BtB stories: Cool Beans

Much has been made of Jacob Bethell’s journey to the upper echelons of world cricket. The boy from Barbados – who arrived in England aged 12 with a vote of confidence from Brian Lara and Sir Garfield Sobers – has been pencilled in as something special for quite some time.

Good players think Jacob Bethell is good. Could be great, even. And as far as white-ball pedigree goes, a statement 88 from 42 against South Africa in the U19 World Cup set the tone in 2022 and had Warwickshire’s Ian Bell calling him “the best 17-year-old I’ve ever seen.”

When Jacob Bethell last spoke to Beyond the Boundaries in the summer of 2022, off the back of that World Cup campaign, his ambitions were grounded and clear, if not a little short-sighted: “I want to force my way into the Warwickshire side through performing well in the second team,” he said then as an 18-year-old. Three years is a long time in cricket, and the landscape for this still-young talent has shifted entirely.

One year after that interview, he announced himself to the internet with a viral catch in the Vitality Blast for Birmingham Bears against Yorkshire, and a year after that hit the fastest fifty in Bears’ history, making 56 not out from 16 against Northants.

This year Bethell made 87 from just 50 for the Melbourne Renegades against Hobart Hurricanes. His list of game-changing impacts is a growing one, and impressive at that.

So what does this mean for the young man now serving a £246,000 IPL contract for Royal Challengers Bengaluru? “I’m pretty chill, to be honest”, he says, speaking from his hotel room in Bangalore. “I don’t play cricket to get famous or to earn money. I play cricket because it’s a sport I’ve loved for as long as I can remember. I played my first hardball game at six years old, and my dream since then has always been to play for England.”

On his second Test match in Christchurch, Bethell scored 96, and despite only having a small sample size, he averages 52.00 with the bat in international red-ball cricket. Nearly twice that of his First-Class average. “Pretty much every time I’ve played against better people, I’ve played better,” Bethell said after that match. “The step up to The Hundred, played better. Straight into internationals, played better. I didn’t really have a doubt in my mind coming into Test cricket that I’d have done well.”

This is the man who rocked up for his Test debut at the Hagley Oval on an electric scooter with his now-trademark bleached hair, zinc-smeared cheeks and collar turned up. “It does feel like I’m meant to be playing for England. I think that’s because I’ve been dreaming about it for so long, it almost doesn’t feel new to me,” he says. Bethell joins the interview via Zoom in what looks like a traditional Indian hotel. Colours red and gold, suitably.

“It’s my second time in India, my first being with England earlier in the year, so I’ve got a bit of rhythm here now. And I’m enjoying it. The cricket’s good. And the boys are going well, which helps.”

One of the things that helps the top-order bat stay grounded is routine. And coffee – proper coffee – the filter kind. “It’s something that the Aussie boys share an interest in,” he says, smiling. “There are some decent spots around here, but I prefer to travel with my kit. Zamps (Adam Zampa) showed me a few gems in Melbourne, but if I can make it myself, I can take that part of my life anywhere. My hand luggage in between games is remarkable. I don’t take any clothes, just a kettle, coffee beans, a grinder, and scales. It’s all part of creating a routine when away from home to get my head in the best place.”

He adds that while he is yet to play for RCB at the time of this conversation, being in an environment that exposes him to the varied conditions India has to offer and world-class bowling in the nets is invaluable. The potent RCB attack he reels off includes the likes of Josh Hazelwood and Lungi Ngidi, the latter also yet to feature at the time of writing. “But there’s no bigger name in cricket than Virat,” Bethell continues, “He’s been class around the group as a leader on and off the pitch. He’s been letting the bat do the talking, and it’s been a pleasure to watch. As much as I’d like to be out there with him.”

RCB’s first four games that pre-date our conversation have resulted in three wins and one loss, they sit third in the table behind Delhi Capitals who are up next. “It’ll definitely be loud,” the left-hander says of the anticipated atmosphere. “Before experiencing it, you don’t know what to expect. I didn’t really know what I was getting into. The crowds are amazing, obviously. They like their team – RCB fans no more than the rest – but you can really tell how we’re doing just from listening to the stands. If we’re not going well they go quiet, it’s eery. And if you get a bit of a run it’s deafening, in a good way.

“I’ve noticed the sheer amount of RCB fandom around India. Playing in Chennai, they’ll be chanting ‘RCB, RCB, RCB,’ and the same in Mumbai. It’s unbelievable to experience. And if I get out there, I can’t wait to show them what I’ve got.

“It’s frustrating that I didn’t get to play here more for England”, he says, referring to the hamstring injury picked up in the Three Lions’ first ODI fixture against India in February. “That game I’d played pretty well, made an impact,” he adds of a battling fifty and 1-18 from three overs in England’s four-wicket defeat in Nagpur.

“I look back now and see that I’d played a lot of cricket without a break. I think that time away from the game will be beneficial in the long run. It meant I missed the Champions Trophy, which was gutting, but selfishly, it was a nice little reset to take stock of the last few months and think about what I wanted to work on. And what I’ve achieved to date. It’s a year-round job now, cricket, so you’ve got to take those chances where you can.”

Bethell had a similar experience with a stress fracture in his back in 2023. “I’m not sure how that happened as a spinner but there you go,” he says half-jokingly when asked about that setback. “That time off had the biggest impact on my career so far. It lit a fire in me to grind and come back in the best shape I could, both mentally and physically.

“The toughest part was not playing cricket. I wrapped up what I wanted to work on around my game, and a large part of that meant working closely with Kate Green on psychology at Warwickshire. Going into the summer, I had a real excitement and hunger to do well – that’s the best place to be. It made me realise how much I missed cricket. I find the mental side of the game so interesting; I went searching for it. Searching for answers. You’re advised to do that now, but I felt I wasn’t getting the best out of myself with the talent I had. I was making stupid mistakes all the time and it was purely down to what I was thinking. Pushing myself on that side of the game is something I’ll be proactive with for the rest of my career. It’s nice to be able to piece it together.”

And despite not playing any cricket since early February – those frosted tips synonymous with the number three’s breakthrough now traded for a more sensible natural brown curl – Bethell’s continuing IPL non-selection is something, he says, doesn’t worry him too much. “I’m facing Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the nets with a new ball, and he’s hooping it around corners, so I think that’s pretty good prep for red ball cricket. The best I can get here, anyway.

“It’s an important mindset shift for me personally. My technique and the way I bat is very much suited to red-ball cricket, it’s a case of becoming more or less expansive depending on the scenario I’m faced with.”

For the left-hander – a member of cricket’s new generation of ultra-aggressors adapt in every format – this is simply part of the modern game. While the IPL typically benefits from a window free from international fixtures, England’s four-day Test against Zimbabwe at Trent Bridge was set to start right in the middle of the tournament’s knockout phase on May 22. The mid-season delay due to political tension with Pakistan caused further complications, although he was not selected for the first Test of the season as England set out to start the summer with the same batting roster as they did in ’24.

Selected in the white-ball West Indies series that starts in May, Bethell continues, now speaking with a heavier Bajan influence than when our interview began. “With the India series, and then South Africa coming after. It’s a jam-packed summer of cricket, and I want to do what I can to take it a step further, like I did in 2024. That is making an impact on any given moment, which is what you’re picked for. Whether that be with the ball, bat, or in the field.

“I pride myself on being one of the best, if not the best fielder in the teams I play for. Especially on the boundary, that’s my strength. I’m working on my inner ring presence at the moment, which I’m pretty good at, but there’s a long way to go.

“I love fielding. I’ve been throwing and catching, diving around on the beach at home with my dad since I could walk. You can have such an impact, especially in the shorter form of the game, in those hotspots out on the boundary. If you pull off a great catch or a run out, and never let the batters get two, it almost always influences the result. I’m always asking myself: ‘If I don’t get runs with the bat, then how am I going to impact the game?’”

With that prompting some discussion around his time spent Down Under – he averaged 24.38 with the bat and 19 with the ball in the Big Bash – the conversation turns briefly to the tantalising prospect of an Ashes series in Australia. “The way I played last summer to get into the England side started with wanting to cement my place in the Warwickshire team.

“I never thought my chance at the international level would come at the end of the summer as it did. Doing the same now is what’s going to get me into an Ashes side – making sure that I make an impact every time I walk out to bat and showing people what I do best.”

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