Contrary to popular belief, seam bowlers are sensitive souls. Take it from one who knows. Catch them at the wrong time, such as Jeff Thomson after a night on the scotch (read Chris Ryan’s wonderful piece in Wisden a couple of years back about that) or Sylvester Clarke with a brandy hangover and they might not appear overly pleasant out in the middle. But beneath all that, they all want to be loved.
No one likes to feel rejection but in the midst of a Test, in front of a full house at Lord’s, it is so much more exposed. And this is how Steven Finn must have felt as England, battling to stay in the first Test, tried to work their way through the Pakistan batting, with the twin objectives of maximum wicket-taking and minimum damage to the significant lead the opposition had already managed from the first innings. Watching Finn for much of the day, besweatered, wandering forlornly from fine leg to mid-off, throwing the ball back to the bowler, giving it a little polish, brought to mind the fate of Woody in Toy Story, when Andy ditches his favourite toy for Buzz Lightyear.
Now, I have found myself in a minority in this Test in that having watched him in a county game a week ago I think Finn is only a hair away from being back to his very best, despite a deal of bandwagon criticism to the contrary. He is, to my eyes, running in well, his action is holding up, and his pace is good, hitting the bat hard. In the first innings, he conceded four runs per over which may seem profligate but in fact is only half a point above his Test match career economy rate of 3.57. He bowled one particularly energetic spell from around the wicket, thrashing it into an unresponsive pitch and gaining nothing in return. But pitching it up and swinging it is not his game. I thought it a worthy piece of bowling.
It seems as if he is out on a limb, though. Chris Woakes and Jake Ball are the Buzz Lightyears in Alastair Cook’s toy box with Finn now the bowler of last resort. This is strange, for one might think that if early wickets to put the Pakistan batting under pressure were required then a bowler who tends to trade punches but can land the knockout blow more frequently than most might be a good starting point.
There might have been a case for giving him the new ball along with Stuart Broad. It would have meant using the Nursery end, although I believe that far from being to his detriment, it could actually benefit him. The nature of the slope can set a bowler nicely at the crease, and, rather than being thrown down the slope, allows action and follow‑through in a straight line; all very Newtonian. But one of the Buzzes got the gig. After five overs from Broad, Cook did turn to Finn but his mistrust showed. For Ball and Broad, he had three slips and a gully in place. Now, with a ball only 11 overs old, he posted one slip fewer, and a man on the boundary just backward of square on the legside. “Have a bowl,” he was saying, “but I am applying damage limitation”; Cook was indicating he expected bad deliveries. Azhar Ali edged his third ball straight to where third slip would have been and down to the boundary. After two good overs for five runs, Finn was off.
Moeen Ali bowled, then, after lunch, Broad again followed by Moeen once more. The excellent Woakes was firing away and removed Shan Masood to a sharp slip catch and Azhar to a very tight lbw decision. A ballsy piece of captaincy by Cook brought the wicket of Misbah-ul-Haq, for the Pakistan captain clambers into spin and ran Moeen ragged during his first-innings century. Misbah hit out immediately and Hales’s running catch justified Cook’s faith in his bowler. Finn got another turn and had Younis Khan hopping around. An lbw appeal was answered in the affirmative, after consideration by Joel Wilson, who makes Steve Bucknor seem like the fastest gun in the west. The review went against Finn, of course it did. Five good overs and he was off again.
Broad, Moeen and the Lightyear twins had all bowled twice as many overs when Woody returned for a third spell, at the Nursery. It was heartbreaking to watch for he delivered a spell as good as any in the game. And it killed him. Yasir Shah was beaten repeatedly and then, when he managed to get bat and pad on one and balloon it to extra cover, Broad was unable to hang on to it. Sarfraz Ahmed was dropped by Jonny Bairstow and then promptly hit Finn through midwicket and, via an edge, the slips for boundaries. Finn kicked the turf and bellowed to the heavens; in the first innings Woakes’s fifth wicket came with the worst ball he bowled. Now he returned and picked up his 10th with his third ball and another besides. To infinity and beyond.
