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I am writing an open invitation today to all Australian cricketing fanatics – your 2011-12 season pass for the Cricket Australia
Emotional Rollercoaster awaits. Dare you take a trip?
But first, a hello to my fellow Roarers! It’s been a while. Having an eight-month-old daughter will tend to do that to you (although she is rather cute and lovely, too!).
Anyway, into the cricket. As Ewan Day-Collins put it in his CricInfo blog: “we lambaste the players, the coach, the ECB, when things go wrong, of course.
But the constant flux in results creates rapid forgiveness, before more accusations are thrown at whoever is seen fit to receive them.”
The blog’s title? “The ups and downs of English fandom”. Only the name needs to be changed to be relevant here.
A crushing win in Sri Lanka… thrashed in South Africa; insane comeback victory in South Africa, belting New Zealand in Brisbane and now another
diabolically (yet undeniably fun) capitulation in Hobart.
So that’d be a comprehensive win by plenty due on Boxing Day followed by another skittled-for-not-much defeat in the New Year? At least you can’t say it’s a dull time to be a Baggy Greens supporter! And who wouldn’t begrudge the Kiwis such a wonderful and long-overdue win on Aussie soil.
I saw the final hour of the Hobart Test on television, and really did feel the dips, inclines and lurching sensation – all in my head, fortunately enough. It was like being on that fan ride previously only reserved for England supporters. Smash! Block! Run-out chance! Decision review! Decision retraction! Got him at last!
Heck, when Michael Clarke was asked to come up and have a happy-snappy with the Trans-Tasman Trophy by Mark Taylor, he almost appeared
totally indifferent to the idea. He looked ready to amble off the podium and immediately set to work on a critique called “How On Earth Are We Going To Beat India Now?”
Even the rest of the team seemed completely disinterested in posing with the prize. Understandably so, too. It hardly felt like anything important.
And let’s face it, New Zealand bowled to the conditions. Almost as if they were really feeling at home (which, to be honest, is nearly a given in Hobart – southernmost Test venue of Australia). Just think of it as Dunedin2.0.
The Aussie bowling? Reasonable-to-very good when fit. A decent pool of guys to pick from, too.
It’s the batting where the cracks appear. I used to be a scorer for a B grade district team in South Australia (I won’t name which). I did the job for six summers, and if memory serves the final one saw the top seven fail on multiple occasions, leaving batsmen eight to 11 – who are not there for their run-making ability – to save the day. The bowlers out-scored the batsmen with the bat. And then bowled as well.
The same applies at the national level now. I wanted to see Ponting announce his retirement straight after the Hobart game – last time at home, etc.
And I’d support calls for Simon Katich to come back as a batsman (although I am prepared to accept Michael Clarke as captain).
Phil Hughes? More time in the Sheffield Shield is probably the prognosis, but he should return at some point. Usman Khawaja – a bloke for the future, so he should hang around for a bit.
What happened on Monday wasn’t Dave Warner’s fault – or Nathan Lyon’s either. Inexperience cost the Aussies with their ninth wicket stand.
What Warner should have done was realised that he had the best part of 130 overs to make 40 runs. Score a run every three overs if necessary and simply bore the Kiwis to death. There is absolutely no shame in being forced into some block-a-rama if it ensures the right man is at the crease to hit the winning boundary.
I picked New Zealand to win the Hobart match – despite the scoffing of a work colleague who, at the height of his confidence, dared to suggest he’d prefer Australia to win the series 2-0 and follow that with a 4-0 sweep of the Indian side. Neither was likely in my opinion, althugh admittedly I tipped a draw in Brisbane…
My pick for the India series? 1-1 with at least one weather-related draw. The other draw would most likely be one of those high-scoring matches (let’s say Adelaide) where a couple of Indians rack up 250-plus each and they declare with about 650-odd just for a laugh half-way through day four. A win for Australia in Melbourne (I hope) and a defeat in Sydney.
Everything has to come together in all departments from ball one on Boxing Day, or the rest of the summer could become a very wild ride indeed (and I don’t necessarily mean that in a good way).
I did think, however, that the level of verbal and newsprint-based national hand-wringing was a little over the top. Robert Craddock, writing in the News Limited press on Wednesday, solemnly declared that “Australia may never again regain Test cricket supremacy”.
Surely that’s a little over the top.
“The result doesn’t suddenly make New Zealand world beaters. But it does show what is possible with skill, perseverance and heart.”
And that was Dave Leggat of Auckland’s Herald newspaper on Tuesday. Describing the winners. And probably why Australia lost, too.
Kiwi captain Ross Taylor agreed, telling the media after the win: “the only thing I try to instil in the players is fight and being proud of playing for your country.”
The scary thing is that Malcolm Knox in the Sydney Morning Herald on Tuesday was probably right. It might have been a worse thing, long-term, to have won on Monday.
So we have to find that elusive combination of skill, perseverance, heart, fight and pride. Or ask for it from the Kiwis as a Christmas present.
Otherwise, pretty soon we might even find ourselves in the same position England did a few years back – trundling-along domestic first-class scene, overdose on limited-over cricket and an ordinary-to-occasionally-surprising Test side. Yikes. Time to buckle up.
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