The glorious career of one of the world’s best cricketers came to an end today with the sad announcement from Andrew Flintoff that injury has forced him to retire aged just 32.
An enduring image will surely be of the Lancastrian heaving some of the world’s best bowlers out of the ground for six. And so we celebrate the Englishman’s career with a massive six of our own.
Leisurely afternoon for numbers three to 11
The best batting display of Flintoff’s career came when he was playing for an under 15s side at his fiorst club St Annes, in his native county of Lanchashire, in north-west England. Fred made 232 not out after being dropped on six, and his opening partner made 60 not out, meaning the other batsmen probably got a drink and just relaxed after a while. “We got 319 for 0 in 20 overs,” Flintoff once said. “You don't forget days like that, whatever the standard you're playing." Incidentally, the club still genuinely hope that Fred will one day return to play for them as a veteran…
Balls to that idea
Pure bloody-mindedness seems to have been the key to the young Flintoff’s early development as an all-rounder. Playing for the England U19s in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, he came into the attack despite the fact he wasn’t supposed to be a bowler at all. “At that time, Fred had been told he couldn't bowl because he was suffering from spine curvature in his back, but Bumble [David Lloyd], the coach, told us to put Fred on anyway,” Flintoff’s then-team-mate Matthew Hoggard once told cricket website Cricinfo. “He bowled about four overs, got five wickets and he bowled freaking rapid. That was Fred through and through. He wasn't supposed to bowl, he did bowl, and he didn't look back.”
Dan Wilton
‘Not bad for a fat lad’
Having debuted for the full England side in July 1998, Flintoff was criticised for ‘carrying a bit too much weight’, and subsequently dropped in 2000. Returning to the international fold in 2001, and despite a personal batting display earlier in the Test series in India that had him on the edge of tears, in the final one-day match of the 2001–2 series in Mumbai, Flintoff made 40 runs at number seven, then took two wickets in consecutive balls to deny an Indian side who only needed 11 runs to win and take the series 4–2. Instead it was 3–3 and the relieved Flintoff unashamedly took his shirt off in celebration. “Not bad for a fat lad,” he once remarked in these earlier days when he’d walked off with a Man of the Match award…
Embarrassing dad comes to support son
A massive six will often be caught by a delighted fan in the stands who’ll hold the ball aloft to cheers from fellow supporters who know how hard it is to catch a cricket ball after five pints of warm lager, but it’s all the more extraordinary that the man who was under one of Fred’s sixes in 2004 was none other than his own father Colin – who then fumbled and dropped it. Flintoff’s innings against the West Indies in Birmingham was memorable enough in itself – a personal top score in Tests of 167 – but there was also much merriment for both father and son at this turn of events. “He never could catch – he always told me he had a brilliant pair of hands, but that's the final proof, in front of the world, that my dad couldn't catch a cold,” Flintoff Jr joked afterwards of his father, who still plays amateur cricket. "If I'd taken it, he'd have been the first Test batsman to be caught out by his dad!" added Flintoff Sr.
Upsetting the odds
Some Australians had already pre-ordered their ‘Australia: Ashes winners 2005’ T-shirts before their team even got on the plane to Heathrow, but they hadn’t banked on the resilience of the English opposition – not always brilliant, but always totally determined. Though Kevin Pietersen stole many of the headlines and the whole team got British honours from Buckingham Palace, this was Flintoff’s Ashes. Fred was awesome when it mattered, and the high point was the second Test at Edgbaston. Scoring 141 with the bat in his two innings, Flintoff smashed Ian Botham’s record for sixes in a single match with nine, then skittled through the Australian line-up with the ball, taking seven wickets and securing a thrillingly narrow win. The icing on this sporting cake was the genuine gesture of offering consolation to his disappointed Aussie opposite number Brett Lee as the rest of the England team celebrated.
Never in the field of cricket conflict…
Devastating with a ball, more than useful with a bat, Fred is also no mean fielder. At the 2007 World Cup, Flintoff took an incredible one-handed slip catch to prematurely end Kiwi Ross Taylor’s innings for 0 and leave New Zealand 3 for 2 (cheapest item free). Of course, that tournament for Flintoff will always be most associated with the notorious ‘Fredalo’ incident where alcohol and a pedalo combined to make the headlines – this is something that Fred himself now has a sense of humour about, having appeared in such a boat on British TV’s BBC Sports Personality of the Year show in 2009 with comedian James Corden for a comedy skit. But watch this catch instead, it is totally awesome…
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