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Taha Hashim on Graham Thorpe
For the current England team, he wasn’t just a storied name from the past to emulate but someone who was perched in their dressing room until a couple of years ago, passing on advice as a coach. Ian Ward, Michael Atherton and Nasser Hussain, his former colleagues, were on the field in the morning as part of Sky’s coverage, remembering both the cricketer and the man. When Hussain walked off at Lord’s with a century and the winning runs against New Zealand in his final Test, Thorpe was alongside him. He was there with Hussain when they won in Karachi, when they put on 288 against Australia at Edgbaston, when they were boys turning into men at Trent Bridge in 1993. And he was there when it was difficult, too.
It was a pretty positive day. We did well to take 10 wickets, specially when the ball got soft. There was some up-and-down bounce which helped me quite a bit. I didn’t expect to be bowling 23 overs on day one but I really enjoyed it.
I thought LBW and caught short leg were in the game. It helps when you’re trying to set up a batter if some ball spin and some go straight. You’ve got to spin the ball to get the drift; when I was younger I didn’t put as much on the ball.