How Not to be a Cricketer review: Let me do what I want

Phil Tufnell's reboot of his life suggests he'd have been better under more loving leadership, writes HUW TURBERVILL

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There are probably two books it would be unfair to compare this to. One is Simon Hughes’ A Lot of Hard Yakka, which was the first to ignore the old adage, “What goes on tour stays on tour”, setting the bar impossibly high when it comes to dressing-room indiscretion… and it was well-written, of course. The other is Phil Tufnell’s own autobiography (well, his first anyway), entitled What Now?, masterfully ‘ghosted’ by Peter Hayter (as ever) – a real warts-and-all affair. 

Instead this 10th book by Tufnell (yes, really, some going if you think about it… when you consider JD Salinger and Sylvia Plath only wrote one novel each) is a pleasant read, quite amusing, something to help you relax in a hot bath, with Radox. 

I’m not sure if the stories – ghosted this time by John Woodhouse – are spun (as it were), some made me titter aloud, though. It takes in the whole spectrum of his life, but is not a third autobiography, rather a sanitised version: as though Disney bought the rights to Stephen King’s grisly book about a car, Christine, and remade it as The Love Bug. 

For a book that you think is going to be all humorous, it starts with a poignant tribute to his mother, who died when he was in his teens, and his father, who did his best amid those terrible circumstances, and who seems a good egg; likewise there is a fair bit of Mike Gatting, who comes across extremely well, conferring discipline and kindness where he felt it necessary – even taking young Phil for a haircut in Uxbridge High Street at one stage. 

I have forgotten much of the Hayter book alas I daresay (it was many years ago that I read it), so I didn’t realise how good Arsenal devotee Tufnell was at football; or that he has only one O-Level, in art. It will be difficult not to think of Rodney Trotter when I see him again. 

The passages about the cricket are broad-brushstroked, but the odd nugget shines through. Jack Robertson of Middlesex and England, the batsman who bowled handy off-spin, dispenses some advice that set Tufnell up nicely. “Hold the ball like this and pretend you’re turning a door handle.” 

^{Tufnell after victory in the first Test against New Zealand in Christchurch in 1992}

Ditto Michael Vaughan gave him what he says was the best tip about batting he received throughout his career. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that when you’re batting, anything outside your right eye you can usually leave.” 

There’s an enlightening bit about facing the bouncers of Waqar Younis, Shaun Pollock and so on; and an extraordinary passage about some of the Australian umpires he encountered. There is no doubt Tufnell’s Test stats would have been considerably better if DRS had been around. 

He liked playing for Mike Atherton (who apparently has no smell, according to this book) and Nasser Hussain; and there’s a nice tribute to Ted Dexter, who used to phone him up with handy tips; but the man-management skills of Ray Illingworth and Duncan Fletcher are described in less glowing terms. 

Basically the thesis of this book seems to be: “I should have been left alone to do what I want,” and he is especially critical of Graham Gooch in that regard. I have less sympathy for that argument. English cricket in the 1980s – as fun and colourful as it was – seemed to be as much about the rock and roll stories off the field as the cricket. Gooch was right to modernise. If you look at Tufnell’s record, maybe he could have been even better if he hadn’t been a cat out on the tiles so often. 

Hussain always says in his Ask Nasser column that a few rum and cokes to settle the nerves ahead of the big game isn’t a bad thing, but everything in moderation, and all that. This book might as well have been called Cigarettes and Alcohol, the song Tufnell chose when he came out to bat in New Zealand in 1996/97. 

As he himself points out he started well, with 32 wickets in his first seven Tests, but after that his stats plateaued, with famous high points, usually at The Oval – 1991 and 1997 especially. 

There must be a passionate following for these books, and occasionally a gem reminds you why Tufnell holds his own on Test Match Special. 

In describing his Test debut at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 1990/91, he writes: “What struck me most wasn’t the size of the occasion; what really resonated was the colour. The sky was so blue and the grass was so green. Everyone in the crowd seemed to have been painted in the most vivid of ways.” Nice. 

A colourful character indeed.

Buy Phil Tufnell's How Not to be a Cricketer here