It Ain't Over 'Til the Fat Boy Spins*

From the distance of an armchair, there doesn't seem to be a hell of a lot that's endearing about Warney. He is, of course, a great cricketer but he doesn't seem like someone you could like. Maybe it's that gargantuanly overdeveloped sense of entitlement to being able to behave however he wants and get away with it. Maybe not. But you know, it just might be.

But one of the reasons I'm enjoying this Ashes series so much is because Warney has behaved in a really sportsman-like fashion for so much of it. And he's really shown up his fellow bowlers. The battle between batsman and bowler is so close and personal I cringe whenever an Australian bowler gets a batsman out and goes through all the gorilla-like hoopla and celebration. It's okay to celebrate a victory, but I feel that most bowlers are not doing that so much as exulting in the defeat of their foe. It's okay not to respect a batsman privately, if you think they're not up to scratch, but it's not okay to be openly contemptuous of their efforts to protect their wicket from you.

Warney gets all worked up when he gets a batsman out, and he engages in a bit of sledging and mind games. I'd say it's all a part of his arsenal out on the field. But when he got Andrew Flintoff out in the second test he also called out to him as he walked back to the pavillion and gave him the thumbs up, congratulating him on an impressive and important innings. He doesn't thump his chest and bellow at someone who was already defeated. He so easily could; he'll be recognised as one of the top cricketers of all time for a very long time and because of that many would pardon that kind of behaviour. He's a showman. If his hair was any spikier it'd be a weapon of mass destruction, and kissing the bracelet his daughter gave him was less the act of a pater familias than just another act in his life as a three ring circus. The details of his private affairs are squalid. And he seems unable to grasp his responsibility for the mess in his personal life.

When he's out playing cricket, though, there's a glimmer of a gentleman showing through where so many other Australian cricketers are too arrogant to bother. I hope amongst the statistics -and the transcripts of the text messages - that quality doesn't get overlooked.



*Best banner ever at the cricket. Whoever came up with that deserves some kind of national recognition.