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“I hate [insert opposition team name]”.
“They’re full of s*?# blokes!” “Lets $*#? these *!#?s up!”
A bit full on for you? Welcome into the dressing room of a grade cricket club.
Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft deserve their punishments. They have made their mistakes, and they will pay for it dearly. But you can’t help but feel a bit of sympathy for them. It all starts at the grassroots level. They’re simply a product of their environments.
From ball-tampering to aggression and sledging, this is now the image of Australian cricket around the world. Australian cricket is in crisis, “heads must roll” says Warnie! The culture is toxic and we’re too angry. We’ve ‘head-butted the line’ one too many times.
But the buck doesn’t stop at the national side. While Cricket Australia, the coaching staff and the players themselves are responsible for failing to rein in the side’s behaviour, the Australian cricket team is, in reality, an extremely talented team of grade cricketers. Head down to our local oval over any summer weekend, and you’ll witness this distinctly Australian cricket culture played out around the country.
The send-offs are vicious. The sledging personal and vile. ‘The Grade Cricketer’ has it right when describing the alpha culture of Australian cricket where you stand over your opponents and belittle and attack them to break their concentration. The image of Warner’s verbal tirade against Aiden Markram following the runout of AB de Villiers in the first Test against South Africa could easily have been mistaken for a pit bull ambushing a visitor into your new home.
But this was just to get under Markram’s skin. Remember, we play hard and fair!
(Photo by Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)
Up until the Ashes, Australia were picking a wicketkeeper purely on the basis that he could talk garbage to the batsmen all day. Picking a bloke because of their sledging ability – if that’s not a grade cricket approach to selection, I don’t know what is!
Nice Gary!
I’ve played in games where our opening bowler, as he walked past the umpire back to his mark would be noticeably driving his nails into the ball. In another game, a player went to retrieve a ball from a construction site that was covered by a large tarpaulin sheet, the wind suddenly blew the tarp to uncover him scraping the rough side of the ball along the concrete pavers.
Sandpaper doesn’t sound too bad now!
This win-at-all-costs mentality isn’t confined just to the Australian dressing room. It’s something systematically ingrained within Australian cricket culture.
Maybe the ‘Cape Town Three’ can be the forces for change that Steve Smith spoke about. By accepting the sanctions imposed upon them and with only premier cricket to return to, maybe Smith, Warner and Bancroft can not only bring about change within the national set-up, but within the pathway that develops the young men that come to represent our country.
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