Losers’ only shame is poor attitude

The leaders of Australian cricket turned their backs on the rising fortunes of the Bangladesh team, says Greg Barns

THE reaction by the media, cricket fans and the Australian cricket establishment to the test match loss last week against Bangladesh demonstrated an arrogance, ignorance and sense of entitlement that says much about how the game has lost its way in this country.

Australia lost the first of its two test matches in Bangladesh by 20 runs, a slim margin. But the headlines and commentary demeaned the Bangladeshis.

The loss has been variously described as a “disaster”, an “embarrassment” and Australia said to be a “laughing stock”.

This rhetoric and sentiment is a failure to recognise the fact that one of cricket’s poorest nations has worked quietly and determinedly, against adversity, to improve itself markedly in the past decade.

Shamefully Australia has ignored Bangladesh for 11 years. That is how long it has been since the two teams met in the only contest that matters in cricket — the test match.

So while Australia has greedily chased money through what seems like relentless and monotonous series against England, India and South Africa, Bangladesh has been honing its considerable talent against sides like New Zealand, Pakistan, the West Indies, Sri Lanka and even England.

When Australia last played Bangladesh in test cricket in 2005-06, the former won handsomely two tests to nothing.

So maybe in the minds of the arrogant Australian cricket establishment that is what Bangladesh remains — an easy beat that does not attract crowds. In fact when Bangladesh came to Australia — way back in 2003 — the tests were hosted by Cairns and Darwin. No SCG or MCG for the impoverished Bangladeshis.

As Malcolm Knox, a fine writer about the game, noted on July 28 this year, “In the 11 years since Australia and Bangladesh last played a Test match, England have played the Tigers at home and away, India have toured there three times and hosted them once, and the players of South Africa, Pakistan, New Zealand, the West Indies, Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka have been there often enough to drive their own Uber cars around Dhaka. The entire Test cricket world, in other words, has built strong playing relations with Bangladesh. Except for Australia.”

Bangladesh has in fact played 57 tests since 2006.

But the big nations that run the International Cricket Council which includes Australia, have disgracefully refused to allow Bangladesh any more than two test matches in a series, except against Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka respectively when they played three matches.

Compare this with India, Australia and England that normally have three, four or five test matches in any series.

Despite the poor treatment of Bangladesh the side has kept taking its chances.

Watching them a year or two ago at the exquisitely picturesque Dunedin ground against New Zealand one was struck by the team’s willingness to take risks, to play attractive cricket and make up for competitive disadvantage with an overwhelmingly positive attitude.

It made for a lovely contrast to the nasty, aggressive Australians.

If the Australian media and broader cricket world bothered to move beyond the comfort zone of stereotyping Bangladesh and other test nations as inherently inferior then they would have realised there was nothing surprising about the win against Australia.

For some years now there have been reports about how Bangladesh, which is the third largest test cricket nation with a population of 160 million, has improved markedly as a cricketing force.

On June 1 this year Tim Wigmore, writing in The Guardian, chronicled Bangladesh’s rise as a cricketing force.

Last year the English media spoke of that nation’s upcoming series against Bangladesh in terms of the latter being a much improved nation. Apparently all of this positive media went unnoticed in Australia.

So, far from being the end of the world as we know it, Australia’s loss in Bangladesh last week was always on the cards. It is just that the insular and arrogant world of

Australian cricket doesn’t get it. But it was not just Bangladesh that last week gave test cricket a muchneeded boost.

The West Indies, the once indomitable force of the game, announced it too should be taken more seriously by the cricketing establishment.

The rampaging West Indies sides of the 1970s and 1980s have long cast a shadow over the team in recent years as it has slid to cricketing oblivion. But last week it chased down 322 in the last innings to beat England. Rudyard Kipling once said, “To be your own man is a hard business. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.” That is what happened to the West Indies cricket team last week.

Test match cricket is one of the most intellectually and artistically satisfying sporting pursuits on this planet.

But it has been debased by greed on the part of Australia and its fellow superpowers.

Last week the magic was back thanks to Bangladesh and the West Indies. Long may it stay that way.