By Marcus Uhe
There’s just something about cricketers and their bats.
There are few relationships as integral to an athlete in any sport as that between a cricketer and his choice of willow.
Ask anyone who’s played the game and they’ll likely have a story about one on standby – whether it’s a favourite, their first, the one from their best season – while simply listing different models from years gone by is enough to elicit guffaws from cricket tragics and can see hours disappear during a nostalgic trip down memory lane.
For cricket-mad Lysterfield teenager Luke Spierings, however, finding the ideal blade has been a struggle over the years due to a medical condition.
Spierings was born with a left-arm deficiency and as such, is forced to bat with only his right hand gripping the handle.
The condition has never stopped him from throwing himself into anything and everything competitive – be it basketball, football, tennis or table tennis, Spierings’ weekends are non-stop as he embraces all that teenage life has to offer with his mates and family.
Finding a cricket bat to suit him, however, has proven a challenge, with the leg-spinner struggling to play a full array of strokes for his Lysterfield Beavers due to the cumbersome weight of the products on the market.
Spierings wants to take his cricket ‘as high as it can go’, whether that be forcing his way into the First XI at Lysterfield’s seniors or even playing Victorian Premier Cricket, options he considers “pretty cool”.
Through a chance relationship with leading equipment manufacturer Kookaburra, however, his fortunes have changed for the better this summer.
Living in close proximity to company Chief Financial Officer Lawrie Kirby, a conversation between the family and Kirby during the offseason put the Spierings in touch with Kookaburra bat maker, Lachlan Dinger.
Some of the game’s most high-profile Australian cricketers have Dinger on speed-dial as the man trusted to perfect and tinker with their bats, from Glenn Maxwell to Alyssa Healy, Phoebe Litchfield and even Spierings’ favourite player, Marnus Labuschagne.
Dealing with the minutiae and specifications in requests from the professionals is something that Dinger has come to expect and learned to manage in his near decade at the Moorabbin factory, but Spierings’ requirements threw him a brand new challenge.
“We make all kinds of different specification bats here customised to sponsored players’ needs and wants but I’ve never made one for someone with one arm,” Dinger said.
“It was a matter of Luke and his family coming down, trying to understand how he sets up and how he bats, and what we can do differently with the bat to help him.
“We do it with all our players, to try to understand what they want.
“There’s limitations and rules and regulations that we have to play with in terms of making the bat, then we spit-balled a few ideas around on how we could reduce weight and make the bat swing a little better, or change the size so that there’s no wasted weight.”
Using a would-be discarded piece of willow that would have been too small to produce something that could be sold commercially, Dinger combined his expertise with the needs and desires of Spierings and developed the one-of-a-kind bat in short order.
With a shorter face, longer handle and an oversized knob at the top, Dinger’s masterpiece came with the ‘Ghost’ sticker insignia in a tribute to Labuschagne.
“The way that he holds it, one of the big things (to consider) was the weight,” Dinger said.
“He told us that with the standard size five bat that he was using, a lot of the handle was wasted by not having the second hand above his bottom hand.
“Removing part of that allowed us to save a bit of weight; it’s not like a standard size that we would produce in retail, it was a totally different size.
“Even something like, it had a bit of an enlarged knob at the top of the handle so that he can lock his hand in – not having that second hand to grab and grip onto, it was about him having some kind of mechanism to lock his hand in.
“It’s not something we hadn’t done, but not in that use for a junior, not something we’ve ever done.
“I think we talked him into a round (handle) because the oval (handle), in your grip, it really dictates that you have to play straight.
“When it’s round, a lot of players feel that you can manipulate the bat better, to hit square of the wicket.”
Dinger’s instincts proved vital, with the eager young batter validating his intuition in his early net sessions and games with the new weapon while fully kitted out in brand new pads and other equipment from the company, having received the rock star treatment upon its collection.
“I had to get used to it at the start because it’s a bit shorter, get used to the length of it and the placement of the hand,” Spierings said.
“It was a bit harder to get a cross-bat shot through (with previous bats).
“I can basically play anywhere with this bat.
“I love looking to have fun with my mates, being out there and being able to have a bat and make some runs, it’s a good feeling, (along with) getting a wicket and having everyone getting around you.
“I thought it was really good on their behalf, looking out for everyone and being really inclusive.”
Early in the Beavers’ U16s season and with bouts of inclement weather to contend with, he’s had limited opportunities to put it to use on Saturday morning thus far, but a number of cherries and scuff marks on the bat face suggest it’s knocked-in and on standby for a long stay at the crease.
As much as he and his family expressed gratitude for Kookaburra’s efforts, the man responsible for the creation had his own slice of satisfaction for crafting something for Spierings to cherish, marvelling at his young client’s endeavour and persistence for the game.
“We love seeing people score runs and the unique thing here is, instead of being someone on a state or national arena, it’s someone in a park, but someone that’s experiencing some difficulty and there’s maybe not a product out there that suits him and helps him enjoy cricket,” he said.
“I said to Lawrie when he left, ‘you can tell he just loves cricket and is a cricket tragic like a lot of young Aussie kids’.
“It’s so awesome that he’s out there and having a crack, regardless of the difficulties that he has.
“I struggle with two hands at the best of times; it’s amazing that he’s still out there playing.
“It’s obviously a fun game when you’re scoring runs – if we can help him do that, he’ll have a lot more fun and it breaks down any barriers that he thought there may be.
“It’s equally as cool making a different and challenging bat (as it is for professionals), something that I wouldn’t ordinarily make, for someone like Luke and you know that they’re going to get a whole amount of enjoyment out of it.”
