Kevin Sharp on the making of Joe Root, England’s double record run-scorer

It is, when you think about it, a remarkable double, and now all eyes are on whether Root can overtake Sachin Tendulkar’s Test record of 15,921 (he has 13,006 and will turn 35 years old in December).

For Kevin Sharp, the former Yorkshire batting coach, who played a key role in Root’s early development, there was always something special about Joe.

“I remember him walking through the door as a 12-year-old at Headingley,” says Sharp. “He’d been put on a scholarship by the junior coaches - no more than some free kit and a bit of recognition - and if anyone was on a scholarship, I’d invite them in, make them feel welcome, do a bit of a session with them.

“I’d arranged to meet Joe at five o’clock one evening. His dad, Matthew, was bringing him from school. I was working with ‘Mags’ (former Yorkshire batsman and current head coach Anthony McGrath) from four till five. Unbeknown to me, Joe and his dad turned up early and were watching from the balcony my session with ‘Mags’, which was very intense.

“Anyway, Mags went, I met Joe, and his dad left him with me. I took him into the office, we got chatting, and it was like, I don’t know, it was just different, something I’d never experienced before.

"It was like chatting to an adult, like he already knew his strengths, weaknesses, what he needed to work on. I remember thinking, ‘Wow, this is a bit special.’ I thought, ‘If you can bat as well as you can talk, you’re going to be ok.’”

Sharp took the youngster into the nets.

“I said, ‘Right, what do you want me to do?’ He looked straight at me and said, ‘I want you to challenge me.’ And I’m like, ‘What?’ I said, ‘What do you mean?’ He said, ‘I want the same session Anthony McGrath’s just had’, which was basically a new-ball session with me hurling short stuff at ‘Mags’ from about eight yards, really tough, challenging stuff.

“I said, ‘I can’t do that, I’ll hurt you’, and Joe said, ‘No, I’ll be alright’, this cute little smile on his face. And my beans were going. I'm thinking, ‘This is different, I've not experienced this before.’

“I said, ‘Alright, get your kit on, your protective gear, because I’m coming for you’. I said, ‘I’m going to tell you something now. I'm not going to be your friend for the next 15 minutes. Do you understand that?’ He goes, ‘Oh, yeah, that's alright.’

“So I gave him a few with the new ball and he left it, he defended late, he played it beautifully and I thought, ‘This kid can play.’ And then this little voice said, ‘Bounce him, let him have one.’ And then this other voice said, ‘You can’t, you can’t. If you hit him on the head you’ll get sacked. You’ll knock him out. There’ll be a 12-year-old kid laid out on the floor with an ambulance coming for him.’ I thought, ‘Sod it.’

“So I let him have one, and it was a beauty, this bouncer. He rocked back and it clipped the grille of his helmet on the way through. I followed through and I'm glaring at him, staring at his face. He just looked at me and said, ‘Ooh, that were a good ball, weren't it?’, as though nothing had happened. I’m like, ‘Wow.’”

More than 20 years on, Sharp, 66, sounds stunned even now. A left-hander good enough to score more than 13,000 runs for Yorkshire between the late 1970s and early 1990s, he knew a player when he saw one, going on to become head coach of Worcestershire and helping cricketers of many different standards.

“After that session, I went back to the office and I said to Ian Dews, who was then Academy director, that this kid will open the batting for Yorkshire one day. ‘That’s a big statement to make for a 12-year-old,’ ‘Dewsy’ replied, but Joe did, didn’t he, and then he went on to do a lot more besides.”

Another memory plays strongly in Sharp’s mind, once more highlighting Root’s bravery and his desire to prepare for the next level, the next challenge.

Yorkshire were in Barbados on a pre-season tour, the 12-year-old now a relative veteran in his late teens as he worked towards a first-team debut.

“We were at the 3Ws ground in Barbados and he took me into this old little shed, which had a concrete floor, and it was dark, really dark, with just some fluorescent lights,” says Sharp.

“I said, ‘Right, what are we doing?’ He goes, ‘All you’ve got to do is run in as fast as you can and hit me on the head.’ So I said, ‘Alright, I can do that.’ It was like he wanted to prepare for playing against the West Indies one day down the line.

“Anyway, I ran in and I’m not kidding, you’ve never seen anything like it. I hit him really hard. On the badge. On the grille. I hit him in the throat. I hit him everywhere. And every time I hit him, I followed through. We did it properly. I glared at him. I swore at him. We had such a great relationship by then. I said, ‘I’m going to f***ing kill you.’ He just blew kisses at me, smiling.

“Afterwards, I said, ‘I did what you asked, I hit you on the head. He said, ‘Yes, you did, but you didn’t get me out, did you?’”

Sharp - who left Yorkshire in 2011 after a coaching reshuffle, a year before Root made his Test debut - helped the protege through good times and bad.

A particularly challenging period came when Root had a growth spurt during his late teens.

Having been, in his own words, “a short-arse” who could “never really get the ball off the square”, the sudden spurt threw his batting out of sync and he struggled to make runs. He kept falling over at the crease and getting out lbw.

“Lads used to call him ‘Bambi’,” laughs Sharp, “because he’d fall over all the time, even when he was walking down the street. He was always, you know, this tiny little kid and then suddenly his legs became right long and his balance went all over the place.

“One day, at Headingley, after he’d got out lbw for about the 10th time on the trot in the second team, he was sat there in the dressing room, head down for about 40 minutes. Eventually, I said, ‘You alright?’ He goes, ‘You know, it was really weird today. When I was batting, I could feel myself growing.’

“But once he’d got through the growth spurt and found his body, if you like, it was never a problem because the mental side of things was always there. That difficult time was good for Joe. It helped to prepare him for challenges ahead.”

The rest, as they say, is history - of the most glorious and wonderful kind. Once Root had found, says Sharp, a pre-delivery movement that helped him to get much better into the ball, to prevent him nicking-off, to complement an already strong back-foot game due to his initial short size, there was never any doubt the Sheffielder would soar.

“For me, the real key is the mental skills,” says Sharp. “Lots of people can play cricket, are good at cricket, but do they know how to make a hundred, how to make a hundred under pressure?

“It’s what I call teacup (T-CUP - Thinking Clearly Under Pressure). During Covid, I wrote something about the skills needed to become a great player, and we used it at the Worcester Academy. I covered lots of things - fitness, strength and conditioning, psychological skills, you name it, and I messaged Joe and said, ‘Would you give me some feedback, please?’

“He messaged back and said the one thing that resonated with him was the part about thinking clearly under pressure and making the right decisions when you’re out there batting. For me, that’s the biggest difference between those who make it and those who don’t quite go all the way.”

Root was one of those who “went all the way”, so far that he went into the Test series against India needing another 373 runs to leapfrog Rahul Dravid, Jacques Kallis and Ricky Ponting to go second on the all-time run-scoring list behind Tendulkar.

“To become our greatest run-scorer in Tests and also one-day internationals is a remarkable achievement,” says Sharp, “and it’s nice to sit there and watch him and think that you’ve played a very small part in his development.

“He still keeps in touch and whenever I see him, we have a good chat. It’s just the whole package, the player and the man. He cares about his team-mates, he wants others to do well, and he’s as unassuming now as when I first met him.”

Root, in turn, has not forgotten Sharp or the influence he had.

He is grateful to everyone who has helped him on the way.

“When he was about 14, I said to him one day, just as a bit of banter, ‘You won’t forget me when you’re playing for England, will you?’. And he says, ‘Oh no, I’ll never forget you.’

“I said, ‘I want two tickets on the gate at Lord’s left for me, full hospitality. I want looking after, Joe. I want everything, the works.’

“And it’s amazing how it worked out because when he first got picked for England, I got a message from him saying, ‘Are you coming to Lord’s to fulfil our deal?’ But I’d just gone to Worcester and I had to turn him down.

“Anyway, every year he messaged me for four years, and I turned him down four times. I just couldn’t do it because I was a full-time head coach. Then, when his little son was born around Christmas-time, I messaged him and just said, ‘Congratulations, mate.’

“He sent me a picture back of a little lad with a miniature cricket bat, about one week old, and then at the bottom the words, ‘Are you coming to Lord’s this year?” And I thought, do you know what, I’ve got to do this now.

“So I looked at the calendar, and England were playing South Africa, first Test at Lord’s, fourth of June, or something like that. I messaged back and said, ‘Right, it's in the diary, fourth of June, Lord’s, England versus South Africa. Two hospitality tickets, please, the full monty.

“Anyway, a few weeks later, Alastair Cook retired from the captaincy and who was made captain? Joe Root. And what was his first game as Test captain? England versus South Africa at Lord’s. Amazing.

“So me and Jan, my wife, went down to Lord’s, sat with Joe’s family and had a great day. I must have had about 10 pints. Anyway, Joe got 180. He batted all day, and it just couldn’t have been any more special.

“If that isn't whatever it is, fate, then I don’t know what is.”