Article - ABC - August 4th, 2006
Haigh and McInnes talk cricket
Gideon Haigh and William McInnes talk cricket
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Pub cricket with Haigh and McInnes
Last Update: Friday, August 4, 2006. 9:12am AEST
By Jarrod Watt
"In this session, there will be two microphones: one for questions, and one for sledging." We are at the Bangalow Hotel, and we are attending the session titled Anyone for cricket? hosted and moderated by Radio National's presenter of The Sports Factor, Mick O'Regan, flanked by acclaimed cricketing author and journalist Gideon Haigh on one side, and reknowned actor William McInnes - also and author of two cricket-obsessed books, A Man's Got to Have a Hobby and Cricket Kings - on the other.
Both share a childhood overshadowed by the greats of cricket on the international arena, both share an adulthood of domestic club cricket in the suburbs; both have established themselves as authors who write about the culture surrounding cricket more than the actual sport itself.
After an extensive lunch the crowd is 'relaxed and comfortable'; the sunshine is streaming through the windows, and there's an enthusiastic atmosphere emanating from the 70 or so folk seated at their tables.
"This afternoon we're going to many different places. We're finding out cricket's connection to history, to literature, to vasectomies, to ennuit, Elgar's cello concerto, a lost bus driver and random acts of kindness...," says Mick O'Regan to the crowd, but they are in for more than that. Discussions, comparisons, demonstrations and the history of the cult of pants manipulation peculiar to cricket players, a claim of having been the first to invent protective headwear, the process of multicultural influences upon cricket at a national and a local club level, and how the 'can't go out first ball' rule has made Australia a soft nation will all be driven, edged, cut and hooked out to the crowd gathered at one of the first events on the Byron Bay Literary Festival drawcard.
Mick O'Regan sends down the opening delivery to Gideon Haigh: put simply, why cricket?
Frankly, cricket these days wouldn't get off the whiteboard in your marketing department. That's the thing I really enjoy about it
"From a playing perspective, nothing creative I've ever done, nothing I've written, or said, has ever matched the sublime sensual experience, that harmony between thought and deed, of a perfectly executed stroke, or the off-spinner that I bowled that comes out just right... You can play cricket with a physique like mine - and there is a place for you. There is also always a level of competence for you in cricket. You can play cricket badly, for longer, than any other sport under the sun," he replies. "The thing that appeals to me about cricket is that you wouldn't invent it today. This is an era... where sport is supposed to be this colourful, spectacular, urban spectale. Cricket is slow, it's distant - the action in cricket takes place further from the spectator than in any other sport. It's understated, it doesn't have colour in it - it's got people who play in white. Who would conceive of a sport today in which you play entirely in white? It involves a wide range of very different skills, and it has incredibly complicated laws that make no concession for the unitiated. Frankly, cricket these days wouldn't get off the whiteboard in your marketing department. That is the thing that I really, really enjoy about it. It's uninventable today, but it's always been there."
O'Regan walks back to his mark and sends one down to William McInnes: what was your inspiration to write about cricket? Was it because of a long fascination for the game, or was it a heat of the moment choice?
"I've always played cricket, for as long as I can remember. I've played in the backyard, on the beach, I've played club cricket in just about every state in Australia - at a very low level - I'm a yeoman as a cricketer. I love cricket, because, as my father used to say, it's a game about life," he replies. "I wanted to have this idea of placing this iconic, old Australia, if you like, this colonial game, and these guys playing sub-district, fourth grade cricket. And I think we've all been there - we've all been driving through suburbs somewhere, and out of the corner of your eye you see this odd collection of people standing... [stands and demonstrates a motionless fielder] And that's all they do. All the time I've driven past such a collection of people I've never actually seen anything happen. I've seen a bowler run up and that's about the end of it. So I wanted to put that pastime in the middle of this new Australia, if you like, in this sweltering, seething mass of cultures and peoples and languages and religions - but it's Australia. I wanted, if you like, to have this sense of a nation coming together. It's an optimistic book, this thing... I wanted to point our minds to this idea that Australia is a reasonably tolerant place, and we have to be reminded of that sometimes, I think, and we have to remind ourselves that there's space for everybody."
O'Regan decides to change pace: he is going to come in from the other side of the wicket and ask McInnes about references in his book to particular mannerisms peculiar to the sport, with reference to Ian Chappell 'adjusting' himself, and the later practice of the Captain's Tug employed by Allan Border and Mark Taylor.
"Adjusting is the term which is Ian Chappell's great gift to Australian culture... I think every kid who ever watched him did it in the backyard. It was as important as actually hitting the ball," says McInnes. "What he used to do was he'd have his bat slung up on one shoulder and he'd look around, think what he was going to do, where he was going to hit, and he'd put his left glove between his legs, on his groin, and ruminate over his protector." he'd put his left glove between his legs, on his groin, and ruminate over his protector
"Show us," mutters O'Regan - and McInnes does, standing full stretch, and, well, ruminating, just like the former captain of the Australian team did to a cricket-mad nation.
"I think Michael Jackson and many other pop singers actually made it their own. And when he was really on fire, he'd bend his legs - ["Re-arranging the field," cries O'Regan] - and give that fantastic Greg Norman flick of his collar. Now, the Captain's Tug was a later development of adjusting. Alan Border was the first person who rode the Captain's Tug across the cricket grounds of the world, and it is a rather furtive pecking of your groin, and you don't have to be wearing your box. It's the all-purpose Rodan's Thinker-type thing to do. You stand at a slip, and you're talking, and thinking about who you're going to put on," says McInnes, again, standing to demonstrate to the howls of laughter from the audience. "It was like the radio operator on the Titanic sending the morse, it's that furtive, sort of panicked, almost bird picking at its seed, a chook who's hungry, going after grubs early in the morning. Because Australian cricket was saved and lead by the originator of the Captain's Tug in the late 80s, early 90s, he passed it over to Mark Taylor, who lead a much more successful team, a team on the rise, so his Tug was a more loquacious, a more confident form of rumination."
"With an upward inflection?" queries Haigh
"It was a little like an archer drawing back on a bow, a little more elegant... he may be selling air-conditioners now, but he was a very delicate Captain's Tugger. Poor Ricky Ponting just chews his fingernails and spits a lot," says McInnes.
For O'Regan, this is indicative of the different way Australians approach the game compared to their English counterparts, and touches on a shared element of the writings of both men - the image of Australian suburban cricket versus the village cricket of England. "Is the whole basis of English cricket versus Australian cricket different from the root up, or is it the same tree with different branches?" he asks.
Australian cricket was saved and lead by the originator of the Captain's Tug in the late 80s
"It's one of those dictums that there is no such thing as social cricket in Australia. That's just nonsense. There are always going to be members of your cricket community that take it more seriously than others. There are those of us on the way up, there are some of us enjoying that gentle ride down into obscurity. Australia and England are two nations divided by a common game, so they're more inclined to exaggerate the differences between the two different cultures," says Haigh, going on to discuss the 2005 Ashes and how England played a lot like Australia always has.
There is much rumination from both stage and floor about the Ashes series; whether the English imitated the Aussie style of cricket to win, whether the Aussies imitated themselves poorly, or whether it was all about a bunch of young players who'd never copped a hiding from an Australian team not knowing about the fear they were supposed to exhibit. Someone suggests perhaps it was because not much of the English team were actually English, which provokes discussion of the comparative multicultural nature of cricket in England and Australia
"The immigrant communities that England has fostered are cricket playing communities - they're often Indians and Pakistanis and Sri Lankan and West Indians, who've brought cricket with them ... that is the reason for the disproportionate number of Asian and West Indian faces in the England side," replies Haigh. "I think that grassroots cricket has changed a lot in the time I've been playing it... I don't think the Australian team is particularly representative of Australian society... but if you play at the level that William and I play, you wouldn't believe who's playing, compared to the received image of cricket these days."
It's then that O'Regan comes in off the long run-up: "I want to talk about Shane Warne now..." and leads a discussion about SK Warne's personality and impact upon the game; the audience gets their chance to pose questions about 20/20 cricket and whether it is a companion or a curse to the game they know and love; William McInnes reads an excerpt from his book A Man's Got Have a Hobby, showcasing his claim that a childhood innovation of two beanies and a bucket to defend the golf ball rebounding from the barbeque wall constituted the first protective headgear in cricket.
When the umpire finally knocks the bails off, the crowd's cricketing appetite is sated, somewhat... until, of course, winter ends and we again catch glimpses of those men forever standing, watching and waiting on sun-parched ovals in the suburbs of Australia.
Click here for source.
Gideon Haigh and William McInnes talk cricket
WinMedia 28k+ MP3 RealMedia 28k+
Pub cricket with Haigh and McInnes
Last Update: Friday, August 4, 2006. 9:12am AEST
By Jarrod Watt
"In this session, there will be two microphones: one for questions, and one for sledging." We are at the Bangalow Hotel, and we are attending the session titled Anyone for cricket? hosted and moderated by Radio National's presenter of The Sports Factor, Mick O'Regan, flanked by acclaimed cricketing author and journalist Gideon Haigh on one side, and reknowned actor William McInnes - also and author of two cricket-obsessed books, A Man's Got to Have a Hobby and Cricket Kings - on the other.
Both share a childhood overshadowed by the greats of cricket on the international arena, both share an adulthood of domestic club cricket in the suburbs; both have established themselves as authors who write about the culture surrounding cricket more than the actual sport itself.
After an extensive lunch the crowd is 'relaxed and comfortable'; the sunshine is streaming through the windows, and there's an enthusiastic atmosphere emanating from the 70 or so folk seated at their tables.
"This afternoon we're going to many different places. We're finding out cricket's connection to history, to literature, to vasectomies, to ennuit, Elgar's cello concerto, a lost bus driver and random acts of kindness...," says Mick O'Regan to the crowd, but they are in for more than that. Discussions, comparisons, demonstrations and the history of the cult of pants manipulation peculiar to cricket players, a claim of having been the first to invent protective headwear, the process of multicultural influences upon cricket at a national and a local club level, and how the 'can't go out first ball' rule has made Australia a soft nation will all be driven, edged, cut and hooked out to the crowd gathered at one of the first events on the Byron Bay Literary Festival drawcard.
Mick O'Regan sends down the opening delivery to Gideon Haigh: put simply, why cricket?
Frankly, cricket these days wouldn't get off the whiteboard in your marketing department. That's the thing I really enjoy about it
"From a playing perspective, nothing creative I've ever done, nothing I've written, or said, has ever matched the sublime sensual experience, that harmony between thought and deed, of a perfectly executed stroke, or the off-spinner that I bowled that comes out just right... You can play cricket with a physique like mine - and there is a place for you. There is also always a level of competence for you in cricket. You can play cricket badly, for longer, than any other sport under the sun," he replies. "The thing that appeals to me about cricket is that you wouldn't invent it today. This is an era... where sport is supposed to be this colourful, spectacular, urban spectale. Cricket is slow, it's distant - the action in cricket takes place further from the spectator than in any other sport. It's understated, it doesn't have colour in it - it's got people who play in white. Who would conceive of a sport today in which you play entirely in white? It involves a wide range of very different skills, and it has incredibly complicated laws that make no concession for the unitiated. Frankly, cricket these days wouldn't get off the whiteboard in your marketing department. That is the thing that I really, really enjoy about it. It's uninventable today, but it's always been there."
O'Regan walks back to his mark and sends one down to William McInnes: what was your inspiration to write about cricket? Was it because of a long fascination for the game, or was it a heat of the moment choice?
"I've always played cricket, for as long as I can remember. I've played in the backyard, on the beach, I've played club cricket in just about every state in Australia - at a very low level - I'm a yeoman as a cricketer. I love cricket, because, as my father used to say, it's a game about life," he replies. "I wanted to have this idea of placing this iconic, old Australia, if you like, this colonial game, and these guys playing sub-district, fourth grade cricket. And I think we've all been there - we've all been driving through suburbs somewhere, and out of the corner of your eye you see this odd collection of people standing... [stands and demonstrates a motionless fielder] And that's all they do. All the time I've driven past such a collection of people I've never actually seen anything happen. I've seen a bowler run up and that's about the end of it. So I wanted to put that pastime in the middle of this new Australia, if you like, in this sweltering, seething mass of cultures and peoples and languages and religions - but it's Australia. I wanted, if you like, to have this sense of a nation coming together. It's an optimistic book, this thing... I wanted to point our minds to this idea that Australia is a reasonably tolerant place, and we have to be reminded of that sometimes, I think, and we have to remind ourselves that there's space for everybody."
O'Regan decides to change pace: he is going to come in from the other side of the wicket and ask McInnes about references in his book to particular mannerisms peculiar to the sport, with reference to Ian Chappell 'adjusting' himself, and the later practice of the Captain's Tug employed by Allan Border and Mark Taylor.
"Adjusting is the term which is Ian Chappell's great gift to Australian culture... I think every kid who ever watched him did it in the backyard. It was as important as actually hitting the ball," says McInnes. "What he used to do was he'd have his bat slung up on one shoulder and he'd look around, think what he was going to do, where he was going to hit, and he'd put his left glove between his legs, on his groin, and ruminate over his protector." he'd put his left glove between his legs, on his groin, and ruminate over his protector
"Show us," mutters O'Regan - and McInnes does, standing full stretch, and, well, ruminating, just like the former captain of the Australian team did to a cricket-mad nation.
"I think Michael Jackson and many other pop singers actually made it their own. And when he was really on fire, he'd bend his legs - ["Re-arranging the field," cries O'Regan] - and give that fantastic Greg Norman flick of his collar. Now, the Captain's Tug was a later development of adjusting. Alan Border was the first person who rode the Captain's Tug across the cricket grounds of the world, and it is a rather furtive pecking of your groin, and you don't have to be wearing your box. It's the all-purpose Rodan's Thinker-type thing to do. You stand at a slip, and you're talking, and thinking about who you're going to put on," says McInnes, again, standing to demonstrate to the howls of laughter from the audience. "It was like the radio operator on the Titanic sending the morse, it's that furtive, sort of panicked, almost bird picking at its seed, a chook who's hungry, going after grubs early in the morning. Because Australian cricket was saved and lead by the originator of the Captain's Tug in the late 80s, early 90s, he passed it over to Mark Taylor, who lead a much more successful team, a team on the rise, so his Tug was a more loquacious, a more confident form of rumination."
"With an upward inflection?" queries Haigh
"It was a little like an archer drawing back on a bow, a little more elegant... he may be selling air-conditioners now, but he was a very delicate Captain's Tugger. Poor Ricky Ponting just chews his fingernails and spits a lot," says McInnes.
For O'Regan, this is indicative of the different way Australians approach the game compared to their English counterparts, and touches on a shared element of the writings of both men - the image of Australian suburban cricket versus the village cricket of England. "Is the whole basis of English cricket versus Australian cricket different from the root up, or is it the same tree with different branches?" he asks.
Australian cricket was saved and lead by the originator of the Captain's Tug in the late 80s
"It's one of those dictums that there is no such thing as social cricket in Australia. That's just nonsense. There are always going to be members of your cricket community that take it more seriously than others. There are those of us on the way up, there are some of us enjoying that gentle ride down into obscurity. Australia and England are two nations divided by a common game, so they're more inclined to exaggerate the differences between the two different cultures," says Haigh, going on to discuss the 2005 Ashes and how England played a lot like Australia always has.
There is much rumination from both stage and floor about the Ashes series; whether the English imitated the Aussie style of cricket to win, whether the Aussies imitated themselves poorly, or whether it was all about a bunch of young players who'd never copped a hiding from an Australian team not knowing about the fear they were supposed to exhibit. Someone suggests perhaps it was because not much of the English team were actually English, which provokes discussion of the comparative multicultural nature of cricket in England and Australia
"The immigrant communities that England has fostered are cricket playing communities - they're often Indians and Pakistanis and Sri Lankan and West Indians, who've brought cricket with them ... that is the reason for the disproportionate number of Asian and West Indian faces in the England side," replies Haigh. "I think that grassroots cricket has changed a lot in the time I've been playing it... I don't think the Australian team is particularly representative of Australian society... but if you play at the level that William and I play, you wouldn't believe who's playing, compared to the received image of cricket these days."
It's then that O'Regan comes in off the long run-up: "I want to talk about Shane Warne now..." and leads a discussion about SK Warne's personality and impact upon the game; the audience gets their chance to pose questions about 20/20 cricket and whether it is a companion or a curse to the game they know and love; William McInnes reads an excerpt from his book A Man's Got Have a Hobby, showcasing his claim that a childhood innovation of two beanies and a bucket to defend the golf ball rebounding from the barbeque wall constituted the first protective headgear in cricket.
When the umpire finally knocks the bails off, the crowd's cricketing appetite is sated, somewhat... until, of course, winter ends and we again catch glimpses of those men forever standing, watching and waiting on sun-parched ovals in the suburbs of Australia.
Click here for source.
posted by WilliamWatch at 8:25 PM
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