GRAEME SWANN INTERVIEW: 'Leach and Bess must have swagger in India'
If spin duo play with swagger England can turn the tide against India: Graeme Swann offers his advice to Jack Leach and Dom Bess ahead of upcoming Test series
- England are set for a tough series in India, with the first Test starting on Friday
- Spinners Jack Leach and Dom Bess will be under pressure to perform in Chennai
- Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar bowled England to 2-1 win over India in 2012
- Swann has insisted Leach and Bess must stand the pressure to recreate that
Graeme Swann pauses as he contemplates the vital, and perhaps missing, ingredient in the spin attack that will attempt to do what he did and bowl England to victory in India.
‘Yes, they can do it because they are wicket-takers, especially as a pair,’ says one of England’s greatest spin bowlers of Jack Leach and Dom Bess.
‘But it will come down to the confidence they have in their ability to take those wickets in India. They have to convince themselves — and this is the tricky bit about Test cricket no one tells you about — that it really will be so much easier if they approach it in the right way.
Dom Bess and Jack Leach have crucial roles to play when England take on India on Friday
Swann took 20 wickets to lead England to victory in India in 2012, tied with Pragyan Ojha for the most in the series, and four more scalps than all England’s seamers put together.
‘Everyone is under 10 times more pressure in Test cricket. Those who can convince themselves it’s a walk in the park, it’s just another game, are the ones who succeed.
‘The trick is getting them running up to bowl as if they’re playing for Somerset on a Wednesday in September on a square turner with just one Sky Sports News camera in the background and a handful in the ground, rather than millions watching back home. If they can do that, we might be in business.’
Few spinners were in business for England more regularly than Swann. He took two wickets in his first over on his 2008 debut in Chennai — where England do battle in the first Test on Friday — and rarely looked back on his way to claiming 255 victims in 60 matches.
Graeme Swann has underscored the importance that the pair handle the pressure in Chennai
With Monty Panesar, Swann bowled Alastair Cook’s England to their 2-1 triumph in India in 2012, the pair taking 37 wickets between them.
Now Swann, 41, is taking time out from commentating on the T10 in Abu Dhabi to consider whether Bess and Leach can be England’s Swann and Panesar over four Tests in one of the most demanding, but also rewarding, environments for any spinner.
‘They have to be unaffected by the pressure,’ Swann tells Sportsmail. ‘Perhaps it came easier to me because I’d played a lot more cricket by the time I made my Test debut.
‘These two guys are less experienced and can’t see a bigger picture yet. They’ll still be thinking, “Christ, if I bowl badly here the press will be on at me”, or, “I’ve just got a five-for and everybody’s saying I didn’t bowl well”.
Swann and Monty Panesar (left) made for a winning partnership against India back in 2012
‘Bess took a five-for in the first Test against Sri Lanka while not bowling well and you could see it was harder for him in the second innings because he was thinking about that. Taking wickets should be a confidence-booster. It worked the other way for Dom. What he needs is someone to sit down with him and say, “Five wickets is five wickets. Don’t worry about it”.
‘You’ve got to get to a point, especially in India, when you’re not thinking about it, you’re just bowling. All you’re concentrating on is a masterplan for every batsman and how to get them out.
‘There are two types of bowler: one thinking about bowling but the other thinking about how to get the batsman out. They’re very different mindsets.’
Swann is not convinced that 23-year-old Bess, in particular, has that right mindset just yet.
Swann (centre) made his breakthrough for England in Chennai in 2008 with a sensational start
‘Leach is good at bowling all day,’ he says. ‘It’s not that he works people out as such, but he’s consistent and metronomic.
‘But Bess hasn’t yet got that consistency and quality control you need in India. He bowls some very good balls and he can be dangerous. But you can’t afford to play four Tests there and have a poor innings in each Test, which at the moment is happening.’
Not that Swann would leave out Bess on Friday and pick the more experienced Moeen Ali, the third spinner back in contention after recovering from Covid-19.
‘Moeen annoys the living daylights out of me, in the nicest possible way,’ says Swann.
Swann has faith that Leach will take the right mindset to India to perform under the pressure
‘He’s a lovely bloke. Look at how good and talented a bowler he is. He takes proper off-spinner’s wickets. But he doesn’t believe enough in himself.
‘He takes wickets any spinner would be proud of. I wish Mo was back to how he was when he first played against India. But if not, it will be better to invest in Dom Bess going forward.’
Swann speaks with passion on his specialist subject but also frustration. It is no secret he would like to be more involved with England’s spinners.
He would like to be a coach or consultant for those trying to plug the gap he left when he retired after the 2013-14 Ashes. ‘I’d love to work with the spinners again and get involved in some sort of way with England,’ he says.
He has concerns over the younger Bess, but would still pick him over the returning Moeen Ali
‘I was pencilled in to have a role with the Trent Rockets last summer in the Hundred before Covid. I was looking forward to that.’
For now, he will watch from afar to see if England and their spinners can do what he did a little more than eight years ago.
‘We do have to give them leeway,’ he says. ‘Bess is so young, and a far better bowler than I was at that age. He’s having to learn at the highest level because we don’t have enough spinners pushing to play for England.
‘English cricket still doesn’t really understand spin or captain it well — and that’s not a dig at Joe Root.
Swann has a desire to held guide the next generation of spinners to recreate his greatness
‘One thing I will say, and Bumble (David Lloyd) mentioned this on Sky in the Sri Lanka series, is that I can’t understand having a deep cover to spinners, like Joe did. It’s just a field placing for a dirty ball. By all means play with a long-on or long-off or a deep midwicket if you’re trying to tempt the batsman into something, but never ever have a deep cover.’
And what England’s spinners really need, says Swann, is a bit of swagger.
‘I didn’t have any doubts when I played,’ added Swann. ‘I didn’t have a care in the world. Very few players feel that way in international cricket because of the amount of respect they give the opposition and the awe and wonder at being there.
‘If I could sit down with Jack Leach and Dom Bess now, I would tell them to just go out there and think, “This is where I belong”.
‘Then, even bowling to Virat Kohli and company doesn’t seem so bad.’
Bess and Leach must arrive in Chennai with no doubts, despite taking on the likes of Virat Kohli
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