Most Australian Test players do things a certain way. Get into the Australian cricket pathway early. Go to the Academy. Win favour with senior players. Think long-term about your career at a young age. Think first of attack, and leave defence as a last resort. Do things the Australian way, never mind the Poms. Keep the game as simple as possible. Avoid tinkering too much with your technique. Chris ‘Buck’ Rogers did none of these things. Instead he forged a cricket life in his own distinctive style, learning from mistakes and imparting that wisdom on others. In many ways he is a player out of time, harking back to the days when cricketers spent as much time with their clubs, states or counties as they did with the national side.
In Bucking The Trend, Chris Rogers looks intimately at his time in the game and the game in his time, valuable as much for the years he spent as an Australian cricket outsider as it is for a cathartic Test recall in 2013. An emotional hundred at Durham that year heralded a wonderfully late blooming spell with Australia, proving him beyond doubt as a quality international batsman. Rogers’ road to the top of the game was far from straightforward; there is rare richness in his cricketing tale.
