Mitchell Johnson has
opened up about his month from hell, saying he
feared being dropped and had failed to cope with
the increased expectations on him during the Ashes
series.
The quick has been put through the wringer in the
past four weeks, being panned for his wild bowling
and bad body language before busting back to form
in the win at Headingley.
AJohnson fidgeted
and looked a little emotional at times as he
fielded questions from his first press conference
since his bowling started spinning out of control
at Lord's last month.
He denied it, but the public spat between his
mother and fiancee clearly had not helped him.
"It has been different for me, I have not been in
this situation before with personal matters," said
Johnson, who was also on the mend from post-match
celebrations.
"It has been a lot different for me, but personal
things do not affect me when I go out on the
pitch.
"I go out there and play my cricket and you don't
want to have those things in the back of your
mind, so once I step out on that field it is all
dead and buried."
His relationship with his mother
was off limits.
"I would rather not talk about it to be honest,"
he said.
"My personal life is my personal life."
Johnson said he had thought his erratic
performances had put him in line to be dumped.
"Yeah
definitely, it was in the back of my mind," he said.
"When you are not going well and you start thinking a
lot of different things and that was one of the things
that probably popped up in my mind as well.
"It definitely was in my mind at one stage."
He said the toughest part of the last month was at the
home of cricket.
"Probably bowling at Lord's, I didn't know where they
were going to be honest," he said.
"I bowled a lot of wides and a lot of short balls, so
that was a pretty tough moment for me and to be
copping it from the English crowd.
"I probably did not know how to deal with it at the
time.
"But it was probably the most I have copped it before
and I have definitely learnt from that and I am sort
of taking it all in now."
'More mental'
He said his problems had been much more mental than
physical.
"I definitely had the head drop in the first two Tests
and was not really getting in the contest," he said.
"I was basically bowling my ball and walking back to
my mark and not really getting in the contest that
way.
"I think in the third Test at Edgbaston, that was one
of my goals was to pump the chest out and get a bit
more involved in the game and I think that has
definitely worked for me.
"I definitely have a lot more confidence and am just
enjoying it a lot more now."
Johnson is keen to keep his bowling rhythm up before
next week's Ashes decider by playing in this weekend's
two-day practice match against an England Lions outfit
at Canterbury.
"I hope I get that chance to play, I think you have
probably seen on a few tours I have been on, that it
takes me a couple of games to really get going," he
said.
"I think definitely I would like to play that game to
keep the ball rolling."
The Australian team heads from Leeds to Canterbury on
Wednesday morning.
