“You can guess how excited I am,” Liam Livingstone says as he remembers how we had spoken for more than an hour just over two weeks ago about his desire to play Test cricket. Now, the day after he heard that his boyhood dream had come a huge step closer with the news that he will be part of England’s 15-man Test squad to tour Pakistan in December, Livingstone is in an exuberant mood. He had been just as open and friendly at Old Trafford late last month but, then, his hopes of playing Test cricket were fuelled by yearning rather than concrete hope.
It is different now. The T20 World Cup begins on Sunday and Livingstone, who is close to a full recovery from the ankle injury which affected his preparations, could be an important player for England in Australia. After his success in the IPL this year, when Livingstone smashed 34 sixes and was second only to Jos Buttler in clearing the ropes, his reputation as one of the most destructive batsmen in the world was cemented. This followed years of big hitting in various forms of white-ball franchise cricket which turned Livingstone into a millionaire.
Yet all his one-day renown and wealth mattered less than his burning ambition to break into Test cricket. The arrival in May of Brendon McCullum as England’s Test coach, and Ben Stokes as captain, at least gave Livingstone a reason to keep dreaming. Their brand of aggressive cricket, which encourages the Test team to play with freedom, chimes with the way in which Livingstone has always approached the game. But, still, the red-ball question remained. How do you break into a form of cricket you no longer play?
During our first interview Livingstone had sounded hopeful but still uncertain as we sat together and watched Lancashire play Surrey in the final County Championship game of the season. “The door’s a lot wider open than it was six months ago,” he said. “And I guess if I was ever going to play and thrive in Test cricket it would be under Ben and Brendon’s leadership. So, if the opportunity arises, I feel I have the game to play Test cricket.”
Livingstone said then that McCullum had not called him and, in regard to Stokes, with whom he had played a lot of junior cricket in Cumbria, there had merely been an exploratory question. “It wasn’t really a conversation,” Livingstone said. “But when he took over as captain Ben asked if I still wanted to play Test cricket and I said yes. I saw Brendon at the premiere of Ben’s documentary and we had a bit of a laugh. We spoke about his theories of red-ball cricket which are exactly how I see myself thriving in Test cricket.
“I have no idea whether they want me to play Test cricket but Ben knows me as a cricketer and as a person. He knows I haven’t played much red-ball cricket over the last three years but that’s down to circumstances. There were two World Cups in two years and I had to go away and try and get myself in them squads instead of concentrating on red-ball cricket. But I love watching Test cricket and I’d love to play it.”
Livingstone made it plain in our first interview that, despite being the No 1 draft pick for Melbourne Renegades in the Big Bash, which starts in December, he would choose to go to Pakistan instead with England if the call came. He laughs now in Canberra when asked if he had heard any whispers since we last spoke. “No! It was a really nice surprise. Stokesy had just asked if I still wanted to play Test cricket so there was that little steer that maybe there was a chance. But you never know until they actually pick you. Then Baz rang me and just said that I was going. I was over the moon.”
Livingstone makes that old sporting cliche sound strangely fresh. He laughs again when I ask if he can remember much about his last red-ball game in August 2021. “Nope,” he says of a match where he scored 12 runs in his one innings for Lancashire against Warwickshire and took one wicket in 26 overs of spin bowling.
Since then Livingstone has been playing white-ball cricket exclusively and his reputation is established around the world for he has had such success in Australia, India, Pakistan, South Africa and England – where he lit up the Hundred in 2021 before missing this year’s tournament through injury. “The only way for me to do it right now is to go straight into Test cricket,” he says. “The biggest step in international cricket, and people say this about Test cricket, is dealing with the intense scrutiny and pressure when playing for your country. But I believe you learn how to deal with all of that much more in the IPL than you would in a four-day county game. So, yeah, moving up to Test cricket is me being thrown in the deep end. But some people can swim, some people can’t. I feel ready to swim.”
The World Cup is looming but Livingstone lingers over his Test breakthrough. “I’ve played a lot of franchise cricket but there’s nothing quite like fulfilling a dream that you always had as a little kid. And for me the dream was always to play Test cricket for England. I’m 29 years old and I still have that dream.”
When did that fevered dream begin? “The 2005 Ashes. I was 12 and watching that series I thought that’s what I want to do when I’m older. The Ashes were on Channel 4 and after school I would go to my nanna and grandad’s and watch it. I still remember where I was, in my nanna and grandad’s front room, when England won that series. It’s mad.”
There is logic, rather than madness, in the selection of Livingstone. His first class batting average is 38.36 and his highest score in county cricket, against Warwickshire in 2017, is 224. That same year he also hit two intelligent and composed hundreds while on tour with the England Lions against Sri Lanka A. “That was when I concentrated on red-ball cricket. I was averaging 40 plus the first five years of my career and so I feel like I’ve got the technique for Test cricket. After Sri Lanka I got called up [in 2018] for the Test tour of New Zealand. I thought that I should have had an opportunity to play there but it didn’t happen. I then fell out of the squad at the start of the next [English] season when there was a change of selectors.”
Livingstone’s focus switched to white-ball cricket because his powerful batting was so attractive to franchises around the world. “Obviously Stokesy and Baz have seen something in me and I think my character and style of play will suit that environment really well.”
Under England’s previous Test-match regime he would have been expected to play with a traditionally conservative approach. Will he now give free rein to his natural instincts at the crease or will he temper his batting in a Test? “Every game of cricket you play is all about reading the situation in which you’re batting. If I do get picked maybe I’ll bat down the order and I would certainly play in a T20 manner if I’m batting with the No 11. But if we’ve got a long time to bat then I won’t be playing as though it’s a T20. It’s a different format, but the principles don’t change. You play the scenario in front of you and direction comes from the scoreboard. I’ll do my best to meet the demands of any situation.”
Livingstone’s ability to bowl leg-breaks and off-breaks could be a useful backup to Jack Leach on Pakistan’s turning wickets. “I think that was a factor [in his callup] and so over the next few weeks I’ve got to get my bowling back up to where it was before I went travelling in franchise cricket.”
At the same time Livingstone hopes to recover fully from the injury which has kept him out of cricket for the past few months, and help England in the World Cup. His rehabilitation, after rolling his ankle badly and falling while walking towards a taxi in London, is almost complete. He expects to be fit for England’s final warmup match on Monday – before their first group game in the tournament against Afghanistan next Saturday.
The frenetic pace of being a hired gun in franchise cricket may rake in the money and seem full of glamour but Livingstone needed to step off the treadmill. “It sounds weird to say but, mentally, I’ve enjoyed being injured. I’ve enjoyed being away from cricket.” So the chance to savour the slower and more layered delights of Test cricket is one to relish. He also seems equipped to deal with increased attention in the longer form of the game.
“I guess it’s the only sport in the world that you probably fail more times than you succeed,” he says. “But one of the biggest parts of becoming a successful professional cricketer is being able to deal with disappointment and failure. Thankfully, I’ve learned to deal with it. I used to throw bats and helmets and scream and shout but, over the last two years, I’ve grown up a lot.”
Livingstone was out of England’s T20 team for four years before he made such a strong comeback in 2021. “The first two years of my career were a whirlwind. I started really well and got picked for England. I didn’t do very well, got dropped and then had a really bad third year. I found it very tough. I was thinking: ‘What did I do wrong? Why did I mess it up?’ It felt as if my chance of playing international cricket was gone. But going away and playing in all these different tournaments was going to make me a better player. So I just enjoyed franchise cricket and the lifestyle.
“The entertainment part of T20 cricket suited me really well. I found a way to play that turned me into a matchwinner and an entertainer. It got me back into playing international cricket but the biggest turning point for me was not waking up every morning thinking: ‘How do I get back into the England team?’ I started waking up in the morning with a smile on my face, travelling the world and enjoying my career.”
As fears for the future of Test cricket intensify it seems refreshing too that, on the eve of the T20 World Cup, one of the most exhilarating batsmen in the world is even more enthused by the prospect of making his debut in an arduous five-day match. “I’ve fulfilled a lot of dreams over the last few years,” Livingstone says. “Playing in a World Cup, playing for England, playing in the IPL. But there’s one burning dream that I have had since I was a little kid and that’s to play Test cricket. That will never change.”
