Cricket’s troubled relationship with drinking: Why it’s so widespread, what England’s Noosa ‘stag do’ revealed, my night at the bar with Andrew Flintoff before he nearly drowned on a pedalo and how Aussie players get away with boozing

‘This drinking team has a serious cricket problem.’

It’s a phrase that draws guffaws, invariably by blokes sporting the slogan across one-size-fits-none T-shirts, propping up the bar on end-of-season club tours.

Because, let’s face it, cricket and alcohol have history. In fact, they are intrinsically linked, dating back to Victorian times when contests on the village green were followed by post-match pints in the local.

Even with the closure of so many of the country’s pubs, more than a hundred remain in the UK that are simply called The Cricketers. Others are named after past greats. Take Bristol’s WG Grace, for one, or The Hedley Verity in Leeds – or Disco Spoons as it’s known to locals, due to its breaking of the Wetherspoons ‘no music’ policy by employing a DJ to knock out tunes into the early hours.

Whether this popular student hangout is a haunt of Harry Brook is unknown, but it is his failed attempt to enter another night spot on the other side of the world – an altercation that saw him struck by a Wellington bouncer on October 31, earning him a final warning for his conduct – that has thrust the issue of the national team’s drinking back into the public domain.

Brook came close to losing England’s white-ball captaincy and was fined the maximum £30,000 under the terms of his central contract for self-reporting the incident, hours before an undermanned New Zealand completed a 3-0 whitewash.

He learnt cricket’s fundamental skills, which have seen him flit this past year between the number one and two positions in the Test batting rankings, at Burley-in-Wharfedale, a traditional English cricket club that owes its existence, like so many, to the trade it does in ale, wines and spirits after stumps are drawn.

While the adults of the Brook family would be chewing the fat in the clubhouse post-play, he would join other children in the nets and outfield with bats and balls as the light dwindled. A familiar scene for many.

As adolescence morphs into manhood, your first 50 with the bat or five-for with the ball is toasted communally with a jug of beer in the bar. A rite of passage you never forget.

Such occasions are part of developing the camaraderie of a team, and the truth is that alcohol remains in cricket’s bloodstream at all levels up to the international stage. Even in these days of plunge pools and ice baths, some coaches believe their best work is done over a different kind of cold one post-play, while celebrations of success remain boozy.

Take the Australian team, for example – the majority of whose members ritualistically drink beer from their Baggy Green caps in the aftermath of Test wins. Four times that has happened over the past seven weeks and no one has batted an eyelid.

Why? Well, partly because before its projection on social media, such ceremonies took place in the sanctity of their own dressing room, and partly because winning alters the optics.

Recall Michael Vaughan’s 2005 Ashes team, who were lionised not only for their exceptional performances but their capacity for drink. The dishevelled images of Andrew Flintoff, Kevin Pietersen et al at 10 Downing Street to meet Prime Minister Tony Blair that September, following through-the-night revelry, are as memorable as any across a gladiatorial 2-1 series win over arguably Australia’s finest vintage.

Or David Boon’s place in Aussie folklore for downing 52 beers on the flight over for the 1989 Ashes tour, beating a previous record set by Rod Marsh.

Back then, being thirsty was a badge of honour and the world a much bigger place, granting genuine freedom for single, 20-something cricketers to enjoy themselves away from the field without judgment.

‘In my day, we weren’t paid very well, so you lived your life, treated it as an adventure, especially on tours to nice places like Australia or New Zealand, which felt like you were on a Club 18-30,’ says Derek Pringle, who played 30 Tests for England between 1982 and 1992.

Temptation to go out and party is always there for young men dispatched to some of the best party places on the planet. Take the infamous pedalo night in St Lucia at the 2007 World Cup immediately after defeat by New Zealand, which resulted in Flintoff being stripped of the England vice-captaincy and suspended for a match.

Flintoff had been trying to call his wife Rachael and young children via Skype when he walked past the bar in the team hotel. He became the recipient of one pint of lager too many I had bought in a round with Myles Hodgson, the ghost writer of his autobiography, Richard Hobson, of The Times, and a lawyer friend of mine from university.

What happened later, once he left us, became one of the most notorious episodes in English cricket this century, but I’ve often wondered how much quieter a night it might have been had he kept on walking.

In addition to the punishment for Flintoff’s amphibious nocturnal adventures, Duncan Fletcher, then England coach, disciplined anyone who was known to be out after midnight, despite no official curfew being in place.

Heavy drinking had also been a feature of the 5-0 Ashes defeat earlier that winter and – according to B5 Consultancy, who thanks to £30,000 worth of funding from Graham Gooch’s foundation have delivered sessions on alcohol awareness to the 18 first-class counties over recent seasons – tends to occur when competitive masks slip, fuelled by personal disappointment and public disillusionment.

Former Brentford, Luton and Stevenage footballer Fraser Franks leads B5 sessions, focusing on how he always regretted how he felt waking up the day after ‘medicating’ with alcohol during his lower and non-League career. The Professional Cricketers’ Association have also offered addresses by former England football captain Tony Adams and his Sporting Chance Clinic on alcohol and drug dependency in educating about mental health.

The major concern regarding the current England team is that the management have continued to actively promote beer and golf as the chief components of team-bonding exercises.

They started the winter with a four-day shindig in New Zealand featuring all players and backroom staff, then sanctioned a trip to Noosa between the second and third Ashes Tests that was compared to a ‘stag do’ by some, despite being in full knowledge of the Brook incident six weeks before. Needless to say, England’s Test vice-captain was not trying to gain entry into a nightclub alone.

Initially, the ECB diluted claims made locally that England’s players were boozing the night before an international match by claiming it had been a couple of drinks, accompanying a meal.

Then, during the Noosa inquest, managing director Rob Key said there had been no need for formal action in Wellington, despite video evidence of several one-day squad members being in attendance at the rooftop bar.

It should not be overlooked that these are young men whose social time is limited by being on the road for months on end. Brook, for example, left his Yorkshire home in early October and will spend less than a fortnight there later this month before heading to Sri Lanka and India for a Twenty20 World Cup that concludes in March.

‘One of the things, obviously, as a sportsman is that you do miss out on a lot, so when you do get the chance to have a drink, or got out with friends, it does feel like a release,’ said PCA representative Sam Cook, following Franks’ session with Essex at Chelmsford.

Daily Mail Sport columnist and England’s record Test wicket-taker Sir Jimmy Anderson placed a different slant on things in these pages recently.

‘Personally, I drank throughout my international career, generally when I felt like I had enough of a window to then recover before a game,’ he wrote. ‘I’d even have one or two drinks during a Test match – but not if there was a long day in the field starting the following morning. I would be very conscious of being sensible. The way I avoided scrutiny, I guess, was making sure my performance levels did not drop.’

On recent evidence emerging online, such as the clip of a worse-for-wear Ben Duckett being mocked by travelling fans, England’s current players do not appear to know their limits or the time and place to let their hair down.

The place certainly wasn’t a Queensland beach resort surrounded by the Barmy Army – and less sympathetic locals – when 2-0 down with three to play, and for that head coach McCullum and Key must take responsibility.

They should have recognised such circumstances made it a disaster waiting to happen. As was placing England’s players in a casino hotel at the start of the Ashes tour in Perth. On tours, it is the behaviour of the seniors that sets the boundaries and creates the culture for others to follow.

The answer to a bad performance is not always found at the bottom of a glass, and if the management are to remain beyond a current review begun at Lord’s this week, the England cricket team’s culture has to change.

No bans on alcohol required, just moderation. The players have been there this winter, but they shouldn’t crave the T-shirt.