Message to Harmison, England Management and whoever else is interested

[Goughy]

Some people may not think that this single topic is thread worthy, but given the million to one chance that someone of some importance actually has a look on the forum I think it deserves it.

Anyway, today (3rd day of the 1st Test at Lord, Eng vs WI 2007) there was much talk in the booth about Harmison and his struggles. Lots of opinions were offered and even Ian Botham said he wasn't sure why Harmison got his hand on the 'wrong side of the ball'.

To be honest I find that pretty disappointing as its a problem I deal with frequently as a fast bowling coach and it is easily correctable.

If you will pardon my crude illustrations Ill attempt to break Harmison's action down and show how it should be adjusted.

Ill do it point by point.

• In delivery Harmisons left arm points to 1st/2nd slip
• When you walk the trail leg follows the lead leg. Thats how you walk in a straight line. It is the same with bowling actions. Where the left arm goes the body and the right arm follows.
• Due to Harmisons left arm, his body is pulled to the left and his right arm would naturally follow in the direction of the slips to a right hander
• Obviously this isnt where he wants the ball to go so he has to make adjustments in the direction his right arm travels. He has to take it away from its natural arc to bring the ball towards off stump.
• This adjustment of the right arm away from its natural direction (which is towards the slips) leads to inconsistency and variable levels of accuracy
• Harmison is fighting against his own action to get the ball towards the stumps and has to 'push' the ball towards off-stump away from its natural direction and away from where his body and left arm are travelling.
• This pushing of the ball often leads to the hand being on the 'wrong side' ie left side of the ball and this adjustment against the natural lines of his action often forces the ball too far and down the leg side

A key for fast bowlers is to think in straight lines. It doesnt matter where the left arm comes from as long as its pointing towards off stump at the highest point of the action and comes down towards off stump in delivery.

This straight line (doesnt matter if sideways on or chest on) bring the whole body through towards the stumps, including the right arm and the ball.

Basically whereever the left arm goes everything else natually follows. Unless a player wants to fight their action and have to make massive adjustment during delivery then the line of the left arm must be off-stump.

If Harmison can adapt and force his left arm up towards the stumps instead of wide and bring it down through the line of off stump like an axe chopping through the off-stump then many of his problems would disappear.

It may sound simple, but it is. People over complicate actions. All the complicated issues are symptoms of fundamental problems. Fix the fundamental flaw and a whole myriad of other issues magically go away.

Take the 6th ball of the 1st over Harmison bowled with the 2nd new ball today. As he went up into delivery I knew it would be a good ball. If you know actions you can see if it will be a good ball before it is even bowled. He actually got his left arm straight and immediately I thought "this is going to be decent". It pitched on a length, just outside offstump and climbed rapidly to the keeper.

He just needs to make that small change and he will be dangerous. As long as he is fighting his own action he will struggle.

If the England Management want to further discuss this point my email and MSN are in the sig below

 

[steds]

Sorry, mr Goughy, but it's not as simple as making one small change. You see, much has been made of Steve Harmison's homesickness and the truth is that Harmison is so attached to his beloved Ashington that he's developed the same innate sense of where home is that homing pigeons have. Now, contrary to most researchers beliefs, this unique sense of direction is not determined by the "map and compass" model. It is infact the bone marrow of this bird/individual being more magnetic than the average bird/individual, and the one strongest pull on this magnetic bone is infact from a magnetic field located in the North East of England. The main amount of magnetic bone marrow in Steve Harmison's body happens to be clustered around his left elbow, and the pull of this North-Eastern field is so strong that Harmison's left arm points towards Ashington at all times. Therefore, the only way we are going to get old Steve bowling straight is to align every cricket ground in the world so that the off stump is always aligned with Ashington or amputate said arm, I'm afraid.

 

[social]

Pretty good explanation Goughy

I agree that the "physical" problem definitely stems from his left side

Cricket is physically an uncomplicated game and Richie Benaud sums it up best for mine - action should be like a windmill with the arms following each other on a parallel plane.

Basically, with Harmy's lead arm taking his head and body towards slip, he has to contort his body to direct the right arm towards off stump

Unfortunately, the problem with Harmison is probably not far removed from the compass theory - mental strength or the lack thereof.

I cant believe that neither he nor the coaching staff arent seeing exactly what we are - he just seems unable to put it into practice on a regular basis

 

[Perm]

Interesting points Goughy, I'm no fast bowling expert but you seem to know your stuff. I suggest you hunt Harmison down and tell him exactly this

 

[Richard]

I hope you've emailed someone - Derek Pringle or Simon Barnes for instance - with this too, Kev. Much better chance of someone of significance reading it there.

It's worth a try, after all, however cynical the Bennetts of this World are.

 

[Goughy]

Interesting to see his 1st two overs today (day 4). Much improved and his left arm is coming up and down straighter. Accuracy is improved and he has broke 90mph early doors.

Good to see. Just a matter of whether he can maintain it.

 

[Prince EWS]

Top thread - makes quite a bit of sense, really. When I remember Harmison in full flow, I think of a tall, almost perfectly straight front arm in his delivery as well as a slightly more upright position just prior to the actual delivery. It looks like he's fixed it a bit this morning though, so perhaps someone else has noticed this.

 

[Gloucefan]

Sorry, mr Goughy, but it's not as simple as making one small change. You see, much has been made of Steve Harmison's homesickness and the truth is that Harmison is so attached to his beloved Ashington that he's developed the same innate sense of where home is that homing pigeons have. Now, contrary to most researchers beliefs, this unique sense of direction is not determined by the "map and compass" model. It is infact the bone marrow of this bird/individual being more magnetic than the average bird/individual, and the one strongest pull on this magnetic bone is infact from a magnetic field located in the North East of England. The main amount of magnetic bone marrow in Steve Harmison's body happens to be clustered around his left elbow, and the pull of this North-Eastern field is so strong that Harmison's left arm points towards Ashington at all times. Therefore, the only way we are going to get old Steve bowling straight is to align every cricket ground in the world so that the off stump is always aligned with Ashington or amputate said arm, I'm afraid.

He bowls ok for Durham away from home though how can you're theory account for this?

Goughy this is a very good thread, you would hope someone on the England coaching staff would be able identify what is going wrong with Harmison.

Edit

I mean Goughy

 

[Poker Boy]

Surely the England management should know about this weakness and be working on it? Troy Cooley got him to do it right, Kevin Shine has not, will AD be the next one to have a go?

 

[Perm]

Surely the England management should know about this weakness and be working on it? Troy Cooley got him to do it right, Kevin Shine has not, will AD be the next one to have a go?

Here's hoping.

 

[Richard]

Surely the England management should know about this weakness and be working on it? Troy Cooley got him to do it right, Kevin Shine has not, will AD be the next one to have a go?

What about the many occasions he bowled rubbish with Cooley in charge?

 

[Johnners]

Gun pictures btw

 

[wpdavid]

What about the many occasions he bowled rubbish with Cooley in charge?

Well, quite - like you, I'm astonished at the mythology that's been allowed to build up around GBH.

Incidentally Goughy, apart from the guys that Richard mentioned, ex-bowlers in the media like Fraser and Selvey might be a decent bet. And the ECB website probably has an email address if you were really feeling lucky.

 

[GIMH]

Excellent post, should take out an Afridi IMO.

You should revive your 1800 call Goughy thread, that was gun

 

[FBU]

His bowling improved on the last day when there were hardly any spectators at Lords.

 

[Perm]

Excellent post, should take out an Afridi IMO.

You should revive your 1800 call Goughy thread, that was gun

I second this whole post.

 

[Perm]

His bowling improved on the last day when there were hardly any spectators at Lords.

Just like how he bowled quite well in the second innings of the Syndey Test match?

 

[wpdavid]

Without for a moment querying Goughy's analysis of Harmison's action, which I thought was brilliant (Goughy, not GBH's action, that is), my problem here is that this isn't something that's crept into his game over the last 6 months, and I don't know how easy it is to change something that's been second nature for a decade or so. The bigger worry is how something so ropey can go unchecked until a player reaches the test side, but we've seen that before, of course.

 

[TT Boy]

Interesting statistic from Agnew's blog (shame about the rest) regarding Harmison and the faux sense of match winning credibility he exudes…

Tests 1 to 10: 28 wickets at an average of 36
Tests 11 to 20: 59 wickets at 19
Tests 21 to 30: 34 wickets at 35
Tests 31 to 40: 34 wickets at 32
Tests 41 to 50: 34 wickets at 37

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tms/2007/05/harmison_worry_for_england.shtml

 

[wpdavid]

Interesting statistic from Agnew's blog (shame about the rest) regarding Harmison and the faux sense of match winning credibility he exudes…

Tests 1 to 10: 28 wickets at an average of 36
Tests 11 to 20: 59 wickets at 19
Tests 21 to 30: 34 wickets at 35
Tests 31 to 40: 34 wickets at 32
Tests 41 to 50: 34 wickets at 37

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tms/2007/05/harmison_worry_for_england.shtml

Yeah, it's amazing how many journalists obediently trot out the "match-winner" tag, given the reality of what's actually happened. Further analysis of the above reinforces my point, as the multiples of 10 approach is rather simplistic. It's also better to leave out the freebies against Zim and Bangladesh, as pretty much anyone in the country could have boosted his average against those guys.

Better to look at:
Phase 1 (2002-2003) - India, Aus & SA
Phase 2 (2004 golden patch) - WI, NZ & WI
Phase 3 (the rest) - SA, Aus, Pak, India, Pak, Aus & WI

IIRC his phase 3 average is about 41, which really isn't clever over six and a bit series.

I've seen nothing to alter my perception that the one time in his life when he got his finger out was after for once getting the message that he wasn't actually doing "enough", which is generallty what he trots out. That involved not getting a central contract at the end of the 2003 SA series and some very unsubtle messages from the England camp after he returned early from Bang a couple of months later. Either side of that, he's spent his entire professional career having his ego massaged first by county then by country instead of being challenged to sort his game out and do what he's capable of instead of getting by on mediocrity. The result is what we've seen over the last two and a half years.