Matt Cleary

Dear David Gower...

What would an Ashes series be without Aussies and Poms giving each other stick about something or other? Answer: nothing

Matt Cleary

07-Jun-2013

So, the old "culture" thing, David Gower, hm? We don't mind, truly we don't. Sledging between Aussies and Poms is (bloody/jolly) good fun, and what would an Ashes series be without Aussies and Poms giving each other stick about something or other? Answer: nothing.

Oh no, bring it, David Gower. Bring it.

But we expected better. I mean, the culture thing? You couldn't have dug up an older bit of schtick? You couldn't have fossicked around in Neolithic Gondwanaland and dredged up a fresher piece of pathos? An old doozy about convicts, say, or Kylie, or sheep? Please. No. We expected better.

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The 16 Aussies who went to South Africa

The squad that toured a country under apartheid in 1985-86 played some quality, hard-fought cricket, but at what cost?

Matt Cleary

31-May-2013

In 1985, South Africa was pariah of the world. The government's policy of apartheid was despised. Anti-apartheid groups were outlawed. The infamous "pass laws" limited the movements of people based on their skin colour. The toilets were divided so that those with different-coloured backsides could not warm each other's seat. Nelson Mandela was in jail, a "terrorist".

Into this political and social maelstrom came 16 Australian cricketers, a near-Test-strength squad imported by Ali Bacher to "keep the game alive" in South Africa.

The Australian squad that turned up in November of 1985 was: Terry Alderman, John Dyson, Peter Faulkner, Michael Haysman, Tom Hogan, Rodney Hogg, Trevor Hohns, Kim Hughes (c), John Maguire, Rod McCurdy, Carl Rackemann, Steve Rixon, Greg Shipperd, Steve Smith, Michael Taylor and Graham Yallop.

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Less cricket on TV? Hallelujah

Why Channel Nine should be applauded for not broadcasting domestic cricket in Australia

Matt Cleary

24-May-2013

I'm not exactly sure, because lawyers arguing over money bores me more than a reply speech to a budget reply speech, but what appears to have happened in the case of Cricket Australia versus Channel Nine is this:

Channel Nine - a broadcaster of Australian cricket since 1977 - doesn't want to show Australian domestic cricket on its television station because apart from the Big Bash League (which Channel Nine doesn't hold the broadcast rights to) domestic cricket doesn't rate enough to broadcast.

Cricket Australia has then said to Channel Nine that when they sold the rights to broadcast its product (cricket), it was on the proviso that Channel Nine would broadcast all of its product, not just the stuff that rates. And with other broadcasters wanting to pay money for the domestic cricket that Channel Nine doesn't show, Channel Nine has reneged on its contract.

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A cricket bucket list

Going on a tour, writing a match report, talking to Big Merv... try doing some of these things before you meet your maker

Matt Cleary

17-May-2013

You are going to die. One day your mighty heart will stop beating, blood will cease to flow to your brain and you will become inanimate, you will expire, you will make like an ex-parrot. There is no other way out. There will be no Hale-Bopp Comet. It is a given: you are going to die.

But there's no reason you can't live large while you're about. Here are some cricket experiences you could tick off the list.

Watch a Test at Lord's. The gravitas, the white picket-fencing, the slope of it, the press box that looks like the Starship Enterprise, the posh blokes in the red-and-yellow ties, the great city of London - it's a ripper, Lord's. To really get into the ground's - and the game of cricket's - bowels, take a tour. Hear the tales of Bradman and Botham and Trueman and Warne. See the Long Room and inside it the long, tall, lovely glass cabinet that Rod Marsh smashed when he hurled his cricket bat at it.

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When AB and Thommo nearly pulled off a Melbourne heist

One December afternoon in 1982, Allan Border found an ally in the form of No. 11 Jeff Thomson and they almost pulled off the greatest last-wicket chase in history

Matt Cleary

10-May-2013

Throughout the middle of the 1980s, the one constant in Australian cricket - along with losing quite a lot - was Allan Robert Border, the great "AB".

More pugnacious than a pit-bull named Fighting Harada, with determination forged against the most terrifying bowlers in cricket's whitest-hot cauldrons, Border was Australia's Rock, a batsman whose willpower and steel - and no small amount of skill - single-handedly battled the forces of evil that so outgunned Australia at the time.

Unlike David Gower or Mark Waugh, who were both beautiful to watch, Border batted like a boxer - hit and be hit, he seemed to say. So many of his innings were lone hands and many were regarded as "fighting" or "rear guard" because he was the only one not killed off. This was some player.

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What Richards and Gilchrist did for modern batting

Their styles were completely different but the result was always the same: quick runs and defeated bowlers

Matt Cleary

03-May-2013

One was raised in the country town of Bellingen in New South Wales, the other on the tropical island of Antigua. One was the son of a schoolteacher, the other of a prison guard. One's accent is a nasal, all-Aussie strine; the other has a lilting Caribbean patois, like rum punch in a hammock. Culturally they were different yet they shared a love of one thing: hitting a cricket ball so hard it nearly caught fire. They were left and right, black and white, yin and yang. They are cricket's greatest master blasters.

I speak, of course, of Adam Gilchrist and Viv Richards, who thrilled two generations of cricket fans. Richards retired in 1991, aged 39, after 17 years of Test cricket. Gilchrist, who like so many kids of his generation venerated the great West Indian, made his first-class debut for NSW in 1992. Both men changed the "accepted" way batsmen bat.

Richards walked out with a strut that said: "I'm comin'". He'd swing the bat like a sword, loosening his powerful shoulders, knowing eyes were on him. It was theatre, machismo and menace. He'd take guard and wander down the pitch, patting it down, chewing his gum and eyeballing the bowler.

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My Australian XI for the Ashes

The squad that has been selected isn't bad at all. The quicks could trouble batsmen, and someone like Usman Khawaja needs just one good score to start a chain of them

Matt Cleary

25-Apr-2013

Australia's Ashes team? I like it.

There aren't many great batsmen, because Australia don't have many. Indeed, Australia have one. The rest are serviceable enough odd bods with eclectic skill sets.

Shane Watson is capable of thumping knocks at the top of the order, though he chokes like a disco chicken the closer he gets to three figures. (Disco chicken? Dunno. But I'm goin' with it.) Big Watto is like inclement weather - he's always threatening but is very rarely as bad as feared.

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How to attract more women to cricket

Show them a good time through the sidelights, and if they enjoy themselves they may come back for more

Matt Cleary

20-Apr-2013

Years ago during the protracted courtship of my wife, I tried to impress her by saying I wrote for Australian magazine Inside Cricket. After snorting sauvignon blanc out of her nose, she laughed and said: "Inside Cricket? I'd rather be inside hell!" And while it wasn't the reaction I'd wanted, at least I got a laugh. And today we have three children. And here we are.

Yet her sentiment was not unexpected. Because even in sports-loving Australia, with cricket the national sport, there are people (if you can believe it) who don't like cricket. It's not uncommon. For many people - let's call many of them "women" - cricket is boring, incomprehensible, ubiquitous, and completely pointless. (Of course many of these same discerning viewers will settle in for a marathon of Kardashians shopping for breast pumps. But there you go - to each his and/or her own.)

Now, my wife and I, like the Ghostbusters, are quite happy not to cross the streams. She'll watch her famous, rich, screeching-idiot Americans. I'll head to the SCG and drink beer. And there are two winners.

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Cricket's greatest bearded XI

And so, for no reason, cricket's greatest beard XI

Matt Cleary

12-Apr-2013

And so, for no reason, cricket's greatest bearded XI.

1. S Anwar - How one imagines Abraham Lincoln would look if he was stockier, darker, shorter, less gaunt, and a cavalier opening batsman from Pakistan.

2. CG Greenidge - Great to watch, our Gordon. Instead of calling for a runner when injured, he'd see it as an opportunity to stand back and belt boundaries. Top batsman, top beard. Coincidence? Probably it is, yes.

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Don't blame Pat Howard

Seemingly because he used to be a rugby player, Cricket Australia's General Manager Team Performance has been on the receiving end of some unfair criticism. The team is not performing highly but that is not (yet) Pat Howard's fault

Matt Cleary

06-Apr-2013

Attended a "Do" the other day, a function attended by various sports and media types. Because that's what you do when you're a sports and media type, you attend Dos. And there you drink and eat and talk sports and media with fellow sports and media types, and there is no argument, it is all good.

So I'm at this Do, doing what you do, at Dos, which is talk about sport. At my table were three other journalists, a couple of retired rugby league players, and a former Australia fast bowler. And so the conversation rolled around, as conversations among Australian sports and media types tend to, to the Australian cricket team, and the recent travails thereof.

And a couple of these types decided a lot of the problems lay with Pat Howard, General Manager Team Performance. "I've spoken to heaps of people and no-one's had a decent word to say about him," said one fellow. "They reckon he's rubbed a lot of blokes up the wrong way," added another. "Quite an abrasive manner, apparently."

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