Mickey Arthur interview

It was a pleasure to sit talking Derbyshire cricket to Mickey Arthur today. The conversation flowed and I would like to thank him for his time, as well as Tom Skinner and Stephen Martin  in the Media and Marketing department for setting it up through Zoom.

Mickey is a very easy man to like, with a regular smile and laugh. The season cannot come soon enough for me!

Mickey, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me today

It's my pleasure, Steve!

Like most supporters, I have listened to and read your interviews since arriving and I want to ask a few different questions! So here we go - you were regarded as a dedicated player who scored over ten thousand all-format runs in your playing career. They were all scored in South Africa and few over here will have seen you bat. What sort of batsman were you?

(Laughs) Put it this way, I wouldn't crack it in the 20/20 these days!

A man in the finest Derbyshire tradition, then!

I was a stodgy opening batsman who played well within his capabilities! I tried to squeeze whatever I could from my talent. Perhaps a Peter Bowler, rather than a John Morris!

We'd take a Peter Bowler any day of the week! Did you ever come to the UK as a professional?  

I did, I played three years in the Birmingham League for Coventry and North Warwick. I loved it, the cricket was great and I grew up as a person. I finished school and at that time in South Africa there was still conscription, so I did my two years army training and started coming over then. They were really good days.

On to Derbyshire matters, it didn't sound like you had to work too hard to convince Shan Masood and Suranga Lakmal to come here. Quite something when many overseas players don't fancy 6 months in England and we have only had 3 full-season overseas players since 2010.

They didn't take a lot of persuading, I know them very well and knew they were exactly what we were looking for. Firstly from a character perspective, then in the standards in which they keep driving themselves every day. I knew where they were in their careers - Shan wants to push his case to play international cricket, whereas Suranga wanted to retire from international cricket and the offer was conditional on that to play for two years. He's still strong and fit and he has two real good years in him in these conditions. 

I wanted signings for the whole year, without chopping and changing. I think if you do that it affects the dressing room and it affects the batting orders if you can't get a like for like replacement. I wanted them to get involved in Derbyshire and make Derbyshire County Cricket Club their home as well. That is so important for an overseas player. 

With Shan back in the Pakistan squad and doing so well in the PSL, is there a chance he could be picked for them during our summer? Is there a plan B for that, someone else coming in, or will you go with the squad?

Well, they picked their white ball squad today and he's not in it. They have Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan and Faqar Zaman, so unless something goes wrong he won't get in ahead of them in the top three in white ball cricket, which is his place.

The only time we might miss him is for the Sri Lankan Test series, where he could possibly get selected, but Abdullah Shafique and Imam Ul Haq have done exceptionally well. Abid Ali is another option, so he may not get picked. That's good news for us, because he will want to score a lot of runs to get his position back.

If we do lose him, I am comfortable that we have cover within our squad to cover that position.

It was great to see Ben Aitchison's contract extension announced this morning! We lost Matt Critchley and Fynn Hudson-Prentice from last year, players we should have ideally been building around, rather than losing and there are many more players out of contract at season end. Are you planning to hold fire on them for now and see how the squad may need re-shaped?

We're holding conversations at the moment with some key members, who we think could continue with us for a little bit, but I also like dangling the carrot, not making it too comfortable. Players currency is performance, that's all they have and I want them to perform, then they will be rewarded. So there are one or two out there.

I really wanted to secure our young bowlers. They have really impressed me and they needed to learn off an experienced quick. So that is why Suranga will be so good for Sammy Connors, Ben Aitchison, George Scrimshaw, Nick Potts and others. We have a good core fast bowling group that we want to retain. I see a lot of excitement in Ben and great potential. He is worth the 'risk' of tying him down for a period of time.

You inherited a squad that struggled last year. How do you go about picking players up, some who need to return to past glories and others with reputations to build?

It's exactly as you say it, Steve. It's a squad in transition and we have had some very good, honest conversations with them and reviewed where we are at, set some realistic goals and discussed how we want to be perceived by the opposition.

The players attitude has been incredible. I get the feeling that the players want to be led, they want structure, they want to be pushed and I will be doing that. The attitude, intensity and work ethic that they have brought every day to their training has been really impressive. 

I just hope that we can get them fulfilling their potential. I have only seen an upside, a lot of players improving over a couple of months. When I see that improvement, it excites me as to what they might be capable of over six months, or a year. I want to squeeze every last bit of talent from them and if I can do that I am pretty sure we will have some success down the line

You come from a country that produced one of the great all rounders in Jacques Kallis, who usually batted three and bowled first change, as well as a fella named Barlow, who was quite useful! Here at Derbyshire we have Luis Reece, whose dual surgery over the winter confirmed it perhaps too big a job to often open both. Do you see a change of role for him, when fully fit?

 I think there will be a change of role as we move down the line. He will start the season  competing for a place in the top six and we expect him to be bowling for the start of the white ball cricket, at the end of May. 

He is training full time now, batting and fielding with the group. He's not going to play the Lancashire practice game, just so we can get another five days training into him, but he will play the Nottinghamshire game and we will take it from there.

What about the captaincy? Is Billy still the man for all formats or is that under consideration? 

I'm giving that a little more thought at the moment to be honest, Steve but I want it clarified before we start the pre-season games. So there will be an announcement early next week. I'm pretty clear in my mind the route that we want to go, but there are a couple of hurdles to jump over first.

Last year we had a problem at 3, with Dave Houghton saying a couple of times that no one really wanted to do it. Has that been sorted yet, in discussions with and observations of players? 

It's interesting, Steve. I've given every player their role and in my opinion we have three players jostling for that number three position, which is a good position to be in. The key is that they all want to bat there and I have a decision to make - who bats three and who bats six. So there are three players for two positions.

Dusty Melton is one of our three overseas players as he is still waiting to qualify as a 'local'. Do you know yet when that will be? 

We are hoping the sooner the better. I get little snippets of information which at times seem to contradict one another but the best case scenario is he will be available as a 'local' from June. It's in Dustin's best interests to get that as soon as he can, of course.

A concern among supporters is that our two spinners on the staff have less than 30 first-class wickets between them. It presents opportunity of course and you seem quite impressed by what you have seen - and have added Mark Watt for the T20. Are you quite comfortable where we are in the spin department on the verge of the season?

I think time will tell on that, Steve. They are different, one a finger spinner, one a leg-spinner, one more beneficial to white ball cricket, the other to red ball. There will be opportunities and it is up to them to take them. I wanted to give them the first bite of the cherry before going looking elsewhere. 

I am comfortable they will stand up in their respective areas.

I was pleased to see you signed Mark Watt, and mentioned back in October he would make a big improvement in our one-day spin resources. My concern was that teams would look at our pace attack and think 'we'll have a slow wicket'. They can't really do that now.

I agree with you. I thought he was the finger spinner of the 20/20 World Cup and bowled brilliantly. I've watched him closely for the last two years and he's got something about him. He doesn't stand back, he's got that fight, but his skills have developed so he can bowl in the Powerplay, at the death, in the middle. 

He was one I really wanted and I'm glad that we could get him over the line.

We only have one wicket-keeper now, albeit a very talented one in Brooke Guest. In a worst case scenario of a mid-season injury, do you think Callum Hawkins could step up, or would the loan market be utilised? 

I think he will get second team opportunity early season and see how he develops. I'm really keen to push our younger players from that Pathway programme and there are probably four players there who I will try and give as much opportunity to as I can. 

That's part of our duty to local cricket and when we have done we will go and look outside at what other options may be out there.

Do you and Daryn Smit feel that the club could field an academy team in the Derbyshire Premier League, like some other counties do?

Steve, to be brutally honest with you I hadn't even thought of that and I haven't had that conversation with Daryn. But now that you mention it, that is probably a very good idea and I will put that in the notepad for when I next meet him!

When I played in the Birmingham League, both Warwickshire and Worcestershire Seconds played in that league in my first year. So I think that there's a lot of merit in that.

[Clarification -one of you asked this question:  the Academy fielded a side in the straight knockout Premier Cup a few years back for a couple of seasons. It is deemed unlikely that, should such a team be formed, it would be able to enter at Premier League level]

Derbyshire has not had a player debut for England while playing for them since Dominic Cork in 1992: 30 years ago. Hypothetically, do you think it would still be possible for one of our players to be selected to represent England? Or do you concede that players with international aspirations would in time have to leave for a bigger budget county? 

No way, Steve! We're going to give it to everybody right here, we want to be people's county of choice. We are going to give them a structure, proper coaching, top level strength and conditioning and not just to county standard, to international standard. 

I would love young players from around England to be knocking on our door saying they want to come to Derbyshire to pursue their careers. That is how I am positioning the club and one hundred per cent, players can play for England from here.

And we as a county would have the budget to retain players of that high quality, would we?

Definitely. Hopefully those players would go on to an England contract, so we can just subsidise it!

Will your family be joining you here?

No, I have three daughters, 28, 26 and 24, one in South Africa and two in Australia, all doing well, all in professional jobs. So they have their lives, I am single and very proud of them!

And how are you enjoying the Derby area? Settled in well?

I'm loving it!  I have a little place out by Langley Country Park and it is beautiful. I've made good friends, the club has been very welcoming and I have been to a couple of Derby County games, getting immersed into the area!

Fast forward to September - what would constitute a good season for you? 

In my mind we're not going to lose a game. I'm a winner and hate losing. In reality, I hate to put a position on where we finish. Player development is very important to me, seeing them reach milestones, achieve career-bests, arrive each day with the right attitude and standards, leave everything out there. 

If they do all those things, success usually follows on as a consequence.

Yes, it was frustrating last season, seeing us not push ahead when opportunities were there, or failing to grasp wins that were there on a plate. Perhaps it is just changing that mentality..?

100%. I want to see players push the limits. They don't get better by being tentative and negative. We've got nothing to lose and we come from a pretty low base. I say to the players every day, when in doubt, take the attacking option. That's how we will play our cricket!