Biography: Stuart Carlisle

FULL NAME: Stuart Vance Carlisle
BORN: 10 May 1972, Harare
MAJOR TEAMS: Zimbabwe (1994/95- ), Mashonaland Under-24 (1993/94- 1995/96), Mashonaland 1996/97- ). Present club team: Harare Sports Club.
KNOWN AS: Stuart/Stuey Carlisle. Nickname: Torch.
BATTING STYLE: Right Hand Bat
BOWLING STYLE: Right Arm Medium Pace (occasional)
OCCUPATION: Professional cricketer
FIRST-CLASS DEBUT: Zimbabwe B v Orange Free State B, at Harare Sports Club, 29 October 1993
TEST DEBUT: First Test v Pakistan, at Harare Sports Club, 1994/95
ODI DEBUT: 22 February 1995, v Pakistan, Harare Sports Club

BIOGRAPHY (updated December 2002)

Stuart Carlisle is the son of a first-class cricketer, as his father, Harare businessman Alistair Carlisle, represented Transvaal B in the Sixties. He is the youngest of a strong sporting family; his older brother Gary, now in America, is a strong all-round sportsman, especially hockey, while his mother was a top softball player who played for Rhodesia and his sister has represented South Africa at hockey.

Stuart himself, born after his father returned to this country, first played in his back yard with his brother and sister; later on, Alistair joined in to help and instruct in the basics. He first played matches at Courteney Selous Primary School before moving to St John's for his final two years, and also made great progress at the Eagles holiday cricket programmes, run by George Goodwin. In his final year of junior school, he scored his first century, against Ruzawi, one of the country's strongest junior school teams, and was awarded a bat.

Later on, attending high school at Peterhouse, just outside Marondera, he played in the school first team during his final three years there. Captain in his final year, he scored 181 in one match, having previously made his highest score to date of 196 for the Under-15 team. He represented Zimbabwe Schools, touring Australia in 1988 and England in 1989, and then to Australia again two years later. He was among the top batsmen on each of his tours. The tour to Australia was a particular pleasure, with the team playing some of Australia's top school sides and winning ten matches, against only two defeats. Stuart pays tribute to the help given him by the Peterhouse coaches Alan French and Mark Jardine.

After leaving school, he worked for Claude Neon Signs for eighteen months before deciding to attend Natal Technikon, earning a Bachelor of technology degree in marketing. He played in South Africa for the Natal Technikon club which won the premier league in 1995/96. In the champion of champions competition between all the top club sides from the various South African provinces that year, Technikon finished second. During his limited time with them, Stuart played an innings of 140 and a couple of fifties, and was also selected for the South African national Technikon team. His team-mates included Lance Klusener, Derek Crookes and the late Tertius Bosch. He found doors closing there due to the `affirmative action' campaign, though, and moved on to play for Durban High School Old Boys, and later Pirates.

Stuart has played for most of his career in the middle order, but in 1993 he decided to open the batting, which he considered later to be the best move he had ever made. Critics said that he did not have the technique to be an opener at the top level, and it was true that the visiting English team of 1996/97 finally put paid to his personal ambitions to open at international level, although he did the job again briefly and with some success in Sri Lanka in 2001/02. Before then, though, he did prove that he has the guts and determination, the ability to hang on doggedly against the best new-ball bowlers.

He began his career as an opener with four fifties in a row in league matches and was immediately promoted to the Zimbabwe Board XI, in 1993/94. After a quiet start, he finished the season with a determined unbeaten 111 against Natal B. Further good innings for the same team the following season earned him a Test place, replacing wicket-keeper Wayne James who had not scored enough runs, in the selectors' eyes, to warrant his retention when Andy Flower could add wicketkeeping to his batting and captaincy.

This First Test against Pakistan, which resulted in Zimbabwe's maiden Test victory, remains Stuart's most memorable match, even though, down to bat at number seven, he didn't even get to the crease. He did sit with his pads on for eleven hours, as Grant Flower shared two massive partnerships with his brother Andy and then with Guy Whittall! But three fine catches all helped materially towards Zimbabwe's innings victory. He has always been a superb fielder.

Mark Dekker was Grant Flower's opening partner at that stage, but he was out of form and confidence, and after a gutsy innings of 46 not out against Pakistan on a poor pitch at Queens Sports Club in Bulawayo, Stuart was promoted to open the batting in the Third Test in Harare. He scored a dogged 31 in almost three hours in the first innings, but failed to score in the second, so his introduction was at that stage only a partial success. He enjoyed a bit more success on the tour of New Zealand the following season, where in the second innings of the Second Test in Auckland he scored a fine 58, sharing an opening partnership of 120 with Grant Flower, then a record. But Dekker was preferred, perhaps because of his more ready availability, for the tours to Sri Lanka and Pakistan in 1996/97.

His Test career received a long-term setback during the England tour, as the visitors exploited his weakness against lifting balls on his body. He was twice out to close catches from such deliveries, and was dropped from the team. Being the man he was, he did not consider his international career to be over, as many did, but rather concentrated on this weakness and continued to tighten his technique.

He did not lose favour immediately, being selected for a triangular tournament in Sharjah in April 1997, but batting at six or seven while Craig Wishart was given the chance to prove himself as an opener. He was not altogether prepared for this tournament, getting a last-minute call-up from Durban, and class spin on helpful pitches saw his exclusion after the first two matches, although he puts it down as valuable experience. He feels he learnt a great deal about how to deal with spinners, handling their length as well as their line.

But for now he seemed to drop out of the selectors' minds. With the success of Gavin Rennie as Grant Flower's opening partner against New Zealand in 1997/98, the way back to international cricket was hard, especially as he was not available for cricket in Zimbabwe until November 1997. He eventually decided, following the advice of others, to return to the middle order to regain his place at international level, despite considerable competition for places in that area. He now found it suited him better to bat in the middle again; although he was still willing to open if desired, he finds the pressure less in the middle order and he feels greater freedom to play his shots.

At club level, he plays for Harare Sports Club, moving there initially after a year at Old Hararians so as to open the batting. He acknowledges the encouragement he receives there from senior players like Iain Butchart and Malcolm Jarvis, and also at national level from Dave Houghton and the Flower brothers.

Early on in his life as a student in South Africa, Stuart did not find it interfering unduly with his cricket. He made his decision to take his course before professionalism really came into cricket in Zimbabwe, and decided to try to get the best of both worlds, pursuing his diploma while playing cricket at the same time. After he was dropped from the Test team after the England tour, though, his absence made it harder for him to keep in the selectors' eyes and fight his way back, and he was unable to do so until the 1998/99 season. When he graduated, he considered the possibility of running his own business in retailing or import and export, perhaps with sporting goods, but these plans were put on hold when the Zimbabwe Cricket Union offered him a contract in November 1998.

Stuart, settled back in Harare, now dedicated himself to regaining his place in the national side. He scored well at club level, and also worked at improving his `little seamers', hopeful of adding another string to his bow. He soon won coach Dave Houghton to his side, impressing him with his tremendous determination and application. He continued to work at his back-foot play, adjusting his game and playing the cut more often, together with the occasional pull.

He had a consistent season in club cricket and was selected again for the Zimbabwe Board XI to bat at number four. He had never been forgotten at that level, and the previous season had scored 140 against Transvaal B in Johannesburg. He had an overall average of around 60 and was developing into a faster scorer, simply by working harder on his attacking strokes all round the wicket, and now his repertoire even included the reverse sweep.

He won selection for Zimbabwe A against the touring England A team, impressing them with some determined batting. In the rain-ruined first unofficial Test at Alexandra Sports Club, he achieved a notable feat by batting on all four days possible owing to the weather in compiling a frequently interrupted innings of 47. In the one-day series he scored 80 off 67 balls to put his team in a strong position, one they eventually wasted, and the tourists learnt to value his wicket highly, unlike their senior counterparts two years earlier. His recent record and even more his attitude regained him his place in the national team for the triangular tournament in Bangladesh and also the World Cup in England.

Success was hard to come by, though; he generally found himself batting at seven or even eight in the order, and if he got an innings he either had to hit out at all costs or fight to recover a difficult situation. Against weak opposition in Dhaka this was not too great an obstacle: he produced scores of 35 (off 43 balls), 43 off 48 and 42 off 29. But in the World Cup this was more of a problem and he did not succeed. The pressure appeared to stifle his ability at times, and he was heavily criticized for scoring only 14 off 38 balls against England at the death, when he seemed so devoid of strokes against the seamers of Alan Mullally that he several times offered no stroke to rising straight deliveries, even though Zimbabwe had an inadequate total and the overs were fast running out.

He lost his place after two further failures, but returned to the team at the start of the 1999/2000 season, to play in one-day tournaments in Singapore and Kenya, but scored only 52 runs in five innings down the order at number seven. This led to his being dropped again, but he was brought back against Sri Lanka, and the selectors finally gave him a chance at number four. In his second match he seized it with both hands, pulverising the bowling for a magnificent unbeaten 121 - which unfortunately failed to win the match for Zimbabwe, as the team's bowlers threw it away with a poor display.

Further failures were to follow at times, but at least he had proved just what he can do when given a reasonable opportunity. In the West Indies he regained his Test place, although at number seven again. He scored 44 in the Second Test, lost his place in England, and then regained it, batting at number three, when New Zealand toured Zimbabwe in September 2000, thanks to the departure of Murray Goodwin. He made a start to his innings but failed to carry it through, concentrating well but handicapped by the loss of form of Grant Flower and lack of confidence in the top order.

Another great one-day innings came in February 2001, when Zimbabwe took part in the triangular tournament in Australia. Set 303 to win in their final match, Zimbabwe fell only two runs short, with Stuart playing the major part by scoring a brilliant 119 off 145 balls. Earlier in the tournament he had hit Shane Warne for two sixes in an innings, and the bowler's anguished expletives were picked up by the stump microphone and widely quoted around the world.

His Test career continued to show a pattern of useful starts without ever going on to record a big score. He scored two fifties in India, but his finest innings was to come in the home Test match at Harare Sports Club in June 2001. India set Zimbabwe 157 to win, and Andy Flower was injured. Stuart went in at 25 for one and stayed until the end, with wickets falling steadily at the other end. Zimbabwe won a four-wicket victory that would almost certainly not have been achieved without Stuart's courageous and determined 62 not out under extreme pressure; no other batsman in the team passed 20.

Further advancement came the following season after Heath Streak's resignation as captain. With senior players unwilling to take on the job, Brian Murphy took over, and when he was injured the selectors hardly knew where to turn. Stuart was offered the job virtually by default. He kept it until the end of the season and by common agreement did an adequate job, but never felt he had the confidence of the selectors. His feeling was proven correct when Heath Streak was reappointed at the start of the 2002/03 season.

Stuart took over in Bangladesh when Murphy was injured, and became the first Zimbabwean captain to win his first Test match in charge, although this was no great achievement in view of the weak opposition. He followed it with a three-nil victory in the one-day series. Murphy was expected to return for the tour of Sri Lanka, but his recurrent injury handed the job to Stuart again. Against Muralitharan and a rampant Sri Lankan batting line-up, he had an impossible job. In the one-day series Zimbabwe were humiliated by being bowled out for a record low of 38; Stuart made 16, and nobody else more than 6.

At coach Geoff Marsh's suggestion he opened the batting again in the Third Test match, and his 64 of an opening stand of 153 with Trevor Gripper was his highest Test score, a fine fighting innings. In India he again raised his personal best to 77 in the First Test.

2002/03 was to be a disappointing season, though. He was overlooked for the captaincy and his batting lost form. He scored just 2 and 23 in the ICC Champions Trophy in Sri Lanka, and then after two unsuccessful matches in the Logan Cup lost his place in the Mashonaland team, guaranteeing he would not make the national side against Pakistan. Left in the cold, he responded with a fine club century, but was never in the frame for the World Cup.

Stuart's experiences do not make for building confidence and security. "I get too many thirties and forties," he says. "I'd love to turn those into bigger scores. I got myself out twice in the First Test [against New Zealand], so I need a little more patience and hope I get to a reasonable score, at least fifty first, before I try to be more innovative."

Stuart particularly admires the Waugh twins from Australia, but says, "I don't try to copy anyone in particular, but there are a lot of great cricketers out there, guys who average 45 or 50 in Test cricket." He has worked hard to tighten up his technique and concentrate again on his back-foot play, especially picking up the short ball. He is learning to play straighter, and in England studied how players like Mike Atherton and Alec Stewart were so adept at playing the ball late. "I know that's English conditions, with the slow pitches, but if you can do that on most pitches you are going to succeed," he said. "I learned, as opposed to pushing out as I think a lot of our players do, to play as late as I can, and that's helped me to keep my head still until the very last minute."

His main strength now, he feels, is in playing straight, although he remains a strong cutter of the ball. The best bowler he has faced, he thinks, is Wasim Akram, while he rates Darren Gough and Andy Caddick very highly as a pair.