Steven Finn on why Brendon McCullum and Jos Buttler are an ideal combination
That same year, I was working on slower balls coming from the hand side. I would squeeze the ball between my middle and ring fingers, roll my middle finger down into the inside of the ball, and the ball would circulate upwards while keeping my arm speed the same. Anyway, that’s the plan.
It’s a difficult delivery to control and I’m a player who likes to feel like I’m in control of what I’m doing all the time. The unknown of having the ball come out of my hands made me nervous.
I worry about this in my sleep, but McCallum makes it sound so easy. He was fully supportive of me trying to pass the ball during the game and emphasized that he didn’t care what happened.
The first time I tried this in a game was at Uxbridge against Gloucestershire. McCallum has actually moved on at this point in the season, but kept trying new slow pitches on me throughout the game.
I bowled the slower ball into the pitch and the batsman hit it too early. The next ball I bowled a shorter pace ball and the batsman was caught behind the glove.
It was the previous delivery that planted the seeds of doubt in the batsman’s mind as to whether the ball could be a slow ball, which got me the wicket. I was the man of the match with 4-24.
That’s not to say McCallum doesn’t care about the results. And he did, with gusto. But, having played the game, he knew you had a much better chance of success if you relaxed and were fully committed to what you were doing. This is the basic premise of his coaching and it suits Buttler and this England team.
