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Don't H8 the Playa, H8 the Game

Really just a rehash of a comment that I left on the Political Umpire's blog, but it is something that I've thought about for a while and it may just drag Steve Davis out of hibernation if he's out there!

It concerns the criticism of Ponting and the current team, and it is a criticism that I just don't get. I know people think that they're nasty, thin skinned and cliquey (and they may have a point), but surely the side under Border/Simpson was far, far worse. Remember, this was where you could get someone like Jones dropped (because he didn’t get along with Simpson), and Mark Waugh retained (because he was a good 'team man') even though the previous Sri Lankan tour saw Jones averaging 40-odd and Waugh around 2.

Even more so, surely they were a far ‘harder’ unit, not to mention more spiteful and less likable lot then. The team was structured around severe, rough, surely types like AB, McDermott, Healy, Boon, Marsh, and perhaps even nastier annoying blokes like big Merv (as much as I loved the bloke) and Tim May. I reckon that they would have been far less pleasant to come up against then Haydon, Gilchrist, Symonds, Clark, Clarke, BLee and co. They don’t really compare when you think about it.

Similarly, the current team that has copped the most criticism are without perhaps the two most unsavoury characters in recent times (at least on the field for one of them), in McGrath and Warne. I can only assume that it is the winning that annoys people most. But then again, they were a far harder lot under Steve Waugh too (yet they won), so it can’t be just that either. I don’t recall this much antagonism towards the team then.

For the record, I don’t like the current lot very much, but that’s not because they are nasty or play the game in an unsavoury manner, more that they seem bland and boring, and lack characters (like a Merv or a Boonie). Plus I don’t like being proven wrong as I have with BLee and Hayden. Another thing I don’t get is the general sympathy people have for MacGill, people seem to empathise with him as being hard done by because he’s not “one of the gang” (although with 42 Tests under his belt, I don’t think that he’s been that hard done by). But by any measure, he is a far less likable character, prone to far worse outbursts than ANY of the current team. Ponting may well pout, be he’s never physically assaulted anyone on the field, and been in as much trouble as MacGill has, such as here, here, here and here. To be totally frank, MacGill just comes across as a prat.

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