‘Oh no, what have I done?’ The time I got Mitchell Starc terribly wrong

2 months ago 18

I was batting against Mitchell Starc in a Big Bash game – Sydney Thunder versus the Sixers. I faced a few balls and every one of them came into me. I got a single and came down to chat to my batting partner, our star South African import Jacques Kallis.

“No worries, mate,” I said. “There’s no swing back into the right-hander. It’s just going across you.” Naturally, Starcy’s first ball to Jacques was a massive in-swinging yorker, stumps everywhere. “Oh no,” I thought. “What have I done? I’m so sorry.”

Mitchell Starc is a leading contender for man of the series.

Jacques didn’t say anything to me and, to be honest, I don’t think it would have mattered because it was one of those unplayable deliveries that only Starcy can produce.

There are plenty of batters around the world who’d know how Jacques felt that day. Brendon McCullum, who was cleaned up by Starc in the first over of a World Cup final. Rory Burns, with the first ball of the 2021 Ashes. Zak Crawley, who edged one to slip in the first over of this series.

Jacques Kallis is bowled by Mitch Starc in the BBL in 2014. Mike Hussey looks on from the other end.

I’ve got Mitch, with 26 wickets at an average of 17 and some important innings with the bat, marginally ahead of Travis Head and Alex Carey to be crowned man of the series after the Sydney Test.

I always knew he was talented, but when he first came into the white-ball team for an ODI series in India he was very mild-mannered and shy. He bowled left arm with decent pace, but I remember thinking, how is anyone ever going to be as good as Mitchell Johnson?

What I liked about Starcy was that he had a competitive streak once he got on the field – I like guys like that – and you could turn to him in the hardest times. With the white ball, you could bowl him in the power play because he could swing the ball and swing it late. In red-ball games I actually felt he was even more dangerous with the old ball, and on flat wickets he could get a bit of reverse swing. Those are the things you need to be successful in Test cricket.

Mitch had only been in the Test team for a year, and he’d just bowled us to victory with a six-wicket haul against Sri Lanka down in Hobart, when the selectors rotated him out of the team for the 2012 Boxing Day Test. I was angry. It was the second-last Test of my career, and I was cherishing every moment I could spend in the baggy green cap. He was bowling so well, and I couldn’t believe they were going to rest him. I was saying to him, “It’s not every day you get to play a Boxing Day Test, don’t rest!”

I knew he didn’t want to, but he was shy and still relatively new to the set-up, and he didn’t want to ruffle any feathers. As it turned out, Mitch struggled with injuries for quite a few years after that, and it wasn’t until 2016 that he got to play in one.

Mitch is a lot stronger with his views now, and more confident to express them. But he has always had great self-awareness about his priorities and what he needs to do to prepare for games.

Starc cleans up Tillakaratne Dilshan in Hobart. He was rotated out of the team for the next Test.

He was only 22 when he rejected offers to play in the IPL to get ready for the 2013 Ashes, and he’s sacrificed millions of dollars since then to make sure he’s at his best when he’s playing for Australia. There’s a lot to admire about that.

That self-awareness has been one of the secrets of his success, and the reason he’s bowling 145km/h at the age of 35.

I remember being around the commentary set-up when Shane Warne started getting stuck into Starcy. Warnie felt his body language was flat, and just kept going harder and harder at him. The dynamic between past players who are paid to have opinions and the current team can be tricky, but I remember thinking, he’s really lining him up here.

No one likes to be criticised, and I’m sure Starcy didn’t enjoy it, but having said that he probably wasn’t quite at his best from a skills perspective – maybe his body language was a bit flat, and maybe he took some of it on board.

Mitchell Starc celebrates after dismissing Will Jacks in Adelaide.

He was in the messy middle phase of his career where you’re copping it from critics, the opposition is working you out a bit more, and your love of the game is really challenged. I can empathise with that because I went through it, myself.

But you get through it to that beautiful place where you are completely in control of your skills, and you don’t care what anyone else says. Starcy is 100 per cent in that place now.

From a physical point of view, there’s no reason Mitch can’t make it to the 2027 Ashes; he’s retired from T20 internationals so he has a bit more time between matches, and it will just be a case of whether he still has the desire.

Judging from how pumped up he was after taking Jamie Smith’s wicket in Adelaide, when he tried to slog and hit it up in the air, there’s no sign of his desire waning.

Mike Hussey played 79 Tests for Australia and is commentating for Fox Cricket and Kayo this summer.

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