The Kentucky Fried Chicken Big Bash in Australia may sound
like it does little to enhance cricket’s unathletic reputation, but like the
other franchise tournaments that have sprung up around the globe in a headlong
IPL-inspired gold-rush, it promises to deal only in the game’s most attention-seeking elements: big hitting, acrobatic catching, high-speed yorkers and
low-speed bouncers. As with the IPL, part of the attraction for foreign
audiences is seeing the mix of unknown domestic players with current
international stars and retired greats.
This morning brought a Melbourne derby
featuring Shane Warne, Luke Wright, David Hussey and Lasith Malinga for the
‘Stars’ and Marlon Samuels, Muttiah Muralitharan and Nottinghamshire and
England’s Darren Pattinson for the ‘Renegades’.
I’m not a great fan of T20 for the usual
curmudgeons’ reasons, but any cricket is better than no cricket, and it’s
always a treat seeing the old warhorses out in combat. It’s not close to the
real thing, and you could argue it tarnishes the memory of great Test
competitors like Warne and Murali. But like hearing a voice you know in a crowd
of strangers, it still brings a rush of comfort and familiarity, even if it
disappears just as fast once you realise you were wrong all along: this isn’t Shane
Warne of 708 Test wickets, the best captain Australia never had and England’s
tormentor for more than a decade. This guy feels more like his off-field
doppelganger, the generator of endless tabloid fodder, Tweeter to a million
followers and a front man for online gambling and hair replacement. He doesn’t
even look right, for Christ’s sake.
Warne is inevitably one of the biggest draws
in the Big Bash. He is after all a proper celebrity, and look what he’s doing
now – playing cricket! Warne captains the ‘Stars’ from his home-town, at least
when he isn’t taking
a break to spend Christmas in London with Liz Hurley. He’s also embraced
the format’s innovations, including wearing an earpiece and microphone to chat
to commentators, even while bowling. Memorably in last winter’s competition he
talked viewers through his plans for the next ball – what batsman Brendan
McCullum would try to do and how he would take the wicket – and then delivered exactly what he predicted,
bowling McCullum with a faster, flat delivery as he shaped to sweep. This story
went around the world, with Warne lauded for his apparent psychic powers. The
bowler now seems doomed to endlessly try and repeat the trick without success, although
he’s having fun with it, predicting ‘this one’s definitely gonna be caught and
bowled’ or ‘hole out to midwicket’. Of course it’s genuinely fascinating to see
the master at work, to hear his plans, see him adjusting his field and talking
about why. Warne always said when he bowled his aim was to get the batsman
playing a particular shot, rather than pitching the ball in a certain place.
You can hear this now as he tells you ‘this guy’s gonna come down the pitch’ or
‘he’ll play forward and nick off to slip’. Warne can’t predict the result every
ball, but he’s uncannily accurate in judging and controlling what the batsman
will try to do.
Today though the spectacle wasn’t so much the cricket as a
sustained and unpleasant argument between Warne and the fiery West Indian batsman
Marlon Samuels. During the Stars’ innings, Samuels tangled with David Hussey
and appeared to hold his shirt to stop him setting off for a second run. After
a brief confrontation the incident seemed to be done with, only for Warne to
resurrect it when Samuels came in to bat at first drop in the Renegades’
innings. As viewers of West Indies’ tour in England last spring will remember,
Samuels is not shy of confrontation, and is perfectly happy to use it to get
his blood up for battle. On this occasion it got somewhat out of hand. First
Warne approached Samuels talking about the shirt-pulling incident and
repeatedly shouting ‘fuck you, mate’ until the broadcasters remembered to turn
off his microphone. This didn’t stop them showing lots of replays of Warne
mouthing ‘fuck you, mate’ while the commentators enthused about his passion for
the contest.
Shortly after, Warne gently chucked a ball
at Samuels in his follow-through, ostensibly passing it to the wicket keeper.
Samuels responded with rather disproportionate force, flinging his bat down the
pitch towards Warne. In truth it didn’t look at all like he was trying to hit
Warne, but it was an extraordinary act in any event and caused a lengthy hiatus
as the umpires tried to establish what happened and cool things down. It’s hard
not to feel sorry for the domestic officials in these circumstances, who in the
face of these superstars seem a little like Mr Muscle refereeing a heavyweight
boxing match.
Eventually they resumed, and while it was
an easy nine-wicket win for the Renegades, there was one final act in the drama
involving Samuels. Lasith Malinga, the tournament’s leading wicket-taker, had bowled
beautifully with extreme pace and control for no reward. There was nothing
beautiful about the ball that ended Samuels’ stay at the crease: a brutal
bouncer that took the top edge of the batsman’s attempted hook and smashed
straight into the grill of his helmet. Samuels showed no obvious sign of pain,
but clearly knew his match was over and walked straight off, blood dripping
from his lips.
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