The Surrey batsman has enjoyed a prolific season to push him into contention and has shown the ability to quickly adapt his game
Daniel Norcross02-Aug-2018Barbados. March of this year. A collection of England’s brightest and best future prospects have been divided into North and South teams to contest three 50-over matches.The South squad contains some pretty familiar names: Sam Curran, Dom Bess, Nick Gubbins to name but three. When Paul Collingwood, coach of the North team, was asked to name the South player most likely to play soonest for England he didn’t name the two 20 year-olds who debuted in the Test team against Pakistan earlier this season. He plumped for Ollie Pope. As it transpired both Bess and Curran earned their chances first due to injuries in the Test team, but it was quite an endorsement for Pope.It wasn’t as if Pope had a particularly spectacular series in Barbados. He scored 110 runs off 111 balls across two innings, whereas Gubbins had stroked two immaculate centuries, but it was the way he scored the runs and his versatility. Pope had started at No. 6 in the second match and was deployed as an emergency opener after Gubbins tore his hamstring in the third game. He also kept wicket.Since then he’s scored 684 runs in the County Championship, the second-highest aggregate in the country, at an average of 85.50, the best by a margin, and a further 244 runs at 40.66 in both white-ball formats. This from the lower middle order and in his second season of first team cricket. After 15 first-class matches he averages 63.25, the second-highest average of any Englishman at the same stage in their career. The only man above him is the unexpected figure of Hampshire wicketkeeper Adrian Aymes who, assisted by seven not outs in 16 innings, managed 64.22.In his fledgling career Pope has scored a match-saving unbeaten hundred against Hampshire, a match-winning unbeaten 158 against Yorkshire, coming in at 69 for 4, and a number of supportive 30s from the middle order in T20s to see his side either home in run chases or to massive scores batting first. He’s put the likes of Aaron Finch and Kumar Sangakarra back on strike when the situation demanded it, and taken control when there was no one else to turn to. He might just be the most dynamically anonymous batsman out there right now. He’s 20, yet somehow he knows exactly how to play any hand dealt to him.”I work it out on my own, to be honest,” Pope told ESPNcricinfo. “I try to find a way of getting to 15 off 10 balls. The hard thing about batting in the middle order in T20 is getting in without chewing up too many balls.”He has quickly developed a reputation for innovation but is acutely aware that you can’t stand still in T20 cricket. The bowlers get to know your tricks and adjust accordingly. “Last year a lot of people hadn’t seen me so I looked to ramp and reverse ramp. Now it’s changed. They start with third man and fine leg back so I’ve started hitting it straighter and over the top.”ESPNcricinfo LtdBut how does he know when to innovate and when to play in orthodox fashion? “[Against Somerset last year] I thought it’s a pretty big boundary. Long-on is out. I don’t think I can clear him. I remember thinking the only real gap in the field is behind me on the off side, so I tried a shot I’d never tried before and it came off. There is technique involved but it’s not always trained technique. It’s practical thinking on my feet.”He does, of course, work tirelessly on technique, always trying to stay one step ahead of the bowlers. “I imagine the field set to me. A lot of teams now have mid-off up so I practice getting it over the top. But I also try to hit every area I can off the same ball.”Playing for Surrey, with its exceptionally strong squad, has simplified matters. “I was told at the start of the season, with players away, I’d get the first few games. I told the management I understood that they had an overseas player coming in. Jason Roy and Mark Stoneman would be back at some stage, but I want to put you in a position where you can’t drop me.”He’s done that and more besides. For many Surrey fans he’s among the first names they look for on the team sheet, but how does he stay grounded after such a giddy start to his professional career that has seen him selected for the England Lions and even touted in as a possible replacement for Ben Stokes in England’s middle order against at Lord’s when the allrounder stands trial in Bristol?”You just keep doing the same thing. Don’t overthink. I try to keep my game as simple and structured as possible.”By his own admission he’s been lucky to play alongside some of the best players of the modern era across multiple formats in Sangakarra, Finch (ranked No. 1 in T20Is) and most recently Alastair Cook when turning out for the Lions. “I pick their brains. Cook is one of the best players to have played in India so I asked him what his method was. You find out what you want to know. Of course you learn by watching, and how they go about practice but you have to be proactive. You have to ask them the questions you want the answers to. With Finch, for example, he’s one of the best power hitters there is. He reckons I need to set my stance a bit earlier to get power into my game.”He has also savoured playing in the Vitality T20 Blast, a tournament he believes can stand up alongside the Big Bash which he saw at first chance during his stint in Grade cricket with Campbelltown-Camden in Sydney last winter where he played 23 games across multiple formats and came away with 997 runs.”In front of 28,000 at Lord’s and 25,000 at The Oval, it really doesn’t get much better,” he said. “The games have been of a really high quality and I don’t think it’s much different from the Big Bash. The crowds are not like that everywhere of course but I think the city-based tournament [set for 2020] is a great idea. Of course some people will come for the cricket, some for beers with their mates. Same as any cricket tournament in the world. Yes it would be good to get the spectators more supportive of the teams in The Blast but this year I’ve seen a lot more kids at the games.”Currently, though, he is eyeing Surrey’s first County Championship title since 2002. “There’s no better feeling that winning a four-day game because of the amount of effort you’ve put in. You’ve put in the work with a group of lads for four days straight. Winning the Championship is the pinnacle.”It may feel like the pinnacle for Pope right now, but don’t be surprised if this wonderfully adaptable, intelligent and thoughtful cricketer isn’t facing, and answering a whole new set of questions for England before he knows it.