End of the cricket season, end of an era

Ricky Ponting's retirement as captain marks the end of a golden era in Australian cricket, the likes of which I do not believe we will ever see again. His greatness as a batsman still has some years to run out if the Australian selectors are prepared to dispense with tradition and pick the best batsman in the country even though he is no longer captain. Kim Hughes was the last captain I can think of who resigned the captaincy and returned to the ranks in 1984, but his tenure was short-lived at the hands of a mighty West Indian bowling attack. I can't see Ponting suffering that same fate - he is too good a player for that and there aren't any bowling attacks capable of dismantling him in that fashion.

It will be interesting to watch Ponting assimilate back into the nucleus of the team and see if the relief of the burden of captaincy, and the accompanying media spotlight, relaxes or frustrates him. I suspect his sheer class as a batsman will win the day. Watching the way he celebrated his century in Ahmedabad last week suggested a man with yet unfinished business and a steely determination to keep proving people wrong. I predicted his century on my radio programme a few days before the match but to be honest, it was hardly a brave prediction. His record in big matches, coupled with his skill and mental strength pointed to the very real possibility that he would play an innings of some significance very soon. And so it was proved.

The end of the Ponting era and the end of the World Cup also heralds the end of the cricket season in Australia. From grown men to little boys, the kits are being packed up and cricket disappears from the everyday landscape for at least five months. That's one reason why I think Australia will struggle to repeat a period of success that started with the latter part of the Border era and finished today with Ponting. Unlike the Asian countries for whom cricket has no real natural predator, Australia has a strong football culture (AFL, rugby codes, soccer) and it's cricket infrastructure is never going to be able to compete with the sheer numbers of the people for whom cricket is much more than just another sport.

My own cricket season came to a premature end halfway through a grand final, courtesy a split webbing and eleven stitches in my bowling hand. The Under-8 team that I coach also finished up last Saturday. Many of the young lads in that team are unlikely to continue in the sport, not for any other reason than a lack of genuine passion for the game. My son is one of the exceptions; despite not showing any great natural ability (at least I know he's my son!!!), his love for the game is quite unlike any of his mates. He mourned the end of the season while a few of his mates breathed a sigh of relief. He went straight to the backyard to start practicing for next season while his mates probably kicked footballs against the fence. I just can't see this happening in the Colombo of my youth where there was never even a suggestion that cricket needed an 'off season'. It wasn't necessarily structured games of organised cricket but backyard/laneway battles that raged all evening until darkness descended and we reluctantly straggled home, swatting mosquitoes with imaginary pull shots.

Australia's strength at the top level will always be strong. There's too much money in the system for that not to happen among the top cricketers in the country. It's lower down the ladder where our lack of depth will be exposed. Perhaps no one outside the country will ever see this because all they see is a national team that will always be competitive. Looking at the way junior cricket is played (and coached), I fear for the long-term future of the lower rungs of cricket.

Despite my pessimism in this narrow sense, I can still see blue sky. Through sheer chance, I came across an unassuming chap called Cameron Tradell who runs a coaching business called Sweetsport. I watched him coach my seven-year-old son, listened to the way he simplified everything down to the most basic level and then saw some amazing results within the hour! It humbled me that there are coaches who come to the game with no great reputations as elite players themselves but still manage to cut through to young kids. His coaching techniques were so simple it made me think "why didn't I think of that?", but the truth is that I've never heard anybody quite communicate with young children like he did.

There are other coaches like Cameron around the country who volunteer their time and wisdom in hidden corners, often unnoticed and unheralded. The system will probably never discover them because they fly under the radar without blowing their own trumpets and attracting the attention of cricket administrators. Parents like me who have played a decent level of cricket tend to dominate junior coaching roles without anyone ever questioning whether I can translate my own cricketing knowledge into a language that youngsters can understand. In one hour, Cameron made more progress than I was able to achieve in three years. It served as a humble reminder that the best talent, players or coaches, are often found by accident, in environments that have a love of cricket that transcends politics, parents and over-administration.

Junior cricket, at my son's club anyway, is predominantly played in the ‘V’ between midwicket and fine-leg, dominated by strong boys who can play the 'hoick' every ball. Most bowlers at this age can barely get the ball to the other end without a few wides each over. A far cry indeed from the Azar Maidan in Mumbai where I recently watched a group of very young lads with impeccable batting techniques facing a bowler who bowled doosras on request! These Indian kids were probably not deemed "elite" and will probably never grace our television screens but their rudimentary skills suggested that something (or somebody) has got to these youngsters at an early age, and set them up with a framework that they can extend as their bodies grow stronger.

Cameron Tradell was one of the few coaches who was able to get the message across to my son (and his friend) that playing straight was a long-term goal that would outlast the temporary glory of scoring cheap runs exclusively through square leg. Try telling a seven-year-old that technique is more important than runs - this was the first time playing straight made sense because of the use of a unique bat that rewarded the boys for hitting the ball with a full face. It absolutely pinged off the sweet spot when they hit straight down the ground and all of a sudden, the hoick was yesterday's shot!

Ponting himself was a junior prodigy, brought up on a classical technique and clearly coached by someone who knew how to coach a kid properly. We are reminded today that soon he will no longer stride out to bat for Australia at number three, arguably our greatest ever in that crucial position. I don't think we'll ever see the likes of Ponting again in this country unless our junior cricket system can encourage kids who can bat for long periods and play straight. Not unless we can find ways to encourage coaches who can see the big picture and can find ways to communicate those simple techniques to young minds who cannot easily understand why a single to mid-on is preferable to a boundary through square leg. That's the difference I see at the grassroots level between the Asian countries and Australia.

Perhaps it has always been thus ... perhaps we'll look back on the Ponting era and wonder if we'll ever see another batsman of his quality. Yes, Sachin Tendulkar is another special batsman but somehow, I expect those cricket-crazy countries, distracted by little else, to produce another Little Master again. I showed my son some footage from that maidan in India and his jaw dropped. And then he picked up his rugby ball and walked out the back door. Cricket season has finished - time to move on. Et tu Ponting.