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Celebration to sandpaper: A bumpy decade for Australian cricket

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Roar Guru
31st December, 2019
10

Australian cricket is back on the straight and narrow, just one Test win away from doing something that was regulation not too many years ago – going through an entire home summer unbeaten.

But let us now sit back and review the decade.

Yes, It was ten years ago Nathan Hauritz took five wickets on Day 5, after Michael Hussey performed yet another rescue job and Pakistan threw away certain victory.

Australia started the decade off doing what they usually do. Winning.

Ricky Ponting was the skipper. Michael Clarke was being groomed as the next leader. Steve Smith was exclusively a leg spinner, Pat Cummins was still at school, and Nathan Lyon was preparing pitches at the Adelaide Oval.

Who would have thought that in this decade Australian cricket would produce the best Test batsman since Sir Donald Bradman or that the groundsman in Adelaide would go on to become the greatest finger spinner Australia has seen?

Between whitewashes, Ashes wins and a World Cup in the middle, it was a decade filled with highs, greatness, controversy, crises, sadness and most notably, idiotically, sandpaper.

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At the start of the decade, this was still a team in transition. By the end of the first summer, the Ashes had been relinquished on home soil for the first time in 25 years, our team embarrassed, the captain injured and fighting to piece it together.

The Clarke captaincy brought a new era of aggression and flamboyancy to a team that wanted to rediscover its ruthlessness. We were introduced to Cummins, James Pattinson and Mitchell Starc as boys and wouldn’t see them on the park consistently for the five years at least.

While we met David Warner in 2009 – you know, on that night at the MCG – Clarke’s captaincy would be the start of the all-format-playing Warner we are used to now.

It was in this little period where Clarke also was hitting double centuries for fun (four in a calendar year), including his iconic 329* at the SCG, when India was still yet to properly get their act together.

Australia went on to win that series 4-0 and hold the No.1 Test ranking for a period in 2012.

The retirements kept on coming. First Ponting, then Hussey.

Ricky Ponting of Australia works the ball to leg

Ricky Ponting (James Knowler/Getty Images)

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The revolving door of opening combinations and partners for Warner was like a code that the public was yet to crack – who would it be at the start of this summer? Australia ends the decade with 17 different opening combinations spanning the last ten years, with Warner having had 11 partners since he debuted in 2011.

Homeworkgate – while dwarfed by what would follow – was the start of a downward spiral in early 2013.

Mickey Arthur decided to go the primary school method of reprimanding players who didn’t submit their homework, barring them from playtime, as Australia was smashed 4-0 and labeled the worst ever touring side to go to India.

They then failed to win a game at the Champions Trophy, Warner punched Joe Root in a bar, Arthur was removed as coach, and before you knew it the first of two Ashes series was about to commence.

The most joyful moment of the first was on the second day of the first Test, as Ashton Agar produced the most memorable near-century in cricket.

The home whitewash and the summer of Mitchell Johnson helped the nation fall back in love with its team. It not only fixed Australian cricket but broke England cricket, which – let’s face it – is something we Australians take great pride in.

Mitchell Johnson of Australia bowls

Mitchell Johnson (Photo by Robert Prezioso/Getty Images)

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It was also around this time when a modern-day Bradman started to emerge. Hello, Steven.

There was also a time when cricket didn’t matter for a little while. We all remember where we were when we heard that Phillip Hughes had been felled by a ball at the SCG. We remember Clarke sobbing on our televisions, reading a statement on behalf of the family, announcing Hughes’ death.

Bats were put out across the world. Cricket brings so much joy, happiness, and friendship. No one thought that a simple act of bowling a ball would take a life.

Yet such was the impact Phillip had on the game in his short time, he created a legacy that will carry on forever.

The summer of 2014-15 – a summer that almost didn’t, but had to happen – marked Smith’s arrival, as he scored hundreds for fun against India. It also saw Lyon finally cement himself as Australia’s long term post-Shan Warne solution – the GOAT had arrived.

With the spirit and emotion of Phillip Hughes with them, and a groundswell of support and goodwill from the public, the Aussies took home their fifth World Cup on home soil in a canter, only losing one game by one wicket, against the co-hosts New Zealand at Eden Park, in what was one of the ODIs of the decade.

The noise from when Mitchell Starc bowled Brendon McCullum with the third ball of the final at the MCG still sends a shiver down every cricket fan’s spine.

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Mitchell Starc of Australia celebrates with Brad Haddin

Mitchell Starc (AAP Image/Joe Castro)

There was no shortage of low totals and crises either.

The Cape Town capitulation – all out 47. The Hobar humiliation – all out 85. The Boxing Day disaster – all out 98. And the infamous torture-chamber that was Trent Bridge – all out for just 60 in 18.3 overs.

It was a constant struggle to find competent batsmen. Players given multiple cracks before being cast back to state cricket not to be seen again. There were endless chances if your surname was Marsh, while others were not given more than a six-month period to make an impression.

The Ashes were home again. Smith scored a lot of runs as Australia regained the urn and also ran the worst marketing campaign in the history of the sport – karma was always going to bite you for the way that was handled.

And then there was Sandpaper.

Cameron Bancroft

Cameron Bancroft (AP Photo/Halden Krog)

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The ball-tampering scandal of 2018 brought Australian cricket to its knees.

Captain Smith and vice-captain Warner were stripped of their leadership positions and handed year-long bans, while Cameron Bancroft was suspended for nine months.

There was a cleanout at Cricket Australia from top to bottom, with chairman David Peever, long-serving chief executive James Sutherland, high-performance boss Pat Howard, and coach Darren Lehmann all departing.

Tim Paine became Australian captain mere months after almost giving the game away. Along with new coach Justin Langer, Paine was given the near-impossible task of galvanising a team and playing competitive cricket.

Against all odds, Paine came home from England with the Ashes still intact. A feat that many great Australian captains before him could not achieve.

It would be remiss of me here not to mention the women who enjoyed a decade of dominance, continually raising the bar across the world.

Our girls lifted four Twenty20 World Cups to go with their 50-over world title in 2013. The game entered the professional era with Ellyse Perry, Alyssa Healy, and Meg Lanning becoming household names. Perry is set to stand the test of time as one of the finest players this country has produced.

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Ellyse Perry celebrates a double century

Ellyse Perry (Photo by Mark Evans/Getty Images)

Introduced for the 2011-12 season, the Big Bash League has become one of the major competitions in Australian sport. The move from a state to city-based league has lifted the profile of domestic players and also attracted some of the biggest names in world cricket, such as AB de Villiers, Dale Steyn, and Chris Gayle.

The growth and popularity of the Big Bash nationally and worldwide has proved a financial hit for CA, which now has an extra eight-figure income stream outside of the national teams.

It was certainly a jam-packed decade, one that both made and broke cricket in this country. As we enter the new year and new cycle, we wonder what the next big stories will be.

Talent-wise, the next generation is ready and waiting, but we hope that this current incarnation of the Australian team still has some building to do in the new decade.

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