The only winners here are the bottom feeding Journos and Murdoch salivating and laughing all the way to the bank in there good fortune, as we watch Australia's two best batsman get slaughtered for making a minor and uncustomary error in judgement, and a bright up and coming talent labelled a cheat for life. It's as if he was the first player to ever tamper with a ball. Were they match fixing or taking performance drugs - No. Their crime was to "tamper with the ball". Premeditated or not it is not a hanging offence. What a self righteous mob of bast..ds we have in Australia. These extremely talented players have been involved in one of the dirtiest tests ever. Warner suffers the humiliation of having his wife publicly insulted, defends her as any genuine Aussie bloke would and "He's a thug". What a joke. Smith gets caught up in all the crap and the best batsman we've had since Bradman is fed to the lions.
Who are the real winners and losers. Well the winners are our competitors. Sadly the losers are all of us, cricket lovers both in Australia and around the world. How many of us have sat back in awe with a smile from ear to ear as Warner hit a massive switch hit for six or Smithy glides across his stumps with his trademark cross bat pull shot for six. Well sadly no more. These players are are as rare as hen's teeth. Once in a generation players or rarer. You'll always have a Steve Waugh or Alan Border (loved these two players by the way) who will grind out a century, but players like Smith and Warner don't come along often. Bradman, Richards, Tandulkar, Sobers are the benchmark of this select group who could win a test at their whim, well Smithy was second only to Bradman and Cricket Australia has just drawn and quartered him.
Will I be watching Australia play cricket in the near future, not a bloody chance. Television rights are costly and rely on ad revenue - I'll be watching something else. The rest of our lineup maybe good blokes but cricket is entertainment and the entertainment will not be on the ground.
Then we have this "premeditated" bulls..it. Anybody with even a small amount of intelligence would know this wasn't premeditated. Maybe it went down something like this just before they run out of the change rooms "Warner says..Hey Bandy how about you take a piece a sandpaper out out with you and work on that ball, maybe we'll get a ball change change that will reverse swing. Smithy chips in and says good idea Dave (laughs) and unfortunately to their amazement Cameron actually does it"
Then as Aussie mates do, they try and protect the new guy (not like the cannibalizing press, commentators and Pollies, even our own PM). Naively they know ball tampering is only a one match crime so the senior guys cover for Bancroft with their initial on air confession not thinking that it was going to end up bigger than North Korea sending a live nuke over Japan.
You have to ask, why did Cricket Australia allow Smith to go on air and make this statement. Surely they new our best and brightest talents were about to get thrown under a bus. Warner and Smith are smart guys. Only a few weeks ago we saw the close up of the tape on Warner's fingers contacting the ball and the accusations of ball tampering. Do we really think that Smith and Warner did not for a moment think that the 40 odd camera's around the ground would not pick up a piece of BRIGHT YELLOW sand paper, on a red ball with a nice white background?
Give me a break. This whole saga does not sit well with me and I think that time and only time will reveal,the true story. Unfortunately one of our greatest batsman has had his career cut short and I do hope he stops all the degrading "sorry stuff" and retires from all forms of the game. The way he has been so savagely treated by the Australian Media, Politicians, Past Players and sadly the Public, I feel we no longer have or deserve the right to watch and enjoy his incredible talent. Do I want to watch these guys come back in 12 months time and have the whole sordid affair relived - no way. Do I want to see the media scum make more money out of it - nope
I'm not sure about save the whales or trees but maybe there should have been a cry to save "Smithy", Warner and Bancroft. For god sake it wasn't a nuclear warhead, it wasn't an affair with a Porn Star and it wasn't a Pollie travel rort. It was a small piece of BRIGHT YELLOW sandpaper (yeah premeditated???). Just on that our Pollies do have the right to say sorry, pay the rort back and all is forgiven.
Really was a sad day today and my thoughts go out to these sporting legends and their families. I hope they stay strong and healthy as they have given us plenty and owe us nothing.
