He started out as a natural talent who lost his way. Now, able to marry venom and control, Steven Finn finally feels back to his best
George Dobell at Edgbaston30-Jul-2015Just over a year ago, Steven Finn sat in the dressing room at Edgbaston and wept. The pace and rhythm were gone. The England place, too. There were no guarantees that any of them would be back.At the time, Finn had been reduced to bowling first change for Middlesex. It wasn’t that he minded; it was that he didn’t understand what had gone wrong. He didn’t understand why the game that had once come so easily had suddenly become so hard. He didn’t understand why all his hard work was getting him nowhere.But as he sits in the same pavilion, he may reflect that the experience has been the making of him. He may reflect that, where once he was a talented kid, he is now an experienced professional. He may reflect that the whole experience, painful though it was, was a necessary process that helped him develop from something raw into something quite special. He’s not a brute hurling a ball now; he’s a fast bowler.And yes, he is fast. Finn has bowled faster than anyone – including Mitchell Johnson – in this Test. His speed, in both innings, has gone above 90mph, with a first-innings high above 93mph. With his height, that presents an uncomfortable challenge for a batsman. Even a batsman as good as Steven Smith, rated No. 1 in the world, who Finn has dismissed twice in this match.Just as importantly, he has gained swing. While the Finn that first represented England swung the occasional ball, the version that has come back into the side appears to have control and regular away shape. The wicket of Mitchell Marsh – bowled by a full delivery – even seemed to tail in just a fraction. It has made him a far more complete package as a bowler.And, most importantly, he has hit the seam and maintained a good length. His spell of 8-1-25-4 either side of tea, in which he dismissed Smith and Michael Clarke, squared up by one that left him slightly off the seam, may well have settled this game. His obvious happiness afterwards – “it feels pretty darn good,” he said in what might have been considered a pretty good Hugh Grant impression – was understandable. There have been some dark days on the journey.In the beginning, fast bowling came easily to Finn. While his school friends were doing their GCSEs, he was making his first-class debut. For a 16-year-old to play professional sport is impressive enough; for a fast bowler to do so is remarkable.Six years later, he was celebrating becoming the youngest man to claim 50 Test wickets for England. He hadn’t had to think about the game; it all came naturally.
Like fixing an engine, Finn was forced to understand how each part of his action worked and how to gain the best from it
But then came the obstacles. His propensity to leak four runs an over made him something of a liability in a four-man attack who prided themselves on attrition and control. Then, after his habit of knocking the stumps in his delivery stride became more than an irritation in 2012, the attempts to alter his action and approach started.The results were, initially at least, wretched. The run-up was shortened, then lengthened again. The pace dropped – Finn continues to deny this, but the statistics brook no argument – the control disappeared and a man who once looked natural and confident then appeared deliberate and diffident.He played his last Test at Trent Bridge in 2013 – he bowled especially poorly in the Lord’s nets ahead of the second Test of that series and was dropped – and, by the time England reached Australia later that year, looked a shell of the bowler he had once been.The image of him alone in the nets at the SCG, bowling delivery after delivery in agonisingly arrhythmic fashion, growing slower the more effort he applied, was one of the sadder sights of the tour. By the time Ashley Giles sent him home suggesting he was “not selectable” – a phrase that had been used throughout the tour by the coaching staff away from the microphones – it was a kindness. He needed a break.What he gained, in reality, was time and space and support. Back at Middlesex, in a more benevolent environment without some of the “banter” that was not always helpful in the England dressing room, Finn worked for hour after hour with the club’s bowling coach, Richard Johnson.There was, for a long time, little sign of improvement. But perhaps at Finchley Cricket Club, where Finn started bowling off two paces, then built it up off three, then four and more, perhaps at Lord’s in May, when Jonathan Trott said Finn was back to his best, or perhaps at Merchant Taylor’s School earlier this month, when Finn and Johnson both came to the same conclusion, Finn started to bowl with the venom of old and the control of new. And, just as importantly, he started to believe in himself again.The process of rebuilding that action will prove priceless. Like fixing an engine, he was forced to understand how each part of his action worked and how to gain the best from it. He was forced – prepared might be a better word; plenty wouldn’t have bothered – to confront technical lapses that his natural talent had, for a while, allowed him to ignore. He was prepared to do the hard work to come again.”Trying to improve hindered me for a while,” he said recently. “But overall it’s been a beneficial experience. I came home and reassessed where I was. I feel good now. I feel I can do myself justice.”That may prove just as well for England. There seems a very strong chance that James Anderson will miss at least the Trent Bridge Test, providing a peek into England’s future. Anderson will surely prove irreplaceable but, at least if Finn is fit and firing, the future does not look quite so worrying.It is not a unique story. The likes of Anderson, Matt Prior and Ian Bell were also selected young only to then struggle and benefit from a spell back in the county game. Gary Ballance will surely prove the same.Bearing in mind the occurrences of players struggling in the England environment, it does provoke reflection on the ECB’s belief in the academy at Loughborough. While millions are spent on a centre that appears to produce little – there are several examples of players who feel their career was detrimentally affected by its coaches – the ECB is drawing up plans to cut the County Championship schedule by 25%. To do so risks weakening the foundations of everything good in the English game.Finn, himself, credits the endless support of Johnson and, to be fair, the ECB’s Kevin Shine. “I’m indebted to those guys,” he said. “They put in hours and hours of early mornings with me bowling through to a mitt, or to a stump and watching and giving feedback. I’m very grateful to the way those guys have given their time so selflessly to me after the last 18 months.”Steven Finn found an irresistible rhythm to rip through Australia’s top order•Getty ImagesBut he also credited a refreshed atmosphere in the England dressing room. More comfortable in the less intense environment, Finn is not thinking so much at the runs he must avoid conceding as the wickets he wants to take. It is a subtle difference, perhaps, but it has helped him relax and produce the cricket that he had shown for Middlesex this summer.”I’m enjoying playing cricket at the moment,” he said. “I used to put myself under a huge amount of pressure. But now we just want to play with smiles on our faces.”We’re playing with a can-do attitude. Before, we were playing some very attritional cricket because it suited the players that we had. Now we’re trying to be a team of people who can showcase our talent. It seems to be working.”It was not as if he had things all his own way. His first over was hit for 14, mainly by David Warner, and he was quickly whipped out of the attack and brought back at the other end.It proved a masterstroke by Alastair Cook. Two ball later Smith, perhaps trying to pile the pressure on to a bowler who has sometimes been suspected of cracking when he is targeted, top edged an attempted pull. Shortly after tea, Finn was on a hat-trick and Australia were the ones under pressure. He had been tested and he had come through.”There have been dark times along the way,” he said. “But it makes those good times all the more satisfying.”Indeed, it will. And, in the long-term, his hard work and increased understanding of his art will serve him and England well.