Stuart Broad interview: How England’s intelligent use of walkie-talkies may help them win T20 World Cup – and the opposite methods groups ought to use to carry their nerve on the dying

As Yuvraj Singh plonked him all over Durban on one of cricket’s most iconic nights, Stuart Broad would no doubt have welcomed a 10-4 disrupting the flow of six sixes.

England used walkie-talkies – legal as long as they are encrypted to avoid detection by outside ears and voices – to send messages from the changing room to the pitchside dugouts during their tense victory over Nepal on Sunday. 

Such chats have been common practice for England since the Sydney Ashes Test last month, extending into the recent limited-overs tour of Sri Lanka, but naturally drew attention as the potential of a major shock loomed when, with six overs remaining, Nepal required 62 runs to win and Brendon McCullum radioed in to speak to his captain Harry Brook.

Respite was not forthcoming in 2007 however for a 21-year-old Broad, in an evisceration at Kingsmead that he credits as being the making of him as England’s second-most prolific bowler.

It was in the immediate aftermath of defeat by India back in September 2007 that one of the game’s great thinkers – whose transition from international dressing room to our living rooms as television pundit has been seamless – began formulating a plan to keep him calm and focused when pressure moments materialised again.

Broad spent a 17-year international career trying to gain whatever edge he could on opponents, and perhaps unsurprisingly is therefore backing England’s tactical use of walkie-talkies at the Twenty20 World Cup, suggesting it is evidence that cricket is finally catching up with more modern sports.

‘I’d say it is a change for the positive,’ 2010 T20 World Cup winner Broad tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘Think of how close a football manager is to the sideline, think of how much communication there is in NFL matches. It feels like an area where cricket is majorly behind.’

England’s use of off-field signalling actually stretches back to late 2020 when, via a coded system of letters and numbers displayed on dressing-room balconies, analyst Nathan Leamon advised captain Eoin Morgan which bowlers to bring on during a Twenty20 series in South Africa.

And Broad aligns such input from backroom staff to the information sharing deployed by all the world’s truly elite sporting teams.

‘The best partnership I had in cricket was with Jimmy Anderson, and our whole relationship was based on communication, so as a team being able to get clear messages out is pretty important, really,’ he says.

‘One thing that I’ve learned from television commentary is that you view the game very differently from up high looking down to what it feels like to the players on the pitch.

‘Ultimately, it’s the captain’s decision, but I think feeding information back to him is really important, and ultimately, the more information you get, the better decisions you’re able to make.

‘Maybe it’s come to the fore because Harry Brook’s an inexperienced captain and Brendon McCullum’s thinking he needs a bit of help or is wanting to give him as much information as possible as he develops with his on-field decisions.’

One thing that was noticeable as Nepal nudged themselves into the box seat during a frantic finale was Brook changing the pace of the game by holding onto the ball while stood next to bowlers Luke Wood and Sam Curran, who successfully defended 10 runs off the final over.

‘There are numerous instances where, if you are not thinking properly or delivering properly, the plan looks wrong and goes wrong,’ Broad continues.

‘Probably the biggest one was Eoin Morgan and Ben Stokes not really talking, not slowing things down when Carlos Brathwaite hit those four sixes in the World Cup final in Kolkata 10 years ago. Watching it, it was very clear that someone needed to just stop for a moment, but the game sort of just whisked through and evaporated.

‘People are always learning different skills when it comes to leadership and particularly tight death overs, slowing it down also gives the opposition batter more time to think of what they’re going to do, so they fall out of that flow zone of striking that they might have created.’

Then there was Yuvraj moment at the inaugural T20 World Cup, of course, while Sunday’s drama also brought back painful memories of starting such a tournament with a loss to a minnow nation.

England suffered double Dutch humiliation in the 2009 and 2014 events, but it was the first felling by the Netherlands at Lord’s, with Broad in the Curran role and defending seven runs that sticks in the craw.

‘I missed two run-out chances and threw the ball past the stumps to give them an overthrow from the last delivery of the match, but I actually bowled quite a good over,’ he reflects.

‘Sam Curran being able to hold his nerve at the end was crucial. Yes, an over like that against someone like Hardik Pandya goes slightly differently, but, he got his team over the line in a tight game and being successful in closing a game out builds confidence.

‘Sam’s a very experienced, short-form player now. He’s played all around the world. He’s had that pressure of going into teams as a senior player expected to deliver for a while now and he’s a great competitor. His flexibility is impressive: he has days where he doesn’t bat and bowls one over, but then others where he makes a big contribution with the bat and bowls his full four.

‘I didn’t necessarily agree with him falling out of the England team last year, because he’s always that sort of guy you like having around, but you’re also judged on performance, aren’t you? He wasn’t quite hitting the performance levels, but he’s changed that around, and I’d put him down as a pretty key player now for England in short-format cricket.’

Brook now leads England into their second Group A match – back at the Wankhede Stadium against West Indies on Wednesday – on the back of eight straight 20-over wins and 11 in 12, despite preparations for this competition featuring scrutiny over his late night misdemeanour in Wellington last autumn and subsequent cover-up to protect team-mates.

‘Harry’s dealt with that very well, to be fair,’ says Broad. ‘It’s distracting when you’re trying to lead a team and you feel like every press conference is about an off-field incident, but I think the World Cup came at a good time, because the focus shifts pretty quickly onto results, and less about team culture.

‘Harry would have definitely learned a big lesson from this. Now you’re an England captain, you’re not invisible. But he’s still playing really well, which is crucial.’

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