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From Stephan Shemilt
BBC Sport
Not a lot of interviews have been conducted with an 11-month-old infant woman present.
But, given that James Pattinson had begun to discuss his family , it was likely that his daughter Lilah rolled around on the floor of a Leeds resort, being amused by the press manager of Australia.
Produced to a father from Grimsby and also a mother in Melbourne from just out of Barnsley, Pattinson could have played for England. His brother Darren did just this, for one Test back.
James was asked to wear the Three Lions, rather than bowl for Australia, when England toured down beneath in 2010-11. The 29-year-old still has fond memories, even though he declined.
“They’re quite good times,” he said.
“My brother worked on the docks as a fishmonger. Me would collect and we would pick him up on the way. I remember him in a white outfit and the glasses, stinking of fish, and I’d be spewing out of the window because I could not deal with the smell, each day.
“We lived at one of those scrawny houses. One day I had been playing with upstairs and I appeared from the window and watched daddy’s reddish’ute. I looked behind me and dad was not there.
“I said:’dad, what is your car doing driving down the street?’ He was just like’what? Are you kidding me?’ Someone else had gone round the back and nicked it. At the moment, father thought it might happen to be his boss during a insurance job. We still do not know.”
This is the mid-1990s. Pattinson remembers getting into scrapes to be the only child in Cleethorpes using the Australian accent and playing with Pogs.
His dad introduced to Grimsby Town him.
“The first time we went to Blundell Parkwe droveand if we arrived back our car had been broken into,” he recalled. “Someone else had smashed the rear window. I really don’t understand what they stole, because we didn’t actually have much. This was.
“My auntie worked at the local pub in Cleethorpes and the door was a fish and chip shop. We used to go at the bar, buy a few fish and chips, then proceed to watch the football. It was fairly cool.”
Pattinson’s time dwelling in England lasted only a couple of years until the family went back into Melbourne -“mommy got sick of this weather” – but that the impression created by Grimsby, and English football, was long lasting.
“When we were in Australia, dad drank out of a Grimsby Town mug he had eternally. I would always be looking up their scores, or he’d inform me if they weren’t going nicely and if they had won.
“I can still remember crying after England lost to Portugal in a penalty shootout. Dad was pretty distraught too.”
The hyperlinks to England and pattinson’s childhood have continued to echo throughout his life and most of his family are still in Cleethorpes.
He’s got tattoos of Big Ben and a top hat. During his time as Nottinghamshire participant, he discovered that Grimsby were enjoying with Notts County at Meadow Lane. He saw them lose 2-1 and went on his own.
But, Pattinson is, in his own words,”100% Australian”. That atmosphere didn’t extend to his father, who needed some convincing to switch his allegiance if his son played Ashes cricket.
“My very first Test series against England was in 2013. He was umming and ahing and I said:’come on, you’ve got to encourage your son’.
“Among the things that helped him change his mind was that when Darren played his Evaluation, some of those great England players that dad loved said some things he was not satisfied with.”
The coincidence of talking about Darren in Leeds, the scene of his brother just match, wasn’t lost on James.
Darren’s selection 11 decades ago was the England pick that is very controversial in memory.
He was able to play Nottinghamshire for his UK passport. After six games for Notts, albeit with a record, he had been plucked from nowhere to play South Africa.
“It was a jolt,” said James, who was 18 at that moment. “Darren rang me up and said’I might be playing England in 2 days. We had no chance so that I sat up all night long and watched it.
“Looking back now, because I’ve been about top-level cricket, I can understand that the flak that he got was simply people’s comments.
“At the moment , I was young and my father hadn’t experienced folks saying bad things about his sons. He was a little beat up about it.
“I really don’t believe Darren really enjoyed the Evaluation that much, but it’s a excellent achievement that he played. If England had not lost, then maybe opinions would be different.”
After Darren retired, he dabbled together with James, who helped a local coach, in coaching greyhounds.
The business has cooled, but the Pattinson boys still have a few racers, even though James is pleased to admit that training winners are far not at bowling fast than the brothers.
It could be that Pattinson misses out weekly on playing at the fourth Ashes Test at Old Trafford. His match figures of 3-56 in England’s amazing third Test triumph were absolutely decent, but his hard back is being managed as part of the tourists’ coverage to rotate his battery of fast bowlers.
From what we understand of Pattinson the cricketer – out the torso, knees draining, snarling fast bowler – it’s challenging to fit him to the chatty father.
He talks of the way he owes much of his career to his father, with whom his fondest memories are of flying around London to a yearlong bus, then contemplates the way he could have been lining up to the side, instead of wearing tight green, if his parents had not decided to go back down under.
Then Pattinson the competition shines through.
“Yeah, I might have a soft spot for England, however, I will do everything I can to win the Ashes for Australia.”
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Analysis and comment by the cricket correspondent of the BBC.
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