I am sitting in the lobby of a London hotel with Justin Langer, trying to figure what it is about this small, genteel, quietly spoken Australian that has so enraged England’s cricketers over the years. For more than one hour now, he has been leading me down gentle alleyways such as his love of writing (he has written three books), the glory of sunsets in his native Perth and the importance of the rose in the quest for inner peace.

“In my rose garden,” he explains, “I’ve got an apple tree, a peach tree, a nectarine tree, a big olive tree and my herb garden. Do you know how good it is when you can do your cooking and walk outside and pick your own herbs? Have you ever smelt the perfume of a rose? My God! “But we get so caught up in the hustle and bustle and the business and the stress of everyday life that we don’t make time for the things that really matter. It’s a cliché — ‘wake up and smell the roses’ — but it’s true, because when you smell a rose it really gets you back living in the mould.”

Who is this pocket-sized philosopher? And what exactly am I being sold here? Is this the same Justin Langer who, a week before travelling to England for the summer’s Ashes series, invited a young West Australian basketball player into a boxing ring in Perth and proceeded to knock lumps out of him — “Come on! Let’s have it!” — because the kid happened to look like Steve Harmison? Is this the same Justin Langer who, within minutes of coming on for an injured Jason Gillespie during the first Test at Edgbaston in 1997, so enraged Nasser Hussain that he wanted to strangle him? “Look, I don’t mind the others chirping at me,” Hussain snapped, “but you’re just the f****** bus driver of this team. So you get back on the bus and get ready to drive it back to the hotel this evening.”

Is this the same Justin Langer whom Michael Vaughan described as behaving like “a bit of a tit” during the second Test at Adelaide in November 2002 after his low diving catch when Vaughan drove to cover was given not out? “To say Langer was angry is a huge understatement,” Vaughan observed. “He was so red-faced, I thought he had turned into something out of a giant packet of matches... For the rest of the morning he called me every name under the sun.”

And what are we to make of his three years (1998-2000), the last as captain, with Middlesex? His teammates scurrying for cover in the changing room whenever he was dismissed? His decree that no pastries or cakes be served to the players as a means of instilling discipline? “I love my rose garden, I love my family, I love my meditation, I love the soft side of things,” Langer told The Australian newspaper earlier this year. “But I also love paradox.”

Who is the real Justin Langer, and how do we begin to explain him?

IT’S WINTER in Perth and for the past five weeks Langer has followed the one-day matches with England at home on television, snuggled in front of the fire with his wife, Sue, and their three daughters. Outside in the garden, the cold has shorn the bushes of their leaves, but he returns to his roses each morning, not to inspect the stems and thorns but in order to reach the temple that lies beyond.

It is here, in a small, custom-built gymnasium at the foot of his garden, that Langer has been preparing for the Ashes. “I use it for training, I use it to meditate and just to escape for an hour from the noise of the kids. It’s like my own little world,” he explains. But it might easily be another planet.

Two years ago, when he informed Sue that he intended to build a place to train, she expected the usual accoutrements — some weights, a mirror, a stretching mat and a treadmill or rowing machine. He never mentioned that a former SAS soldier, covered in tattoos, would call every morning to supervise his work-outs.

He never mentioned the combat videos, the punchbag, the sparring sessions or the custom-built boxing ring. And he most certainly didn’t mention his shocking plans to decorate; the walls were covered in scribbles from a black felt marker. And not just any scribbles ...

“When I admire the wonder of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands in the worship of the Creator.” — Gandhi “You ask what is our aim? I can answer in one word: victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror; victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory there is no survival.” — Winston Churchill

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the things you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” — Mark Twain.

“If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster/ And treat those two impostors just the same.” — Rudyard Kipling