Whaddabout that Final eh?
How about those England boys and all those big moments? The Stokes heroics, Buttler being Buttler, the Archer cool at the death of the death? That throw from Roy and the sharply calm captaincy of Eoin Morgan?
Amid the kaleidoscopic madness of that chaotic ending, it was easy to lose sight of what had gone earlier and the incredible performance of one player on the biggest stage in cricket. Whaddabout Liam Plunkett?
Who’d have thought Liam Plunkett Bowling Cross-Seam In The Middle Overs could become a thing? But in this World Cup, it has most assuredly become A Thing. Plunkett hadn’t bowled at his best in the semi-final against Australia; it was the only match in which he took no wickets, undermined perhaps by new-ball dominance that had preceded him.
But throughout the tournament his range of cross-seamers – he has three variations of that variation – have captured the biggest scalps: Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle, Hashim Amla. And at Lord’s, the first of his three wickets was his former Yorkshire team-mate and linchpin of the New Zealand line-up, Kane Williamson. With cross-seam in the middle overs. Whuddathunket!
“I felt good I wasn’t going to try and do anything different,” said Plunkett after the game. “I was going to bowl cross-seam, mix the seam up and just hit my length. That’s what Morgs said to me first-up. He said, ‘We’ve not tried cross-seam yet. Do what you do.’
“And he often said to me during the game, ‘You’re the best in the world at that point.’ So to have your captain say that to you, it gives you a little bit of a spark and today I felt good and just to get Kane out is a massive turning point. I’ve played with Kane, I know how good he is, obviously player of the tournament, so to get that wicket it felt like the momentum had shifted a little bit.”
When we spoke during the aftermath of the match, Plunkett was still struggling to be coherent through the emotion and kept apologising.
“It’s not sunk in, it’s not sunk in. I had a minute where we won and then we went back upstairs, I bawled my eyes out. You know the guys are celebrating and I was just hit by a wave of emotion and seeing my old man, who’s been on the journey with me, my mum and dad, but my dad, he’s not an emotional person but to see him cry, it was tear-jerking for sure.”
Plunkett has every reason to feel this more than just about anyone. He made his World Cup debut twelve years ago – in 2007. Just let that sink in for a second. That longevity in itself also serves as a reminder that many professional cricketers, even the best ones, can go through their career without having their glory moment on the big stage.
“It’s surreal,” said Plunkett. “I was playing in the World Cup in the Caribbean, 2007, I think it was, against Ross Taylor and then I’m in the final with Ross Taylor again. It just goes by in a flash.”
“But I’ve never really won a massive trophy. I know this is the biggest of the biggest for a cricketer to win the World Cup. I won a trophy with Durham way back when, and a few Champos, but I’ve never won a T20 in front of a big crowd or an IPL. It was meant to be, to win this in front of a big crowd in England at Lord’s, the best ground in the world, in front of an amazing crowd and everyone got to see it on TV. I’d have given my right leg for it.
ALSO READ: Dobell: Legacy-maker Stokes rewrites his own intro
“The boys have been amazing over the past four years. You don’t deserve to win anything, you don’t deserve to win a World Cup, but what we’ve played in the last four years, we’ve dominated teams on the other side of the world. We’ve travelled, we’ve won away series, we won here 4-0, we beat the good teams, but you’ve got to put that all together for a World Cup. We saw that in the ICC Champions Trophy, we got beaten in the semi-finals and you start to think, in the back of your mind, that you can’t go on to win a trophy.”
Plunkett’s ten runs from ten balls, including a crucial boundary, shouldn’t be overlooked either. He was the last batsmen to contribute any runs in a partnership with Stokes; those who came after were all out for ducks. But he stresses the balance of personal responsibility and faith in team-mates.
“I think the best thing about this team is that you know the person behind you can do the job, but no one wants to leave it to them.”
England’s next ODI is eight months away. Their next World Cup campaign is four years away and England have learned, at long last, the value of long-term planning. At 34 years of age, it’s possible that we may never see Plunkett’s Cross-Seam In The Middle Overs on such a big stage again. But it is also probable that nothing could ever surpass this.
“I’m speechless. I keep thinking, ‘I’m a World Cup winner’. Sorry if I’m not making too much sense,” he apologises once more.
That’s quite okay, Liam. As Eoin Morgan would say, do what you do.
Source: ESPN Crickinfo