Andrew Flintoff: Cricket 'saved me' after Top Gear crash

There's a point in Flintoff, the Disney+ documentary released on Friday about the life of England allrounder Andrew Flintoff, that stands out from a cricket perspective.

Amid harrowing, never-seen-before images of the devastating injuries he suffered in a car crash just over two years ago, interspersed with footage from the highs and lows of a storied career, Flintoff's wife, Rachael, says it first: cricket saved him.

In the most confronting examples imaginable of cricket's influence on his life, and the accident itself, Flintoff describes his instincts during the crash while filming the TV series Top Gear in December 2022 as being like the split-second decision a batter makes on how to deal with a delivery hurtling towards him.

As the open-topped three-wheeled Morgan Super 3 he was driving around Surrey's Dunsfold Aerodrome overturned on that fateful day, he believed that if he turned his head a certain way, he would likely break his neck or die. So he made the decision to fall face first.

He was left with broken ribs and serious facial injuries, which required extensive reconstructive surgery and left him with noticeable scarring.

"You get 0.4 seconds to make your mind up where the ball's going, what shot are you going to play, how are you going to move your feet," Flintoff says. "As it started going over, I looked at the ground and I knew if I get hit on the side, I'm going to break my neck. If I get hit on the temple, I'm dead. My best chance is go face down. I thought my face had come off. I was frightened to death."

And perhaps it is his cricket background that has contributed to the difficulty he has experienced healing the psychological scars of the accident.

As a player, he says, he was able to not just visualise performing a particular skill, but to feel like he was living it. In the documentary, he likens that experience to the intensity of the nightmares and flashbacks he has of the crash, remembering everything in vivid detail. It left him battling anxiety which kept him housebound for months except for medical appointments early on in his recovery.

"After the accident, I didn't think I had it in me to get through," Flintoff says. "This sounds awful, part of me thinks I should have been killed. Part of me thinks I wish I had died. I didn't want to kill myself. I wouldn't mistake the two things. I wasn't wishing, I was thinking: that would have been so much easier. Now I try to take the attitude, the sun will come up tomorrow and my kids will still give me a hug. I feel in a better place now."

Again, cricket has played a pivotal role in Flintoff reaching this point, finding comfort and purpose in his role as head coach of England Lions.

"The common theme through my life is obviously my family - parents, brother, grandparents, Rachael, the kids - but then it seems almost everything comes back to cricket," he tells friend and former England rugby player now presenter Martin Bayfield in a Q&A session after the film's premiere in London.

"That's been the one constant thread through my life. It's probably the one thing, like Rachel again said, probably saved me. I've been welcomed back into that fold and I'm loving it. I've got the opportunity now to coach. Who would have thought a 31-year-old me would be put in charge of kids, the next-best England players? And I absolutely love it.

"So for everything that's happened, I think sport has been the one thing that's given me the coping mechanisms to get through pretty much anything, because some of the lows in cricket were so low, and you have to come back. It was resilience, it was passion, surrounded by people you love and people you trust. It was probably one of the most important things in my life after my family and my friends."

One of the friends most instrumental in Flintoff's return to cricket is Rob Key, a former team-mate who is now director of England men's cricket.

In a moving scene in the documentary, Key sheds rare tears talking about how cricket has helped to look after his mate of nearly 30 years. The film reveals how, after the accident, Key would invite Flintoff to attend England Test matches in virtual secrecy, watching from a secluded area and visited by a select few mutual friends as he began to venture out of the house after so long.

Key is now also effectively Flintoff's boss, overseeing the Lions coaching role he has held since last October. And Flintoff was eager to bat away a question from Bayfield about progressing to the England head coach role, held by another friend, Brendon McCullum.

"As a player, you're always looking for the end of the game," Flintoff says. "It's about making decisions now, make a good decision now, and make a move, and then put yourself in a position to win a cricket match. I was guilty of that with a lot of things. You do a TV job, and it's, 'what's the next job?' It's always chasing something.

"We have got an exceptional England coach who is incredible. I'm so happy with where I'm at now. I'm not looking for the next job, I'm coaching the Lions, and I think for me, that is the perfect place for me to sit.

"I can work with these young lads. You're not just coaching them as cricketers, you're trying to help them navigate through a career, through life, to be better people. I don't see it as a stepping stone, I see it as the perfect job for me at this moment in time. I hope I am the perfect choice for them."

Flintoff says he will also continue to work in television from time to time.

The crash interrupted filming a second series of Flintoff's Field of Dreams programme, where he teaches a group of young men from his hometown of Preston about cricket as a positive influence on their lives and which he has since finished and seen go to air. He also filmed a special edition of the gameshow Bullseye with plans for more to come.

But cricket is very much back as an integral part of his life again. Perhaps it never left.