In sport talent alone is not enough. Even when it is coupled with character there is no guarantee that a player will make it. If you don't believe me, turn to page 158 of the new Wisden Almanack.
RETIREMENTS it reads CAREER FIGURES – Players not expected to appear in county cricket in 2011. Run your finger down through the fine print to 'S'.
B.M. Shafayat M 119 Runs 5,828 HS 161 100s 9 Avge 30.04. There was a time when they used to call Bilal Shafayat 'Billy Sapphire' around the County Ground at Trent Bridge because he was such a gem of a player. And it wasn't all that long ago. He is only 26 now. He should be in the prime of his career. He could have been playing for England. But last Saturday the man who was once described by the Daily Telegraph as "the most naturally talented English batsman since David Gower" was batting at first drop for the Birmingham club Wellington against Knowle and Dorridge in the first round of the Williamson Trophy.
How did it come to this?
"I have natural talent," Shafayat says. "But that only takes you so far. It is really a mental game, and I suppose that is what I am going through at the moment. What's happened over the years, it has been tough. It has been a period of maturing, growing up and, to be honest with you, of becoming an adult." They say this could be a golden age for English cricket, that there have rarely been so many talented young players coming through around the circuit. Everywhere you look there are young twentysomethings scoring runs and teenagers taking wickets. They would all have a lot to learn from Shafayat's story.
"I sort of knew that Notts were going to let me go halfway through last season," Shafayat says. "I had a very good start [he made 159 against Durham MCCU], and some of the senior players were coming up to me saying 'you could get 10 first-class hundreds this year'. That's no word of a lie. I was feeling brilliant. But I had six games where I wasn't able to get a big score. Then I was left out.
"In the second team I did very well, I got three big hundreds straight away," Shafayat remembers. "There was a chance to get back in to the first team but the manager overlooked me and picked a youngster. And then I thought, 'Yeah, maybe I've just missed the boat. I think I know where this is heading.'" Where it was heading was the manager's office, and one of the most difficult conversations of Shafayat's career. "I hope things work out, Billy, and all the best for your future career."
Shafayat is a good guy. As the Notts coach Mick Newell said when the club let him go, "his attitude and approach have been exemplary". Shafayat is honest enough to admit the truth. "If I had scored enough runs in the last two years Notts would have kept me. It was black and white with them. 'If you perform you stay, and if you don't you go'. There was no real flexibility or any leniency in it. And in the last two years I did not score enough runs."
That did not make it any easier to accept. "Me being me, I had always been the first pick of every side from a very young age," Shafayat says. "But this was like being left against the wall as the last boy to be picked for a school football team. Hearing those words, 'All the best for your career', that's not nice."
If you know your cricket, you will know that Shafayat is not just another county pro who could not quite cut it. Eight years ago he was the captain of England Under-19s, and, as the BBC said at the time, "one of the most exciting talents in English cricket". There were a lot of good players in his Under-19 team: Alastair Cook, Tim Bresnan, Luke Wright, Samit Patel, Ravi Bopara, Liam Plunkett. Shafayat was the star.
In 2001 he became the youngest Championship player in Nottinghamshire's history when he played against Middlesex. Aged only 16 he came in at No5, just after some whippersnapper called Kevin Pietersen had been trapped lbw by Phil Tufnell. 177 balls later he was bending down to kiss the turf to celebrate his fifty. It was an ostentatious flourish, typical of a young man who had every right to be cocksure about his talent.
In 2002 his star grew brighter still. He made 118 and 201 not out in a single U-19 Test against India. In 2003 he led England U-19s to Australia. In the first Test at Adelaide produced an all-round performance for the ages. In the first innings he scored 108 out of 331. In the second he added 66 out of 366. And in the fourth he took six for 54 with his brisk medium pace. "He stood head-and-shoulders above his team-mates" said Wisden. "He won the Test almost single-handedly, driving like a dream." A nation which had been starved of success against Australia for over a decade had seen the future.
And it looked glorious. The next year he was picked for an England 'A' tour. The test started right after he got back from that 'A' Tour. Notts gave him a single first-class game that year, at the fag end of the season. "I was 20. They wanted me to be patient. I was told to be patient and my chance would come." Things are different now. The circuit is full of younger players being given early opportunities, simply because the ECB now gives extra funds to the counties to pick players who are under 25. Shafayat is 26. Sides who claim to be adhering to noble ideals by fostering young talent are not being entirely honest about their motivations. "Now it seems slightly different. It's the wrong time to be over 25 because there is a financial incentive for counties to play under-25s."
If that system had been in place in 2004, Shafayat's career might not have taken the twist it did. Frustrated by the lack of opportunity at Notts, he moved to Northamptonshire to work with Keppler Wessels. After two solid seasons there, ("1,000 runs in my first year, and just under 1,000 in the second when I was doubling up as wicketkeeper") he was lured back to his old club after being promised a shot at nailing down the No4 slot in the order. That never really materialised.
Instead he was pushed up to open, a tough job at Trent Bridge, where the ball moves about so much early on. Even then he was being talked about as a future England player, frequently tipped as the one to watch in the season previews. But two sound seasons were followed by two lean ones. He scored in stutters and splurts, his form slumped. The journalists found new players to fete.
All these thoughts are still fresh in his mind. When I called him he seemed almost to second-guess why I wanted to talk to him. For the first time in nine years he is starting a season without any kind of county contract. And he has been asking himself the same questions that I wanted to put to him.
"I'm still figuring out what I struggled with," Shafayat admits. "I think I'll learn over the next 12 to 18 months. From what I can gather at the moment, it was doing it over and over again under the immense pressure that I felt was on myself in every game. That was it more than anything. It felt as if every game was so important, and as though I was playing for my spot. When you're young you compete with others without knowing it, but you're certainly not put under any extra pressure by the management or by people around you. But the expectations grow as you get older. People expect you to perform day-in, day-out."
That may sound a legitimate explanation to you and me, but Shafayat's self-diagnosis is more complicated. If this reads like he is feeling sorry for himself, it should not, because he does not. "Sportsmen thrive under pressure. I enjoyed that pressure. But it also takes a toll, especially if you are not performing. It is a domino effect. You go from one innings to another thinking 'oh, there's another performance that I have missed out on.' You don't get time to step away from it all and try and correct the mistakes you are making."
Right now, Shafayat seems a little lonely. Not in his family life; he has a wife and three children, the youngest of them two weeks old. But lonely professionally. "There are times in county cricket at certain counties when there are not enough helping hands there to teach you, to show you where you are going wrong. Up to 19 I felt I was fearless and had all the talent in the world. Things came very easy. But then there is a point where you do become an adult and people expect you to perform at that level all the time. There is no manual that anyone gives you. Sometimes you have to work things out for yourself. And sometimes that takes a while. The support outside cricket has been brilliant. Within the circuit, that's where you find out who your friends are."
Nobody loves you when you're down and out. All of a sudden a lot of the things he took for granted as a pro, such as his kit sponsors, have gone. "I understand that. Everything is a business. They are only with you while it benefits them. And I guess the same goes for some journalists as well. That's the way the world works. But you see friends leaving you, or the people you thought were friends at that time when you were doing well. I guess that's the way it works in sport and in life generally, and those are the times when you have to stay strong. And you realise who your friends are."
High up among those friends is the Professional Cricketers' Association. "I can't speak out enough for them. They have been phenomenal, telling me where to go, who to speak to, what to do, getting things back on the road, how to start earning again. And they give me hope, they remind me that I am only 26, so if I can get another place now, there's eight to 10 years of cricket left in me, and within that I still think I can play international cricket. That keeps me going."
This winter Shafayat was playing for Habib Bank in Pakistan, playing alongside the likes of Azhar Mahmood, Younis Khan and Shahid Afridi. "It has given me a different angle, a different view of my career. I feel as if I have moved forward in my own game." He is a devout Muslim, always has been, and along with the players' union and his family, it is his faith that has helped him stay strong. He also loves boxing, and has taken inspiration from his heroes there. "Look at Ali, at Tyson. I read books about them, and they motivate me. If you go down it is a matter of coming back.
"Everything is a blessing in disguise, I really believe that. What I am going through now is for the better. It will become part of me. I am 26. I'm not exactly where I wanted to be, or where I was heading to be with my career when I was young. But this has sure made me a lot hungrier to succeed." His optimism is impressive. But bubbling underneath it there seems to be some self doubt. There is bound to be.
But he is battling it, keeping it at bay. "If I had signed another contract at Notts maybe I would have carried on making the same mistakes." With county finances as they are, it is going to be hard to find a new club. Shafayat knows that. "I used to have offers coming left, right and centre, but it is not exactly the same now." But in a way he is one of the luckier ones. He is fit, and has his family, his faith and his talent. A lot of good cricketers get released and don't have those things to fall back on. This week he is playing a trial match for the Sussex second XI against Middlesex. He has played one game for them already this season, making 51 and 141 against the Somerset seconds.
"They've called me for a second look, which is positive", he says. "It will be fine. It will be fine." I sense he is telling himself that as much as he is telling me. "God willing, everything will work out if I keep working hard. God is watching and he does reward you for your efforts. Whatever happens over the years, hopefully my claim to fame won't just be my Under-19s career. I am sure there is a lot more to come."
Wish him luck. He will need it. Because in sport talent alone is not enough.
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