Ryder's crash course for trouble

Whether Jesse Ryder was sober or not on the night of the assault, history has not treated him well when he's been out on the town late at night. He has become a magnet for stupid behaviour, his own and that of others. There is cruel irony in the fact that he was attacked after he made the decision to step out of the limelight, to become less of a target for the boofheads, writes Dylan Cleaver in New Zealand Herald.

Now the question is whether he can come back at all. Ryder faces his toughest battle - first to survive, then to recover. Everybody who has any passion for the game wants it to happen. Getting him back to play international cricket - or any sort of cricket - might seem hopelessly irrelevant, were it not for the fact that out in the middle, with a 156g projectile flying around, is the one place he has always been safest.

David Leggat, writing in the same newspaper, asks whether Wellington Cricket should have been more careful with Ryder (after the match against Canterbury, when he went drinking), in light of his problems with alcohol in the past.

Should it have been more assertive in ensuring that if a few quiet drinks were to be had to mark the end of the season, with Ryder as a team member present - and this is not suggesting he was even drinking on Wednesday night - there weren't some checks in place? For example, why was Ryder the last player to leave the Aikmans Bar, rather than exiting at the same time as his teammates? It may not sound much, but with this player, and his history, it is.