Cricket fans are an anxious bunch. They are constantly looking at their game, wondering what is wrong with it and what needs to be changed.
For an example, look at one day cricket.
The format was originally invented to make the game more interesting and to bring more fans.
That certainly worked and the format was going well. Until another, shorter, format turned up and made it the weird relative who mysteriously turns up to all family outings without ever being invited.
Since the introduction of T20 cricket and particularly international T20 cricket, one day cricket has struggled for relevance, grounds, players and recognition.
Once used as a means of acclimatising players to Test cricket, it suddenly became the cricket world’s equivalent to social smoking – something that people did sometimes, though without a clear reason why.
Cricket Australia recognised the issues with one day cricket a few years ago and changed its domestic tournament to run over a month, rather than the whole summer, freeing up grounds and players for Test and T20 competitions.
The lack of investment in the format has seemingly resulted in a smaller talent pool of players, with the Australian ODI team recently losing a series 5-0 in South Africa. This is the first time they’ve ever been swept 5-0.
There are some mitigating factors, including significant injuries to key players, but the abject defeat suggests wider issues are at play.
Unless you’re the Fremantle Dockers, you don’t go from being one of the best teams to easy-beats within 12 months.
Even when considering the injuries, the Australian team was outplayed in every department, particularly with the ball. It was such a bad overall showing that Matthew Wade was one of the better performers.
Bowlers Chris Tremain, Joe Mennie, Daniel Worrall and Scott Boland are good state cricketers, but against South Africa they combined for 15 wickets across five games for the cost of 685 runs with an average of 46. They also leaked 6.6 runs an over.
Adam Zampa is a leg spinner with promise, but he too took more of a battering than the Montague Street bridge.
Mitch Marsh seems to have taken over his brother’s job of ensuring someone named ‘Marsh’ is in the team, with little other justification for keeping his spot. He averaged 27 with the bat and 67 with the ball.
Of the batsmen, only David Warner had a better than average series, with his 386 runs at an average of 77, following on from the success he had in Sri Lanka where he also captained the side.
Aaron Finch and George Bailey remind me of overweight middle-aged businessmen who are still at the bar after 11pm. Their best is behind them and the night isn’t getting any better. I only know this from my own experience.
So what is to be done?
A good start may be to select a better mix of experience and youth in the bowling squad.
Jason Behrendorff is bowling extremely well for Western Australia in the domestic tournament, with four wickets at an average of 27.
He swings the white ball early, and at 26 years of age, he has plenty of experience.
Cameron Boyce seemingly stepped into a vortex, which resulted in him dropping out of the national selectors’ view and landing in Tasmania. That’s a worse result than nearly everything the guy from Quantum Leap ever experienced.
Still, he has a decent international T20 record, with 8 wickets at an average of 19, and he is also performing well in the domestic one day competition.
Marcus Stoinis isn’t the quickest bowler going around, but he may be the best looking, and he has taken six wickets at an average of 21 for Victoria this season. He has also shown he can bat, averaging 36 with a strike rate of 110.
I bet he even dances well too. What a bastard.
For the batsmen, rather than banishing last summer’s Test centurions Joe Burns and Usman Khawaja from all forms of international cricket, it might be worth letting them find form in the shorter format.
Failing that, Stoinis’ teammate Cameron White is once again dominating the domestic one day competition, having hit two centuries in four matches.
But perhaps the greatest change of all needs to be Australia’s approach to the game.
Cricket Australia needs to stop being a social smoker, get to the local shop and start smashing Winfields properly, or just quit altogether.
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