Ashes 2013-14: The Amazing Michael Carberry Story

The ball from Clint McKay was full, wide and swinging wider; Michael Carberry planted his front foot and slashed hard. His bat, that had come down in a cut-throat arc, skewed in his hands as the ball collided into its outside edge and flew high into the air on the off-side, spinning wickedly as it landed fortuitously in no-mans land between the boundary and the inner-ring. It was the shot of a desperate and broken man. 

Carberry was playing in just his fourth ODI for England having scored only five runs in the series so far, looking horribly out of touch in the process and having been gallingly run out for 1 by Kevin Pietersen in the previous match.

At the age of 33 and with just one Test cap to his name, Carberry would have been well aware of the importance of the series with regards to his international future, and nothing represented more his simmering anger and disappointment at his continued struggle for recognition and poor returns in the series than that hideous heave over the infield. 

It is ironic therefore that it is thought to have been that very innings in September that earned Carberry his place in this winter's Ashes squad. Having opened the batting, he saw three of his teammates fall victim to a McKay hat-trick, and England were reeling at 8-3 inside five overs. The innings that followed from Carberry was gritty, feisty and ugly but reaped 63 precious runs, hauling England from a position of grave danger into one of relative security. 

While Carberry—normally a fluent and vivacious left-handed stroke-maker—was undoubtedly frustrated with his lack of timing and scratchy compilation of runs, the England management were thought to have been mightily impressed with the fight and perseverance he showed in the face of genuine adversity. 

The fact that his eventual re-selection for the Test squad, following years of fighting for just that, was achieved at a time when he perhaps least expected it is indicative of his disillusionment with the England selectors that was laid bare in a forthright interview in All Out Cricket magazine earlier in the year: "Frustration is an understatement. It wasn’t explained to me. But I’m not one for phoning up the selectors and badgering them asking why I’m not playing, it’s a decision I’ve had to slowly but surely come to accept.”

They were carefully chosen words, but there's no doubting the veiled hostility and its testament to Carberry's case that a panel of selectors wary of criticism were not perturbed from his selection in light of such comments.

Whether Carberry will actually make an appearance in the Ashes this winter will be dependent on factors out of his control, but what is certain is that there are very few players whose battle for international selection has been waged as long or as hard as Carberry's.

The Croydon-born batsman made his first-class debut way back in 2001 for Surrey against Leicestershire and is in fact one of only two players from that fixture still playing today. The first five years of his career were ones of unfulfilled potential and frustration that saw him move from Surrey to Kent before eventually settling at Hampshire in 2006, where his career turned a corner.

Soon after his move to the south coast, Carberry became a prolific run-scorer in all formats and 1,000 Championship runs in 2007 earned him a call-up to the England Lions tour of India in early 2008. Two hundreds on that tour, and another against New Zealand for the Lions in May, enhanced his growing reputation further.

The runs continued to flow for Hampshire, and Carberry climbed the next rung on the ladder in 2009 when he was included in England's Performance Programme in South Africa. When injury befell Paul Collingwood, Carberry was named as cover in the full England squad for the third Test against South Africa. He didn't play but he was closer than ever before.

Finally, in early 2010 thanks to a resting Andrew Strauss, Carberry made his Test debut for England in Chittagong against Bangladesh. His selection saw him become the first non-privately educated specialist batsman to play for England in over a decade and the first black England cricketer since the turn of the Millennium.

But his time at the top of the sport was short-lived, as two scores of thirty were not enough to prevent England changing the balance of their side for the second Test, and Carberry was the man to make way. The opening partnership of Strauss and Alastair Cook was not broken again until Strauss' retirement in August 2012. 

For Carberry, it was during this two-year period that he fought his most ferocious battle; the battle with his own health.

In late 2010 it was revealed that Carberry was suffering from a pulmonary embolism—which in non-medical speak is a blood clot of the lung. Carberry was left short of breath, he had sharp chest pains and he was coughing up blood. The serious setback ruled him out of traveling with England’s Performance Programme to Australia that winter. Not only were there fears for his career, but there were fears for his life.

Yet nine months later, Carberry completed a remarkable comeback when he scored 300 not out for Hampshire against Yorkshire at the Rose Bowl in an epic third-wicket partnership of 523 runs with Neil McKenzie. In an interview at the close of play that day he said, “Not only am I lucky to be playing, I’m also lucky to be on this planet at all.”

It is this desire to overcome adversity, this grit and determination, that has epitomised Carberry's career. He has fought his social background, the great England opening pairing of Cook and Strauss, obstinate selectors and even his own health in his battle to get where he has got to now. 

In light of the journey he has taken, it would seem unjust were Carberry not afforded the opportunity to add to his single Test cap. While his doing so would most probably involve the breaking up of the Cook-Joe Root opening partnership that has already had time and faith invested in it, Carberry's initial squad selection demonstrates the management's unease surrounding the current pairing, and indeed the top three more generally who struggled for runs in the home Ashes series.

All Carberry can do right now is continue to work hard, train hard and quietly impress in the background; a bittersweet set of requirements for a man who has seemed so close, yet so far, for so long.