after the close of play in Somerset’s match against Surrey at Guildford. After stumps had been drawn, I was sitting in the bar having a pint with my team-mate Pete ‘Dasher’ Denning. Brian said he was going back to the team hotel and I told him I would get a lift from one of the other players and would see him later, a fortunate decision on my part as it turned out. On his journey Brian went over some oil on a bend in the road and lost control of the car before smashing into a lamp post. When I saw the wreckage later I realized how lucky I had been, as the area around the passenger seat had totally caved in. Naturally, Closey didn’t have a mark on him!
At least he was doing his best for me in other respects. Called up to face the West Indies in the 1976 summer Test series, I’m sure he put in a good word for me with the England captain Tony Greig. After I scored my maiden first-class century, 167 not out, to help Somerset beat Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge at the beginning of August, the calls for my elevation to the international side began gathering momentum.
My delight at being picked for England for the first one-day match against the West Indies at Scarborough on 26 August was understandable. But what I did not appreciate at the time, in fact until years later when it was too late to fully make amends, was the effect my single-mindedness was having on Kath.
She had been warned in advance, of course, that the life of a cricketer’s wife is seldom easy. Apart from the long separations, during which so much has to be taken on trust, when a player is attempting to establish himself in a highly competitive environment it is all too easy for him to forget, ignore, neglect or simply be blind to the needs of his partner, and that can lead to big problems. This, regrettably, was certainly the case with our relationship during those early years.
I was so focused on what I was trying to do and so self-centred in that respect that Kath, regretably, often came second on my list of priorities and that affected her deeply. During our initial courtship, I would make a point of looking out for her arrival at the ground and was the first out of the dressing room to see her at the close of play. As I began to establish myself in the Somerset team over the next couple of years, the need to be so attentive seemed to become less and less important. As I mentioned before, Kath often said to me that I was putting the team and the cricket before her. Of course, I reacted as you would expect me to at that stage of my life, by telling her not to be so silly and to cheer up and get on with it.
I know now how hurtful it was to her, for instance, when the following season she was the last to know that I had been called up for my Test debut against Australia at Trent Bridge. She had in fact been informed by my mother Marie.
‘Isn’t it wonderful news about Ian?’ Marie had said.
‘What news?’ asked Kath.
Marie told her that after their celebratory drink at the ground she had been home for some while and had been certain that I would have rung home by now to tell Kath.
Kath was fuming when I did eventually get round to calling her, particularly as I excused the oversight in typically clumsy fashion.
‘Oh, sorry, love. The lads brought me a drink and I got carried away. You know how it is.’
‘Perhaps next time you have some good news,’ she said, ‘you might consider letting me in on it. Although I do realize I am only your wife.’
Looking back on those times, this was not the only example of my thoughtlessness. Kath also got somewhat irritated when I went out with the players and dismissed her by saying, ‘Why don’t you go and have a chat with so-and-so’s wife?’ I was not deliberately trying to exclude her, although later on when it came to dealing with the latest tabloid scandal I certainly was also guilty of that. It was just that the merry-go-round was travelling at full pelt – and I didn’t want to get off.
I was living for today and letting tomorrow look after itself. I was approaching life like a single man, blissfully unconcerned about marital responsibilities – the original one-eyed jerk. The immediate result was that quite soon after we were married, Kath became very depressed, so much so that she sought medical advice. She went to see our local doctor and told him that she kept bursting into tears. He did not seem to be very helpful, but I was worse. I just couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about and so we rowed … and rowed. We were both strong-willed characters, and Kath gave as good as she got. The situation was not helped, of course, by the fact that I had insisted that we continue to live in Yorkshire while during the summer I would be based in Taunton. During the season, when the opportunity arose of spending some time at home, I then managed to make things considerably worse by disappearing for games of golf. The problem grew and the tension between us rose to such an extent that on occasions when driving the 28 miles from my parents’ house in Yeovil (where Kath would occasionally spend time) to a match at Taunton, the extent of my input into the conversation would be the occasional grunted ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
I’m happy to say that, against all the odds and most people’s expectations, Kath and I have managed to stick together through thick and thin, but I have no hesitation in saying that she deserves the lion’s share of the credit for that. How she put up with me in those early days, I’ll never know. Although this is hardly a valid excuse, I understand now that my behaviour was a symptom of being totally absorbed in my own career. My whole world revolved around cricket, the team and my mates. So by the time I got into that England side for the one-day match in 1976, I must have been pretty unbearable.
I did not exactly cover myself in glory on the field either, but I got the distinct impression from Greigy that I had done enough to be selected for the upcoming winter tour to India and Sri Lanka and to Australia for the Centenary Test in Melbourne. When I was not, to put it mildly, I sulked. Kath tells me I was hell to live with during the early part of that winter: really awful, a bear with two sore heads. Again, all I could think about was myself. Then, by the time I had settled down again and our life at home had stabilized, a telephone call from Donald Carr, the secretary of the Test and County Cricket Board, threw our lives back into turmoil.
Donald informed me that I had been selected for the Whitbread young player scholarship to Australia. I was thrilled, of course, but it had been by no means certain that I could afford to take up the offer in the first place. The scholarship, clearly intended for young single players, merely covered air fares and living expenses. I had a young wife and mortgage to look after, and although my county salary had been doubled to £1000 it looked as if the trip would be financially impossible. Fortunately for me, when I explained this to Donald, Whitbread came up with a suitable package. Then, five days after I arrived down under with Mike Gatting, Bill Athey and Graham Stevenson to begin the three-month trip, I discovered that Kath was pregnant with Liam.
Before the news broke, my first major cricketing trip abroad had been more or less purely a social one. One game, against an army side in Melbourne, was typical. After an 11 am start we stopped at lunch for what we thought would be the normal forty-minute break. In the end, after a barbecue had left us fed and watered like Royals, we staggered back on the field fully two hours later. The batting side then declared, we batted for twenty minutes, then stopped for tea. An hour later the game restarted, ran for another ten minutes then we all decided to call it a draw and pack up. I learned far more about surfing than cricket on that bizarre trip.
So while I was busy enjoying myself, Kath found herself pregnant, alone and fed up. She had no idea how to contact me so she telephoned Colin Cowdrey, who had been responsible for selecting those to go on the scholarship, and told him to pass on a message that she urgently needed to get in touch with me. Trying not to appear like the neurotic wife, she explained her reasons to Colin and he made several calls before finally tracking me down. When Kath eventually managed to get through to me on the phone, all she heard on the other end of the line was total silence.
‘Ian,’ said Kath, ‘I’m pregnant.’
No
