Growing Paine
Australia’s new skipper pledges fresh start and ‘respectful’ cricket
Australia Test captain Tim Paine has pledged yesterday to embark on a new era of “respectful” cricket and rebuild public trust after the ball-tampering scandal that rocked the sport.
The newly appointed leader said the fallout from the tampering episode was greater than players had anticipated and promised a different style of cricket in the future.
“Going forward we have a clean slate. We can rewrite the way we play a little bit,” the 33-year-old told reporters in Tasmania’s capital Hobart.
“The main thing for us is to bring the fans back to Australian cricket and make sure they like the way we are going about it, they want to come and watch and be proud of the Australian cricket team,” he added. The ball-tampering scandal during the third Test in South Africa last month stunned the sport and sparked reviews into the culture within Australian cricket.
Then captain Steve Smith and his deputy David Warner have been banned from international and domestic cricket for a year, while Cameron Bancroft was exiled for nine months, leaving the squad badly weakened.
Under scrutiny
They have all apologised and accepted the sanctions.
Paine said all three would be welcomed back to the national side but in a new environment that met public expectations.
“Certainly playing international cricket you have to be as competitive as you possibly can be, but we just have to look at different ways of doing that,” said, “more respectful ways of putting opposition teams under the pump.”
Australia has been under heavy scrutiny for sledging and Paine said on-field talk with the opposition “will be very different going forward”.
Cricket Australia (CA) announced a meeting today to discuss who will replace head coach Darren Lehmann, who despite being cleared of any wrongdoing resigned amid the scandal fallout.
But it denied media reports that former Aussie opener Justin Langer had already been selected for the job.
“The process to be undertaken for the appointment of a new Australian men’s head coach will be discussed and agreed at the CA board meeting this Friday,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
“No appointment has been made, and nor will any candidate be put to the board for ratification on Friday.”
Paine yesterday endorsed Langer but added there were many highly-regarded candidates world wide. Langer remains favourite to take the top job but has indicated he wants to maintain his coaching and family commitments in his home state of Western Australia.
Former Australian Test captain Ricky Ponting, along with former pacemen Jason Gillespie, have also been touted as potential replacements for Lehmann.
Some commentators have suggested the coaching appointments be split across the three forms of the game — Tests, ODIs and Twenty20s.
We can rewrite the way we play a little bit. The main thing for us is to bring the fans back to Australian cricket and make sure they like the way we are going about it.”
Time Paine » Australia Test captain
Indian Premier League founder Lalit Modi believes there will come a time when players will earn $1 million (Dh3.67 million) per game while warning that the traditional programme of matches between countries “will disappear”.
A Twenty20 domestic franchise competition launched a decade ago, which has spawned a host of imitators worldwide, the IPL is now the most lucrative of all cricket tournaments.
“The IPL is here to stay,” Modi told the Daily Telegraph. “It will be the dominant sporting league in the world.”
IPL teams are bankrolled by wealthy businessmen operating in an environment where the passion for cricket in India, the world’s secondmost populous nation, makes the game an attractive target for sponsors and broadcasters.
At present there is a team salary cap, with the likes of England all-rounder Ben Stokes earning $1.95 million per season from the Rajasthan Royals. But Modi believes that if that $12 million cap is relaxed, leading IPL players could earn as much as English Premier League footballers and even NFL stars.
That would have a huge impact on international cricket, with players torn between making an IPL fortune and representing their countries.
Meanwhile, in a chilling argument for cricket traditionalists, London-based Modi forecast the end of country versus country contests, which effectively finance professional cricket structures all round the world and the demise of the International Cricket Council, the sport’s global governing body.
“Today international cricket does not matter,” he said. “It is of zero value to the Indian fan.
“Tomorrow you will see bilateral cricket disappear,” Modi added. “Big series will happen once every three or four years like the World Cup.