Coming Back To Me: The Autobiography of Marcus Trescothick
A true-life sporting memoir of one of the best batsman in the game who stunned the cricket world when he prematurely ended his own England career. Trescothick’s brave and soul-baring account of his mental frailties opens the way to a better understanding of the unique pressures experienced by modern-day professional sportsmen.At 29, Marcus Trescothick was widely regarded as one of the batting greats. With more than 5,000 Test runs to his name and a 2005 Ashes hero, some were predicting this gentle West Country cricket nut might even surpass Graham Gooch's record to become England's highest ever Test run scorer.But the next time Trescothick hit the headlines it was for reasons no one but a handful of close friends and colleagues could have foreseen.On Saturday 25 February 2006, four days before leading England into the first Test against India in place of the injured captain Vaughan, Trescothick was out for 32 in the second innings of the final warm-up match. As he walked from the field he fought to calm the emotional storm that was raging inside him, at least to hide it from prying eyes. In the dressing room he broke down in tears, overwhelmed by a blur of anguish, uncertainty and sadness he had been keeping at bay for longer than he knew.Within hours England's best batsman was on the next flight home. His departure was kept secret until after close of play when coach Duncan Fletcher told the stunned media his acting captain had quit the tour for 'personal, family reasons.'Until now, the full, extraordinary story of what happened that day and why, of what preceded his breakdown has never been told. He reveals for the first time that he almost flew home from the 2004 tour to South Africa – of what caused it and of what followed – his comeback to the England side and a second crushing breakdown nine months later that left him unable to continue the 2006-07 Ashes tour down under.Coming Back to Me will replace the myths and rumours with the truth as Trescothick talks with engaging openness and enthusiasm about his rise to the top of international cricket; and describes with equal frankness his tortured descent into private despair.
Читать Coming Back To Me: The Autobiography of Marcus Trescothick онлайн беплатно
MARCUS TRESCOTHICK
Coming back to me
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
with
Peter Hayter
To the most important people in my life:
Hayley, Ellie, Millie, Mum, Dad and Anna
Contents
‘That sadness swept over me. The thing I had feared most was happening and, if my previous experiences were anything to go by, the process was as unstoppable as a domino chain.’
In the good times, the times before the long days and longer nights when depressive illness turned stretches of my life into a slow death, I had occasionally caught a glimpse of the perfect end to my career as an England cricketer; at The Oval, pausing on my way back to the dressing-room to acknowledge the applause celebrating the Test century with which I had just secured England’s latest Ashes victory.
That was what I saw in my sunlit daydreams. That was how it was supposed to happen.
The reality? Hunched-up, sobbing, distraught, slumped in a corner of Dixon’s electrical store at Heathrow’s Terminal 3, unable to board the 9 p.m. Virgin Airways Flight VS400 to Dubai for which I had checked in alongside my Somerset CCC team-mates on the evening of Friday 14 March 2008; but which I was now in no physical, mental or earthly state to take, hanging on for the pain and terror with which I had become so familiar during the previous two years to subside, and let me breathe.
I almost made it. I got almost as far as it is possible to get without actually walking through the door onto the plane and I had wanted to so much. Until the very eve of our departure, in the weeks leading up to it, I never seriously thought that I would have a problem going on the 12-day pre-2008-season tournament also featuring Lancashire, Sussex and Essex. I was well in myself and I was cautiously optimistic about what getting through the trip might mean in terms of my hopes of a future with England, even though my last appearance for them was now 18 months behind me. England’s players, selectors, management, coaches and captains had all stated that, while they had no desire to put me under undue pressure to return, when I felt I was ready, so would they be. This was a real chance to find out if I was. The tournament was to be pretty low-key though Andrew Flintoff would be there to continue his recovery programme following his latest ankle operation back at home, with relatively little of the intense media coverage I had always found so discomforting.
All things considered I was looking forward to the test and what a successful outcome might mean, even though I knew failure would end all hope and all argument. After two aborted overseas tours with England, to India in 2006 and Australia the same winter, I knew it would be strike three – you’re out.
I had spoken to my wife Hayley, who had given birth to our second child, Millie, a sister to two-year-old Ellie, on 19 January, and, mindful that separation from family, friends and the familiar had been at the root of my problems, she had said all the right things: ‘Twelve days? You’ll be fine.’
The day before I left I talked with the Somerset coach Andy ‘Sarge’ Hurry, a former marine turned PT instructor, about what might lay in store. He had asked, ‘What can we do to make this easier for you?’ and had already arranged with the rest of the staff and players that, once I got to Dubai, I was going to be kept fully occupied. With no time to wander, my mind might just be able to stay away from the thoughts that had, on occasions, made existence seem unbearable and that way, perhaps, the illness could be kept at bay. Busy days playing, training and practising would have been followed by lengthy team planning and selection meetings and I was never, ever, to be allowed to dine on my own unless it was my choice. Not that they were going to ask me for my belt and shoelaces, just that they wanted to create a comfortable environment in which I could relax and remain calm.
I had told Andy: ‘Look, I really think I’m going to be fine …’ then added, ‘as long as nothing out-of-the-ordinary happens.’
After six weeks of disturbed sleep following Millie’s arrival, a part of me was also looking forward to the shut-eye I was going to be enjoying in Dubai.
Maybe I should have taken more notice of the slight twinge of anxiety I had felt that day, but I had known all along that this was not going to be straightforward. In any case the feeling was nothing like as intense as that warning sign which usually preceded a full-blown crisis; some people might describe it as a shiver down the spine, for me it was more like a progressive freezing, vertebra by vertebra from top to bottom.
