Ashes loss blamed on player's wives
There's been a lot of excuses and finger pointing to explain why we lost the Ashes - bad umpire decisions, substitute fielders, our crap batting, our even crappier bowling, Ricky Ponting's decision to send England in at Edgbaston (sorry to harp, that moment still grates). But the scapegoating has reached an all-time low as Cricket Australia investigate the possibility that having player's wives on tour was the cause of Australia's poor performance. I don't know if they have any policy on sex the night before a game - I didn't read anything about it in Australia's "The Spirit of Cricket" agreement. The article cites an example from a previous tour:
"Border had witnessed several unsettling incidents on the 1985 Ashes tour where, it was once reported, one batsman was seen walking his baby daughter in the foyer at daybreak when he was required to bat in a Test a few hours later."I just love the wording: "several unsettling incidents" and "it was once reported", as if such scenes of domesticity are so horrific, they can scarcely be imagined happening to an Australian cricketer. But the argument goes that the players weren't spending enough time on traditional bonding. I seem to remember Andrew Symonds doing some pretty intense team bonding with Shane Watson and a few of the guys the night (and on into the morning) before the Bangladesh game. Maybe if Symonds had spent the night with his family, we wouldn't have lost to Bangladesh and started the tour so poorly.
| Posted by JC on Sat 12 Nov |  12 comments |
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