In 2014 Stuart Broad said, “I think if I could choose anyone to bat for my life, it would be Jonathan Trott”.
Trott started his career in a high-pressure match in Ashes 2009 when Australia had comprehensively beaten England in the previous Test to level the series 1-1. England needed to win the match if they were to regain Ashes, and with England’s third batsman, Ravi Bopara, failing, Trott was called into the squad on the back of some solid performance in domestic cricket.
Trott didn’t disappoint. He displayed the calm of a veteran as he went to score a 40 and 119 in the second innings of the Test to help England win the Ashes. He would subsequently be part of the team that won the Ashes Down Under in 2010-11, scoring 445 runs at 89 batting at third.
A batsman blessed with superb powers of concentration and a ruthless appetite for runs, he was a Wisden cricketer of the year and the ICC cricketer of the year in 2011. It took Trott 23 Test innings to reach 1000 runs level with Kevin Pietersen and Mike Atherton.
He was also a hugely underrated one-day player as he averaged 52 for England in coloured clothes. His career batting average in ODI cricket is the highest of any England player.
(AAP Image/Dave Hunt)
It’s no coincidence that perhaps the best time in English cricket overlapped with his playing days. He has pulled England out of woods innumerable time in his brief career.
The one innings which strikes me most is in the Test against Pakistan in 2010 when Trott and Broad lead an epic recovery in the last match at Lord’s with a record stand of 332 for eight wickets after being seven down for 100 to pull off the series win.
Against India in 2012 Trott, after having lacklustre series by his standards, survived an attack in the third innings to score 143 to not just save match but to ensure England left Indian soil on a high.
It’s rather unfortunate that such an amazing career came to standstill when Trott had to return midway through the 2013-14 Australian Ashes series dealing with depression. His absence was clearly felt, and England went on to lose the series 5-0.
He gave us glimpses of what he was made of when he fought mental illness and staged a comeback when he was asked to do a tough job of opening the innings, which is something he had never done before. He responded strongly by scoring a half-century, but perhaps that old fluency was missing.
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Since then its been a struggle to find such a class batsman for England who can be an automatic choice in all three formats like he was.
He played a limited number of ODI matched, but he scored 1280 runs in first 25 innings, the highest by any player before Babar Azam recently broke that record. He scored his best 137 against an attack featuring Brett Lee, Shaun Tait and Mitch Johnson back in 2011, and at one stage in his career he averaged 86.28 in Tests against mighty Australia.
Though Trott didn’t have the longevity of Atherton oa Alastair Cook, he clearly left his mark in the English history book as a run machine and one of the most effective batsmen.
He was to England what Rahul Dravid and Kumar Sangakarra were to their respective countries. Perhaps that’s the best one can describe him as he bids adieu to first class cricket.
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