MUMBAI: Will Young doesn't get to put on his Black Caps Test cap as much as he would like to. For the longest time, he has been New Zealand's go-to reserve batter. He still is. Despite being a part of the squad, Young has played only 19 of the 33 Tests New Zealand has played since his debut.
But the good thing about him is that he is very much aware of it. That is why, whenever he gets the chance to don that Black baggy cap, Young does everything in his power to savour the experience. Sunday was one such day. Young had just finished the post-match presentation at the Wankhede Stadium where he won the Player of The Series as New Zealand completed a historic 3-0 victory against India. He walked into the press conference hall, switched his Black Test cap for a training cap and sat down to take some questions.
As the answer started coming, one thing seemed clear. Listening to him feels as calm as watching him bat. Unlike every other batter who has taken guard over the ten days of play that happened in this series, no one has looked as compact and composed against the spinners. He would take a leg stump guard, do his routines, get on his front foot if the ball is full or stay in the crease if it's shorter. That he has the lowest strike rate among the top six run-getters of the series tells how much he trusted his defence. He would keep it as simple as possible, using the sweep shot very minimally.
One look at his wagon wheel and the lack of runs through the square will tell the story about how textbook he has been. Of the 122 runs he scored in the Mumbai Test, only 13 came through the square on the leg side. For Young, sweep is a shot that he uses just to manipulate the field so that he can work his singles down the ground.
“The ball was turning quite a lot, so I felt that moving down the crease might be a bit risky because of getting stumped. So, I felt at times when the bowler was bowling and there was a field that I liked and I felt like a sweep was on, I was prepared to have the courage to try it. And then once you get the field you like, you can sort of go back to plan A and look to milk from there,” said Young.
At some level, to have the clarity and success Young has had seems astonishing — he finished as the third-highest run scorer with 244 runs at 48.8 average — especially knowing that he hadn't had any game time before this India tour since they arrived in the subcontinent. However, Young attributes it to the work he had put in at the nets in Noida (during the abandoned Afghanistan Test) and Sri Lanka. “I ran the drinks (in Sri Lanka), but there were really good nets there and I could train most days, whether it was with Michael Bracewell who was on the drinks with me or Rangana Herath who was bowling to me a lot. So, I felt really prepared, to be honest,” he explained.
As much as he acknowledges the learnings from Kane Williamson — if not for the veteran’s injury Young might not have played in India — the New Zealand No 3 for the series tried to stick to his strengths and do just that. “A lot of the guys look up to Kane and lean into his thoughts on the game and how to face certain bowling. It's great at the moment because we've got fantastic batters all throughout our lineup. And they've all got slightly different methods. I think on the day, you've just got to pick what method you think will work. And you've got to have the courage to back that and show your skills. So I try not to bat like Kane. I try to bat like me and do it my own way,” said Young.
It had been almost ten minutes. The media interaction — through which Young wore a smile and answered in his quite unassuming voice — was over. He got up and walked down, did some handshakes, a couple of pictures and walked through the room. Suddenly, he paused and remembered something. Only to walk back to the media manager, to exchange the training cap and put on his Test cap again. He knows what it means to him and how hard the opportunity to wear it again is going to be. He was not going to miss out on the chance to put it on with pride. For he has done not just himself but the entire New Zealand proud.