A CORDON OF PORCUPINES

It was a pleasure to have a second piece recently published by The Nightwatchman, the cricketing quarterly for esoteric and/or longform writing that was recently given The Independent's Book of the Week award.

The Nightwatchman is a stablemate of its football forerunner, The Blizzard, in which I've had three articles published – a history of Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao's short-lived rivalry in the early 1980s; a short story about a plane full of English football pundits that goes down over the Amazon; and a theoretical piece picking apart the football / chess analogy – and the pair of them are, I suppose, the places most congenial to my quirky, intellectualising, perhaps self-indulgent take on sports writing. 

The first piece was a look at what Jacques Derrida and deconstruction can teach us about Graham Onions' career-best spell of 9-67 for Durham at Trent Bridge in August 2012, while this most recent one was about the five men who formed the most fearsome slip cordon in Test history, each of whom winning over 100 caps: Ian Healy, Mark Taylor, Mark Waugh, Shane Warne and Steve Waugh.

The original submission was 6000 words, which, on request, was subsequently reduced to 4500. The title it was given was not my original choice (that was 'Cordon Insanitaire'), although it is growing on me. I buttonholed Shane Warne in the Trent Bridge media centre last year and asked him for a quote, but he flatly refused. He was busy sexting Liz, I think, and there was no money in it for him. Still, I got one from Dizzy Gillespie... 

A Cordon of Porcupines at Wisden India

JASON GILLESPIE: GLEANINGS

The process of cricket freelancing often involves trying to extract as much saleable material as possible from famous ex- or current players. Thus, as well as asking Jason Gillespie about the finer points of coaching and fast-bowling (and coaching fast-bowling) for cricinfo, we skipped through some of his career highlights, too. 

Without spoiling things, I particularly enjoyed him thinking he had Murali sussed out, while the tale of his final ever victory song with the Aussies was very touching. Not as 'Dizzy' as he looks.

Jason Gillespie: Gleanings

HEATH STREAK: GLEANINGS

The pursuit of interesting cricketers to interview to help earn a crust recently put me in touch with Heath Streak. I'd gotten hold of his email from Gary Brent, a 75-time Zimbabwe ODI cap who sub-pro'd for Moddershall once each in 2008, 2009 and 2010.

Streak instructed me to call him at "8am Zim time", which meant getting up at 5.45am here and creeping into an icy conservatory to make the call (it had to be on loudspeaker, so as to record). He spoke incredibly softly, so quietly at times I couldn't hear (and, worse, felt certain the mp3 dictaphone wouldn't pick up, particulalrly as tractors rumbled up the lanes), but once the air warmed up and the voice was raised, it was a pleasurable chat.

As with so man of his countrymen, he wasn't given to lyrical floursihes, but there was a sharp, dry wit in there. Hopefully that comes through, even if a lot of it was off the record. You wouldn't want Robert Mugabe to read it.

Heath Streak: Gleanings