A National Disgrace
Three weeks back, on a warm and hungover Saturday morning, I pulled on the whites and dusted off the pads and adjusted the box for the first time in a few years. When you’re always on the move like those of us in the journalistic community are, well, it’s hard to lock yourself down for every summer Saturday. So a few years back-when working on a story involving panda bears and the Australian Labor Party that never really reached its natural and messy conclusion- I decided to hang up the whites for good. It was a tough decision, but one that had to be made.
And for the last three summers, those whites have remained unstained by grass or leather.
That was until three weekends back. Drunkenly stirring, feeling the hurt of a Saturday morning, angry and tired, my portable telephone started making dreadful noise. When it didn’t stop, I had no choice but to investigate. The noise, of course, was only the ring but how was I to know?
When I flipped it open and grunted, my old skipper was frantically jibbering.
“You play…ah, cricket…today…important game…viral infections and alcoholics…we need bowlers…you…you bowl…be there…no, I’ll be there…be ready…twelve,” was all I made out before the phone went dead.
I had seemingly accepted the offer because about an hour later, I was re-awoken by my skipper howling like a bear at me, screaming and yelling and grabbing.
“I need a shower” I muttered, as Skip tried to push me out the door.
“No time” he yelled, grabbing my shoes and pushing me towards the car.
But I’m an old pro wrestler, so I twisted out and made it to the bathroom.
When I made it to the car, not fifteen minutes later, Skip was in tears and ranting and raving. I gave him a shot of whiskey, swigged one back myself and told him to calm down…he was manically jabbering about being late and must win games.
“Well, never mind all that…I’ll drive” I enthused, an uneasy sense that maybe I hadn’t fulfilled my obligations this morning and perhaps I was not contributing to my full and whole capacity.
When we arrived at the ground, the opposition captain looked none too pleased but that’s by-the-by I guess. And it hit me as I peeled off the shorts and pulled up the white strides…what a wonderful eclipse for the senses.
The smell of freshly mown lawn…the chirping of fieldsmen and birds and pop-by spectators…the overview of white speckled on green…the feel of leather and willow and the sun burning your neck…the taste of competition and fear and justice…
I knocked up a cheeky six not out from the old number eleven slot and then it was into the field. After five overs, Skip pointed at me and rolled his arm over in some form of windmill ritual. “Stretch Up”. Well, indeed…
As I stood at backward square leg, stretching half heartedly, it occurred to me what a wonderfully fair and tangible game cricket was. A player’s contribution was always very easy to measure, unlike in most sports. And players who had the numbers to suggest they contributed significantly were rewarded and those who didn’t weren’t. I was thinking about this when the batsman played one just around the corner and it looked like I would have to get on my bike…but I just raised my hand and called out to the fine leg.
On my fifth ball, I claimed my first wicket for three years. Bounding in and leaping awkwardly, I fired in a well pitched in-swinger that knocked over the opener. After toiling away all day, I finished with 3 for 31-the top wicket taker in our three wicket defeat.
As I wandered from the pitch-probably for the last time- team mates grabbing for my hand and muttering thoughts of shoulder-carryings and guards of honour, I realised I had contributed. It wasn’t a sense or a feeling or a thought…it was a fact. It was there in the scorebook.
And that’s the way cricket is. Performance is measurable, contributions graspable. It is all there in the scorebook. Any fool with an infants understanding of cricket and at least one decent peeper knows that…
But, unfortunately, there are some queer, perverted, pretentious gits out there who don’t get it…who don’t understand the tangibility and subsequent fairness of cricket…who like to go on “feelings” and “intangibles” and “hopes” rather than facts, figures and the goddamn scorebook…
And it just happens to be the case that our national selectors have seemingly foregone over a century of tradition and common sense and started basing selection on “feelings” and “intangibles” and “hopes”…
Runs don’t seem to count and wickets don’t seem to matter. Nor does present or past form. Trevor Hohns and his band of merry madmen pick the Australian international sides on a whim and a dice roll. Whoever comes to mind, whoever is trendy, whoever will sell, whoever the tarot cards say.
Just ask Brad Hodge.
Disregarding what all national selectors have done for the moustache and what half have contributed to cricket (it can hardly be said Trevor Hohns or Andrew Hilditch have contributed anything to cricket), all these bastards should be stoned. And no correspondence will be entered into on this point. I am right, fully and completely.
The non-selection of that fine Victorian batsman, Brad Hodge, is the biggest selection disgrace since Dean Jones was dropped for Damien Martyn in 1992. That’s saying something with Mitchell Johnson, Mick Lewis and Brett Dorey having all played recently for Australia and Shane Watson, Nathan Hauritz and Scott Mueller receiving Test caps over the last decade.
How can anybody of sound mind drop a recently capped player who has a test average of 58? And for a player who three months previous was considered washed up?
There is not an ounce of logic to this decision. Even madmen like William Burroughs couldn’t have found sense or meaning in this quagmire of stupidity. Brad Hodge did nothing but perform this summer, making a stoic 60 on debut when wickets tumbled around him and then scoring a magnificent double ton at Perth. And then he is blindsided, king hit by that thug Trevor Hohns who said his domestic form was not good enough. Of course, Damien Martyn had averaged 21 for WA this summer but that’s probably not relevant right now…
In the good old days, fools like Hohns were taken out, whipped and beaten until their stupidity and arrogance were sent flooding out of them, like blood from their ear. He is destroying Australian chances…destroying Australian cricket…destroying cricket.
The look of pure joy on Brad Hodge when he wandered onto the MCG for the first time as an Australian Test player…well, it was the same as mine when I came charging in for the first time in three years. The world and the moment and the game were beautiful and that childhood feeling that the game was fun and embodied all that was good and fair. But thanks to that germ Trevor Hohns and his barmby bunch of co-conspirators, the smile has been wiped from the face of Australian cricket…we all look on the game now as a business, where hard work and runs doesn’t always make the nut and blonde hair and prettiness will always get a pay cheque.
But he’ll pay the price. Australia’s inevitable failure-which will probably start in South Africa-will be blamed on the fools that fucked the system. And that is you Trevor Hohns.
When Brad Hodge makes it back, he’ll be shot because deep down he realises it doesn’t matter what he does. Youngsters will worry more about marketability than the forward defence. And the price of the baggy green has dropped off like a rapid cliff face…stocks are down and now is the time to sell.
Australian cricket is down and only sliding further, keeling over in pain from the ball kicking Trevor Hohns has given it. And we should flee, investing all funds that can be raised on opposition glory…
It’s sad and it hurts but it has to be done.
And that, cricket freaks, is that.