'I wasn't anywhere near retirement in my head'

Ten months after his international career was brought to an abrupt end, England’s leading Test wicket-taker opens up to Harry Latham-Coyle about what the future may hold

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The body is sore, the mind frayed and frazzled by four ultimately fruitless days in the dirt but the smile on James Anderson’s face is broad. It is the morning after the night before; his longawaited return to competitive cricket in the colours of Lancashire complete. Victory may not quite have come against Derbyshire but England’s greatest ever Test bowler is back doing what he loves – and the only thing, really, that he has had to know how to do since his late teenage years.

“My body definitely knows I’ve started playing again – it was tough getting out of bed this morning,” he grimaces before the grin returns. “But I absolutely loved it.”

Across more than two decades, a master craftsman of swing and seam bowling has been driven by an obsession over his art. From Galle to Grenada, on Himalayan foothills and sun-parched South African plains, a Test career that sprawled the planet and 704 wickets was simplified by a singular focus on 22 yards and his chosen skill. Approach, deliver, reset, and go again and again and again.

The inevitable end, his age would suggest, is near, but do not dare tell Anderson that. Across a conversation that spans the breadth and depth of a journey that began on the back pitches of Burnley Cricket Club and ended with the most magical of receptions at a packed-out Lord’s, Anderson’s competitive spirit is just as clear as each time he leapt languidly through his delivery stride. Having signed on for another summer in whites for the Red Rose, he hints at least one more – “I’m looking forward to this season with Lancashire and then I’ll think about next year” – and makes clear that life as a full-time coach is not yet for him.