History has had some great supporting characters.
Not sidekicks. That would be disrespectful. The number twos – those who make the stars shine that little bit brighter.
Brian Clough had Peter Taylor. Elton John had Bernie Taupin. Elsa had Anna.
Mitchell Johnson, the moustachioed menace who destroyed England at the speed of light, had Ryan Harris.
The 2013-14 Ashes, when England were humiliated 5-0, will forever belong to Johnson. The left-armer was pure pyrotechnics, battering stumps, pads and helmets, for his 37 wickets. At the other end, new-ball partner Harris was every inch his ‘Rhino’ nickname – rampaging and relentless.
It was Johnson who walked away as an Ashes legend, but Harris who produced ESPN Cricinfo’s ‘ball of the century’, external, a physics-defying in-outer to bowl England captain Alastair Cook. Kevin Pietersen called Harris the best Australian seamer he ever faced, and KP took on Johnson, Glenn McGrath and Brett Lee.
There were plenty of reasons why Harris might never have pulled on a baggy green cap.
His father was born in Leicester, meaning Harris could have played for England. An attempt to spend time with Sussex as a local player in 2008 was aborted. Before then, a younger Harris who liked “drinking beers” was let go by South Australia, only to regain his state contract as a first reserve when another player rejected theirs.
With a second chance, Harris realised he could add some pace to his bowling, and a move to Queensland helped fulfil his potential. Still, a troublesome right knee, a hangover of schoolboy injuries sustained fielding and playing Aussie rules, would plague and ultimately end his career.
He did not make his Test debut until the age of 31 – just before an Australia side in transition was famously humbled 3-1 on home soil in 2010-11 by Andrew Strauss’ team. It remains the last time England won down under.
“They were just relentless,” Harris tells BBC Sport. “I just remember walking into changing rooms at breaks thinking ‘what do we have to do to get these blokes out’.”
As his team suffered, so too did Harris, breaking his ankle in the fourth Test. Nothing compared to the misery of Johnson, whose game fell apart to a soundtrack of taunts from the Barmy Army. He bowls to the left, he bowls to the right. You know the rest.
“For the first time in his career he was challenged and the ball wasn’t coming out anywhere near what we would have liked,” says Harris. “Mentally, he started second guessing himself.
“That happens when there is so much pressure on. He was there to intimidate and bowl fast, but he couldn’t quite get that.”
Harris’ next crack at the English, in 2013, was just as problematic for Australia.
A chaotic build-up, including controversy over homework and David Warner punching Joe Root in a Birmingham bar, culminated in Mickey Arthur being replaced as head coach by Darren Lehmann.
“Boof had a massive meeting about how we all have to be in it together,” says Harris. “We had team values Mickey had drawn up – starting with ‘I will do this, I will do that’. Boof flipped that. He changed the ‘I’ to ‘We’. It was all about us being together.”
Australia found themselves 2-0 down, but could have won all the last three Tests before ultimately losing the series 3-0. There was a return series in Australia straight away, and Harris sensed the shift in momentum.
“You look at it on paper and it’s one of the worst results, but we thought it was way closer than that,” he says.
“When we got back on the plane, we left really hungry, and knowing it was going straight back, we saw it as a great opportunity.”
