Two days into his new job as Kent’s head coach and Adam Hollioake is still adjusting to the bare necessities, such as working out how much fuel is left in his company car.
“This is the poshest car I’ve ever driven, much posher than the one I have in Oz,” he says of his Honda hybrid as, rather worryingly, the fuel gauge reads zero miles left and we’re stuck in rush-hour traffic on the way to him dropping me off at Canterbury West station.
“You know what, I reckon the last time I was in Canterbury the tree was still there,” he says referring to the lime tree on the outfield that fell down in a storm in 2005. “Maybe, I’ve been back once since then, dunno.”
He did indeed play one T20 game at Canterbury in 2007 during a brief return to county cricket when he played eight games for Essex but, as he works through his jet lag and battles with the city’s ring road, you can understand why memories are a little hazy.
A chat with Hollioake never lingers that long on the cricket, even though he has one of the game’s sharpest brains.
Before staff putting chairs on tables closed up the Oriole cafe at Canterbury cricket ground and shooed us into the traffic, Hollioake was happy to “go deep” with the conversation because his life has encompassed so much else apart from playing or coaching around the world: boxing, MMA cage fighting, a sports psychology PhD and working with bereavement charities.
“In the space of 15 years, or something like that, I lost my best mate [Surrey wicketkeeper Graham Kersey] in a car accident, I lost my brother in a car accident, and I lost all my money in a failed property development venture so then I was fighting in a cage to earn money.
“I was like: ‘God, what else are you gonna give me? Just leave my children alone.’ I can deal with anything else because I’ve had to deal with some big things early in life, so I don’t see what can hurt me now, apart from, as I say, leave my kids alone.”
He calls the succession of bereavements “exposure therapy”. He coolly says he is “not scared of dying myself”. He has come to terms with mortality because it has smacked him in the face. “I’ve seen it, lost enough people myself to know it’s going to come to all of us. I lost Graham Thorpe last year, lost eight of the team I played with over the years, guys like Joey Benjamin, Danny Kelleher from Kent, who was my flatmate, lost my brother, Tom Maynard, Graham Kersey, and Nick Peters, who was my best mate at Surrey.”
Even though he speaks openly about his losses, it is only when asked. He believes there is a fine line between talking and letting it dominate too much. “There’s been poor advice telling men to talk about their problems. They don’t give you a guide on how to do that. So I notice a lot of men go out there and talk to everyone who will listen about their problems all day, every day. And then what do you end up doing? And it’s no fault of their own, they just end up ruminating and affirming their problems themselves. If you spend 50 per cent of your day talking about your problems, you’re going to go around feeling sad. So I think you’ve got to control that.
“And that applies to many elements of life within a team. If the team sits around complaining about biased decisions or whatever then they get good at whatever they practise. If I practise being a negative d---, then if I do that, all right, I’ll be good at being a negative d---. So you got to talk about and affirm what it is you want to be.”
In 2003 I interviewed Hollioake’s father, John, when Ben’s loss was still very raw. He said that Ben would appear to him in visions. Adam is different. “He reckons he still does and probably a week does not go by without us having an in-depth chat about it. I think, I’ve probably had only three or four dreams about him, which is odd, because I spend the vast majority of my time thinking about him more than anyone, other than living people. I just can’t summon him up. I’ve spent my time making things happen in sport, but I’m a terrible medium.”
It is an intriguing appointment, and you cannot help but think Kent players will benefit from someone who has been around the block, rather than graduating from player to coach through the England and Wales Cricket Board system. “I’m a man. I face my mistakes and try to learn from them. That’s all you can do. Any experience when you do well at something is good but you gain more out of things you f--- up and I’ve done plenty of that as well.”
The cage fighting is over now – “mate, I’m 53!” – but he looks like he could jump in the ring and his reputation for being one of the hardest men in the game might put a few on edge. “The public perception of me is that I’m some sergeant-major type, an angry, dictatorial leader because of the fighting, but I’m pretty relaxed… until I’m not.”
It took a while for Hollioake to find coaching. He moved to Perth when he retired from Surrey in 2004, then to Queensland. His property company collapsed owing £10 million to creditors, including Alec Stewart (they remain firm friends and talk weekly). He was declared bankrupt and had only his playing pension for income. He turned to boxing, earning about £600 per bout to pay the food bills for the family.
He drew his first cage-fighting bout, and then gradually returned to cricket and business. He has since coached in Afghanistan and worked with England, Queensland and Pakistan before ending up at Kent. He was recently with Andrew Flintoff’s Lions team in Australia.
This is his first head coach role and he takes over a Kent side who finished bottom of Division One of the County Championship and bottom of their group in the Vitality Blast. He has a job on his hands. “We won a lot when I was at Surrey but I don’t get caught up in wins and losses. I just get caught up in attitude. I want our side to be the best at all the things that require no talent, so that’s time-keeping, discipline, hard work, attitude, all those things. They require zero ability. They just take effort. They don’t offer a championship for that, but we can award it to ourselves if we feel we deserve it. Then wins and losses will take care of themselves.”
Hollioake has a house in Canterbury and his 18-year-old son is staying with him for the summer, so he feels at home already. Kent’s campaign begins with an away championship match against Northamptonshire, pitting him against Darren Lehmann, proof the second division probably has bigger-name coaches this year than it does players.
“My kids are getting to an age now where they’re more self-sufficient, and I wanted to try and do something for myself now. I’ve got a bit more time to sort of follow my dreams again.”
Hence a Surrey man joining neighbours Kent, but then again as a kid with an Australian accent playing for England, crossing boundaries is nothing new. “You know what? I hated all the counties when I played for Surrey and every side hated us, so wherever I ended up was always going to feel weird.”
We made it to the station, and when I later checked if he had enough fuel to get home he replied: “Still haven’t got any yet. Will see how I go in the morning,” and added a laughing emoji. After everything that has happened, running out of petrol is nothing.
