On Thursday, Harry Brook will walk out at Lord’s in an England shirt for the opening Test Match of the summer against New Zealand. He has a Test triple century to his name in Multan and has just captained his country at a T20 World Cup. He has, in fact, been ranked by the ICC as the number one Test batter in the world. But he will never forget where it all started.
“It all started here for me,” said Brook in a video recently filmed at Burley-in-Wharfedale Cricket Club.
The video in question has been filmed as part of Yorkshire’s Chasing Glory campaign. It celebrates the work done by recreational clubs within the White Rose county and also our club’s famous Pathway and Academy programmes.
“My dad, my two uncles and my grandad all played a hell of a lot of cricket here, and I think it’s important for Yorkshire to have clubs like this.
“To have a couple of players come out of this club and play cricket for Yorkshire, England Lions and England is such an amazing thing for the county and Burley-in-Wharfedale.”
All-rounder Matthew Revis is the other player from Burley which Brook references. They have both gone on pretty much the same journey – Burley, Sedbergh School and through the Yorkshire system.
Revis hasn’t quite reached the same destination Brook has just yet, but a senior international debut may not be too far away.
“It’s only a small village club here,” continued Brook.
“Everybody starts somewhere, and this was the place where I started.
“I managed to get into the Yorkshire Pathways, and I’ve gone on to do some good things so far. But hopefully there’s a lot more to come in the future.
“Without Yorkshire in my career so far, I wouldn’t have played for England. No chance.
“I think that’s something for the future as well.
“You can only create good cricketers by giving them opportunities in certain situations and games to go out there and try and perform to the best of their ability and show the rest of Yorkshire what they’re about.”
Many a star name has come through the Yorkshire age-groups and the Academy, be it male or female. There are unquestionably plenty more to follow in the footsteps of current England limited overs skipper Brook.
Yorkshire’s pathway continues to set the benchmark for developing professional cricketers of the future. The transition rate from pathway to professional is exceptionally strong; 16 of the current Yorkshire men’s squad alone graduated through the pathway, with a further five in the women’s squad.
The scale of the pathway is also equally impressive. During 2026, almost 600 pathway fixtures will be staged across Yorkshire alone and the Club will work with over 340 cricketers across 26 squads, providing opportunities for talented players from every corner of the county.
As part of the Inspire pillar within Chasing Glory 2026–2036, Yorkshire’s new 10-year strategy, the Club has placed talent development at the heart of its future vision, making it a collective obsession and embedding a true high-performance culture throughout the Club. Alongside this, Yorkshire Cricket and the Yorkshire Cricket Foundation are committed to unlocking the full potential of the county’s talent ecosystem, building transparent pathways and collaborative systems that ensure discovering and developing talent is viewed as a collective responsibility.
Now aged 27, Brook’s talent was first spotted as a toddler down at Burley, a ground which his late grandparents’ house overlooked. There is a bench which Harry’s father David built down at Burley which pays tribute to Pauline and Tony.
Brook added: “To be able to produce players to go on and play at the top level, international cricket and for Yorkshire for a long period of time, you can only do that by going through the Pathways, whether that’s the Academies, the winter programmes that they have through the age-groups.
“The way that cricket’s evolving, you have to have the back from the coaches to go out there and play without fear.
“The Pathways are so important.”
So, when Harry walks out at the Home of Cricket to tackle the Kiwis, he will do so with Burley-in-Wharfedale and Yorkshire behind him.
And there will be others who are at the start of the same journey who will be telling a similarly inspiring tale in the years to come about how they were Chasing Glory too.
