Shane Watson has been in the media spotlight for reasons he would rather forget.
Having had more injuries at the start of his career than most professional cricketers experience over the course of the entire careers, Watson has received considerable criticism questioning his physical and mental toughness. Was his bludgeoning of the New Zealand bowlers in the last round of the Super 8’s a sign of better things come?
Watson is a marketers dream. Well-groomed, well-spoken, polite and talented; his face is almost tailor made to sell men’s health products to the metrosexual generation and his off-field demeanour is the kind that wins the hearts of grandmothers. This clean image and his poor injury record have been construed by many as the symptoms of a soft underbelly and many a former cricketing great has dismissed him as a fragile talent – good in the domestic stuff but not tough enough for tests.
Despite this criticism, Watson has been persisted with and even rushed back into a winning team when he returned from injury.
It wasn’t that long ago that another muscle-bound, Queensland all-rounder was persisted with much to the disdain of the broader Australian cricket media. Until Andrew Symonds’ massive innings in the opening game of the decidedly more exciting 2003 world cup, he had yet to convince the greater populace that he deserved a spot in the green and gold pyjamas. Now you wouldn’t pick an Aussie team without him.
Symonds hadn’t really failed prior to this but he hadn’t really excelled either. He was there or there abouts but as a sportsman representing Australia’s national obsession that was never going to be good enough for the average armchair punter. Wisely, John Buchanan didn’t listen to the popular opinion of the time and continued to select Symonds. To Buchanan’s credit, Symonds proved him right and so hopefully will Shane Watson.
The time has come for Watson to finally prove his critics wrong. He is fit, he is in superb touch and he is one game away from playing on the biggest stage there is in the shortened form of the game. It is time for the real Shane Watson to stand up and show he has been deserving of his coach’s unflinching support.
[pic via ABC]
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