Aficionado's,
The Chairman and the Three Wise men have found themselves between a rock and a hard place, as the new cricket season hasn't exactly got off to a great start, despite the Mighty Blue Bags winning their first four games in the Shield outright at almost full strength and all but booking a place in the final before December. When NSW cricket is strong, Strayan cricket is strong, eh? Three blokes have cracked in November, and can't play on. And none of them have done a hammy. These sort of things can be career-enders. Not the first, nor the last, to have their heads done in; that's no place to be and there's no fun there when you're like that. This does not auger well. With two of the absentees in almost certain test contention, the selectors had to be disturbed from their slumber to do some hasty re-thinking for a squad to take on Azhar Ali's Paki's [btw it's pleasing to see Imran Khan's love child and namesake making a comeback at 32 after two years in the wilderness.] And then Jimmy Pattinson gets rubbed out for one match for calling an opposition player a homo - the third time he's called blokes names in a Shield game this calendar year. Doh. Then Smiffy gets reported, and cops a "code of conduct" and a fine for dissent, failing to remember the fundamental principle that The Man in White is Always Right. It seems they just can't help themselves. Given that the first four picked [SPD Smith, DA Warner, PJ Cummins, JR Hazlewood] are carrying the can for the team, the pickings are on the rather slim side. Yet again. And eight of the players in the squad are 29 or older. Where are the gifted 16-year-old tear-aways?
Amongst the droppee's post-Ashes, it was most disappointing to see the Token Muzzie brushed. The Ooz Man has once again been treated disgracefully by the selectors [he does average 40 in Tests after all], even though it never helps having a poor Ashes, moving to Queensland, ever, and making F-all early-season domestic runs. But you'd have to sincerely hope they aren't going to hang the "has-been" placard around Khawaja's neck. If you want to know about cricket being a cruel game, just ask Tokes, he'll tell you. You are in constant danger of being shoved out the back door without so much as a sausage. In the never ending quest for another opener, Harry Harris has been the victim of having his card marked "not quite a Test cricketer". JoBru Burns comes back from the bush for another shot at opening, despite having next to no form, purely on a horses for courses basis. No surprises either that the patsy in Sandpapergate and therefore the third "cheater" in the squad, Cam 'Bonkers' Bancroft, comes back with Alfie playing favourites and Chairman Trev saying "he can bat anywhere". That, after ten tests as an opener? Redeem one, and you have to redeem them all, is the only other explanation. Mike Neser is no bolter and no rookie and has been bought in to replace the perpetual 12th man Sids as the traditional "entertainment officer", handling important duties such as preparing the trays of powerful gin & tonics. The poster boy for the banana industry, PM Siddle's laugh-a-minute demeanour will be sorely missed, but he'll happily admit he's been carrying the drinks for a bit too long.
The Summer comes after the very close run thing that was the 2-2 Ashes in the Old Dart. Memorable only for Smiffy playing right out of his brain and getting Bradmanesque-like averages while his partner in crime Burbs Warner picked up a very bad dose of The Yips. Ian Baker-Finch came to mind; couldn't play the shots he'd mastered on the practice greens. Warner was obviously suffering under the ban on punching out Joe Root for being an obnoxious Pom in some bar room brawl in Birmingham, after which he made a mountain of runs. Never mind that the middle order failed miserably, often, or that Hazo and Cummo carried the attack under difficult circumstances bowling out Pommies and winning a couple of matches. It was not like the Glory Days of a five-nil thumping, 2006-07 style. Who will ever forget the "Never in Doubt" Test in Adelaide, when England declared their first innings closed at 500+, and still lost. The Great Warnie, Ooh Aah Glenn McGrath and Alfie Langer all retired, while Damo Martyn drifted off the face of the planet mid-season without explanation at the peak of his powers, never to be seen again. Stresscothick lost his shit after two tour games, and went home before the first Test, which he knew would mentally destroy him. Pup tonked a couple of classy tons and was never again dropped by Straya, while Roy Symonds went north in search of the ever elusive Barra and became a shadow of his former self. Things moved in mysterious ways that summer.
Which brings us around to the inevitable question. What would Pup do? Given that he eschewed a spot on the selection panel whenever he could, not much. Clarkey said practically said nothing on the ESPNSTAR TV commentary of the Ashes that was remotely memorable and he was sparely used, now that he likes to keep well out of the limelight in his home country, preferring the Sub-Continent where he is considered one of the deities in the Hindu sect which has cricket as its cult. Sachin is God, of course, but Pup sits right with him at the Long Table along with a host of other living luminaries. And why not spend most of your ample spare time in India, when you've retired too early, where you can really easily soak up the "star factor"? Pushing snake oil on Wagner vitamins TV commercials, and appearing in magazines wearing a Hublot watch can't be that hard, surely? No-one asks for Michael's opinion in Australia anymore - never did really - which is par for the course, given the best batsman of his generation's shabby treatment from the General Public, who've put in 15 solid years of wholehearted detestation of the bloke for reasons known only to The Great Unwashed. No wonder he's sodded off.
So for the utter, hopeless tragic, the following snippet is shamelessly clipped from the little known and poorly read website, cricket365 https://www.cricket365.com/, who've highlighted the speculation involved in selection in times of difficulty with this splendid idea...picking the ‘Feuded With Michael Clarke’ XI. All eleven, top to bottom. Simon "Strangler" Katich? First picked. Captain:
"A theoretical cricket team selected solely for the fun of it, often under some ludicrous self-imposed constraint.
It’s a harmless and entertaining menial diversion – the cricket selection equivalent of doing a crossword puzzle, claiming to be gluten-sensitive or solving a sudoku. It’s a piece of play not just beloved by the dregs of fandom, but endorsed by as revered a figure as Sir Donald Bradman.
Bradman himself, whose selection of an all-time XI for the book 'Bradman’s Best’ featured five specialist batsmen, two spinners, Don Tallon (Test batting average 17.1) batting at six and, wildly, given the evidence at hand, a cover blurb by Richie Benaud declaring ‘Sir Donald was the best selector I came across in the game anywhere in the world’.
(Bradman, by the way, would qualify for two out of the three XIs mentioned above, and surely only misses out on the third because Clarke was still two years away from his Test debut when The Don passed away)."
You be the judge.
