Oh Mickey, What A Pity You Don't Understand

Didn't think twice

Mickey Arthur never controlled the South African cricket team during his five years as the head coach. Graeme Smith did that. It was a mistake he wasn't going to commit again in Australia.

As a result, four players have been suspended for a Test match so that the head coach could instil discipline into his side. All four were a good chance of playing in a Test match which will determine the series. Shane Watson and James Pattinson certainly would have played and with Phil Hughes form, Usman Khawaja was almost as certain. Mitchell Johnson, who has had success at Mohali, was a strong possibility. Australia needed something new, something aggressive to upset the Indian batting groove. It was scenario made for Johnson.

Instead, three of them will run out drinks and wear also-ran orange vests whilst Watson flies home, earlier than planned, to be with his partner, who is in the very final stages of pregnancy. According to statements made at airports, he's going home to consider his future in cricket. Frankly, with lucrative money deals to be made by the best short form players in the game, why would Watson give a toss about Test cricket for Australia after this shabby treatment.

Let's just take pause and remember that these players have been suspended for a breech in the code of conduct. It didn't involve drug taking. It didn't involve drunkenness. It didn't involve flashing their private parts to local girls in a nightclub or sneaking Bollywood would-be's into their rooms. It didn't involve punch ups in a local bar. It didn't even involve failing to turn up to training or a team function.

They didn't do their homework.

If this happened at your local high school, imagine the ruckus if four boys copped a five day suspension for failure to hand in their homework - two of them on their first offence. You'd have to wield a knife or sell drugs to the Principal when someone else was watching to cop a bigger punishment.

Michael Clarke, in his resolute yet ridiculous defence of a decision he was an agreeable party to, has said that this wasn't the first offence by the players involved. He wouldn't explain the details of previous offences but wanted reporters to know that it was about building a team culture of discipline. He spoke more of the coach than the players.

Mickey Arthur was more forthcoming. In his earlier press conference, he admitted it was Watson's first offence: the same Watson who had a few days earlier asked the coach for some time to discuss the task with Arthur on the very day suspended him. James Pattinson had made a similar request. It was on the subject of prior offences that Arthur's comments were revealing. He was happy to indicate that some players had been refusing to fill in their daily wellness chart: a self-reporting page of questions about their fitness and general physical and mental wellness.

Two players - Khawaja and Johnson - had been guilty of this. Information from close to the team indicate that Khawaja, in particular, had been questioned over his attitude.

It's hard to imagine, isn't it, why players would be reluctant to complete these wellness questionnaires - late in a summer when Ben Hilfenhaus, Peter Siddle and Mitchell Starc were dropped "on rotation" to keep them fresh. Perhaps Johnson and Khawaja at least had the integrity to not submit a lie or perhaps they just forgot.

It would be nice to know if warnings have been issued to players on the tour. Unfair dismissal laws in Australia require three warnings but then, three strikes and your out is another game. Were the players warned that a failure to complete Mickey Arthur's mind space exercise would cost them the opportunity for selection for the third Test or are we looking at a South African autocrat, struggling for a reason to justify his continuing role and not prepared to loose mastery over his charges?

If so, he is in for a rude shock sometime soon. Australians won't be pushed into corners and told what to do. We have a proud history of irreverence to authority and whilst many would agree that Khawaja and Johnson may have been problematic in this issue, Watson and Pattinson were looking to do the right thing and had made the right approaches, but have been dealt with harshly and in a manner totally inappropriate.

Just a guess, but I bet Phil Hughes gets gold stars from the Headmaster for handing in his paperwork ahead of time.

"Outta here boys ..."

The surprising player in this high handed game has been Clarke. He had looked better than this. Scoring masses of runs won't be enough to win back the players' respect now.

Arthur, with Clarke's public support, has created fear and low morale in the Australian team. Players are frightened to be truthful and fighting to retain their spot in the side, Test by Test, for reasons other than form. On a tour that has always been difficult, a sense of "team" has been destroyed, despite the usual PR ploy of propping up the team image by having younger players front for press conferences, saying everything is hunky dory.

It isn't.

This action was about discipline? No, it was about control and the crushing of individuality. It was the same planned control which Arthur imposed on Graeme Smith and his team for five years before they parted company. Sure they had success but they crumbled under pressure often, when conditions or situations called for creativity.

South Africa are now the most flexible, innovative team in world cricket. South Africa are also number one.

John Buchanan ran a disciplined side but then, he understood discipline to be something you built in players, not imposed. His was the approach Steve Waugh believed so strongly in, that you trusted in players and gave them responsibility. It pays to remember, he had one of the most reckless and ill-disciplined players of all time under his guidance. Iron fisted control tactics rarely work in schools and will never work with a bunch of Australian men playing at the sharpest, highest end of the widely based triangle that is Australian cricket. They are not for crushing and grinding.

Its doubtful whether morale was plumbing to the current depths during the Yallop leadership or the ill-fated 1977 tour to England when the Packer sabotage was unfolding.

Apart from destroying morale and alienating players from the captain - who will sit at his table at the AB Medal now? - this decision has made Australia the laughing stock of the cricket world. MS Dhoni and Harbhajan must be hoping they have recovered from fits of hysteria in time to play on Thursday.

This has been a successful team under Clarke/Arthur, until India. This summer, it started to go wrong when a Test series against the best team in the world - the team Arthur lost control of - was surrendered after Australia dominated two thirds of the play. It was lost when we failed to pick our best team, almost certainly because of Peter Siddle's truthfulness.

The Sri Lankan series whitewash which followed was against an old team who were off their game and Australia, case-hardened by jousts with South Africa, walloped them. The one-day series began the worries for the management team and the media started to question on and off field tactics.

The Indian tour is the most difficult in world cricket so Australia took an unbalanced team of rookies. India is a hard place. Food, water and the many distractions of a culture so different to Australia make it tough for even seasoned campaigners. This is why Steve Waugh called on his players to embrace India and in doing so, know how to win. It was learning to know what the head wobble meant ("Save Your Legs").

Winning in India is extremely hard. The conditions, the form of the locals and extremely odd team selections have resulted in two hidings - two very hard lessons. The players didn't need homework to know that.

Arthur see Clarke have just made winning, science fiction.

 

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