00:00Well, it's eight years since I left, so there's been maybe you could say a few different permutations
00:15of Australian team. Obviously, Ricky played on as captain for a while, so that was one
00:23little section, and then Michael Clarke's captaincy period. And of course, now it has
00:29a new feel to it. Obviously, Steve Smith, well and truly, it's his tenure now as captain.
00:39And what I see is players fighting for positions in the team. I don't see a lot of stable or
00:48there's not a lot of stability at the moment. And this isn't a criticism of those players
00:52or anything. It's just where the team's evolved to at the moment. It's sort of trying to,
00:59as a unit, settle and get that continuity and the consistency, both in results and in
01:07team selection. And it's hard to know what comes first, good results or good selection
01:16and so on, and which one feeds off the other. But it is a team that's just trying to find
01:25a stable base, and it doesn't seem to be able to achieve that just at the moment.
01:32I think they've got to continue to just back their ability, believe in their own ability.
01:42You don't get to international cricket standard in any nation without being a talented individual
01:49player. So they've got to have belief that they have the skills and that they can go
01:53out there and mix it with the best. And then moving from an individual mindset to a collective
01:59team unit, it's got to be important that they're all working together. And around the edges
02:07of the Australian cricket team at the moment, there's a lot of discussion and conjecture
02:12and topics of past players and clashing personalities. The quicker that they can remove themselves
02:21from that, and I'm sure Darren Lehman and the leadership team are trying to do that,
02:28the more they can move away from that, the easier it will be to focus on the job at hand.
02:33Yeah, I don't know Steve in depth. I know him and I've spoken to him a lot, but I've
02:42never toured with him, I haven't played cricket with him. So I'm judging from afar, and I'm
02:48judging from talking to those that are around him. He looks to me like he's definitely the
02:54man to lead that team. He's going to learn as he goes. All leaders learn once they are
03:02there. They assume full time the responsibility, and that's the challenge for him. But he looks
03:10to me like a young man that's hungry to do it. He loves the game, he's a good thinker
03:16of the game. So yeah, I think he's the right guy, and I think it's just a challenging period
03:22that will help him learn the role of captain. It looks to me like David Warner has really
03:30embraced the role as vice-captain, and he's thriving on that. It's really important that
03:36those two are working together and get through this challenging time and lay the foundation
03:43to move ahead.
03:48It seems that opponents are saying the Australian team is now a toothless tiger compared to
03:53what it used to be, and I guess that's talking about the verbal stouches on the field. It
03:58doesn't matter what you say on the field. It doesn't matter if you're abusing someone
04:03or being smiling and nice. It means nothing unless you're backing it up with performance.
04:10The Australian team, I think, are in a little phase where I said earlier, they're just lacking
04:15a bit of confidence. So with that, they're maybe losing the desire to go out there and
04:21posture, and they're not feeling like it's what they should be doing. They're probably
04:27thinking they've just got to focus on the cricket, and that's fine. I think there's
04:32more speculated about sledging and about it being a tactic than actually what happens.
04:41In our era, we didn't sit down and make a match plan of who we're going to sledge and
04:46what we're going to say. It's an emotional game out on the field, and things happen in
04:53the spur of the moment. Some players react better than others. Some are more balanced.
04:58Some are calm. Some aren't. I guess that's the theatre of sport, the beauty of sport,
05:03that you get to watch the emotions. The great players withdraw the emotion from it and then
05:09rely on their skill, and that's what makes them succeed. So this current team at the
05:15moment, I don't know that they've said, we're not sledging anymore. I just think it looks
05:19to me like they're just down on confidence, and that's not part of their mindset.
05:24Don't put me down as an angel. I was involved in a few scraps, but I didn't go out there
05:36with the intention to get into a fight, so to speak, because I always felt as soon as
05:41I said something, I felt really nervous. At the end of the day, if I'm batting and a ball
05:47is coming in, and I say something back, you can get out the very next ball, even if you're
05:53on 100, even if you're not. Or if I was wicket-keeping, I thought, oh, I shouldn't have said anything
05:59because if I then drop a catch, I look the fool. So I got nervous whenever I got myself.
06:06But sometimes, as I say, you're so hyped up and the adrenaline's going and the emotions
06:11are flying around, you find yourself in a verbal stash that you didn't plan for. But
06:17I didn't go out there with the intent. As I say, I don't think there's as much sledging
06:23in cricket as what people perceive or like to portray.
06:30That book, I tried to focus more looking internally than externally at others. I wasn't on any
06:38campaign to talk about other people and their faults or discrepancies and issues. So hopefully
06:45I got that. But of course, there's always little things. And the other thing, that was
06:50my recollection of my journey. So I absolutely can say, if someone says, no, that happened
06:56something different and I don't remember it that way, that's fine. Everyone's got their
07:00opinions and entitled to their memories because we're talking about lengths of time that go
07:05back 10, 15, 20 years. So that was my recollection. And say on the Satchin one, I wrote in there
07:12about we felt and I felt after a game that he could have been more sporting. He didn't
07:17come in and shake hands. And that captures the headline because Satchin, he's the best
07:23player I've played against and absolute highest echelon is legend of the game, India passionate
07:29about it. But I spoke to Satchin straight after that. We spoke on the phone and he clarified
07:35to me about that situation. And I said, look, apologies if I got it wrong. That's what we
07:41felt at the time and what I wrote. And you clear the air. I think you confronted, if
07:47someone's offended by something or disappointed, as was the case for my career, just talk about
07:52it. So I don't sit here and think I should retract that statement. That was my recollection
07:58of that event at that time. And if that is the way I saw it conflicted with the way Satchin
08:04saw it, which it clearly did, but we've spoken about that. And I like that, that now I can
08:09put my hand on my heart and say, the air is clear. I don't have any grudge about that.
08:15And everything read in full context shows you exactly what the meanings are. So yeah,
08:21so I don't think of any, that's one little thing in a book that had a lot of details
08:27in it. I don't know that there's anyone around that I can't walk up to and say hello and
08:32have a friendly conversation with where they're thinking what you said was wrong.
08:40The IPL was really the pioneering event of all the T20 leagues around the world now.
08:48Every nation now has their own T20 league and has tried to almost copycat the IPL's
08:54version. Some have been done extremely well. The Big Bash in Australia is a fantastic league
09:01and really well run and administrated, well watched and participated by the viewing audience
09:09and the crowds. Some countries haven't got it right, maybe rushed into it and didn't
09:14have the foundation right and the backing to make it successful. But the IPL was an
09:21amazing time in my cricketing career. It was right at the end of my traditional career,
09:26if you like. So I went into that first tournament, like everyone, having no idea what it was
09:32going to be like. Were we going to be serious? Was it going to be hit and giggle? But from
09:39that opening day, opening night when McCollum hit that 150, it was game on and everyone
09:46knew it was going. It's become more refined over every edition but it was very serious
09:52intense cricket. I thought I might play one year because I'd just retired and I ended
09:59up playing six. So it's a bit addictive, you wanted to be a part of it. But yeah, it's
10:07a wonderful experience and great to get to know so many other opponents a little bit
10:13more closely and broaden that sort of friendship group that cricket already provides.
10:22T20 cricket and even one day cricket I think still has a place. It's just about the volumes
10:28of cricket that I think need to be addressed. But they're very important to the game. I
10:35thought they're great, experiment there, but leave Test cricket alone. That was my initial
10:40thoughts. That's the masterpiece. You don't graffiti it, you just leave it. It's a pure
10:46game, allow that to keep going. But I think I'm starting to probably understand and realise
10:56that for Test cricket to maintain any sort of standing in the current world that we live
11:03in, the lifestyles, the landscape that is around in a sporting sense and just in a general
11:10social sense, I think Test cricket may need to be changed somewhat and whether it's day
11:18night cricket, pink ball or perhaps I know the discussion is around about four day Tests.
11:25Will that mean that the entertainment on offer is hastened, it's quickened up and a day where
11:35a team bats for a whole day building up to prepare for the final onslaught may need to
11:41happen a little bit quicker and that might be a bit more contemporary around what life
11:46and lifestyles are like at the moment. So, yeah, I'm very much more open-minded now about
11:51changes to the game to keep it contemporary and at front of mind for the current life
11:58that we lead.
12:02Yeah, my first tournament in 1998, it was a great experience. I'd not played here before,
12:08not been here before to this region so all I remember there is Sachin Tendulkar batting.
12:13He scored 100, back-to-back hundreds in two one days, one in the last round, Robin, and
12:19then one in the final, I think on his birthday from memory. But yeah, it was a fascinating
12:26place to come and play cricket, totally different from anything that I'd grown up playing, totally
12:31different environment, and it's been wonderful to be able to come back with such regularity
12:36both in a playing sense and now in various roles and capacities like this one as brand
12:43ambassador for the University of Wollongong and the Dubai campus here now. So, yeah, wonderful
12:51part of the world and always really interesting to come here.
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