Despite holding a job that requires careful counting and meticulous concentration, emerging Australia umpire David Taylor has lost track of the number of COVID-19 tests he’s undergone during a memorably challenging summer.
Taylor began 2020-21 as a new addition to Cricket Australia’s match officials’ contract list, but quickly realised the demands arising across a season beset by ‘bubbles’ and border closures would bring opportunities he might otherwise have waited years to access.
So the former Penrith first-grade skipper (and club life member) quit his job as a property manager on the Gold Coast and threw himself headlong into a journey that began with his appointment to officiate in the women’s international series between Australia and New Zealand in Brisbane last September.
“Normally someone on the rookie contracted list, which I’m currently on, isn’t allowed to have involvement in those international games,” Taylor, who relocated to Queensland almost five years ago, told cricket.com.au.
“You would have to be on the national panel or above.
“But Cricket Australia received special exemption from the ICC for me to be involved in those games, and it all came about through the logistics associated with COVID seeing as I was already up here (in Queensland).”
From his involvement in that limited-overs series, as fourth (reserve) umpire, Taylor notched a number of career milestones in short succession and often in scarcely believable circumstances as the ever-dwindling team of umpires, match referees and support staff became unsung heroes of a summer like no other.
Taylor’s 33-day stint in the Rebel WBBL hub in Sydney ended in mind-November with him having to travel home via Adelaide where he was required to serve a period of ‘soft’ quarantine before returning to home to the Gold Coast.
But while in Adelaide, umpire shortages in Sydney meant he was required to head back to the WBBL where (after observing a three-day isolation period) he resumed duties before flying to the Gold Coast at month’s end via Canberra where he spent another period in ‘soft’ quarantine prior to arriving home.
With COVID cost-cutting having already reduced the national umpires panel from 12 to 10, and with CA needing to provide officials for the men’s Dettol limited-overs and Vodafone Test Series against India, Taylor was then added to the roster for the KFC BBL.
He duly made his BBL on-field umpiring debut in the match between Brisbane Heat and Adelaide Strikers at the Gabba shortly before Christmas just hours after being informed he was being elevated from fourth umpire duties because colleague Greg Davidson was unavailable having recently travelled from a COVID hotspot in NSW.
“You could probably liken it to being named twelfth man then being told an hour before the game starts ‘No you’re not twelfth man, you’re actually playing today’,” Taylor said of his sudden call-up that was rendered comparatively seamless by his next experience.
Just over a week later, Taylor’s duty-free evening was disrupted at barely an hour’s notice when advised he would replace Phil Gillespie as on-field umpire for the Heat-Sydney Sixers game at the Gabba after Gillespie was advised he must immediately self-isolate as a result of having recently been in Melbourne.
As the differing isolation protocols in each state and territory saw further pressure placed on the available stocks of match officials, previous CA provisions that no umpire or match referee should travel on game days or work two nights in succession were jettisoned.
“I did five nights in a row in one stretch, where I was two nights on-field, two nights in a row in the third umpire’s box and for the fifth night, I flew to Adelaide that morning to be fourth umpire,” Taylor said while at pains to point his experience was shared by most of his colleagues.
“It’s not just me, it’s been virtually all the umpiring team and the staff and the match referees who have been impacted.
“At the end of the day, this is our job and we love being involved and helping facilitate the entire summer.
“We’ve had a lot of people who have done a lot of work this summer, so being flexible, agile and adaptable has become the mantra for all of us.”
Among the more notable umpire moments of a summer now in its final phase were:
- Gerard Abood left his Sydney home in late November to join the men’s international hub and did not return until 75 days later having officiated in international, tour and BBL matches in six cities
- Tasmanian schoolteacher Darren Close took the first flight out of Melbourne after his final BBL match at the MCG on January 26 to be in his Devonport classroom for the first day of the school year
- Greg Davidson served 14 days self-isolation in Brisbane having arrived from the NSW central coast shortly after the northern beaches outbreak, and ate Christmas lunch alone in a corner at the match officials’ hotel as he was required to interact with colleagues from a distance and while wearing a mask
- Brisbane-based Donovan Koch left on December 8 and embarked on 55 consecutive nights on the road, the most of any official involved in the KFC BBL
- Paul Wilson (en route from Canberra to Brisbane) was a last-minute addition to Boxing Day Test panel after colleague Rod Tucker had to leave hub for personal reasons, which meant Wilson’s wife, Sally, urgently couriered her husband’s Test uniform to his Melbourne hotel on Christmas Day
To complete his maiden summer of top-level umpiring, Taylor was appointed to officiate alongside Clare Polosak in last weekend’s Women’s National Cricket League grand final in Melbourne.
But true to recent history and his experience of 2020-21, Taylor was unsure up until just hours before the opening delivery if he would be able to participate, or indeed if the match would proceed at all.
A COVID-19 outbreak in Brisbane a day earlier meant all members of the Queensland Fire squad as well as officials who – like Taylor – had travelled from Brisbane had to take COVID tests on Friday night in the hope negative results would be returned before scheduled starting time next day.
“I got mine done at 10.50pm after CA did a tremendous job getting a pathologist to the hotel,” Taylor said.
“That was what ensured the game could go ahead because we all got our test results back first thing the next morning.
“I think if we all had to go and find a testing station to get that done in Melbourne on the Friday night, it’s doubtful the game would have gone ahead.
“I don’t actually know how many tests I’ve had done this summer, but it would have to be near twenty I would imagine.”
With his umpiring duties seemingly finished for the summer, Taylor is at home on the Gold Coast where he will await CA’s release of officials’ contract lists for 2021-22 which are expected in the next month or two.
In the meantime, he’ll busy himself looking for work, indulging in a bit of golf, fishing and football watching and planning an imminent return to his home town of Dubbo to visit family members he has not seen for around 18 months.
Although that trip is also under threat due to the ever-changing COVID landscape.
“I’m trying to work out how I can get back there given the new restrictions that are in place because of the Brisbane outbreak,” he said.
“I guess that’s just the way life is at the moment.”
Don’t miss The Heat Repeat on Foxtel, coming April 7. The two-part documentary will also be shown on Kayo and cricket.com.au.