The Myth of Five Day Cricket

I play basketball Tuesday day nights in what is loosely termed a social league, which is to say that there aren’t any clubs or coaches or training involved, but it’s still a competitive undertaking. Towards the end of last season I mentioned to my good friend and teammate that we were right on the borderline of making the finals. “Who gives a shit about finals,” he replied, “I just want to play a game."

I spent most of last Sunday with this idea rolling around in my head as I watched seemingly lacklustre Australian and Sri Lankan Test sides produce a seemingly lacklustre day of Test cricket. I was aware that I was watching the live contest unfolding in front of me but I was also projecting forward to future contests – who should bowl the next over, who should be dropped for the next game, who should be trialled for the next series and so on. But to what end?

The Test cricket calendar rolls on relentlessly with no championship to play for and no World Cup every four years, just a vaguely statistical concession of who, at any given point, is rated as the world’s best test cricket team.

The recent Australia vs South African series highlighted why this is problematic as well as intriguing; whoever won the series gained the number one title and yet, barely two weeks later, the Australian team needed every bit of five days to defeat the lowly 6th ranked Sri Lanka. If the Ashes started tomorrow the Aussies would go in as rank underdogs. And this is pretty much where we end up; The Ashes as the only “meaningful” series in Test cricket, and even then, it’s more about mythology and the history of colonization than cricket.

Every summer I loosely follow the AFL off-season; the draft, the trades, pre-season progress, players returning from injury etc. The purpose of these activities is clear; they are all rungs of the same ladder, perched up against the premiership window. Still, this structure only holds as much meaning as we're willing to give it, and even then, it's currency only hold value for 12 months.

Every winter I have no idea what international cricket team is next touring Australia and I cannot recall who toured last. And yet, this does not in any way diminish my enjoyment of watching the contest. I look forward to long days on the couch, deeply ensconced in the rhythm of a game that has no off-season, a match that lasts for five days and an etiquette that requires players to ask umpires to do their job. I know there is no greater context for the game than what is immediately in front of me and that’s part of what makes it so interesting; it is almost contest purely for the sake of contest, and it is this lack of framework that allows us see and marvel at the masterful feats of concentration (Faf Du Plessis), stamina (Peter Siddle) and occasionally transcendence (Michael Clarke).

During the above mentioned “lacklustre” day’s play, that same friend and teammate glanced at the TV scoreboard and then at me on the couch, “That must suck,” he said, “bowling all day and not getting a wicket.”

I wasn’t sure if he meant for the players or for me, both probably, but it didn’t matter. Walk to the top of your mark, turn, run in and put the ball on the spot.

The Curious Case of Phillip Hughes

Corresponding with Ricky Ponting’s recent slide in form was a slide down the batting order. From his customary first-drop position Ponting moved down to no 4, presumably to further shield him from the swinging ball, and since then the Australian top order has looked decidedly ramshackle.

With Ponting now retired, the chance has arisen to rebuild the Australian batting line-up and give it a good trial run against Sri Lanka ahead of the coming Ashes series. But the selectors have painted themselves into a particularly interesting corner.

Not that long ago, new batsmen to the Australian team were introduced slowly. The senior, more experienced batters moved up the order and took more responsibility, while the rookies were given time to find their feet. Indeed, some of the recent greats, Damien Martyn, Dick Ponting and current captain and run-machine MJ Clarke, all started their Test careers as no. 6 batsmen before eventually graduating up the order.

This type of thinking changed when Steve Waugh found himself comfortable at 5 and refused to budge. The idea was that you left players where they were most comfortable and therefore most likely to succeed, maintain a strength rather than try to patch a perceived weakness and possibly expose another.

Accordingly, the current Australian team finds their best, most in form, batters at 5 and 6, with three other batsmen who all prefer to open. So, what did they do? Select another opener, of course.

Ironically enough, it was a lack of specialist opening batsmen that created this current glut of openers. After Hayden and Langer departed, middle order players like Katich and Watson were forced to the top as Australia searched for someone who could negotiate the new ball.

Phillip Hughes was first given his chance in the PHL era (Post Hayden & Langer) against an intimidating attack on South African soil, and at just age 20, he made two centuries and a 70 in his first four innings. He then experienced horror runs against England and NZ that saw his technique questioned and dismissed and his confidence sink to “Maverick-post Goose’s-death” levels (I’ve used that joke already, right?). He now returns for his third Test stint, armed with a technique that has been rebuilt more times than The Melbourne Eye, presumably to bat out of position at first drop.

The incumbent number 3, Shane Watson, is a riddle wrapped up in an enigma, and in a way, the key to the entire success of the Australian batting. He is clearly one of the best six batters in the country yet, almost in spite of all his talents, he has become the James Dean of top order bats, looking beautiful and departing early, and averages only 36 in Test cricket.

On paper, considering he is needed to bowl his excellent stump-to-stump seamers, Watson seems a natural fit to bat 5 or 6, yet, as previously mentioned, Australia’s two best bats are already firmly entrenched in those positions. (And while we’re here, yes, it is worrying that Mike Hussey is still the second best batsman in the team.) Further confusing the issue, Watson seems to bat better the higher up the order he plays and has a history of failing “mentally” when approaching milestone scores.

This is where the question of Clarke moving himself up the order needs to addressed: The team’s best batsman needs to be in the top 4. The aforementioned Steve Waugh could get away with batting 5 because of who was in front of him. Michael Clarke, currently in the form of his life, doesn’t have that same luxury. And now is the time to act.

Ed Cowan and Davey Warner need more time as openers, Clarke should bat at 3, Watson 4 and Hussey and Hughes at any point after that. If one of the openers should need replacing, or if Mr Cricket finally calls it a day, Hughes can reclaim his spot at the top and the new man in the team slides in at 6, just how they used to do it. (Ultimately, I would be shocked if anything happened, other than Hughes batting at 3 and Watson 4. And I can understand the reluctance to move Clarke, although it could be argued that he may as well seeing as though he normally finds himself striding to the middle after about 15 overs anyway.)

For now, it is chance number 3, batting at 3, for Phillip Hughes. He is still only 24, even though it feels like he’s been around forever, and he has a weight of runs behind him in all forms and at all levels of the game, something I like to call “The Mike Hussey Rule”, or, to paraphrase Rasheed Wallace, “bat don’t lie”.

Still, the questions abound: Can he bat down the order? Should he be opening? How many runs does he need to stay in the team? Is he a long-term no 3? What happens if he gets caught at 2^nd slip, again, for not much? Can he survive being dropped again?

But here’s where it gets truly curious: With so many runs, such a unique technique and such an ugly recent history, is Hughes just good enough to dominate domestic attacks but just flawed enough to be found out at International level?

There’s been a lot in the press this week about Hughes’ improvements and the mentoring sessions he’s had with old coach Neil D’Costa, who summed up the situation quite succinctly.

“He's the leading run-scorer in the Sheffield Shield,” said D’Costa, “Either our domestic bowlers are shit, or he's improved.”

Not quite an answer, but, as is seemingly always the case with Hughes, an interesting proposition.

Ponting Too Often Dismissed

My favourite cricketer of all time is Mark Waugh. In the field, “Junior” made difficult catches look easy and impossible catches regular occurrences. I reckon in 10-odd years of watching I saw him drop one ball. As a batter, he combined an effortless, upright grace, that “lean-on-the-ball-and-watch-it-race-though-mid-on”, with a calculated aggressiveness which seemed to manifest as a particular distaste for spin bowling.

M. E. Waugh is always talked about as one of the most entertaining batters to watch, but he was often accused of not caring enough, of being too nonchalant, of under-achieving. It appeared as if effort took the fun out of the game for him, and he couldn’t understand why everyone else was trying so hard when, for him, everything came so easy. This, unsurprisingly, only made me like him more.

Ricky Ponting has never been accused of not trying hard enough. A cricketing prodigy, identified at 11 years old as a potential Australian cricketer, he not only made it, but went on to become arguably the country’s greatest batsman since you-know-who. More than talent, this is testament to his hard work, commitment and competitive instincts. Yet somehow I can’t help but think that these very same traits led to Ponting never really being fully embraced by, if not the Australian public, then the wider cricketing world in general.

Ponting has always been acknowledged as a once in a generation batsmen, but he was never universally loved the way Steve Waugh was; he was never accepted with all his flaws the way Shane Warne was; and he was never forgiven, his on-field success finally outweighing all else, the way Michael Clarke is well on his way to being now.

Far from Australia’s other sporting myths and archetypes, there is a stoic humility expected of Australian Cricket Captains, and if Ponting suffered from a certain lack of grace, it was his boyish competiveness, often mistook for oafish, grown-man anger, that eventually led to him being labelled entitled and ill-tempered, most likely first by a cartoonishly tabloid British press.

But this is an all too simple view that misses the point about Ricky Ponting the competitor: He has always been a scrapper, punching above his weight, playing under 17s as a 13-year-old and first class state cricket at 17. But the best players often don’t make the best leaders (and vice-versa) and Ponting was given the helm of the ship only when no other option presented itself. When it finally began to lilt he attempted to right it the only way he knew, by digging in a scrapping harder, by wanting it more than the other guy.

Eventually his failings as Captain grew to define him, their rarity somehow giving them more significance, and his successes disregarded as a simple right of passage. Ponting got to live his last cricketing years as a number 4, and without the pressure of captaincy he was left to simply make runs, while without the distraction of his captaincy we were left to finally appreciate his talents.