Ming making his mark

This article first appeared in the Mar/Apr 2016 issue of WGM.

Despite enjoying a fanatical following in nearby India, cricket has traditionally struggled to capture the interest of the wider Asian audience. Not so for Hong Kong’s Ming Li, who recently became the first Chinese player to sign with a major cricket franchise.

There is a well-known saying in Australia that captaining the Australian cricket side is the second most important position one can hold in the country behind the Prime Minister, such is the huge popularity of the nation’s number one sport.

Yet arguably the most unusual storyline of the recent cricketing summer is the unlikely journey of a curious 24-year-old from Hong Kong.

Barely a decade since he saw his first game of cricket and immediately fell in love, Ming Li became the first Chinese player to be contracted by a major cricketing franchise anywhere in the world when he signed with Australian Big Bash League (BBL) Twenty20 team the Sydney Sixers in November.

Invited into the squad as part of Cricket Australia’s community rookie programme, the young leg-spinner has spent the summer training alongside and learning from some of the world’s best players including Australian Test spinners Nathan Lyon and Stephen O’Keefe. It’s an incredible opportunity given the sport’s minor status in Hong Kong where Ming is one of only around 700 cricketers – which begs the question: how does a kid from Hong Kong ever find himself playing cricket in the first place?

“My younger sister (Godiva) already played,” Ming explained when WGM caught up with him at a recent Sydney Sixers training session. “She told me it was interesting but at first I said, ‘No, I like football.’ But then I went with our father and mother to watch her play in a match and it was the first time I had seen cricket. I was 13 and it just felt interesting with the ball and people hitting it. I just wanted to learn.”

Like most kids his age, Ming spent the next few years trying to bowl as fast as possible but that would all change in 2006 when he stumbled across a video of Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne on YouTube. One of the greatest bowlers of all time, Warne was feared by batsmen the world over and Ming was instantly enthralled by his ability to make the ball drift to the right through the air before hitting the pitch and spinning sharply back in at the stumps.

“At that time my English wasn’t that good. I didn’t know how to say his name but watching him, he turned the ball a lot so I wanted to learn how to do it too,” Ming explained.

“I told my coach, ‘Can I look like that guy and turn the ball a lot?’

“He said, ‘Yes, why not?’ so he taught me. It is very difficult because you need to control your wrist but I’ve kept learning.”

Ming’s timing couldn’t have been better given Hong Kong’s somewhat unexpected rise through the cricketing ranks in recent years. Despite their limited playing stocks, the tiny nation was one of the six Associate Members (from a pool of 37 Associate Members) to qualify for the 2014 ICC Twenty20 World Cup – joining the 10 full member nations for the very first time. Proving it was no fluke, Hong Kong recently qualified for the 2016 Twenty20 World Cup too.

And although Ming hasn’t played in an official T20 game for Hong Kong in almost four years now, he could well become one of the sport’s most valuable assets in the coming years.

Certainly the Sydney Sixers recognize the added value he brings.

“It’s definitely a potential avenue for us to spread further into Asia,” explained Sixers General Manager Dominic Remond. “Obviously Hong Kong is enjoying a lot of success with its national team recently and there is expansion in China as well – particularly their women’s team is fairly strong and developing quickly.

“This is all part of it – to create some role models for the Chinese community in Hong Kong and China but also in Sydney because we’ve got a huge Chinse community here that don’t have a great affiliation with cricket. So it’s a reason for the local community to get involved with the BBL.”

With that in mind, Remond is also hopeful that the experience will help Ming – who didn’t actually play a game for the Sixers this season – improve enough to warrant a call-up in future.

“The main thing for him this season was just to come out here and experience what it’s like to be part of a BBL club,” Remond said.

“As a community rookie he is really part of the broader Sixers squad so he comes to training and bowls in the nets with the guys. The main opportunity is for him to learn from our bowlers and he sits in the dugout with the guys during the game. He is around them the whole time.

“We took him down on one of our road trips when we played Melbourne Renegades so he experienced life on the road with a professional team. It’s really about soaking up the experience around the team. We’ve done quite a bit of work with him from a physical perspective too so he’s done some sessions with our strength and conditioning coach.

“The idea is that he then takes what he has learnt back to Hong Kong and shares that knowledge with his teammates back there.”

For his part, Ming – who became the first ethnic Chinese player to take part in an official T20 when he debuted for Hong Kong against Afghanistan in 2012 – believes he has made significant strides this summer and is hoping to dedicate more time to his cricket when he returns to Hong Kong. Most likely that means quitting his job as a delivery driver.

“I might have a change of job because I get very tired delivering and then training. I want to take more time for my cricket,” he said.

“It’s very difficult in Hong Kong to play full time cricket but I enjoy it and I can improve a lot. I think I’m improving.

“It’s been a good experience to see the fielding here (at the Sixers) and to work on my bowling. Everything is getting much better and I can turn [the ball] more.

“I didn’t know a lot of professional cricketers before this but now I just want to train and then when I get home just watch cricket on TV all the time because I love it!”