I will regret this for the rest of my life
THE enormity may well have hit him as he sat alone with his thoughts on the 12-hour overnight flight from Johannesburg to Sydney.
But the emotion did not really strike Steve Smith until he made first mention, and then eye contact, with his dad Peter standing at the side of the crowded room.
Asked what message he would send to children who follow cricket, Smith took one of many of the deep breaths which would punctuate his confessional. “Any time you think about making a questionable decision, think about who you’re affecting,” he said, voice on the verge of cracking before looking to his left. “You’re affecting your parents and to see the way my old man’s been... it hurts.”
Throughout this sorry saga it has been hard not to feel some sympathy with the inherently likeable Smith and to see a grown man break down in tears as he cast a glance towards his father was a tough watch.
More than any other moment this was the one when realisation of exactly what he had thrown away – REPORTS the captaincy of his country, the opportunity of a million or more lifetimes, the dream for many but reality for so few. No wonder there were tears. Yet the reality was also that this was also a first step on the road back and what was clear yesterday from the support he received from within the dressing room and sport in general was that he retains not only sympathy but goodwill.
Financially, the former skipper has been hit hard with Weet-Bix terminating a lucrative deal as the face of their breakfast cereal yesterday to add to his cancelled Indian Premier League deal, worth £1.3 million.
They were not the only ones moving to distance themselves with sportswear giant Asics dropping David Warner and Cameron Bancroft and lead home series sponsor Magellan pulling out of their sponsorship deal with Cricket Australia. Money was the last thing on Smith’s mind when he made a first step back into the hearts of the cricket-loving public.
His plea was for forgiveness and ultimately acceptance back into the fold, even if he appeared to accept things will never quite be the same.
“I know I’ll regret this for the rest of my life, I’m absolutely gutted,” he said, choking back more tears.
“I hope in time I can earn back respect and forgiveness. It was a serious failure of leadership – my leadership – and I’ll do everything I can to make up for my mistake and the damage it has caused.
“If any good can come of this, if there can be a lesson to others, then I hope I can be a force for change.”
There were many voices of support from inside the game – Michael Clarke, Kevin Pietersen and Mitchell Johnson among those to put their shoulders behind his rehabilitation and return in a year. Yet the cautionary voices about how