Kent all-rounder Darren Stevens says being cleared in his match fixing trial has been “a massive weight off his shoulders” as he prepares for the new season.

37-year-old Stevens has long been a fans favourite at Canterbury, and enjoyed perhaps his best season ever last year, with a number of unforgettable innings including a record-breaking 118 against Sussex in the YB40 competition, and an incredible unbeaten 205 to beat Lancashire on the final day of the campaign, before sweeping up the prizes at the club’s End of Season Awards Dinner.

Stevo’s success was all the more incredible considering the fact that he played most of the season under the cloud of his match fixing trial, relating to two charges of failing to report a corrupt approach, from his time playing for the Dhaka Gladiators in the Bangladesh Premier League.

However, having now been found not guilty, Stevens is free to continue his Kent career, much to the delight of his teammates, coaches, and all the Kent fans.

“About eight months ago, I thought that might have been my last year”, Stevens admitted to KSN when we caught up with him at the club’s annual press day.

“Some days I did [think it was all over], some days I didn’t – that was the way the winter went. It was a long winter, a frustrating winter, but thankfully we got the right decision and I am actually sitting here, answering your questions at pre-season!”

Stevens admitted of his relief that the right verdict was eventually delivered.

“It’s a massive weight off my shoulders and my family’s shoulders that, yes, I’ve got work for this year! It was one of the longest winters of my life, but it’s all done and dusted now and we can move on as my family and Kent Cricket. I can get on with this year, see what happens, and I can hopefully get another couple of years out of this body of mine for Kent!”

Stevens took a break from the game following the trial and before pre-season, giving him the opportunity to switch off for a couple of weeks.

“When I got the “not guilty” verdict, I rang Jimmy [Adams, Head Coach] the next day and I just basically said to him that I needed a bit of time away from everything. I flew out to Cape Town with my missus Katie and we had a couple of weeks out there.

“I was hoping to get a bit longer but Jimmy wanted me back on the 14^th [March!]

“I went out there; we turned the phones off and I didn’t check my emails, and just had two weeks of getting my head around the past nine or ten months and the period I was going through at the time. I just wanted to clear it up and to come back to pre-season as fresh as I can be.”

Stevens admitted that his disrupted off-season meant he was slightly behind on where he would have liked to be, fitness-wise, but he was confident he would be ready and raring to go by the start of the new campaign.

“Yes, I’m a little bit behind on fitness, but I’m not too fussed about that – come the start of the season, I should be back to where I want to be.

“Cricket-related, I think it will do me good. I’ve had 17 or 18 years of being away every winter and of pre-seasons with full summers, so I think it will do my mind and my body good to have this period off.

“I’ve been hitting balls for the last two or three weeks outside now, and I actually don’t feel much different to what I did in that last innings down here at the end of the summer, so I’m pleased with that.

“To be fair, I’m just really looking forward to getting to Worcester for that first game.”

Now in the latter stages of his career, Stevens understands that he has to look after his body to give himself a chance of playing as much cricket as he can, and of prolonging his career for as long as possible.

“I think that will be all down to the new fitness guy Jon [Fortescue]!”, he laughed.

“He says “as long as I can get you right for each game, that’s all that I’m bothered about”, and I said to him that that’s all I’m bothered about – as long as I can get through each game, then it’s all on you. He was happy with that.

“Pre-seasons get a little bit longer now as you get a bit older, because all you want to do as a senior player is get into each game and perform. That’s what you get paid for and you try and entertain people.

My mind is all on that first game [against Worcestershire]. Loughborough MCCU next week will be a good run out but I think it will be the first game at Worcester that my mind will be switched on.”

 

Top picture supplied by www.sarahansellphotography.com.