Where the Aussies get it wrong

December 10, 2001 by neil manthorp

 Neil Man­thor­p  — 10/12/2001

Whether it’s prac­tise facil­i­ties, prepa­ra­tion tech­niques, domes­tic play­ing struc­tures or even their psy­cho­log­i­cal approach, it becomes galling to hear how much bet­ter the Aussies are than the rest of the world. Well, they don’t get every­thing right.

In time-hon­oured tra­di­tion the Aus­tralian 12th man dur­ing a Test is ful­ly fledged mem­ber of the Test team ind remains with the team through­out the match. He is paid a full match fee and is involved in every aspect of the match from team meet­ings to a share of the bonus pool.

Infact, Queens­land seam­er Andy Bichel received an aston­ish­ing A$33,000 for his three con­sec­u­tive 12th man appear­ances in the just com­plet­ed series against New Zealand. On top of that, Bichel auto­mat­i­cal­ly qual­i­fied for an ACB con­tract after his three ‘Tests’. In South Africa a play­er also qual­i­fies for a UCB con­tract after three Tests or six one-day­ers — but only if he plays!

So Bichel col­lect­ed A$33,000 for keep­ing the Gatorade cool and anoth­er A$90,000 for the min­i­mum con­tract. Nice work if you can get it.

The mon­ey is only aspect of the prob­lem, how­ev­er. Actu­al­ly, some peo­ple may argue that it is only right and fair that the 12th man is paid (although a full match fee is sure­ly excessive!).

The main prob­lem the Aus­tralian selec­tors are fac­ing ahead of the Ade­laide Test is that, should leg spin­ner Stu­art MacGill not play, the team will have to endure the prospect of sit­ting in — or return­ing to — a dress­ing room con­tain­ing a man many of them can’t stand.

Shane Warne, for exam­ple, can’t stand MacGill and does­n’t care who knows it. But with no flex­i­bil­i­ty in the Aus­tralian 12th man sys­tem there is noth­ing any­one can do about it. Ha! Ha! Imag­ine the atmos­phere if the match gets tense. What a laugh. It makes a change to see the Aus­tralians tak­ing aim at their own feet and pulling the trigger.

In South Africa there is plen­ty of flex­i­bil­i­ty. Boeta Dip­pe­naar and Jacques Rudolph have both been intro­duced to inter­na­tion­al crick­et as 12th men but, sim­i­lar­ly, a young­ster on the play­ing staff of the host union has also done the job when the 12th man was bet­ter served play­ing a domes­tic match.

Good to see we can still lead the way with com­mon sense in some things.