Stay strong

https://www.sundaymail.co.zw/jarvis-still-hurting

AS the start of the 2019 ICC-Cricket World Cup in England and Wales edges closer, the thought of Zimbabwe missing out from the showcase is like opening old wounds for fast bowler Kyle Jarvis.

“It will always be a tough thing to talk about missing this World Cup when we know we should have been there,’’ Jarvis said.

It is the first time since 1983 that Zimbabwe will be missing at a World Cup.

Jarvis, who was with Craig Ervine when the Chevrons needed 15 runs off the last over to beat UAE in last year’s qualifier to book a place at the World Cup, opened up about the World Cup heartbreak.

He also spoke about his fiancée, who is one of the major reasons for his return after five years at County side Lancashire.

“It was heartbreaking, we all wanted it so badly we played so well the entire tournament and then for it to go down to the last couple of balls and then not get over the line was heartbreaking. I feel on another day when there wasn’t rain, we would have won that game comfortably. Unfortunately, Duckworth Lewis wasn’t on our side that day,” Jarvis said.

Like most of his teammates, Jarvis admits he briefly divorced himself from cricket following their failure.

“I don’t think I wanted to pick up a ball for a couple of months after that. I had an opportunity to go to the UK, which I ended up turning down. I just wanted to get away from cricket for a little bit, just get my body right again because I was struggling through-out the qualifiers with an injury,” said Jarvis.

Although he has somewhat moved on, the pain of watching the World Cup on TV will be nullified as Zimbabwe will also be in action in Netherlands and Ireland.

The World Cup runs from May 30-July 14 and for the Chevrons, they will atone for that by touring Netherlands for two ODIs and as many T20s between June 19-25.

Another tour of Ireland for three ODIs and three T20s will follow from July 1-13.

Zimbabwe begin their camp tomorrow at Harare Sports Club.

“We all know we are not going to the World Cup so I guess we have to see what’s in front of us and go from there.

“We always go there to beat them, it’s a bit of a derby for us we beat them quite comfortably in the qualifiers, I am sure they want a little bit of revenge.

“We are going there looking to win every single game, we got a really good exciting team, we off the back of a four-nil win against the UAE as well as having Taylor and Masakadza back so I think we are going there with a strong side. We are definitely looking to win everything.”

It is almost two years since Jarvis made an international comeback after quitting international cricket to play County Cricket.

The situation with Zimbabwe Cricket was dire at that stage, with players enduring months without pay and Jarvis opened up on why he returned.

His comeback started with a Test versus West Indies in Bulawayo in October 2017, followed by the ODI return in January 2018 in Bangladesh and his first T20 against Afghanistan in February 2018.

Jarvis is currently his team’s best bowler, leading stats in Tests with 10 wickets from four innings and 18 ODI wickets from 10 innings since June 2018 to date.

“Obviously I guess I felt I owed Zim Cricket a lot after they brought me back from County Cricket.”

So did Kelsey, his fiancée.

“We are getting married in December.

“She has always been a big help in my career and everything else.

“I learned a lot over there in my five years in the UK and I am a better player now than I was prior to leaving, so I really want to do well for Zimbabwe.

“It’s been a really good two years, a lot of ups and a couple of downs but most of all ups. We have come back, we have won a Test match in Bangladesh and we have played some good games of cricket.

“I have really concentrated on my white ball skills and I am quite happy with the way it’s going.

“Back then all I used to worry about was how fast I could bowl, now there are other things. I am sort of the leader of the bowling attack and I know I have got to be the one to show up more often than not.”

For someone who struggled with injuries previously, the 30-year-old feels stronger and fitter. “I have just come out of the gym, my body is strong and I am happy. As a bowler, you are always going to have a few niggles. Since I came back two years ago, I think I have missed one or two games through injury, which is pretty good for a 30-year-old.

“I am happy where I am at, I am just trying to get strong for the upcoming series.”

Zimbabwe will have to go through qualifiers again to play at the WT20 Cup in Australia in 2020 and Jarvis reckons they will prevail in the qualifiers set for the UAE in October, where the top two teams will progress.

“For sure there is that motivation, we know we have been through a qualifier. We dealt with the pressure the whole way.

“We know we are a good team, we should qualify pretty comfortably. We got our plans, we know when it is and we are building up to that. It’s an exciting time, I am sure we will qualify.”

Tough times in Zim at the moment, well its almost become a norm having been going on for so long. Most people in the country generally survive through informal businesses so to go a week without any business really left a lot of families starring down the barrel. Shops being closed only made the situation worse.

Whats really sad is Zim has enough mineral exports and we shouldnt even be having foreign currency shortages. But all these funds are just ending up in the hands of a few people. You see people rocking up in Bugatti verons, Lambogins even a Tesla in a country were the common man cant afford three meals a day. All we have is hope

https://www.playersvoice.com.au/jason-g ... Aq0OA3K.97

Jason Gillespie - Contributor

‘Could you take a fielding drill for me?’That’s how it all started.

I was playing in the Indian Cricket League with the Ahmedabad Rockets and our coach, John Emburey, looked like he needed a hand one day. So I asked him if I could help, he said yes and that set in motion a crazy chain of events that are still unfolding to this day. I’d never thought much about coaching to that point. It hadn’t been on my radar and it certainly wasn’t the reason I offered to help out John that day. But after running that drill – and then another, and then another – a thought occurred to me: I was enjoying it. Helping the other lads was quite a fulfilling experience. I kicked the tyres a little bit more while I was playing with Glamorgan and Matt Maynard, the director of cricket there at the time, convinced me to sit for my coaching levels. ‘It might be an option down the track,’ he said. ‘You never know.’

Not long after that, I received an email out of the blue from Heath Streak. Heath and I had spent a bit of time together at the ICL. The ICL turned to dung and a lot of us were stiffed out of plenty of money but, still, it brought together players from all over the world – players I hadn’t had much to do with before – and a lot of good friendships came out of it.

Heath was one of those. Heath wrote something along the lines of, ‘Mate, I know you did a bit of work with John Emburey at the Rockets. I’ve mentioned your name as someone who could possibly coach the Mid West Rhinos, one of the franchises here in Zimbabwe.’

I’d applied for assistants roles with South Australia and Western Australia and they hadn’t gone anywhere. Aside from a bit of coaching at my local club in Adelaide, there wasn’t anything obvious on the horizon. So I talked with my wife, Anna. We made the call. We were off to Kwekwe.

THE ZIMBABWEAN BANK LESSON

The coach I was when I left Australia is quite different to the coach I am today. When I first arrived in Zimbabwe, I was pretty big on structure. I had my training sessions scheduled down to the minute. I’d pin them up on the whiteboard, print them out and hand them around. Nets at this time. Fitness at that time. Done. I soon realised that being rigid wasn’t always the answer, though. I remember driving to training one day through the centre of Kwekwe, a small town of only about 100,000 people between Harare and Bulawayo. Training was due to start in 30 minutes. It was going to be an important session. We had a stretch of important games coming up. As I looked ahead of me I could see a queue that must’ve been 200 metres long outside the local bank. At the time, people were worried that banks in Zimbabwe mightn’t have enough money for them to withdraw their savings. So, when payday arrived, they’d line up for hours in order to get their cash and take it home. As I was driving past the line-up, I noticed a few familiar faces in the crowd. ‘Look, there’s our wicketkeeper.’ And 20 metres later, ‘Look, there’s our fast bowler.’ They were all in their Rhinos training kit. It struck me that the line wasn’t moving very quickly and these boys were pretty much no chance of making training on time.

So what do you do? Do you stomp up and down and tell them off for not keeping to my schedule? No. You read the play and change accordingly. You realise that, for these boys, withdrawing their money to feed their families had to be their top priority. Salaries in Zim are nothing like in Australian cricket. It can be tough just to get by, especially for the players who lived in the high-density Mbizo area. Some things in life are just bigger than cricket and looking after your family is one of those. I sent a message around to the team telling everyone training would be delayed. The world kept on spinning.

That wasn’t the only lesson from my time in Zimbabwe that shaped me as a coach. There was a day where I’d planned a heavy training block: nets in the morning and a few hours of fielding and fitness in the arvo. I’d arranged with the franchise to put lunch on for the boys in between. Many of the players would arrive to training having not eaten breakfast. You couldn’t in good conscience put them through a big training day without feeding them. The day before, our CEO came up to me.

‘We can’t afford to put the food on.’

Zimbabwe Cricket hadn’t been making their payments to the club. We were skint. You realise that, for these boys, withdrawing their money to feed their families had to be their top priority. I guess I could’ve dug my heels in and got cranky with the CEO, but that wouldn’t have got me anywhere. It wasn’t his fault. The better option, by miles, was to adapt to the situation that was in front of me. Anna and I grabbed half a dozen loaves of bread and put together the lunch spread ourselves. Peanut butter sandwiches, Vegemite sandwiches, a fruit platter, a big 15 litre thing of cordial … whatever we could get our hands on. By making that little change to the plan, we were able to push ahead with training and prepare for the games coming up. Those couple of years in Zim were really important for me. It was there that I decided I wanted to pursue coaching as a career. I remember in my first year having a drink in the outdoor area of our home in Harare one afternoon. I must’ve had a silly grin on my face or something. Anna walked up to me and said, ‘You’re loving what you’re doing, aren’t you?’ ‘I really am,’ I replied.

LOSING DAD

The next stop for me was Yorkshire and, while it was a world away from Kwekwe in terms of finances and resources, it was similar in that it reshaped me as a coach. The biggest lesson came from my saddest experience. It was 2013 and I was in my second season as head coach. Anna, the kids and I were moving from a rental property to a place we’d bought in Leeds. Mum and Dad timed their holiday to the UK so that they could help us shift all our gear over. The new place was just around the corner from where we’d been living, so I hired a little truck and Dad and I got to work loading and unloading boxes. We’d been going for a while and Dad looked a bit tired. We said, ‘We’ll do one more load, then we’ll head up to the pub for a couple of beers. We’ve earned a few pints.’ And we had a little laugh about it. Dad was in the back of the truck unloading stuff. I was inside the house moving boxes in. When I came back out, I couldn’t see him. He wasn’t in the back of the van. He wasn’t on the footpath.I wandered around the Hilux. He had collapsed in the gutter. He was having a heart attack. I was yelling and screaming in a panic, telling Mum and Anna to call an ambulance. A doctor and nurse who lived a few terraces up ran over to offer assistance. There was one moment, in particular, that I’ll never forget: I was doing heart compressions on Dad’s chest and I looked up to see my two sons, who were only seven and six, staring down at me. There was sheer terror on their faces and Anna saw it, too. She grabbed them and took them away so they couldn’t see what was happening. Dad passed away.

I spent a fair bit of time after that thinking and reflecting. I began to look at life through pretty different eyes. Watching your dad die in front of you challenges the way you think, the values you possess and the things you place importance on in life. It makes you see things for what they really are.

My main takeaway was to relax. Cricket is a game. It’s something I’m fortunate enough to work in and it should be celebrated. Yes, livelihoods can depend on it but, really, it shouldn’t cause lots of stress and distract you from the truly important things in life, like family. It was an important lesson. Watching your dad die in front of you challenges the way you think, the values you possess and the things you place importance on in life.

Family was the main reason Anna and I decided to head back to Australia after five years with Yorkshire. As much as we’d loved our time in Leeds, we didn’t want to be away from home anymore. Our son Jackson, who is 13 now, had spent more than half his life in Leeds, Cardiff, Harare and Kwekwe. It was a great experience for him – as it was for all the kids – but it was time for them to really know where home was. The kids all had thick Yorky accents when we came back – particularly the youngest two because they learned all their words there. Delaney was born in Leeds and Kingston was only a baby when we moved to the UK. They learned all their phonics from Yorkshire teachers. The accents are gone now, the kids are settled in school and we’ve found ourselves a nice home on the coast just south of Adelaide. I’m glad we made the move.

WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT

A coach has to put himself last. I love that. When you’re a player, it can be quite an insular experience. Yes, you are playing a team sport but you’re often judged on your individual performances. I always thought that getting a five-fa or scoring runs was great, but it really meant bugger-all if your team didn’t win. As a coach, though, it’s not about you. It’s about helping players and empowering your staff. It’s about making sure all the preparation work has been done so your team is in the best possible position to win.

In many ways, I’m enjoying coaching more than playing – and I loved playing. It’s also very challenging. No one likes having to tell players they’ve been dropped, or that their contract isn’t being renewed. The only way to approach those situations is to be up front and honest. Most players respect the decision when you’ve explained it to them. Another tricky aspect is the travel. Cricket is an international game and you can’t expect to land jobs in your own backyard. These days, I spend the southern hemisphere summer coaching the Strikers in the Big Bash League and the northern summer with Sussex. Sussex was an interesting move. When I was first approached about the job there my response was, ‘But I’ve only just moved back from England for my family.’ They were great about it. They told me I could work the UK summers and be home for the Aussie summer. Anna and I spoke about it. We agreed it could work. Being away from the kids can be tough, but if they were in the UK I wouldn’t see them all that much more during the season. I’d always be on the road and they’d be busy with their school and their mates. They’ll all come over for a few weeks during the school holidays. The best thing, though, is that when I’m home, I’m home. I take the kids to school and pick them up. We spend lots of quality time together. And that’s what it’s all about, really.

Read more at https://www.playersvoice.com.au/jason-g ... Doq8D88.99

Trying Times in Harare now and this is so disturbing. The deteriorating socio-economic Situation in zw is making people Resort to thieving and mugging. So sad

https://twitter.com/BrendanTaylor86/sta ... 38400?s=19

1) Just had an alarming situation outside my house, I was waiting for my wife's return in my driveway. I started hearing her screaming about 100m from my gate, she was getting mugged by 4 armed men. I ran outside and they sped away in red Honda Fit.

https://twitter.com/BrendanTaylor86/sta ... 38336?s=19

2) Fortunately she only lost her handbag and it could of been a lot worse. People are getting desperate, be vigilant when entering your property and try keep off the roads after dark. With all this load shedding we're easy targets.

You do have a very Aussie lingo there jayb , been to sue before ? I really hope everything is all good , would love to here from googly . Thoughts are with zimbos

Really loving day 4 of being crammed in my house with no access to the outside world. Missed a job interview yesterday for overseas due to the imaginary law they’re using to enact this social media block. These f****rs are on a one way ride to hell.