It was 25 years ago that Mark Butcher scored a monumental 173 not out in England’s successful chase against Australia in the Headingley Test. He scored seven other Test hundreds, some of them against the most fearsome attacks. He is now a popular commentator and sharp analyst of the game. Excerpts from Butcher’s exclusive interview with The Hindu at Lord’s:

Your comparison of Vaibhav Sooryavanshi with Garry Sobers earlier this year got a lot of attention. It was fascinating, how you proved, through the help of visuals, the similarities in the bat swing, hand speed…

I watched him make that 175 [off 80 balls] in the Under-19 World Cup final [against England at Harare]. I was struck by that incredible, long, high backlift, the huge follow-through, the complete circle almost where the bat finishes around, tapping him on the spine. You know, Sobers used to hit a lot of shots with his feet together. He would play full balls almost off the back foot. And Sooryavanshi can hit them like that too.

Even if his career ends up not reaching the expectations that other people have, which I think is very unlikely, he has still in the IPL done something that all of the greatest players up until now have never, ever done: none of them have managed to score at a strike-rate of 230, hit that many sixes, be that consistent in the entirety of the IPL. It is still one of the most remarkable things I have ever seen.

Today’s youngsters are exposed to T20 from the beginning, whereas when I was very young, it was Test matches. They grow up thinking about batting very much in a hyper aggressive mode. These younger guys can do things at their age that we wouldn’t have dreamt of at ours.

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Yes, even Sachin Tendulkar didn’t hit as many sixes, for all his genius. Sooryavanshi is a product of the T20 era of cricket.

Correct. So he will have to learn the game the other way around. He will have to learn how to bat time, to defend. In our generation, it was the opposite. We would have to spend a lot of time learning how to hit the ball.

How do you recall your masterpiece — 173 not out in 2001?

My main memory is about that summer, really. I wasn’t expecting to play Test cricket again. I got an opportunity and I played 42 Tests in a row. I had completely changed my game.

Your father helped, didn’t he?

That is right. The biggest thing I remember is the relationship I had with my dad in the winter of 2001. I called him and said, ‘Dad, I am hating playing cricket.’ Something that I had always loved. Now I was hating it. And I said to him — ‘Treat me as though I have never played the game before.’ So we went right back to the beginning. He really taught me how to hold the bat, how to stand, the whole thing. We changed my grip. We changed my stance. We changed my backlift. Everything. We went back to zero. Like I was five years old. And we worked like that for about three months. And then I luckily got back into the team. I had made a few runs playing for Surrey. A few injuries in the England camp before the Ashes started, and I got in.

How much does that knock, which came against Glenn McGrath, Shane Warne, Brett Lee and Jason Gillespie, mean to you?

Ah, it was huge. You wouldn’t be talking to me if it hadn’t been for that. And I wouldn’t be working in TV either. So that innings changed everything. It was the greatest day.

And how was the coach’s reaction?

I know my dad was in tears when [BBC] Test Match Special called him up.

The players you like to watch these days?

I actually love watching K.L. Rahul. I think he is a sensational player. Really classy. Harry Brook is fabulous to watch when he is in. Joe Root, too. And Travis Head — you can’t take your eyes off the screen when he is batting.

You have played against some of the greatest bowlers in history. Who were the most challenging among them?

Blimey! Curtly Ambrose. Him and Courtney Walsh. And then you had, obviously, Shane Warne. Glenn McGrath. Murali [Muttiah Muralitharan].

Among the Indians?

Harbhajan [Singh] and [Anil] Kumble, on those tracks.

And the batters you admired?

[Brian] Lara was sort of the king around about those times. Fellow left-hander, so I greatly admired him. Then the guys like [Ricky] Ponting, Sachin [Tendulkar], obviously. I remember applauding Ricky from second slip at the WACA, much to the annoyance of Nasser Hussain, who was standing next to me at slip. He glared at me. I was just standing there going, ‘Oh man, that’s good’. There were a lot of great players around, like the South Africans, Jacques Kallis and Graeme Smith.

Is there cause for concern about the future of Test cricket?

Yeah, of course, there is. What you would like is to have eight to ten teams who are competing on a level playing field. If only England, Australia and India are playing each other, the game is starting to eat itself, you know.

Eventually, one of the great things about all of the series that go around is that you are anticipating and you are excited about the idea about playing this team at this venue. But if it is the same three teams the whole time, it is not that exciting.

What has happened in the modern era is that the gap between the countries that have plenty of finances and the rest has got wider. The competition has perhaps thinned out a little bit in recent times. And that is a huge shame, that finances have meant that a lot of countries, the West Indies, being the most obvious example simply because of their dominance [in the past], have suffered.

South Africa are kind of hanging in there. They are still producing a lot of players and they still manage just about to keep enough of their most talented players to play Tests. But in places like Sri Lanka and the West Indies, they find it very difficult to keep their best players who disappear off to earn more money playing T20. And that is a problem for the world game.

The First Class game and the structures that produce Test Match cricketers are strong in some places and not very strong at all in others.

Your thoughts on Bazball?

I have been critical of it at times. In the game of cricket, the Test match is the game. And they tried to do something that was going to take the game to a different place. But Test match cricket kind of fought against it a little bit. Because when it came down to it, in the big games against the likes of India and Australia, it didn’t work. And so, Test match cricket is kind of greater than any idea that people might have around how you play it.

And Test cricket is the greatest form of sport.

It is. The sport itself dictates to you what is necessary. And if you push too hard, the game will bite you back. And that is what happened. There is as much pleasure to be taken from a really hard-fought draw sometimes as there is from smashing it all over the park.

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The women got to play a Test at Lord’s, finally.

This has come about because the world has decided, well, you know, this is a great game of cricket, right? Why would we want to stop 50% of the world’s population from enjoying and playing the sport that we think is a great sport? And so that opportunity is now there and what you are seeing is a product of that.

Players in the women’s game that you enjoy watching?

I like Smriti Mandhana’s batting. She is just an incredibly graceful player. So easy on the eye. Very, very lovely to watch. She plays pace and spin equally well. She reminds me of David Gower, in fact. Harmanpreet Kaur is very good to watch, too. And Jemimah Rodrigues is a fine technician.

Besides cricket, music is your other passion. And you had the opportunity of performing with Sarah Brightman, one of the greatest voices of our time.

It was good fun, singing some of Sarah’s favourite songs on live television. It was kind of nerve-racking, but it was good.

Curtly Ambrose is a huge fan of Jasprit Bumrah and despite the Indian spearhead’s struggles with stress fractures in the past, the Caribbean legend would not want to change anything in his unorthodox action as he feels every fast bowler takes the field with a risk of getting injured. Bumrah, arguably the best all-format pacer in the game right now, has had his fair share of back problems and underwent a surgery in March last year. After a long rehab, Bumrah made a comeback ahead of the ODI World Cup in India in November and he has not looked back since then.

The 30-year-old can get wickets in a T20 at any stage of the game and in the longest format, he has the ability to strike with both the new and the old ball, more so when it is reversing.

In a telephonic interview with PTI, Ambrose said Bumrah should not change a thing unless he sustains a serious injury.

“What I can tell you something about Jasprit Bumrah, I’m a big fan. Right from ever since I saw him the first time. He’s so unconventional but highly effective. And that’s what I like about him. When you look at traditional fast bowlers, you wouldn’t look at Bumrah, he’s so unorthodox.

“He has done a great job for India and still doing a great job in all formats. I met him a couple of years ago when India played in Antigua. He’s someone I’ve always enjoyed watching because he’s so different,” said Ambrose who is involved with promoting the ongoing T20 World Cup here.

Bumrah’s open-chested action does put pressure on his back but Ambrose believes every fast bowler has to deal with risks like that.

“From my little experience, there are no two bowlers who are exactly alike. Bowlers may have similarities but they are never exactly alike and we all have our different styles everyone is different.

“In terms of his longevity, in terms of injuries, (for) every fast bowler, there is always risk of being injured. But at the same time you can’t go out there thinking that way.

“You’ve got to go out there and do the job to the best of your ability and whatever happens, happens. The only way he should change is if he, may be, sustains a serious injury or has to re-model his action or something,” said the 60-year-old who played 98 Tests for the West Indies taking 405 wickets.

Ambrose, who troubled the world’s best batters with the extra bounce he created because of his 6″7′ frame, also doesn’t believe that the stress on Bumrah’s back is only because of his action.

“I’ve never been through it (stress fracture). So it would be unfair for me to even try to say what to do. I will leave that for the medical expert. I don’t think Bumrah’s stress comes totally from his action.

“You can look at Ian Bishop, he had a perfect action and he also had stress fracture,” reasoned the cricketer from Antigua.

Too much cricket being played, Test cricket is real cricket

The international calendar is busier than ever before with T20 leagues around the world taking a lot of space. Ambrose acknowledged that the game has changed drastically and too much cricket is having an adverse impact.

“The game has become a bit more commercialised. Too much cricket is being played as well. Players are leaving from one series to the next, there is franchise cricket as well. Guys could get burnt out.

“It’s still exciting, there are wonderful players around but too much cricket is being played and that to me would be a bit of a concern,” said Ambrose.

You can only get legendary status by excelling in Tests

The fearsome pacer from Antigua played plenty of limited overs cricket but for him Test cricket is the only format that produces legends.

“I’ve always preferred Test match cricket over anything else. I’ve played ODIs, I’ve played four-day cricket, but for me it isn’t international cricket. Test match cricket for me is a real cricket.

“I believe at the end of a career, if you’ve been judged, if you want to become a legend, you have to play Test cricket. You would not become a legend playing ODIs or T20s. There is talk about Tests dying, I don’t really think so.

“…the powers that be, need to do something to make Test match cricket a little more attractive and we’re going to be okay. But Test match cricket is not going anywhere,” he asserted.

Ambrose was at his peak in the 1990s and relished his battles against the likes of Sachin Tendulkar. In modern-day cricket, he would have loved to test himself against Virat Kohli, Joe Root, Babar Azam and Kane Williamson.

“When I played, I thrived on challenges. In every team, there were at least a handful of great batsmen. And you know, with a reputation as well. So for me, they tend to bring the best out of me when I play.

“To dismiss them, gives me more pleasure than dismissing numbers 9, 10, 11. You talk about these guys, they are great players (Kohli and Co). It would be nice to play against them but having said that, I’ve played against some greats in my time as well,” he said.

On the ongoing T20 World Cup, he is happy to see the smaller teams like teh USA and Afghanistan surprising the biggies of the game.

“Well, prior to the start of the World Cup, I predicted some upsets and so far we’ve seen a few. So, I am quite happy for that, it makes the tournament more interesting as opposed to all of the big teams just running away,” added Ambrose.