“It was after the Oval Test and Baz came over and said: ‘You’re in. You’ve had a great summer in terms of stepping up to lead the attack and I want your experience. I feel you can have a really positive impact on the other players, on and off the field. I can’t guarantee selection but we want you to fulfil that role for us this winter.’”
With that, Chris Woakes was folding up his England whites and popping them in the suitcase for the first time in two and a half years. Destination? Multan, for the three-Test series against Pakistan that begins on Monday. The mission? A series win, naturally. But, on a personal level, a correction to the numbers and narrative that make this return to life on the road a very Brendon McCullum selection.
At home, the figures are stellar and worth repeating. Fresh from 24 wickets at 20.25 in a 5-1 Test summer, Woakes has 137 at 21.59 on home soil. It is the lowest bowling average for any seamer in England with 100-plus victims, bar Fred Trueman and Alec Bedser. The strike rate – a wicket every 42.9 balls – is bettered by no one. Throw in the runs from No 8, the professionalism, plus the small matter of two World Cup winner’s medals, and McCullum, always sunny side up admittedly, wasn’t hyperbolising when hailing a “remarkable cricketer” during the season.
But chatting over a flat white in Birmingham last week before flying to Pakistan, Woakes, acknowledged the flip side; those 36 wickets at 51 on the road that have kept the chatterati going over the course of his 11-year Test career. He is not immune to the eyebrows raised at this overseas recall, the jokes about confiscating his passport, nor is he consumed by them either. The backing of his head coach and his captain, Ben Stokes, is plenty.
“I’ve been around long enough, I know I need to be better [away from home],” he says, meeting the subject head on. “The slight frustration from my side would be that, yes, I agree, my away record is nowhere near as good as at home. But my home record is bloody good. Exceptional. So it’s pretty hard to get the two exactly the same.
“It’s more when people say I’ve never had a good game away from home. I have. It’s just probably the games in between have been poor rather than average.
“It’s not something that gets me down. I know what I’m capable of. The fact I’ve been selected suggests I’m pretty good and from a knowledge perspective I have a wealth of it, more so now than ever in my career.
“The opinion inside this dressing room is the only one that counts, captain and coach. As long as you’re working towards the team trying to win and in the style they want, that’s all that matters. While I’ve got that backing and support from them, I will continue to give it everything for England, home, away, wherever.”
It is good to hear Woakes sounding so bullish, even if talk of Mr Nice Guy has always underplayed his inner steel. Pakistan is not necessarily the fast-medium graveyard some assume. Jimmy Anderson and Ollie Robinson got the Kookaburra ball to nip about in late 2022, their contributions central to the 3-0 clean sweep. This time Robinson is on the outer, not trusted to stay on the park after too many false dawns with conditioning, while Anderson has slotted into the role of bowling coach after McCullum tapped him on the shoulder in April.
When Woakes, 35, survived this look to the future it was queried by some, even if he is seven years Anderson’s junior and the batting made it a false equivalence. “Sometimes that’s taken for granted,” he says. “Part of the reason I have played so much is that role. You have to bat time, build partnerships, change gear.
“I’ve worked on it all my career and get serious job satisfaction from it. Although I look back at the 62 [in the third Test against West Indies] and think I threw it away. No Warwickshire player has scored a Test hundred at Edgbaston. I knew that stat and still kick myself.”
After a decade operating in the slipstream of Anderson and Stuart Broad, the upshot, finally, was a first summer with the new ball. That in itself says a bit more about the home and away records, not that Woakes has ever bemoaned coinciding with the pair. “I can’t say the new ball was overdue,” he says.
“I have so much to thank them for. If they’d not been around I might not have learned so much. I may have got an opportunity sooner but might not have been as good. We’ll never know. I’ve won 200-odd caps across all three formats and I’d have been happy with just one in each. I feel very fortunate, even if it’s taken a lot of hard work.”
That hard work often gets underplayed with fast bowlers and, as well as a dash of salt and pepper in the beard, this summer has brought a touch of the old bowler’s gait when Woakes is walking back to his mark; a slight hobble that denotes a career of pushing through the pain barrier.
“Really?” he says. “Although it doesn’t surprise me. I’ve bowled a lot of overs. I remember Jimmy in his farewell speech to us saying you have to have a sadistic streak. When you wake up in the morning, you hate it … but you also love it. It’s joints for me, stiffness in back, knees, ankles.
“But I’m really pleased with playing all six this summer. I was sore after the third Test against West Indies, had a week off, then bowled in training to prepare for the Hundred. It wasn’t widely known at the time but I suffered a grade two thigh strain. Not major, but it should have been at least a fortnight out.
“I still managed to get fit to play at Old Trafford 10 days later. Jimmy had told me: ‘I don’t want you to bowl in training until very, very late. You won’t forget how to bowl.’”
Anderson’s advice to trust the body and the knowhow was the “perfect” example of his impact, says Woakes, after the switch from senior pro to rookie coach could have been awkward given the obvious reluctance to retire. “Jimmy would be the first to admit it was weird for him and us before the Trent Bridge Test, guys working out when to speak or approach each other. He’s usually got his emotions going before a match and so to slot in as coach must have been hard.
“But he’s been brilliant at picking his moments, tactics, skills, sending messages out to the middle or having a quiet word in the dressing room. Just the right balance. He just knows what I need at this stage of my career.”
Could that knowledge see Woakes go to a similar age? “Past 40? Nah … hmm … I guess you never say never. But I have only looked at what’s up next, never too far down the line. I do want to keep playing all formats.”
No Anderson or Broad on the field also meant a fresh new-ball partnership with Gus Atkinson, Surrey’s silent assassin who whistled up 34 wickets and a century in his maiden summer, plus a place on all three honours boards at Lord’s. Woakes, the last cricketer to achieve that rare treble – one of six – was jokingly ordered to “welcome him to the club” when he got back to the dressing room.
“Stokesy made me do it,” says Woakes, smiling. “Even though we didn’t know each other much Gus and I really hit it off this summer. We have very different skills: I swing it, he goes to wobble the ball early, I bowl mid-crease, he is tight to the stumps. We communicated really well.
“He’s a young bowler but quietly confident in his skills. Not shy, just quiet. There is definitely more to come. People might say he’s got tougher challenges ahead, but it wasn’t an easy summer. Test cricket is bloody hard regardless of opposition and he bossed it.”
Woakes can be said to have done so, too, and for reasons that go beyond the boundary. During his time at the Indian Premier League his father, Roger, died due to heart failure. Woakes flew back when he was ill in hospital, returned to India as things appeared to be improving, only to then receive the terrible news at the beginning of May when 4,000 miles from home. Little wonder his start to the season with Warwickshire was low-key and that first Test at Lord’s a bit rusty.
“It was the first time either Amie [his wife] or myself had lost someone. It was really tough and it still is,” he says. “My dad lived a great life. He was 81 and the main reason I got into the game. He loved it.
“Cricket has been good for me, giving me a purpose. But also perspective with it, that really family is the most important thing.
“I didn’t quite know how to act. Was I getting back into cricket too soon? It wasn’t just losing Dad, it was a duty of care to Mum, my sister, the rest of my family, and you spread yourself thin. So I’m not surprised I didn’t start great.
“It was all a bit of a blur, I almost can’t remember playing [those county games], but I have to give myself a bit of a pat on the back for how I’ve handled it.”
Whatever happens next on this return to the road, that pat on the back is well earned.
