Remember when: Taylor ends his drought

June 7, 1997. The third day of the first Ashes Test at Edgbaston, Birmingham, the end of one of modern cricket’s most storied batting slumps, and the beginning of a cathartic rebirth for Mark Taylor.

The Australia skipper landed on English soil as a man under the most intense media spotlight. His drought had extended out to some 18 months, and it was 21 innings since he’d even reached 50.

Critics had suggested his career was well and truly over, and that only his astute captaincy and peerless ability at first slip was keeping him in the side.

Upon his arrival in the UK, shameless British press presented Taylor with a metre-wide bat.

Taylor responded to the taunts in the most emphatic way possible.

His side trailing by 360 on the first innings, Taylor walked to the crease under all sorts of pressure.

“We were miles behind in the game, so we needed to get off to a good start,” he recalled for cricket.com.au.

“Fortunately we did that.”

Taylor, alongside fellow centurion Greg Blewett, was instrumental in what was ultimately a losing cause. Yet if there has ever been a time when a century was valuable in spite of the match’s outcome, this was it.

“There were a couple of shots off my legs early on that got me going,” he recalled.

“I’d been caught at second slip in the first innings playing quite an expansive drive, and I thought to myself I needed to tighten up and just get back to my original game plan, which was always to leave the ball wide of off stump early on and make them bowl to me.

“It also probably helped that England were so far in front in the game, because they attacked the stumps more, and bowled a lot straighter. So I just waited until I got a few on my pads and I was able to flick the ball into the on-side a lot more.

“I made 50 off about 60-odd balls – it happened really quickly.

“I didn’t play many memorable strokes, but just being able to clip a few off the toes allowed me to start scoring quicker and I was able to get that monkey off my back.”

Australia went behind one-nil in the series, but fought back to retain the Ashes for the second time under Taylor’s leadership. 

The former skipper recalled just how maligned he had been – and could only empathise as he watched his successors travel down the same painful route.

“I’ve seen it with Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting since,” he added.

Quick Single: Waugh's last ball century

“(A bad run of form) is difficult for any player, but particularly the captain, because you’re doing media every day or every second day, and you’re constantly being asked the same questions: ‘How’s your form?’ ‘How important is it for you to get runs and lead by example?’

“You get these questions over and over, and there’s no doubt that eventually it just weighs you down.

“You’re trying to stay positive, you’re trying to say all the right things, but it gets to you after a while.”

Taylor’s Edgbaston century proved a turning point in the left-hander’s career, as he managed a century in each of the next four Test series in which he played.

“The next year I had one of my best years in Test cricket,” he said.

“It just tailed off at the end of the Ashes series in Australia in 1998-99, and it was then that I realised it was time for me to give the game away.

“I’d had a tough time in ’97, a really good time in ’98, but then I was starting to wane again, and I thought, ‘Well I’ve either got to step it up again, and find another level in my play, or, if I’m not prepared to do that sort of work, I have to get out’.

“I knew then and there it was time to get out.”