James Anderson has the ball. It’s the bright red Duke, the one he loves. It’s 2013, the first Test of an Ashes series and he’s at his favourite Trent Bridge. Oh, look at him go. The release is perfect. Michael Clarke may know a thing or two about batting, but he has no idea about this. It comes in, he moves his pitch-perfect feet into a forward defence. But, hey, it’s actually Jimmy’s stock outswinger. It nips away and nails the off-stump. Australia 22/3.
Jimmy has the ball. It’s 2016 and he’s in the coastal city of Visakhapatnam. He’s rushed himself back from injury to play against India. But the ball doesn’t do tricks. It goes, unfailingly, on a straight line. Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara respect him, but not much else. They turn over the strike and play the drives when they want. Anderson turns back each and every time, but nothing’s going for him. It’s hot, it’s humid. And he doesn’t have his magic.
Perhaps, even when the cows come, the first thing they will ask is…so, what’s the verdict on Anderson?
Which Anderson? The one who on Saturday, at the cold and cloudy Lord’s, came up with a ripper to dismiss Kragg Braithwaite and then almost overcame himself with emotion at taking his 500th Test wicket. Or the surly, angry character who almost becomes a different, much inferior bowler when he travels outside England?
The Jimmy phenomenon
James Michael Anderson is as enigmatic as they come. At 506 wickets in 129 Tests, he is quite simply, by just the numbers alone, the sixth-best bowler in the world and the third-greatest pacer after Glenn McGrath (563) and Courtney Walsh (519). Without doubt, and again when we talk just about the numbers, he should be comfortably England’s best bowler of all time.
But, even in his home country you’d find few who’d call him England’s greatest pacer, let alone bowler. Forget the number of wickets, it’s always Bob Willis and Fred Trueman who are the torch-bearers of English pace. And in a discussion of pace greats, few would put him anywhere near Glenn McGrath.
“His average is considerably worse than all of the other quicks in the 400 club. It’ll feel hollow seeing his name above the likes of Walsh and McGrath if he plays another couple of seasons,” says a comment on Reddit’s cricket subreddit after his 500-wicket milestone. This view is shared by many; while some comments praise Anderson, most debate his quality. Sure, yes, he is good, but how good? The 500-wicket club is not to be trifled with, it is an elite club, much like the 10,000-run one. Just managing to enter it should bestow greatness upon a player.
But not on Anderson. Many sardonically point to the fact that he has been able to play a large number of Tests in his favourite home conditions which has allowed him to swell up his tally. “This guy has been the primary beneficiary of the Sky Sports era with three-test home series against Sri Lanka and New Zealand every second year,” dryly comments another user.
Roaring at home, bleating abroad
And none of these criticisms can really be dismissed outright. Titanic, outstanding, terrific as he has been at home, his away figures can even flatteringly only be dismissed as middling. He has an average of 33 away with only 171 wickets. Among bowlers who have taken at least 150 wickets away from home, Anderson’s average is a shocking 40th.
In the land of the great foe Australia, Anderson is not even in the top-five of England bowlers. Only 43, no five-fors and an average of 38.44 put him in undistinguished territory and far behind Botham and Trueman who both average in the late twenties Down Under.
This gets even more play because of the disparity within his cricketing personality. As is now common knowledge, there are two Jimmy Andersons who inhabit a ground. One is the surly, abusive fast bowler who dishes out foul-mouthed tirades at every opportunity. He has fought with umpires, opponents and was reported also involved in a tempestuous altercation with Ravindra Jadeja in 2014 in a matter where Rahul Dravid had criticised the “not guilty” verdict.
It was evident even on Friday after he took his 500th wicket. While you would expect the pleasure of achieving something as historic to keep you in good spirits, Anderson was grumpy at being warned twice for running on the wicket and was regularly seen talking, visibly unhappily, with umpire Marais Erasmus.
Does anyone have a verdict?
But off the field, he is the complete opposite. Shy and soft-spoken, he remains diffident in press conferences, hardly ever talking much or a length. The snarl and aggression has disappeared, he is a gentle human being not happy at talking about himself, uncomfortable with being too long in the limelight.
Ultimately though, Anderson is a rare breed: an out-and-out swing bowler. Of course, as his career progressed, he has picked up the magic of reverse swing, displaying it with such intent in his tour to India to 2012 that it even impressed its original master Wasim Akram. Yet, it is conventional swing that is his bread and butter.
And that is perhaps the only way to understand him. Without the power of swing, Anderson has been mostly powerless. And swing is only available when the conditions are conducive. When the conditions are not, the swing disappears and the Lancashire bowler becomes ordinary, looking to prevent runs rather than taking wickets.
But when it is cloudy and it is seaming as it almost always is in England, he is perhaps the greatest bowler England has seen. He toys with batsmen, messes with them, plays with them and then dismisses them. Much of Anderson’s career may lie in enigma. One thing will not: he is England’s greatest bowler on a (mind the caveat) helpful pitch.
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