‘Boring, boring,’ commenced a chant in the lower deck of the Olympic Stand on the third afternoon of Australia’s Melbourne Test against South Africa. ‘Boring, boring …’
It wasn’t surprising—at that stage only one wicket had been taken that day. Yet no sooner had it begun than it ceased—nobody was joining in. And, in fact, for all the ease with which JP Duminy and Dale Steyn were picking Australia’s attack off, this was interesting. This, you sensed people thinking, must be the ‘cycle’ that older fans have been banging on about all this time. Hmmm. Weird.
New sensation it certainly is. To have even a vestigial memory of a time when their country was not the benchmark in international cricket, an Australian must be at least twenty. Melbourne Tests of the last two decades have regularly resembled ritual sacrifices, Australia’s fifteen victories accruing by an aggregate margin of 1678 runs and sixty-eight wickets.
The South African surge, too, seems to have burst from nowhere. The average Australian fan is not nearly so well informed about overseas cricket as, say, the average Indian— mainly because it has hardly mattered. South Africa arrived here a good deal more softly than in 2001–02 and 2005–06, when predictions of a stern contest proved dismayingly off-beam. But Graeme Smith, who let his talk do the cricketing here three years ago, has been stunningly recast: with no Warnie to be the butt of, he suddenly looks a substantial figure indeed.
For Australian cricket, as distinct from the Australian cricket team, defeat is not all bad tidings. Reinventing the narrative of Australian success has proven a challenge to the game’s marketers. The eagerly awaited Ashes of 2006–07 turned out to be a chore; the backlash against the Australians after the Sydney Test a year ago revealed a core of supporters to have been alienated by the perceived arrogance of their national representatives. At least for a period, defeat might endear Ponting’s men to as many fans as it disappoints.
Even the age-old gripe that it is harder to get out of the Australian XI than in might need revisiting. The boys of baggy green represent their country’s longest-running TV soap opera, but for some time theirs has been a series in search of new characters. A few have auditioned unsuccessfully, notably the South Australian pair Dan Cullen and Mark Cosgrove; some might come again, like the West Australian batsmen Shaun Marsh and Adam Voges; more will shortly have their chance, doubtless including 20-year-old opener Phil Hughes from New South Wales, with his keen eye and cast-iron concentration. It’s fun to be debating the composition of the Australian team again after so long either scrutinising their etiquette or goggling at their earning capacity.
The Australian press is not quite so innocently amused. Condemnations after the Melbourne Test were crushing, consensuses being easy to build when one man, Rupert Murdoch, controls two-thirds of the daily print media and a single know-nothing comment piece can be syndicated round the country. Australian players still being something of a protected species, criticism has been heaped at the door of the selectors, chairman Andrew Hilditch in particular. News Ltd tabloids even grew all nostalgic for Hilditch’s predecessor Trevor Hohns, that ‘uncompromising man who made tough decisions’—overlooking how they pilloried Hohns for many of those tough decisions, including demanding his head when Steve Waugh was dropped as Australia’s one-day pilot.
The curious aspect of both the Perth and Melbourne Tests, however, was not that Australia lost, but that they lost from winning positions, which suggests that it is not the raw talent at fault so much as its deployment. The figure who has so far gotten off lightest is coach Tim Nielsen, who has between times even had his contract extended to 2011. Perhaps the luckiest figure around, meanwhile, is John Buchanan, who, with timing worthy of Warren Buffett, exited at the exact zenith of Australia’s fortunes, the 2007 World Cup.
Speaking of market timing, Australia’s is not good. Fans will always regroup and commentators always rant, but sponsors are skittish: hardly a day goes by without some story in the sports pages about a backer backing out, an advertiser reducing exposure or even a broadcaster having second thoughts. And Cricket Australia is renegotiating deals with two of its three platinum partners, Commonwealth Bank and the telco Hutchison, right now.
Watching cricket on television in Australia is a disarmingly seamless experience, so often do the advertisements feature the self-same players. One minute you are watching Adam Gilchrist drive a ball. Next minute he’s driving a car. And while Australia might be losing the cricket this summer, they continue dominating the commercials, with Ponting, Hayden, Symonds, Clarke, Johnson and Hussey in outstanding form.
Except that as each wicket fell during Australia’s melancholy procession on the fourth day in Melbourne, the jokey ads for everything from financial services to fried chicken began to jar. ‘That’s stumps!’ said Symonds in a corny car ad seemingly at the end of every over; if only it were, said his on-field deportment. For the last fifteen years, Australian players have been chased by advertisers as the Beatles were once chased by screaming teeny-boppers. But if fans in Australia are more loyal than they’re sometimes given credit for, corporates are more fickle than they pretend, especially at a time when sponsorship has become very much a buyer’s market. It mightn’t be long before cosy old boredom begins looking quite attractive.