and the gap between the grille and the helmet peak has been reduced and is now fixed to try and avoid the ball from sneaking through to strike the face. That fixed grille took a bit of getting used to for me because it meant the top bar was in a place where I’d previously been looking to try and locate the ball. It was a concern for me as having anything interfering with my vision made the helmet more, rather than less, dangerous in my view, but I got used to it and now playing with such a helmet has become second nature.
Neck guards were also introduced as clip-on additions to the helmet, aimed at reducing the consequences of a blow around the area where Phillip was struck, by dispersing the impact, but although I tried one for a while in the nets, I just couldn’t get used to it. It just didn’t feel right as I felt it restricted my movement as I turned my head, and so I opted not to use it. That might be seen as an unnecessary risk but my view is that while I need to be protected at the crease, I also need to feel comfortable, and for me a helmet without the neck guard works on those levels.
That first Test after Phillip’s passing was tough for everyone in our side. It had only been a couple of months earlier that he’d been part of the squad in the UAE and now he was no longer with us. There was a great deal of emotion as we sang the national anthem ahead of the first day’s play, but my main recollection of the period and the match itself was how flat the playing group was. Our changing room was like one where we’d just lost five games in a row. There was no energy, and none of the usual bubble you get within an Australian dressing room before and during a Test match.
It was tough but I think we all knew we had to get out and play the game because, however painful the situation was, we all had to try to come to terms with it as best we could. And I think we all did that with our performances in that Test match, and we continue to honour and respect Phillip to this day. When someone was a part of our lives as Phillip was for so many of us within the game, we will always remember him.
In the circumstances, I can count my double of 162 not out and 52 not out, and especially the unbeaten hundred in the first innings, as two of the more satisfying Test innings of my career. When I reached my hundred on the second day and looked up to the heavens as I stood on the number 408 that had been painted on the ground—a mark of respect for Phillip as he is the 408th player capped by Australia at Test level—there were tears in my eyes. I took off my helmet and Ian Gould, the umpire, very thoughtfully told me: ‘Take your time, take all the time you need.’
It was actually an outstanding Test match, not least for the way we managed to win it on the final day when India seemed to be in a position to secure a remarkable win of its own. By that stage, Brad Haddin had taken over as captain with Michael Clarke out of action following a first innings hundred (128) of his own which was interrupted by a back injury and then a hamstring issue as he fielded, and Brad quickly showed himself to have something of a golden touch that day.
As Virat Kohli—who batted outstandingly well in that match and for much of that series—was easing India towards the winning line as it chased 364, we were looking a little flat and Brad said to me: ‘You get out of bat-pad and out into the field to help me out with some energy.’ I think that’s the last time I’ve fielded bat-pad and I wasn’t sorry to get out of there. Suddenly—not through any action by me, I might add—everything seemed to click for us, Nathan Lyon got on a roll by taking seven wickets in the innings and 12 in the match, and India went from 2–242 to 315 all out to give us a wonderful win by 48 runs.
We enjoyed the success and had a good get-together as a team in the dressing room after the match, remembering Phillip and delighted we could pay tribute to him by securing a win at a venue he called home. But at the same time we all knew that it was going to take more than just five days for us to get over the trauma we felt in the wake of Phillip’s passing, and that was exactly how it proved, as playing again at the SCG in the final match of the series was just as testing for many of us, especially those who’d played in that fateful match and also those of us who’d played alongside Phillip at state and international level.
It was one of the toughest parts of my life so far and however long I play the game and am involved in it I hope I never have to experience anything like it again.