More Sports HQ Videos
Plays of the Week
Once in a hundred year upsets, drought breakers and the return of rugby league, these are the plays of the week.
Oh come on, at least the Matt Renshaw story of being caught short during the first Test in India and Allan Border's savage response to removing himself from the game – see quotes – allows TFF to retell one of my favourite sporting yarns.
Yonks back, see, I did a bio on Steve Waugh, and in his first tour of India, the first Test was at Chidambram Stadium, Madras (now Chennai), with the temperature simmering around the 40-degree mark, the humidity horrifying, and the barometer perpetually hovering between Oppressive and Depressive.
![Matt Renshaw rushed off the field following the dismissal of David Warner.](/web/20170225090706im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/j/w/8/x/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.guk968.png/1487972994617.jpg)
On the second day, Dean Jones went out to bat, despite suffering from a terrible combination of dysentery and vomiting and feeling like he was going to faint. Seeing him wobble to the wicket, the 30,000 chanting Indians seemed to chant even louder. In an extraordinary effort of will, though – and overcoming terrible leg and stomach cramps along the way – Jones somehow put together a century. And still kept going.
In the tea break it was Waugh who helped him change his clothes, removing the drenched and disgusting whites, and assisting the Victorian with putting on something fresher. For all that, by the time Jones was on 120, he was sure he was going to collapse from heat stroke – and he very well might have.
![Illustration: John Shakespeare](/web/20170225090706im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/k/z/9/f/image.related.articleLeadNarrow.300x0.guk968.png/1487972994617.jpg)
Dry-retching at the end of every over, the Indians had allowed him to have a runner. But by the time he got to an extraordinary 150 runs, he just couldn't go on.
"Mate," the Victorian croaked to his batting partner, Allan Robert Border, "I'm going to have to go off, I just can't go on, I'm too crook."
You could have hit Border's eyes with a sledgehammer right then, and the hammer would have cracked.
"Sure, mate," Border said in reply, his voice dripping with a particularly acidic kind of sarcasm. "And when you go back in, can you ask them to send a Queenslander back, because that's who we need out here."
Jones stayed, and went on to score 210 runs, which would prove to be his most memorable Test innings. He savoured it while lying in hospital on a saline drip – and it would take him well over six months to fully recover.
And that, Matt Renshaw, really was what it like in the old days.
Once the carnival is over, our athletes must have support
Two stories.
About 25 or so years ago, seeking any excuse to get away from covering a car rally on the edge of Perth where these madmen kept going rrrRRRound and rrrRRRRRound and rrrrrRRRRound, tearing up the Australian bush in the process, I suggested to the sports editor I go in search of Australia's greatest sporting hero of the 1970s, Olympic gold medallist Shane Gould, said to be on a subsistence farm somewhere down near Margaret River.
He agreed, and when I found Shane she was on her hands and knees in her laundry, clearing away sheep droppings – happy with neither that situation nor her general lot. In our subsequent interview, and several times since, she expressed in no uncertain terms how lacking things were when so much effort was put into getting people to the top of their sport, and no effort was put in to help them down the other side.
A decade or so ago, meantime, I caught up with the great Viv Richards, just before he went on stage with Ian Botham on a show they were doing around Australia, and this night was up Epping way.
"Mr Richards," I babbled to him in the darkness behind the curtain, as the MC started on his intro, "you know what it is to hit the English pace attack for six over the Members Stand at Lord's. Once you know what that is like, does anything in real life get close to that?"
Ladies and gentlemen ... please put your hands together ... the Master Blaster himself ... VIV RICHARDS!
"Nothing," Richards said to me with a gleaming smile, just before going through the curtain. "Absolutely nothing."
All put together, what have you got?
The short answer is, trouble – and we have seen it, bad, in just the past few weeks.
Ten years ago, four of the most famous, accomplished figures in Australian sport were James Hird, Ben Cousins, Daniel Vickerman and Grant Hackett. Back then, it was inconceivable that any of them, let alone all four, would lose their way to the point that one would be homeless, two would have been effectively put on suicide watch, and one, just this week, would oh so tragically have managed to take his own life. (OK, you're right, so maybe there is less of a surprise in the case of Cousins, but the other three were bywords for stability, mental strength, and success.)
The lesson in it for us?
Simply this. Once the carnival is over, there is a duty on all of us to continue to look out for the carnival's stars, not to assume that because they have climbed an extraordinary mountain to be at the top of their sport, the other side of that mountain are sunlit uplands. All too often, they ain't.
![Heartbreaking loss: Dan Vickerman will always be remembered fondly for being a giant on and off the field.](http://web.archive.org./web/20170225090706im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/g/b/o/a/image.imgtype.articleLeadwide.620x349.png/1487924894246.png)
Heartbreaking loss: Dan Vickerman will always be remembered fondly for being a giant on and off the field. Photo: Jason Oxenham
With the blessing of his widow, TFF wrote a piece this week about the late Daniel Vickerman, essentially addressed to his young sons that they might read in a couple of decades to know better the sort of man their father was.
The short answer was, as good as it gets. And if mental health issues can run so deep with him, that he would take his life, they can happen to anyone. Several Wallabies have contacted me this week, noting how Vickerman's tragic death has prompted them to call blokes they've been meaning to get a hold of for months, and even years, saying, are you OK? Vickerman, as it turned out, was not isolated from fellow Wallabies, nor from his family – and was so aware of the issue about the difficulty of transition to post-sporting life he was due to speak at a conference on it today at UTS.
But there will still never be a better example that the whole thrust of the mental health experts that the way forward is for us all, is to reach out and "say are you OK?" is right on the money.
Lifeline 13 11 14.
Eastern magic
You will recall those huge storms rolling across Sydney Town late last week, with big black clouds that not only spelled trouble, they actively caused it! They were bad enough, and with more forecast, that, in the lead-up to Sunday morning's 2.4-kilometre charity swim, Murray Rose's Malabar magic, at least 200 people pulled out and decided to sleep in instead.
Ah, but not the truly hardy ones! They set their alarms regardless, and were rewarded with near-perfect conditions with a light offshore breeze and a clearing sky. Led by the famed blind marathon swimmer James Pittar, 800 swimmers hit the water, over whatever distance they chose, from 250 metres to 1km to 2.4km.
Among them were swimmers that were, deaf, blind, amputees, paraplegic, or had cerebral palsy, autism, and Down syndrome. All of them together in the water, thrashing it out in the waters off Sydney Town, and all applauding each other furiously as they emerged. I know it, you know it. Gotta love this city!
(Oh, and at the at the end of the day as the organisers were packing up, a bloke came up, his arm around his son who had just swum in the race. "If your fund-raising is down due to lower numbers don't worry," he said. "I've got you covered. Just let me know how much you need ...")
![Leading by example: Blind swimmer James Pittar.](http://web.archive.org./web/20170225090706im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/k/b/v/w/image.imgtype.articleLeadwide.620x349.png/1487893582265.png)
Leading by example: Blind swimmer James Pittar. Photo: Supplied
What they said
Allan Border after Australian opener Matt Renshaw "retired hurt" – instead of runs on the board, he was about to have them in his pants – in the first Test against India, just before lunch on the first day: "I hope he is lying on the table in there half dead. Otherwise as captain I would not be happy." Renshaw came back out after lunch to score 68 and ended up top-scoring.
Michael Clarke was also stunned: "What is going on here? He's retiring ill. With only 15 minutes to go until lunch, I can't believe he's retiring. This is unbelievable from Australia. Steve Smith doesn't know what's going on."
Renshaw makes specific reply to Border: "That's something he grew up with, that was his mentality. Steve [Smith] was good and he understands when you need to go to the toilet you've got to go to the toilet. It wasn't an ideal scenario but it's life pretty much."
Long-time Wallaby second-rower Nathan Sharpe tweets, after Dan Vickerman tragically took his life last weekend: "I had my arm around you for most of our playing days brother. No words can express the sadness #beatpeacenowmate #RIPbigV."
![Keeping 'em guessing: Eddie Jones, with his pet dog Annie.](http://web.archive.org./web/20170225090706im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/k/a/m/a/image.imgtype.articleLeadwide.620x349.png/1487891911245.png)
Keeping 'em guessing: Eddie Jones, with his pet dog Annie. Photo: Getty Images
Eddie Jones on work-life balance, no really: "I never talk to my wife about rugby. I don't have anything rugby-related in my house. If you walked in, you wouldn't know that I am involved in rugby. I don't keep anything. I give everything away; it means more to other people."
Grant Hackett thanking his parents for their support over the past week of troubles: "They have been amazing and have stood by me through thick and thin – I can't say enough about them – I could not wish for better parents."
Cleveland Cavaliers star Kyrie Irving: "The earth is flat. It's right in front of our faces. I'm telling you, it's right in front of our faces. They lie to us."
Wanderers fan "Mick" after 14 members of the Wanderers fan club were banned for 18 months for producing a lewd banner regarding the coach of Sydney FC: "They had to do something. It's got out of hand. There is [sic] certain elements there who think they're bigger than the club."
Brisbane Bronco Kodi Nikorima: "It is a business at the end of the day, so there will be no hard feelings there if they do decide to get another halfback. I guess at the end of the day, it will be up to me."
Simon Poidevin on five Australian Super rugby sides: "Napoleon tried to conquer the Russians with 450,000 soldiers who left France and only 10,000 returned ... you just can't stretch yourself too wide."
Evergreen George Smith on playing for the Reds: "I hope they don't expect the George Smith of old. I've developed into a different player than I was in my past years. I feel I'm a more complete player these days. I may not be as fast as I was when I was 19 years old but I think I'm a lot smarter in the way I play the game."
A Nike ad playing in Saudi Arabia shows "a woman nervously peering out of her doorway and adjusting her veil before going for a run in the street," as the female narrator says in a Saudi dialect: "What will they say about you? Maybe they'll say you exceeded all expectations." Feminism, empowered by capitalism, heading straight towards ludicrous religious strictures. Who will win? Discuss.
Former Essendon chairman Paul Little on a 2012 tape recording which has emerged of a meeting of Essendon officials when he discusses a conversation he had with the then AFL deputy chief executive Gillon McLachlan – now CEO – at a time when the ASADA investigation into the club's supplement program was just getting under way: "He [McLachlan] then said to me, 'there is a 99 per cent chance that the players won't be charged.' And I said, 'well, I'd like to believe you but are you happy for me to use that language in front of the players?' And he said, 'oh no, you can't do that'. And I said, 'well f---, you're telling me one thing and over here I can't tell anything to the players'."
Team of the Week
Lincoln. Became the first non-league team, whatever that means, to reach the FA Cup quarter-finals in more than a century.
Carly Wilson. The WNBL player finishes with 363 games, sixth most all time.
Melbourne Rebels. Bloody hell. In their opening dig of the season of Super Rugby, they were completely dusted by the Auckland Blues, going down 31-0 in the second half alone. Nevertheless, the coach said, of course, "there were some positives out of it, that we can build on." Bloody hell!
Waratahs. Begin Super Rugby season on Saturday night against the Force. As if you didn't know!
Sydney FC. Suffered first loss of the season.
Tamarama SLSC. On March 5 and March 12, they will be conducting a pilot program, in collaboration with Weave Youth Services for reintroduction of the club's "Holly Days" program, an Indigenous outreach program to introduce kids from the La Perouse area to surf lifesaving. If interested contact the club.
RIP. Daniel Vickerman. A memorial celebration of his life will be held next Wednesday 1 March from 2pm on Sydney Uni rugby No 1 Oval. I am informed by Daniel's parents, Les and Val Vickerman, that all those who would like to pay their respects are most welcome.
Twitter: @Peter_Fitz
0 comments
New User? Sign up