All good things must come to an end – and that includes the careers of cricketers. Sometimes the timing is dictated by circumstances beyond the player’s control, such as injury, but sometimes it is a matter of personal choice. This was the case with John Crawley – but how did he know the time was right?

“A number of reasons really. I’ve had a great twenty years playing cricket, and had great support, firstly at Lancashire and now, more so even, with Hampshire. The club have been very, very good to me but I set myself very high standards and over the last five or six months I haven’t been able to hit them. My form hasn’t been that great and we were leaving out youngsters who are probably going to be the future of the club – and they need to be playing. I didn’t think there was much point in me holding back the youngsters; part of my role is trying to develop them.”

Michael Carberry was quoted in Wisden Cricketer as being full of praise for the help John has given him over the years. “When I started” John told me, “the old fashioned pros just tried to hang onto their jobs but I think that’s all changed. The role of senior players nowadays is to help develop the youngsters, as much as anything. You should pass on what you’ve learned over the years, in both domestic and international cricket, to try to help the youngsters along because they’ve not had that experience. And yes, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy that one day they’ll take your place.

“I’ve got no regrets – I’ve been very lucky. I’ve played a game which I’ve loved since being a kid, and it comes to an end at some stage.”

I wondered if his mentoring skills were something John would look to take forwards to his future career. “Dealing with cricketers, dealing with sponsors, dealing with supporters; it all gives you a lot of good skills. They’re people skills: being honest, having a lot of integrity, but also being able to speak your mind if you think something’s wrong. Hopefully I can carry those on to whatever comes next.”

Which neatly leads on to the question as to what John does plan to do next. “It’s certainly going to be a commercial role. A job within cricket is a dream job, being directly involved in either helping to run or administer the game is a very good job to have, but they are few and far between. So whether I work in the world of sports management, or finance, or the world of education, or healthcare… there are a number of options so it’s a case of seeing what the opportunities are. It’ll be an interesting few months ahead!

“It’s a little bit daunting to be approaching the job market, especially as we’re coming out of a recessionary period where the market isn’t as strong as it could be. It’s daunting because your payments from playing cricket have effectively ceased, but on the flipside it’s very exciting because it gives you an opportunity to build a career in something else.”

Looking back rather than forwards, what are John’s best memories of his playing career with Hampshire? He smiles. “There are so many good memories really. The Lord’s Final in 2005 – you never forget the Lord’s Finals that you play in. That was a great day, and unfortunately I missed out in the latter stages of the competition this year, but that again was a very good competition for Hampshire. And playing with great players throughout my time here; we had Wasim Akram for a while, Chaminder Vaas, Shane Watson, Michael Clarke and some of our domestic guys, like Nic Pothas and Dimi Mascarenhas, and all the guys that you play with really. That’s what you’ll miss the most I think. But most of all I’ll remember playing under Shane Warne – that was a privilege for me – he was brilliant at what he did.”

John also has an international cricketing career to look back on. “Again – great memories! We got to travel pretty much the whole world but I was unfortunate I never really got to the subcontinent. You remember the good times – winning the series, like Dominic Cork in New Zealand when we were in a tough situation to win over there. You remember all your individual achievements – especially if they contributed to a win for the team as well. It was unfortunate we came across a very strong Australian side so we never tasted an Ashes success, which was disappointing, but you can’t turn back time.”

So what of Hampshire without the elegant Mr Crawley at the crease? “As it’s panned out over the last year or so, in one day cricket we seem to be playing very well. Four day cricket has been a bit more of a struggle this year; we seem to have got runs on the board reasonably regularly but in the last handful of games we’ve found it difficult to bowl anyone out twice. I’ve always said that the teams who win four day competitions are teams that have a very, very strong bowling attack. So that will be an area of focus in the future – it’s a long season so you do need to speculate to accumulate and pay a good number of bowlers a good salary so they can win you the games.”

I have to say that I will miss John greatly; not only has he been a player I have loved to watch, but also a consummate professional in all my dealings with him. I also believe that just about every other Hampshire fan will feel the same, and John’s final word as we shook hands was for all of us. “Be sure to say how much I’ve appreciated the fans’ support” he told me. “Whatever else you write, that’s the most important thing to get across.”
 

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