'Nothing Without His Backing': Root Opens On Relationship With Late Thorpe

Star England batter and former captain Joe Root hailed late English great Graham Thorpe, noting that he would have not enjoyed such a brilliant career with the Three Lions without his backing. England players will pay tribute to the late batter before the start of the first Test match against Sri Lanka at Manchester on Wednesday. The teams will be lining up for a moment of applause before their national anthems at the Old Trafford Stadium, with a tribute video being played on the big screen. Broadcaster Sky Sports will also be paying tribute to the batter in their coverage.

Thorpe died by suicide at the age of 55 on August 4, after years of battle with what his wife Amanda described as "major depression and anxiety". Thorpe made his international debut in 1993 and was the mainstay of the English batting throughout the late 90s and early 2000s. The southpaw played 100 Tests and scored 6744 runs at an average of 44.66, with 16 hundreds and 39 fifties to his name. His highest score was 200*. In ODIs, the gritty batter scored 2380 runs at an average of 37.18 with 21 fifties.

Root, who worked with Thorpe during his days with England Lions as an up-and-coming batter rising through the ranks and then later with the England senior team in the late 2010s and early 2020s as one of the all-time greats, said that Thorpe was a "complete batter", a "rockstar: and helped him improve his game, especially in subcontinent conditions.

"He was one of the players that stood out in that time [for England in the 1990s and early 2000s]. He was one of the guys that consistently performed when things were tough and when results were not always going in our favour, which I think is a great quality to have," said Root as quoted by Sky Sports.

"Even when I was young and learning about the sport, you could tell he had a good game against both spin and high pace. He could play the short ball well but also had success in Sri Lanka. He was the complete batter, like a rock star who could sing you a ballad and rock your socks off at the same time. I always looked up to him and took a lot of inspiration from him," he added.

Root said that a lot of interactions with Thorpe came when he started his coaching career with the England Lions in 2010 and the veteran backed Root to be a key part of the team. This stint with England Lions started a close relationship that the two would share over the next 12 years or so, in which Root had the support of Thorpe. He also noted the late batters' role in developing the next generation of England batting, most particularly, skipper Ben Stokes.

"A lot of my interactions with Graham and where his biggest influences came were as a coach when he started the second phase of his career. It was quite surreal first getting to meet someone of his stature and talking about the game," said Root.

"It was about a year or so later, before I had even scored a first-class hundred, that he was involved in the England Lions set-up and pushed really hard for me to be involved in that team. I worked very closely with him for the next 12 years or so. He had a huge influence on my career and arguably without his backing and pushing my case, I may not have had the career I have had."

"Clearly the work he put in during that 10-12 year period... he worked tirelessly. We had good, honest conversations about areas I needed to improve. Not just me but you look at guys that came through in that time: Jonny Bairstow, Jason Roy, Jos Buttler, James Vince, Sam Billings. He played a big role in Ben Stokes' development," Root concluded his point.

Root said that the team is grateful to Thorpe for his contributions, noting his attention to some fundamentals of the game and how he worked differently with each batter. The superstar batter also credited Thorpe for improving his game in the Asian conditions.

"There were certain fundamentals that he was big on - can you get really close to the ball and far away from it? - but he did not have one way of coaching. The way he spoke to Jonny would be different to the way he spoke to me and to Jos and to J-Roy (Jason Roy)," he said.

"A lot of the scores I have got over the years in the subcontinent have been down to the basics I learnt from my very first tour with him," he added.

Root said that some of the biggest lessons he learnt from Thorpe were shared off the field, in which the late player would share his set of struggles with cricket and lift as well, which helped Root a lot as a youngster. He termed his bonding with Thorpe as "special".

"Some of the best lessons I learned were not necessarily in the nets but over dinner or a few glasses of wine, just talking about the game, about shared experiences people can relate to. He was very good at that, talking about areas of his game he struggled with and similarly other areas of life as well," said Root.

"It is a special coach that can have that relationship with players and it was certainly one I managed to have with Graham. He could change the mood in the dressing room if things were quite tough, he had a great sense of humour, he could make difficult situations a lot easier and was always great fun to be around. That is something I am really going to miss."

"A lot will and should be talked about how brilliant a player he was for a long period of time, but we should remember the impact he has had on English cricket as a fantastic coach as well," Root signed off.

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