Northern lights: Sandhu gambles on a fresh start

It was a cold Thursday in June when Gurinder Sandhu packed up his life and made the three-hour drive north from Hobart to Devonport. His car jam-packed with the accoutrements of his two years spent on the island state, he made his way to the back of the queue of vehicles filing on to the Spirit of Tasmania.

De-listed but not dejected, Sandhu was heading home. His first interstate move had in many ways been a bust, but the fast bowler has always been one to find silver linings, and he found them here too. And so his exit was not a tail-between-the-legs retreat, but a mere stopover ahead of a new adventure.

"I got home just in time for my birthday so we could celebrate as a family," he tells cricket.com.au. "I told my dad and brother but we didn't tell my mum. I was sitting on the lounge when she came in. She was excited, really happy."

Three weeks later, he was packing up his life again. This time he was heading north, accompanied only by his belongings and the fuel of ambition unfulfilled.

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Gurinder Sandhu was a 19-year-old rookie when he picked up the most prestigious individual prize in New South Wales cricket, the Steve Waugh Medal, back in March 2013. The news turned heads for a few reasons, not least his age and the fact his career to that point tallied six matches. Australia has struggled to produce professional cricketers of south Asian heritage, and the fact that Sandhu was a tall fast bowler who did not rely on pace and bounce made him rarer still.

In the three years prior, the Blues had rolled three young quicks off the production line and into Australian colours, one after the next: Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins. All pushed their pace past 140kph and all were seen as the future of Australian cricket.

Image Id: C59812085F694DE1B9D17A006BFEA257 Image Caption: Sandhu burst onto the scene at NSW // Getty

Sandhu was a little different. He was no slouch but he couldn't rival that trio for pure pace, instead relying on swing (both in and out, with new ball and old) and some clever variations with the white ball.

He had taken 14 wickets in two Sheffield Shield matches and another 14 in four one-day domestic games, enough to see him push past the likes of Brad Haddin and Trent Copeland to claim that Steve Waugh Medal, but no level of early success can guarantee one's future.

"Steve Waugh was actually there that night," Sandhu remembers, shaking his head and smiling. "My parents were there – which I probably should've read into but didn't even think about – and next thing I'm one of the final four names.

"Steve Waugh starts off the speech to present the award and he's like, 'This is a young kid…' and I'm thinking, 'Oh shit, it's me'. I couldn't believe it."

Across the next two domestic one-day tournaments, no-one took more than Sandhu's 26 wickets. In between he played for Australia A and was part of the National Performance Squad based out of Brisbane, where he spent a handful of the ensuing winters as part of that group.

In 2015, in the build-up to Australia's World Cup campaign, Sandhu got a phone call from then chief selector Rod Marsh. A few weeks later, he made his ODI debut, against India at the MCG.

"It seems like a while ago, getting cap number 206," he reflects. "It was an amazing time. Darren Lehmann was the coach. Mitch Johnson had an injury, I was basically his replacement while he did his rest and rehab.

Image Id: DFD43F62A83743449F6815C696148557 Image Caption: Sandhu receives his cap from Rod Marsh // Getty

"I didn't play the first two games, I was just running drinks, loving being in the squad, thinking, ‘How good's this?’

"Third or fourth game of the tournament, they tell me, 'You're in'. I called my parents, they jumped in the car and drove down to Melbourne with one of my uncles, and a couple of nieces and nephews. It was funny that it was India."

Funny because Sandhu's parents were born there. They came to Australia in the 1980s and hail from Punjab, where strong family ties remain. Gurinder and his brother Harmon (who also represented NSW underage) spent Christmas holidays there with cousins during their youth, riding tractors and motorbikes on family farmland, and playing cricket on the streets. They did that at home, too; most afternoons, Aminta Crescent in Hassall Grove, in the far north-western reaches of Sydney, would come alive in a flurry of cricket or soccer.

It was there that Sandhu learned the skills of fast bowling – and batting – that pushed him to those early, dizzy heights. Before he was 22, he had already lived out a good share of his cricketing dreams.

"I'm pretty lucky," he says. "I got a rookie contract with NSW in 2012, after the Under 19s World Cup, two years after I finished school.

"I feel like my career has been pretty opposite to how most careers are: after you get your rookie contract, for a few years you learn how you need to train, you start talking to people, looking at what they're doing and trying to emulate that. Then you go through a few hard pre-seasons, training your ring out.

"As a normal rookie that's what might happen.

"I didn't do too much of that at the beginning of my career. I was playing really well. I won the Steve Waugh Medal in my first season having played six games.

"I was just like, this is so easy. I was just enjoying playing for NSW, making some new mates. Then I got to play Big Bash, was playing for NSW and then Australia.

"Now it's like I'm back down where I started from. I need to work hard now, and get better."

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Sandhu's move to Tasmania was partly about opportunity but he had also been enticed by the prospect of reuniting with Tigers head coach Adam Griffith, with whom he had worked leading into the Under 19 World Cup in 2012.

In his maiden showing for Tasmania, the 2018 one-day domestic tournament, he was equal leading wicket-taker, his 18 victims including seven (and a hat-trick) in the final, which the Tigers lost to Victoria.

That form, albeit with the white ball, pushed Sandhu into Shield calculations and he made his first-class Tigers debut in round four that season, taking the wicket of Victoria batsman Peter Handscomb and bowling satisfactorily in a six-wicket defeat.

But with a plethora of fast-bowling talent in the group, Sandhu lost his place and never regained it. As he worked with Griffith and learned more about his craft, it became apparent that what had held him in good stead in one-day cricket was holding him back in the four-day game.

"My consistency and skills probably weren't where they needed to be for Shield cricket," he concedes.

"Shield cricket is hard work … sometimes that inconsistency can help you in one-day cricket; if the batsman knows you're hitting the top of off-stump every ball they can line you up."

He developed a training plan with Griffith targeted largely at improving his consistency. They were simple, repetitive drills that he could do on his own.

"'Alright, today, I'm putting some cones down on rough lengths – top of off, top of middle, yorker, bouncer – and I'm bowling 24 balls, and we'll see how many times I can hit the one I pick'," he explains.

"I'd go into the indoor centre and do that as an extra. And it was really working."

Image Id: E302E41628D446A992D928620998EF5B Image Caption: Sandhu forced his way back into Tasmania's Shield side // Getty

Sandhu also began a concerted effort to improve his batting. The left-hander has a career-best of 97no in first-class cricket and has always been more than a tail-ender, but a weekly two-hour session with Tigers batting coach Jeff Vaughan and a group of fellow aspiring allrounders was again aimed at increasing his consistency. It paid dividends in Tasmanian Premier Cricket last summer – playing for Kingborough, Sandhu scored 357 runs at 71.40, including an unbeaten 109.

With the ball, Sandhu's hard work in 2019 also began to show on the field. Playing in Tasmania's second XI against Queensland last November, he took 6-43 from 20.1 overs.

It was enough to see him return to the Tigers squad for the final Shield match before the break for the KFC BBL.

"I was over the moon to be selected," he says. "I was pumped, and ready to play, then two days out from that game I did my calf at training."

Sandhu didn't know it then, but he had played his last game for Tasmania. At season's end, he was told his contract would not be renewed.

"Unfortunately, the feedback was just that I hadn't played enough," he says. "I felt like if I was good enough to be selected in the XI the last time I was fit, what had changed?

"But that's sport. It's cut-throat. You can take it on the chin, or be a Debbie downer and throw the toys out of the cot.

Image Id: 5075217DFCA54B839BBB4DC8322B08E4 Image Caption: Sandhu's time at Tasmania has come to an end // Getty

"The first couple of days I wasn't great – you're losing your job.

"But then I spoke to my manager: 'OK, what can we do next?'

"I know I've got plenty of time in my career. I've just turned 27. So far, me at my best is playing one-day cricket for Australia.

"So if that's me at my best and I did that at 21, why can't I do it again?"

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It was an unseasonably warm Thursday in July when Gurinder Sandhu climbed into his packed car and drove north once again. He stuck his COVID-19 border pass on the windscreen, and left his parents' home at 5am. Then he put on some podcasts, made the odd stop for coffee and fuel, switched to his R&B playlist on Spotify, and arrived in Brisbane some 10 hours later.

He had still been in Tasmania when he plotted this next move, which had been reached due to a number of factors.

"My original thought was to stay down in Tassie and work my way up," Sandhu says. "I was like, 'If I'd just been selected, why can't it happen again?' Then the news came out about no second XI cricket (due to COVID-19), and then I heard Peter Siddle was moving down.

"So I had a look at the bowling group there at Tassie, and I thought Jackson Bird and Siddle, they're very similar bowlers to me in terms of what they offer, and they're great bowlers. Then Nathan Ellis, Riley Meredith had good years.

"I had a few chats with their coaching staff. It was going to be pretty tough, which at the time I still thought, 'Yeah that's okay – nothing comes easy'.

"Then I was at home one day and I saw Cameron Gannon was leaving Queensland. I had a look at their list, especially the bowlers, and I just thought, ‘You know what, I really like Brisbane, I know the city – that could work for me."

He spoke with Usman Khawaja, though the Queensland captain was reluctant to colour Sandhu's decision.

"He didn't want to encourage me to move up just because we're mates," he says. "And I understood that. When I did make the decision, he told me he thought it was a good one."

Instead, Khawaja passed on the phone number of Bulls head coach Wade Seccombe.

Image Id: F97801759AC449A2BA0BA3520A1160E9 Image Caption: Sandhu is confident he can be a force in first-class cricket // Getty

Never one to die wondering, Sandhu made the call.

"I just called him and said, 'Hey mate, I'm not looking for any handouts or anything, I'm thinking of potentially moving to Queensland. I wanted to ask you if somebody – myself or anyone – is dominating grade cricket there, is that something you and the selectors take seriously?'

"And he was like, 'Mate, bloody oath. We always take it seriously but with no Second XI cricket this year, it'll be even more so'.

"I just wanted to hear that from the state coach."

Sandhu used flatmates.com to find a place to live in Bulimba, which sits on the southern side of the Brisbane River not far from the CBD. His housemate is a fellow supporter of the Bulldogs in the NRL so they have found something to bond over, and he is also a barber, so Sandhu has been scoring fades every couple of weeks in exchange for the odd takeaway coffee.

On the cricket field, he has signed with premier club South Brisbane, where fellow paceman Billy Stanlake plays, and where former Australia and South Africa international Kepler Wessels is the head coach. He has already been working with Wessels on his batting, which he wants to get to a standard that allows him to be viewed as a useful number eight – or even number seven – in all three formats.

Before leaving Tasmania, Sandhu had also gotten himself into the best shape of his career. Utilising the fitness program of renowned high-performance coach Jock Campbell, he hit a personal best of 7:05 in the Australian cricket standard 2km time trial – around 10 seconds quicker than he had been previously.

Since arriving in Brisbane, he has signed on to his local gym and is maintaining his fitness. Now he has lofty ambitions to fulfil. The fast bowler who averages 23 in List A cricket, strikes every 27 balls and concedes just 5.14 runs per over wants to become a force in Shield cricket.

Image Id: A5279352DC524188A4923E0125EEF4E9 Image Caption: Sandhu is also chasing a new BBL deal // Getty

"I really want to show that I can play red-ball cricket as well – not just one-day and T20 cricket," says Sandhu, who is also off contract with Sydney Thunder and could potentially become a target for his former national coach Lehmann at the Brisbane Heat.

"I feel like I'm in a good spot. I've got a lot of good signs to go off from last summer, I'm enjoying being here in Brisbane and I'm fitter and stronger than ever.

"To me, the last time I was fit, I was selected for a Shield game – that's what I'm trying to keep in my mind.

"Playing for eight or nine years, I've learned a lot. Especially these last couple of years, I know what I need to do at training now to have my batting and bowling ready to go for a game.

"I'll have a good crack this year, and it might take me two years to put on some good performances and to show that I'm really keen and I want it, but I'm definitely prepared to give it my all."

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