Lives in Cricket No 45 - Brief Candles 2

8 So close But as the tour went on, Glenn suffered back pains which got worse as time went on, and his cricket inevitably suffered. “My zip and bounce deteriorating, I saw doctors, physios, chiropractors, and it just wasn’t going away.” The realisation dawned that, after all, he wasn’t necessarily going to be able to make a career of cricket; so instead he went back to his studies and secured a bachelor degree in commerce at Lincoln University at Christchurch. “My cricket was limited as not only were my zip and bounce gone, but also confidence.” Nevertheless, after five years Glenn resumed a club cricket career in the 1994/95 season, starting as a batsman who bowled. In 1995 he played for the Wellington City B team and quickly found his touch with the bat. By the 1996/97 season he was scoring lots of runs, and was also bowling a lot better. Halfway through that season he started training with the Wellington squad; “a few injuries and I found myself as 12th man when the side travelled to Northern Districts [towards the end of February 1997]. I felt I fitted into the team well.” Glenn is, I think, being modest about gaining his place in the squad through injuries; Wellington in fact had a pretty settled side in the Shell Trophy in 1996/97, with only 16 players being called on for their first six matches spread over four months. All but one of the eleven that played against ND had played in at least three of the previous five matches, while the eleventh was an established player who had represented Wellington consistently since 1993/94, and who certainly was no ‘emergency selection’. Whatever the reasons, Glenn was now in the first team squad, and when injury forced upper-order batsman and off-spinner Jason Wells to withdraw from the following game, against Otago at the Basin Reserve in Wellington starting on 15 March 1997, he was called into the team. Glenn takes up the story: “I remember being incredibly calm and ready for the game. We batted first and I found myself batting at six. I didn’t mind as I think they were saving me from the new ball, being my first game. I was solid [though] my first scoring shot was an edge through fourth slip. They tended to bowl too short to me, so it was easy enough to cut and work around. I really enjoyed it. Seventy-six before getting in a tangle on a short one. I was fairly satisfied though.” Glenn actually scored 77 with 12 fours, off 142 balls in 199 minutes, before being caught by the opposing captain Robert Lawson off the bowling of Aaron Gale. Wellington had lost three early wickets (they were 16 for three at one point), and this is presumably what he is referring to when he suggests that he was held back so that he didn’t have to face the new ball. Modesty prevented him mentioning that his 77 was the top score in an innings total of 285 (next best was Gavin Larsen, with 56 at number five). He had come in at 85 for four, and left at 254 for eight, his biggest stand being 78 for the eighth wicket with Mark Jefferson. Otago then gained a first-innings lead of just seven (Glenn not bowling), and again the Wellington upper order proved vulnerable. On the third day