“The kids end up spending a lot of time at cricket grounds,” Garraway says. “There is a natural link to it because we spend so much time engaged with that. And it is a sport that people get very passionate about. They’ve had some good experiences, because that’s what you want in sport, isn’t it?”
Cricket’s idiosyncrasies make family a particularly important route into the game. The challenge of learning the rules, and being accustomed to a sport that could last days, is far easier for those steeped in cricket from birth. Seeing their dads idolised might also encourage children to try and follow them.
“Kids are likely to be aware that their pro athlete parent has a special status,” says Dom Malcolm, Professor of Sociology of Sport at Loughborough University. Being a professional athlete, especially a cricketer, with the travel it entails, will dominate family life far more than normal nine-to-five jobs. “Children of pro athletes are likely quite immersed in the world of sport from an early age and consider it a realistic career goal.”
Easy access to facilities, and family tolerance for this curious game, can accelerate a child’s development in their formative years. But passion on the cricket field cannot be forced; reaching the top demands desire from within. Vaughan consciously sent Archie away from the family when he was 14, keen not to be an overbearing influence.
“He loves his cricket and is always wanting to learn,” Steve Harmison says of his son Charlie, joking: “Just doesn’t listen to his dad too much.”
Atherton is “very good at keeping his space,” De Caires has said. “It’s something I’m obviously immensely proud of my dad for, but I’m happy just getting on with my game.”
Training time and coaching alone is not enough to make it in any sport; the ‘10,000 hour rule’ is neither necessary nor sufficient for any aspiring athlete. Kerry Packer, the founder of World Series Cricket, proved as much with his son James. The young James played cricket on outfields and in corridors with many of the best players in the world. His father then hired a private coach, the former Test cricketer Barry Knight, and installed an early model of a bowling machine to try and make James into a professional. It didn’t work.
Here, then, lies the essential contrast between sport and many other industries. Other jobs can be passed down the family, just as Packer senior did with his business interests to James. Sports success cannot.
Yet sons of cricketers do have a significant advantage over even the young Packer: their genes. To see Rocky Flintoff swatting sixes, or Charlie Harmison, who is already 6ft 4in and now aims to bulk out, is to see two young cricketers who have physiques that give them a chance to replicate their brilliant fathers. Archie’s cover drive and back foot drive are said to evoke Michael’s elegant strokes. While Archie has impressed Garraway as Millfield captain too, his style better resembles “the solidity of Andrew Strauss” than his dad’s more adventurous approach.
Olivia Martin is a dedicated sports journalist based in the UK. With a passion for various athletic disciplines, she covers everything from major league championships to local sports events, delivering up-to-the-minute updates and in-depth analysis.
