Matthew Fisher enjoyed the perfect start to his international career when he took a wicket with just his second delivery on debut for England.
Fisher was a late addition to the England side for the second Test against the West Indies in Barbados, getting picked after Craig Overton fell ill before the game started. He is one of two players making their debuts, with Saqib Mahmood also brought into the side.
The Yorkshire seamer was entrusted with the new ball by captain Joe Root, bowling the second over after Chris Woakes. And, after getting hit for four off his first ball, the 24-year-old induced an edge from John Campbell the following ball which Ben Foakes comfortably caught.
It was the stuff of dreams for Fisher, who wheeled away in celebration and pointed to the sky in a touching tribute to his late father Phil, who tragically passed away from bowel cancer when his son was only 14. "It is probably the hardest thing someone can go through," he told the Daily Mail ahead of his trip to the Caribbean.
"I don’t think I could have got through it without the support of my mum, brothers and the rest of my family. Dad is the biggest part of me getting to where I’ve got to.
"Mum was the one I’d go to about stuff at school, but with Dad it was all about cricket. When I am playing, that’s when I get the connection with him.
"When I do well, I feel an even stronger connection. I hold the ball up to the sky for Dad every time I get five wickets."
Yorkshire's interim managing director of cricket Darren Gough was full of praise for Fisher after he was handed his England debut. "I know [Matt] very well from over the last three months," Gough told talkSPORT.
"And from what I’ve seen, he’s a guy who since he’s come back from the England A tour is a lot fitter than he’d been from the reports I’d got. He looks trim and from all the testing we’ve been doing in the last four or five weeks he’s very fit.
"He can bowl, let me tell you. He’s a very impressive character, a very intelligent young man, very outspoken, but what else would you expect? He’s a Yorkshireman.
"But, he’s got a lot of empathy with it, he’s a terrific leader of men and I think from all the young men I’ve met at Yorkshire he was one of the first that stood out to me.
"And I was thinking that later down the line this is a possible captain, even though he’s so young and he’s a bowler. But he has definitely got true character."
