More than 20 years since Steve Waugh last tormented England, his opinions still pack a punch, his judgments still sting. He is hard but fair, authoritative but relaxed – qualities, you imagine, that go without saying for anyone who captained Australia’s Test team 57 times.
Bazball, he says, was a breath of fresh air, a necessary corrective to some ‘pretty dull’ Test cricket. Then again, England lacked a Plan B. Stephen Fleming, meanwhile, is a ‘smart guy’ and a ‘good selection’ to replace Brendon McCullum as Test coach. ‘But, you know, it’s a big, big difference coaching the Chennai Super Kings to coaching England.’
Above all, Waugh – who is in London to plug his involvement with Amsterdam Flames, one of the six teams from the Netherlands, Ireland and Scotland in the new European T20 Premier League – cares about the game and its future. And for a player whose dedication to winning matches for Australia, including 41 Tests and the 1999 World Cup, he feels these days more like one of cricket’s global citizens.
‘Last week’s victory by Bangladesh against Australia in Darwin was a good thing for cricket,’ he tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘It shows the sport’s alive and well, and these other countries are getting up to speed. We don’t want cricket to be dominated by two or three countries. That’s no good for the game.
‘I want Test cricket to survive. While I’m a T20 owner, if you ask me what cricket I like the best, I’d say Test cricket any day. So I want to keep promoting it, but at the same time I want T20 competitions to prosper and survive – as long as they’re doing the right thing and leaving a legacy.’
Waugh, now 61, has invested his own money into the Amsterdam franchise, believing the ETPL – which begins in Voorburg on Wednesday, and consists of 32 matches across three-and-a-half weeks – is not just another T20 tournament, but a chance to embed cricket in the local psyche.
‘I want Test cricket to survive,’ says Australia legend Steve Waugh. ‘While I’m a T20 owner, if you ask me what cricket I like the best, I’d say Test cricket any day’
‘The victory by Bangladesh against Australia in Darwin was a good thing for cricket,’ says Waugh. ‘It shows the sport’s alive and well’
‘T20 cricket’s about size, speed, agility, and fitness, and Dutch people tick those boxes,’ he says. ‘You’ll be surprised by this league. There will be some superstars created over the next few weeks. They have the talent: they just haven’t had the experience or the exposure against quality players.’
The conversation drifts inevitably towards Bazball, and here Waugh offers more nuance than most of his compatriots – surprisingly, perhaps, for a player who scored 10 Ashes hundreds and won eight of his nine series against the increasingly hapless Poms.
‘Look, I first want to give them a lot of credit for getting people watching Test cricket again,’ he says. ‘I was one of those. I couldn’t wait to watch England play Test cricket. You just didn’t know what was going to happen: it was never boring.
‘So full credit to them, because a lot of Test matches were pretty dull and unexciting, to be truthful. Cricket has Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum to thank for sparking a lot of interest.
‘But I think the problem was they didn’t have a Plan B. You can’t have one way of playing at that level, because teams are going to plan and prepare accordingly. If you can’t pivot in a different direction, you’re going to get caught out. That’s what happened to England, unfortunately. They probably threw away four or five Test matches where they should have won, because they were too stubborn to play any other way.’
Waugh knows Fleming from their playing days, not least from a series in Australia in 2001-02, when the tactics and nous of New Zealand’s captain helped limit Waugh to an average of 19 and secured a hard-fought 0–0 draw – a triumph in those days against a formidable team.
‘He’ll bring discipline and know-how, and he’s a strong personality, although pretty quiet. But just the way he carries himself: he gives off confidence, and that’s really important. He and Joe Root will form a solid combination.
‘But, like anything, they’ll have their teething problems, and you know it’s a big, big difference coaching the Chennai Super Kings to coaching England. There’s a lot more responsibility, you’re expected to change things, and you’re responsible for English cricket, which has a long and proud tradition. So he’ll have pressure, but he’s the sort of guy who enjoys pressure.’
‘I want to give them a lot of credit for getting people watching Test cricket again,’ says Waugh of Ben Stokes and Bazball. ‘I couldn’t wait to watch England play’
Waugh wins Player of the Series after Australia won the Ashes in Australia in 1998-99
Australia, too, are feeling the heat going into Saturday’s second Test against Bangladesh in Mackay. ‘Last week was a bit of a shock to everyone,’ says Waugh. ‘Everyone thought Australia would fight back on day two and it would be back to business as usual. But Bangladesh dominated the whole Test.
‘It was a huge wake-up call for Australian cricket, and I want to see the reaction in the second Test to see whether it was just a one-off or whether the landscape is changing.’
Did Bangladesh’s win demand a re-evaluation of Australia’s 4–1 Ashes triumph? ‘Yeah, it was probably a bit of an indictment on the English team,’ he says. ‘Maybe that Ashes series wasn’t as strong as everyone thought it was. Everyone’s allowed an off-game, but it was unusual: Australia all had it almost together, so that was a bit of a concern.’
But Waugh now has other concerns, having spent so much time over the past few months setting up the Amsterdam franchise that he says he’s barely seen his family. And his ambition is deadly serious. ‘My goal is to see one of these European teams win a T20 or a limited-overs World Cup in the next 15 to 20 years,’ he says.
Steve Waugh’s days of tormenting England may not quite be over.
