Test Match Special - The making of new England captain Nat Sciver-Brunt

Episode Date: May 28, 2025

Stephan Shemilt has been speaking to some of the people who have known Nat Sciver-Brunt the longest to determine if they always knew she was captaincy material.Stephan speaks to former Middlesex captain turned commentator Isabelle Westbury who attended the same school as Nat Sciver-Brunt in the Netherlands and she shares her first thoughts on the all-rounder. Stephan is also joined by national selector Lydia Greenway who played alongside Sciver-Brunt for England and her former coach Mark Robinson who moved her up the batting order.Plus we go behind the scenes and speak to Nat Sciver-Brunt's wife and England legend Katherine, who shares her memories of playing and living with the new England captain.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Bring more gear, carry more passengers, face greater challenges. Welcome to the world of Defender, with seating up to eight, ample cargo space, and legendary off-road capability. It's built to make the most of every adventure. Learn more at landrover.ca. This podcast is brought to you by Wise, the app for international people using money around the globe. With Wise, you can send, spend, and receive up to 40 currencies with only a few simple taps. Plus, Wise won't add hidden fees to your transfer. Whether you're buying souvenirs with pesos in Puerto Vallata or sending euros to a loved one in Paris, you know

you're getting a fair exchange rate with no extra markups. Be smart. Join the 15 million customers who choose Wise. Download the Wise app today or visit Wise.com. T's and Cs apply. from BBC Radio 5 Live Hello, I'm Stefan Schemelt and welcome to the Test Match Special podcast. England women have begun a new era under coach Charlotte Edwards with a 3-0 T20 series win

against the West Indies. There are sterner tests ahead. India arrive later in the summer and there's a 50 over World Cup in October. All this with Nat Siverbrunt as the new captain, only the fourth permanent England captain this century. I've been finding out about the new skipper from the people who know her best,

learning how the girl born in Tokyo journeyed to one of the most coveted positions in English cricket. You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. While Siverbrunt was born in Japan, and attended school in Poland and the Netherlands, as a student at the British school

just outside the Hague, she started to develop her sporting prowess. Another student at that school was Izzy Westbury, who later became Middle. sex captain and a cricket broadcaster and writer. I asked Izzy when she first spotted Nat. I sort of knew of that as friends of my sister. But I guess the first time she really came across my radar was when she started to annoy me. And she annoyed me because I thought I was the tomboy, the one that played, the only girl that played in the football team, the kind

of sporty kid. And I quite enjoyed that moniker. And then this little upstart popped up into the senior school. And not only was she another girl in the sort of football sphere? She was really, really good, like, really good. And, yeah, it was, I was like, oh, my God, who is this person? And, and yeah, she was a very good football. I think she played basketball as well. And yeah, she was, she was already at that stage, just very adept at sort of hand-eye coordination and, and also, I think, a bit like me, but even better, just enjoyed the kind of fight you have with teenage boys when you are that girl and your ponytail, hanging out your cap kind of thing. She perhaps did it a bit more

quietly. She's a very quiet personality, but she kind of let her skills do the talking. Yeah, definitely. I'm all right in thinking it was football first. I think so. And I think that was for most of us, because again, it was just the, it was the sport that was there and that was accessible. I'm not entirely sure how she segued into cricket, but for me, it was actually as a a direct result of football in that I played for a local football club. And I think I got to the age of 13. I think it was the same policy in the UK is that the governing body basically said girls can't play mixed competitive teams from the age of 13 onwards.

And for me, the club I was playing out, they just didn't have a woman section. This was the early 2000s. And so the next nearest team for me was really far away. It wasn't girls. It was all women. I was 13. My parents were a bit uncomfortable with me. doing that. But the club that I played in, the football club I played in, had a, they had a cricket

team in the summer. And of course, there were no regulations about girls playing cricket in the boys' team, perhaps because it was a smaller sport, perhaps because it's just not a non-contact sport, but there was nothing there. So the club basically said, why don't you play cricket instead? And I was like, well, I wanted to continue being the only girl in the sporty team. And so I played cricket. And I think that happened to a lot of girls as well. So, yeah, I mean, it's interesting. I think a lot about, you know, if I'd grown up maybe 10 years later when you did have a lot more provision for girls football, whether I would have gone down that path. And the same might well be said of Nat, even more so, because she's just so adept across

those different sports. I mean, yeah, you could argue that she was the one that got away in football, perhaps, a bit like an Elise Perry or something like that. And that's what I was going to ask, because everything I've heard about her is that she is talented at pretty much any sport that she turns her hand to. Yeah, 100%. And I think that's as sort of the hand-eye coordination aspect of it, but there's also just the physical aspect of it. She grew quite fast. I think she was always quite a tall person at school as a teenager as a teenager as well. And then she's just, yeah, incredibly athletic, very fit. But again, it was it was also unassuming. You don't, you sort of didn't realize that she was becoming such an athlete until the return sort of came on on the field. And certainly for me, I sort of had that glimpse into her not playing cricket, but playing sport and football as a young teenager.

And I didn't then see her again until maybe I was in my early 20s. She was in her late teens and we were playing sort of county cricket age group representative, represented cricket. And yeah, when you don't, it's a bit like when you see kids growing up, you kind of forget that they're growing taller. But if you haven't seen them for a few years, oh my God. When I saw it again, I was like, oh, help. and then playing against her as well because I played for Middlesex when she was playing for Surrey

and I think my starkest memory of thinking oh my god that's going to be ridiculous was it must have been in 2013 14 or it was one of those years I'm not sure whether England women got the full-time professional contracts or when they were starting to go sort of semi-pro with the chance to shine contracts as well and already that was you know better than pretty much anyone else. And then there was one season where she'd had the benefit essentially of just being full-time professional over the winter. I remember standing at cover. She just created one of my fingers with a cover drive off like in the first over or something. And I just thought, well, she was better than me before the winter. And now she's had just six months of just smashing

balls. What do you think was going to happen? And yeah, yeah, she has a pretty hard cover drive, I think, even then. You said before that, you know, at school, you felt like, you were the sporty girl, you were the one who was getting involved with the boys and playing football and those sorts of things, and that when that came along, it's like, that was annoying you because that's what you wanted to be. Chink she knew that you were annoyed, because it strikes me that her character, she would just not pay any jot of attention to that. No, I don't.

And even if she did, she'd sort of just not, she's not, she's not at all confrontational in character. she kind of just you know she's the shrugs often takes it in her stride and actually this is you know this this bodes well for this this partnership with with Charlotte Edwards I think you know what you could argue that one of the

criticisms of the captain coach relationship for England women over the last decade or so is quite often you've had very similar characters in those roles well I think Charlotte is a bit more of a fiery character you know if something's gone wrong she's gonna she's gonna tell you and I remember that just from playing with her

representative like if you dropped cat oh my god you know what's happening whereas i think nat is you see that in her vice captaincy as well she's she's understated she's reserved um and she's not someone to show that that emotion she almost reminds me of a just butler character in that respect um she's very outwardly polite as well but um could can be a little vixen underneath perhaps is that the standout memory for you of her prowess that cover drive when you were fielding in the ring and it took your finger with it, or is there anything from school that you can remember when she might have

done something ridiculous then as well? No, I mean, at school it was just on the football field, but I think it was just that gap of not having seen her for ages and then suddenly she was just this cricketing superstar and just thinking, oh, my days. Siverbrun went on to play county cricket for Surrey as a 17-year-old and was picked by England only three years later.

One of her teammates was there. Lydia Greenway, who is now the national selector. I think from memory she was quite a late developer, or not even a late developer. She was someone who came to the sport a bit later than others. She obviously had been travelling quite a bit because of her mum's job. So she was being exposed to lots of different sports. So, yeah, if I'm honest, it wasn't really until playing against her in a few county games.

and then mainly when she made her international debut back in 2013, I think it was. So, yeah, I didn't actually know a huge amount about her, to be honest. What was she like when she came into the squad? Because she's not, I wouldn't say she's shy, but she's not a huge personality, is she? No, and do you know what? I think that's probably one of the best things about Nat is how she came into the squad. she's kept a lot of her best qualities, which I think is that ability to keep humble. You know, she's a really unassuming sort of character.

And even though she's gone on to have a huge amount of success, which, as we know, can change people, I don't think she's done that. I think the one thing that I have seen more recently is she's just become a lot more assertive. and this is obviously with my time coaching at the Mumbai Indians. I think she has began to be much more of a natural leader, which we all know can take a bit of time when you're around a group. Go back to that debut. It was at Louth Cricket Club.

I mean, what does that say about where women's cricket was at that time? And compared to now, when Nat is going to play in, you know, pull on by Indians for hundreds of thousands of dollars, a 12 years different. I mean, what must that have been like at the time playing international cricket at a clubground? Yeah, I think it was, yeah, I think her two debuts in ODIs and T20, yeah,

one was Laos and then I think the other one was Loughborough. So, yeah, I mean, for her, and probably for us all at the time, we didn't know any different. You know, we were used to playing at these outgrounds. We played at Stratford-upon-Avon, we played at Bath Cricket Club. So at the time, it just was as it was, and we didn't really question it. And I think, I suppose that the process has been quite gradual.

So the game hasn't gone from just being at those outgrounds, suddenly to be in front of the oval crowd where it's a sell-out. It's been a gradual process. So I suppose someone like Nat has been able to grow with that and become more accustomed to overtime playing in front of those bigger crowds, which, you know, obviously peak at somewhere like the WPL or a World Cup final at Lords, which obviously she experienced as well. She batted eight in her, in her England debut and bold, I think it was second change. I think it speaks to two things. One, maybe she hadn't quite found her way, but also you were a good team.

Yeah, I think so. And I guess we had been together for quite a long time, that particular group. It was mainly the squad that was from, I think, our 2009 success. There might have been a few retirements along the way. But yeah, absolutely, I think we were an established group. But I think at that time, there was also an opportunity to bring in some younger players. And yeah, she didn't get a huge amount of opportunity at the start. But I do remember quite vividly. I think she impressed really quickly. That was the one thing that I remember about Nat is she wasn't one of these players who came into international cricket who took a long time to find their feet, which I probably fell into

that sort of vein. But I think for Nat, she absolutely got to grips with it a lot more quickly than I've seen most international cricketers. And then I think from there, she sort of made her way up the order pretty quickly. I think she got to, I think, maybe number five or six, maybe within 12 months or so of making her debut. So I think that's, yeah, I mean, that says a lot about how good she was baking into a relatively established start in 11. What was it about her that was impressive? Was it temperament? Was it, just the way that she handled herself? Was it not being out of her depth on the field? How did she adapt so quickly? Yeah, I think it was all of the above, to be honest. I think

absolutely her temperament. I remember it was the 2014 home ashes and we actually batted together quite a bit and very quickly she became one of my favourite teammates to bat with and that was mainly because of her calmness. I think she absolutely didn't get flustered by the situation, which is very much how she is now. And I think her ability to read the game as well, I think that's something that probably we don't give enough credit to Nat is tactically how good she is. And I know she obviously hasn't been captain in the past, but I think how she thinks about the game and how she reads the game, that became very evident. And so for me, that said a lot about her ability to read match situations, absorb pressure, and execute skills, and adapt

accordingly. So, yeah, I think because of her character at the time, it probably went a bit unnoticed as to actually how good she is or was. You played with Nat, but then your professional relationship with Nat picked up again at Mumbai. I know you touched on it a little bit. But how was she different to the nap that you knew as the young player to now, I don't know, one of the best two or three players, you know, one of the most expensive players in that WPL auction? What differences did you notice in the last three or four years of working with her in India? Yeah, I saw a massive shift in how she operated within the group. I saw her take a lot more of the leadership, I suppose, characteristics on. And that was from our preview meetings where we were looking at oppositions, where we were

looking at their sort of top six or seven batters and how she went about, I think, helping the bowling group in terms of their bowling plans. It was really great to see, actually, just how much of a leadership role she was happy to take on there. And then I think on the pitch as well, I think that we sort of had a four person leadership group, which was Harmon, it was Nat, Mealy, and Haley, and Haley Matthews. And the four of those together, like, it really was a joy to watch because you could see how much they respected each other's opinion.

So whenever one of them spoke, all of them would listen, then obviously it was up to Harmon as to what happened on the pitch. But yeah, that was a real progression that I saw with Nat. so in a way those captain qualities were coming out and starting to come out and I think more than anything she was really comfortable with that and I think sometimes when you have an unassuming and humble sort of character they don't always like taking that step forward into the spotlight but I think more so these days that's something that Nat is a lot more comfortable with

which is yeah great to see Siverbrunt started her England career in the middle and lower orders but when Mark Robinson was appointed England head coach in 2016 she was pushed into the top five and has remained there ever since I asked him what prompted that move obviously the moves which is well documented that we did after that India World Cup was to create room for the younger players you know so obviously Lydia left and Charlotte left and we created opportunity in room for for younger players to grow and produce. And that was, like Tammy was one of the beneficiaries of that. So, and she took it. So for me, yes, she was pretty obviously somebody special. She could bat ball and field.

And she's tall and great levers. So as I say, for me, I didn't even, I wouldn't even realize that was the case. It was just somebody who needed to be, for my point of view in the highest position where she could dominate in a position where she could dominate games 2017 obviously was at a time of an amazing success but also a time when you were put in the spotlight and non more so than that actually because of what she did in the tournament and even the natmeg you know that that becoming apparent to everyone and how did she deal with that

How did she, because she's quite a quiet character, someone who keeps herself to herself. So how does she deal with the spotlight and fame? Yeah, look, as I said, by the time the World Cup game, she was one of our best players, which helps. You know, in a short term of the self and Ali taking over, you know, we had the Pakistan series, and I think we'd have gone away that winter.

I can't remember Sri Lanka, wherever we do. By the time that World Cup, she was on our best players. So that helps because you've, got more confidence in yourself, she's got confidence in the bowl, she's confident she's being backed. Obviously, we lose the first game against India, which then is a bit of a pivotal moment for everybody, really, how we respond to that message you really get right. And we win a scoffy game, we're in a scoffy position against Pakistan. I think then that, if she gets hundred in that second game, that well-cock, she's away on the highest stage, live on TV, which

at that point we weren't always on TV then I know that World Cup was the first once of every game to be on TV but she's off and running and she just grew and grew and grew as that World Cup went on What about her bowling as well? Because I think you and her

did some work on her action and actually she put quite a bit of pace on, didn't she at one point? Yeah, as I say she's a gifted cricketer so she could bowl so at times in my time she opened the bowling quite a bit because she could swing it, so sometimes

would use it to exploit the new ball. She had good change-ups. So we did. We just tried to move her out a bit and fine-tuning and give her the right type of direction.

But yeah, I mean, you've also got to protect. The other thing I suppose you were trying to do with an all-round male or female, you're trying to help them manage their time. so how much time you know some

you know because primarily our best number one skill was a batting and when you were three and one cricketing you've got to get your bowling and your batting in and obviously a field in and she was a good slipper if we sometimes went

had slips so helping and manage her time and how much how she divides her work rate and her attention into a different skills so between us would try and help for that and again allow her the space to grow and be a human being

and not be able to tired because of that extra workload but she's magnificent as I say keep going back I keep using that word athlete and at times you haven't had enough natural athlete she was won great engine naturally fit

when you did all the testing apart from that first time when she turned up on my first tour the first time I met her which as I say she'd do everything at high quality and one of the qualities that she'll be as a captain she'll lead by example

because as I say, she will be one of the best fielders. She will be able to take the ball and put a spell in for the team. And she's the best baddest, so her best qualities will be an ability to lead by, leave from the front knee by example. You know, talking about her qualities as a leader, have they always been evident? Because there's been times when she has stepped up to Heather and as Heather's replacement and the captaincy didn't always sit well on her shoulders. And I know you rate Heather as one of the best leaders that you've, worked with, maybe she's a bit more of a natural leader, Heather. Is it, is that fair from

that's point in view? Is it something that she's sort of grown into, taking on responsibility to the point where now she can become a full-time captain? You know, look, leaders come in lots of different shapes and sizes. And I'll have a bias, my own bias about a leader will be different to somebody else's. And you have some, talking about captains, you know, I've worked with some captains who led the dressing room but didn't really lead the training ground and they were fantastic on the pitch and in a dressing room we didn't want much to do with training and go home just different type of captains Heather's qualities where she wanted to be the best version of herself as a batter as a player and then when she got the captaincy she wants to be the best

version of herself as a captain so she wanted to get to know the young players she wanted to if we're doing the pre-work for the match analysis the next day she'd want to be involved than that so she had a great understanding so I felt I had a like a sister with me learning with me I was working with somebody I think that would be slightly different I think with Nat she will lead fitness because she'll do it naturally and she'll have probably a bit different softer skills to have her the skill of the coach and Charlotte Edwards is a brilliant coach will be to understand Matt's strengths

and what you have to do as a coach you fill in the gaps, you promote and work with your captain's strengths and you fill in the gaps that might be slightly there. I'm sure she'd be a great success because first of all she'll have the respect of the team and she'll love it the respect of the world in the women's game. Everybody respects that as a player which will help

and then with the guidance and the support of Lottie off the pitch and as they work out their working relationship where each other's responsibilities lie then that's how the best partnerships work as I say it's that you are a partnership best coaching captain relationships is

you know you've worked out who and what you're responsible before when I had Heather she was a young she was 25 when she had took her 26 so my job was to grow heather and give her more and more responsibility as it went along that's a 30-year-old woman experience now and it'll be a different type of dynamic that she'll have with with charlotte but full respect and for charlotte and likewise for now i think

they'd be great together so we've heard from teammates and coaches but what about nat siver brunt the person she was just nat siver when she first became an england cricketer and it was the game that led her to her future wife, Catherine Brunt. I spoke to Catherine, who was holding baby Theo, about her memories of her early relationship with Nat. Cricket brought us together, and it was in a, I was working at Loppa, uni, and she was coming into the National Cricket Performance Centre there and trialling, and she came with this robotic arm, because at that point she's, her bowling action, she's got quite hyper-extensive elbows and knees and she had this like robotic arm brace on

and I remember the England coach at the time was saying to me he was trying to wind me up saying who was that? Mark Lane I think and he was like oh this is going to be the next fast bowler Catherine watch out she can bowl 70 plus so I remember having a keen eye and just having a little look

to see what this person was all about I thought to myself actually because she's not all that to be fair so did you see a bowl before you spoke to her yeah so your first impression of it was as a cricket or not as a person first impression was who's this douchebag with an arm brace on who thinks that they're faster than me and then what came first housemates or business partners housemates definite during uni during their uni years which seems to go on for a thousand years and i just lived at the uni pretty much um we all decided to rent together

because you know you have more fun that way and also it was a nice way to have cheap rent so there was me nat amy jones beth langston at one point there was also a page schofield in there for a stint and fran wilson they like swat oh i'm tammy beaumont sorry so we had like this cricket house if you like it was a brilliant time we all lived together for like a decade um but during that decade we went from renting for a couple of years to then me and Nat bought a house as a joint venture and converted it and then everybody just lived with us so we had this like that was the start of our sort of business venture together and a way where so all the people that lived with us they basically paid our mortgage and we got through all

the years where we weren't paid so it was ideal in terms of you two getting together did everyone else know you were going to get together before YouTube did yeah well everybody's speculated um because everybody knows in the sporting world everybody's got their nose in everybody's stuff so it's like you assume and then you make it real don't you with gossip and then it just it it does the absolute rounds forever until it comes out it's not like we wanted to hide anything from anyone it was just but also me and that didn't really know either we were such good friends and as a house we got on so well that we're all best mates today like beth and amy were my bridesmaids and maid of honour i'm going to be amy's with beth and that and we're so close

and it was actually me holding back i just was i said i care too much about you as a friend to to sort of ruin that so it was more like casual until one day i was just like what am i doing this is ridiculous she's the best thing that's ever happened to you don't mess it up sort of thing and and it all came together on that day at lords is that right you've both sort of spoken about that before i mean it sounds like yeah that was the day i decided to fully commit to nat she nat was fully committed years before that to be honest she did she did wait and i think that's what made it easier for me to decide because this person obviously loved me quite a lot to do that.

But I think Nat is wise beyond the years but I'm very mature from a young age whereas I feel like I've always been quite immature. I've got my head screwed on for sure but I just always felt quite mature and not

sort of knowing what it was I wanted ultimately. You've got together on the day the World Cup final and a couple of years later you decide to go public with your relationship. How difficult was that for you to? We were because it's easy to say this is us now because you know you strike me as

private people really. Yeah and we would like to just be completely private but the reality is we are in international sport and that comes with being on TV and being photographed and having interviews and people asking intrusive questions and it was like

right well we can be one way or we can be the other and me and Nat Nat's not really open but I'd say I'm very open and honest and we both felt it was important to sort of touch on subjects that people would find helpful some people, not all obviously, but we cover a lot of difficult bases, I'd say. Being in the public eye, playing international sport, being gay, being a woman, we covered a lot of, ticked a lot of boxes

that we felt could touch areas where people struggled. So we thought if we can't, if we can help a handful of people just to feel a little bit uncomfortable then why not so was that the same when you were quite open about your fertility journey as well exactly it's like it's like well we've taken five steps why not take sticks we definitely didn't need to share about that and i don't need to put a picture out there of theo either but it's like one day there will be so i can either control that or not and yeah we're we're private anyway and we don't rub anything in anyone's face but we live honest lives and happy lives and we want to share that and you know help people with stuff that's just not really spoken about like there's so many

things we've had to do and learn and trial that now other people don't need to do that like a stand a bit of once she had gone public with your relationship and everyone knew or even just when you guys knew what was it like playing together what was it like i don't know when when that was captain and did cricket ever come home with you or was it always always left on the field not as captain

at Trent Rockets yeah that was actually quite hard because I can come across quite bossy I guess and opinionated and I like to think I'm never wrong and all these things when you've got a quite a quiet

modest nut is you know she just goes along with it so I am effectively the captain at home so when she's bossing me around a cricket field it doesn't sit right she's good at it it takes a level head doesn't it somebody who's quite calm and calculated and I'm not normally quite calm so she she's good to have that's why I guess we make a good partnership because she stole the things I'm not so I'd like to think we both give each other as something that we lack in some way I know she's in the room and this question might, you might embarrass her when you answer this question.

How will she do it? How will she be captain? Probably the same way she's always done. I don't know how she played in that WPL tournament in front of 40,000 people who can literally love you or hate you, just based on what you do for them, but still manage to be the most consistent person they could possibly want in like under the hardest circumstances so i think like watching that and how she dealt with that tournament under what we were going through i think that taught me that she'd be fine and we've seen nat be able to pull off some of her best performances in the worst situations so i think with that alone this is one of those things we're in a really hard situation and if there's

anyone for the job i think it would be nat so thanks to Izzy Westbury, Lydia Greenway, Mark Robinson, Catherine Siverbrunt and baby Theo for their memories and thoughts on the new England captain Nat Siverbrunt. That's it for this episode of the Test Match special podcast. Don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss an episode from us throughout the summer and you can hear every ball of every game live on the BBC Sport website and app. On BBC Sounds, this is sport strangest crime. From the man who tried to buy cricket.

One night, one game, one or takeoff, $20 million. The kidnap of a super horse. It must have been terrifying. Of course it was. How we got through a little on. An ill-advised errands changing F-1 forever. It will haunt the people involved for as long as they live.

A trillion-dollar takeover, which never took off. Broadsters of this level, they will never stop. The mysterious death of a superstar cyclist. Entering the world, a professional cycling was like joining the mafia. And teammates becoming bitter enemies and one of the biggest football clubs in the world. Betrayal, plots. We've gone beyond women's football in France.

Sports, strangest crimes. Listen on BBC Sounds. In Turkey, if you're willing to take a detour, you'll discover the food, even social media hasn't got to yet. From Michelin Stars and Wine in Ola, to traditional recipes and the home of Baclava in the east. Discover the culinary capital of Gaziantem and talk to the locals. Every dish has its own story.

Flavors, experimentation and tradition, Turkey has it all. Plan your detour at go-turkia.com.