导出博客文章Keaton Jennings prolific form last summer has earned him his first experience
with England Lions but, even as he relishes his opportunities at the
Loughborough national performance centre, he is wrestling with the dilemma of
whether to abandon his career with crisis-ridden Durham. On one hand lies his
natural sense of loyalty, on the other the notion that an England career is not
too far away. He has some agonising ahead.Jennings has held several exploratory
conversations with Durham about the possibility of captaining them in at least
one limited-overs format, with Paul Collingwood, at 41, retaining the role in
the Championship. There have been a couple of discussions about captaincy but
nothing has been decided - not from Collys point of view either - but there have
been discussions, he said.Jennings freely admits that his future remains
uncertain following the enforced relegation of Durham to Division Two of the
Championship, and the issue of points deductions, by the ECB as punishment for
the bailout they required from central funds to avoid bankruptcy. Strict
financial controls over forthcoming years question whether they can remain able
to compete.It was a wholly different world when Jennings signed a four-year
contract and he is adamant that the changed circumstances, in which Durham have
also been reconstituted as a community interest company under the chairmanship
of Sir Ian Botham, leave him entitled to leave should he so wish. The exact
nature of that escape route has not yet been revealed.I was slightly worried
when I signed the contract about players staying but at the time I had to make a
call and put my head on the block, Jennings admitted. It has been a long summer
and I have a lot of thinking to do over the next two or three weeks and a lot of
conversations to have.Warwickshire and Yorkshire will be among a clutch of
counties monitoring the situation, but they may have to wait a while longer.
Jennings, preparing for a Lions trip to Dubai, has other matters on his mind.At
the moment I am really excited to be here with the Lions and I really want to
focus on that first. It is the first time I have been involved with the ECB in
any format and mostly I am trying to enjoy the next couple of weeks. At the end
of the day everything is open. I am not saying I would like to leave because I
love Durham and I love the guys at Durham.It is a challenging time for him. Much
as England seek to plan their international pathway, Jennings, who came close to
selection for the Test tour to India - a surfeit of left-handers did not help
his cause - has suddenly sprung to prominence, much as have Ben Duckett and
Haseeb Hameed, whose international careers are already underway. Duckett has
emerged, too, from Division Two of the Championship. Does Jennings think he
could do that? Youd better ask the selectors, he said.Strikingly, Jennings
negotiated his contract without the help of an agent, which makes him a rare
individual in modern-day professional sport, especially as a player with
realistic international ambitions.At first meeting he is a genial sort, not
immediately recognisable as the son of Ray Jennings, a former South Africa
wicketkeeper who gained a reputation as a hard disciplinarian during his
coaching years. Clearly, though, he has a similar appetite for self-sufficiency
and between them father and son negotiated the contract that might yet hold the
key to his future. He has no regrets.I learned quite a lot about myself during
the process. It was interesting to call up people and have some hard
conversations: in terms of who is the coach going to be, who are the senior
players going to be, what role would I play?If I had given that job to an agent
I wouldnt have learned as much about myself and made the contacts and friends
that I have made. It has been an interesting year in a lot of respects but at
the time it was the right call definitely.I have had a few friends and members
of the family say we think you are a little bit crazy but I enjoy being hands
on. I think my Dad enjoyed it as well. It gave him a little hobby.News of
Durhams plight broke in early October when he was back in South Africa,
labouring through an accounting exam for which he knew, due to the daily grind
of the county circuit, he was not remotely prepared.It was the day I walked into
an auditing exam. Id walked into it having not finished my coursework - during
the cricket season you tend to run out of time - and I think I failed the exam
which didnt help but thats life. Then I walked out of the exam to the news. It
is sad what has happened but at the end of the day the guys have got to face the
facts I suppose and come back from there.As players we didnt have too much of an
idea about the extent of what was going on. I suppose there were the previous
years financial statements we could have looked at but I dont think we realised
the extent it was at. At the end of the day I am not experienced enough to sit
down and analyse those statements but those are the sanctions that have been
given and unfortunately that is what we have to live with.During the season
there was no talk. There were fears that it was not as financially stable as
being said but at the end of the day we didnt think we werent going to get paid
or the club was going to deteriorate as quickly as the media had perceived. From
a players point of view we thought that everything was alright. When you are in
the changing room it was a bit of a bubble and you end up caught within your 15
guys and that is your bubble.Jennings is quick to give much of the credit for
keeping spirits high while rumours swirled to Collingwood, who along with the
head of the academy and former coach, Geoff Cook, has become symbolic of the
good things in Durham cricket while mismanagement has happened all around them
and the general economic difficulties pervading the northeast have done their
worstCollingwood is a huge influence in terms of social aspects, of vision and
of drive, Jennings said. At 40 years old now - he will be 41 next year - he is
one of the hardest trainers. After a days play he goes in the gym and he sets a
standard of what is expected of you as a professional but then he will go away
from cricket and really enjoy his time as well and educate the guys away from
cricket about how they got that balance.There is no sense that Jennings is now
holding Durham to ransom over the captaincy that Collingwood has fulfilled with
such vigour. He recoils at the notion. No, not at all. I have never been a guy
to put a club under the pump, to say if you dont give me the captaincy I am
going to leave. That is not who I am. For me whatever is right for the team must
happen. If it is right for a team that I will captain I will captain. If it is
not right then I am more than happy to play a supporting role.In his early years
at Durham, watching Jennings bat could be a taxing duty. He was a stilted
left-hander, wary of stroke, concentrating largely on survival, especially on
the demanding pitches at Chester-le-Street. Last summer, though, something
clicked. It was more than just the natural progression of a career. His 1548
Championship runs, with seven centuries, spoke of higher ambitions. His
improvement had its roots in some prolonged self-analysis when he questioned
whether his cricketing obsession was becoming self-destructive.It was a special
year for a lot of respects, he said. I suppose it was down to a slight change of
mindset. I had been chatting to my uncle, who was a sports psychologist, over
the winter and he went through a process of trying to help be more positive and
on the back of that finding happiness and thinking Am I really happy playing
cricket or am I happy doing something else? I am generally too
attention-to-detail for my own good sometimes.I sat down with my dad and got a
bit of happiness outside cricket and I think off the back of that it kind of
helped me out. I put a bit more energy into my studies - I am studying financial
accounting - although I have deferred it another year and I will finish in
2018.Then within that I did a bit of coaching, spent a little time with my niece
and nephew so outside of cricket I had a bit of balance in my life instead of
just being all-out cricket: gym, train, go to the ground. I played a bit of
golf, enjoyed a beer and I suppose had good downtime with family.Which neatly
introduces the topic of his father. When he was coach of South Africa, Jennings
was once called by the Telegraph this rabid disciplinarian with his bristling
moustache. His perfectionism was taken as read, his demands high, his honesty
searing. His son, eager to build a cricketing career, looks on it all with
equanimity.My girlfriend says we have been watered down through the generations,
he laughed. My dad is very - harsh is the wrong word - he is very stern, he is
very firm. He is a huge professional and this is how he puts food on the table
for the family.He tells a story of his fathers playing career when, as a
wicketkeeper, he grew his own grass at the Wanderers. He used to bring in his
own grass seed and grow it to practice on because he knew if he dived on the
grass that was there he would hurt his arms. So he grew his own grass and told
the guys not to cut it. He knew exactly how he wanted it.Jennings senior, 62
now, his moustache bristling in shades of grey, coaches cricket at Dainfern
College, a private co-educational school in Northern Johannesburg. The family
lives on a golf estate about 2km from the school. Most days, Ray drives his golf
buggy up the road and runs the cricket for 5 to 18-year-olds in the afternoon.
Keaton tries to help out when he visits.He has taught me the discipline and hard
work aspect of anything in my life. I have never shied away from hard work or
doing the hard graft at the right time. He is a character like that - he built
his own garden. There was a big unlevelled piece of land where the house is
built and he carried in chest-high stones and built this little garden the way
he wanted it. He is a hard-working man and very disciplined and I suppose that
is what I have taken from him.
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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- U.S. silver medalist Polina Edmunds has withdrawn
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