4 axed for 3rd test

[Whowants2know]

The only reason people are making such a big deal about this now is because of the rumours and innuendo surrounding the team.

Why are the rumours still going??? Where there is smoke, there is fire??

 

[The Speaker]

Any time anything bad happens to a sandgroper, West Australians look for an east coaster to blame.

>: (

 

[Outshined]

Getting dropped for not handing in a report like this isn't discipline, it's a power trip. Being good at essay writing has no impact on the field. And further more, team morale is also important in a sporting team.

I'm not sure how failure to comply with instruction isn't a disciplinary issue.

 

[carnthemlions]

Teams don't operate in a work place?

Depends on what sort of workplace we're talking about.
Morale and discipline are very important in a lot of workplaces. Particularly when the work being done involves people working in teams.

 

[carnthemlions]

Getting dropped for not handing in a report like this isn't discipline, it's a power trip. Being good at essay writing has no impact on the field. And further more, team morale is also important in a sporting team.

What does essay writing have to do with it? Reviewing your own performance and that of the team doesn't require a 5000 word essay. "I didn't bat so good and i can't play spin" and so on would suffice.
And yes, it is discipline.

 

[Underdog]

Depends on what sort of workplace we're talking about.
Morale and discipline are very important in a lot of workplaces. Particularly when the work being done involves people working in teams.

Yeah, the question was more rhetorical. Many workplaces work in teams where discipline and morale are vital. I don't buy that the cricket team are in some unique position to justify heavy handed punishment to their team members when it goes against commonly held methods used by many other teams in the corporate world.

 

[Wickzki]

What does essay writing have to do with it? Reviewing your own performance and that of the team doesn't require a 5000 word essay. "I didn't bat so good and i can't play spin" and so on would suffice.
And yes, it is discipline.

It's a power trip the second you suspend a player who didn't even play for not handing in an essay/text message on the team's performance.

Seriously, what on earth is Mitch Johnson meant to write? "I could been more diligent with the drinks"?

 

[Howard Littlejohn]

Reports on another forum that Patto was dropped for falsifying fitness reports.

Given the consequences of telling the truth, who wouldn't? Rotated out, excluded as punushment, either way the bowler most deserving of selection was quite likely to not be selected.

And that Khawaja, Lyon and Johnson are part of a clique around Watson.

It seems Khawaja's manager isn't happy with the behaviour of his own client, or the professionalism of cricket generally.

 

[mediumsizered]

That's another part of this I genuinely don't understand.

Do the Captain and the Coach not talk to their players?

How is it possible that neither of them grabbed one of the guys and said, "Patto, come grab a coffee with me and go through those points I asked you about."

'Hey Watto, make sure you drop off that team review thing I asked for or you're dropped'.

I expect that would have done the trick.

Something along the lines of these two posts should have been the commonsense approach from Arthur & Clarke. Not maintaining silence & then adopting a 'gotcha' approach. You get the impression that perhaps Arthur and/or Clarke may be losing some of the players.

 

[Cooldude]

At least laughed and thought this is junior school rubbish, but then I found out those pricks had 6 days just to reply an SMS and they didn't even do it. I hate people who don't answer when you're trying to organise shit with SMS, so those pricks deserve it, from my biased point of view

 

[mediumsizered]

Pretty standard in every organisation I've worked in - senior management (Arthur) ask staff to do something outside their normal work and the middle managers (Clarke) ensure that all of their staff do it.

And if the staff don't complete the task, the middle managers cop the kick in the arse from senior management.

 

[ReservoirDog]

 

[Caesar]

Why are the rumours still going??? Where there is smoke, there is fire??

Maybe. I'm sure a number of players in the team don't particularly like Clarke. There are players in every side who don't like their captain. Border and Waugh were notorious dickheads who were disliked by numerous players in their sides. Taylor earned plenty of dressing room resentment for being carried by the team during his periods of poor form. Those teams were on an upward trajectory though, which keeps people quiet. Team tensions always translate into rumours around losing sides, because morale is low, there is more friction between different personalities, and there's plenty of blame to be apportioned.

As for their truth, who knows? Look at Zoehrer. Accepted wisdom for years was that he was sacked as part of a vendetta for sleeping with Simmo's daughter. Ten years later he writes a book and admits he was a total arseh*le who basically begged to be thrown out of both the Australian and WA teams.

Something along the lines of these two posts should have been the commonsense approach from Arthur & Clarke. Not maintaining silence & then adopting a 'gotcha' approach. You get the impression that perhaps Arthur and/or Clarke may be losing some of the players.

And you know that's what they did... how?

Personally I think it's far more likely that the whole team had been given a talk about poor discipline and not completing tasks, and it was made clear to them that the coaching staff were taking it seriously. A few players thought they were bluffing, or figured their profiles would protect them from any punishment too harsh, and just ignored it.

 

[mediumsizered]

What a load of shit. Watson is a grown man, the same age as Clarke. If Watson can't take responsibility for his own shit, really....

If the captain has to go to the VC and say "make sure you do this and set an example to the lads", then maybe the VC shouldn't be the VC...

One of the first things you learn as a manager is that not everyone shares the same motivation as their colleagues or the same priorities as their colleagues. Some are automatic doers, others need a gentle (or sometimes not so gentle) prod. Leave everyone to their own devices & it will come back to bite you. Give some gentle encouragement (or advise the consequences of non-compliance) to those who you recognise as needing it & you will most likely nip any issues in the bud.

 

[Underdog]

One of the first things you learn as a manager is that not everyone shares the same motivation as their colleagues or the same priorities as their colleagues. Some are automatic doers, others need a gentle (or sometimes not so gentle) prod. Leave everyone to their own devices & it will come back to bite you. Give some gentle encouragement (or advise the consequences of non-compliance) to those who you recognise as needing it & you will most likely nip any issues in the bud.

Apparently you can't apply decades of workplace research and practice to the team...

 

[courtjester]

One of the first things you learn as a manager is that not everyone shares the same motivation as their colleagues or the same priorities as their colleagues. Some are automatic doers, others need a gentle (or sometimes not so gentle) prod. Leave everyone to their own devices & it will come back to bite you. Give some gentle encouragement (or advise the consequences of non-compliance) to those who you recognise as needing it & you will most likely nip any issues in the bud.

I don't disagree with this at all. But the directive was pretty simple. Prepare some sort of quick report on how you/the team can improve. Even just an SMS. But some people didn't do it.

Regardless of whether it was through forgetfulness or deliberately ignoring team orders, you can't really blame team management at all in this situation imo.

 

[Belnakor]

One of the first things you learn as a manager is that not everyone shares the same motivation as their colleagues or the same priorities as their colleagues. Some are automatic doers, others need a gentle (or sometimes not so gentle) prod. Leave everyone to their own devices & it will come back to bite you. Give some gentle encouragement (or advise the consequences of non-compliance) to those who you recognise as needing it & you will most likely nip any issues in the bud.

This is a group of high achievers. If you don't have the motivation to play test cricket then **** off.

 

[Hellgood]

Any time anything bad happens to a sandgroper, West Australians look for an east coaster to blame.

This story came from Sydney.

 

[Caesar]

Maybe we need a tongue in cheek smiley.

 

[damochandler]

this is just to cover up cracks that are widening in this team and the players have lost faith in the coach and clarke is just his middle man.

 

[Phone]

Personally I think it's far more likely that the whole team had been given a talk about poor discipline and not completing tasks, and it was made clear to them that the coaching staff were taking it seriously. A few players thought they were bluffing, or figured their profiles would protect them from any punishment too harsh, and just ignored it.

Yeah we know this happened. In August.

"It's not about being selected and that's it, go and have a good time. There's a lot that comes with representing your country, on and off the field and it's just about making it very clear to all the boys that we all sit on the same line, there's no-one special in the team, everyone has the same rules, the same guidelines and the same expectations.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/pakistan-v-australia-2012/content/story/578592.html

 

[Xsess]

Get rid of Clarke and Arthur and bring back the players and administrators from the Waugh era to mentor and bring back some stability and proper values of a traditional Australian Cricket team. This is our only true national game these two fools and the majority of CA are playing with and its got to stop. They don't appear to have any respect for our current players and are treating them like a schoolboys. Clarke should stick to the catwalk and leave cricket to those that embrace the real traditions of past Australian players.

 

[The_Reaper]

Get rid of Clarke and Arthur and bring back the players and administrators from the Waugh era to mentor and bring back some stability and proper values of a traditional Australian Cricket team. This is our only true national game these two fools and the majority of CA are playing with and its got to stop. They don't appear to have any respect for our current players and are treating them like a schoolboys. Clarke should stick to the catwalk and leave cricket to those that embrace the real traditions of past Australian players.

And four of those players acted like schoolboys

 

[mediumsizered]

This is a group of high achievers. If you don't have the motivation to play test cricket then **** off.

If only it was that simple. The Australian cricket team has a coach nowadays for the same reason that AFL teams have coaches. When you bring a group of people together, regardless of whether they are sportsmen, or working a job like the rest of us, you are bringing together people from different backgrounds, different education levels, perhaps different cultures. A good manager can identify these types of things & manage his/her people accordingly, whilst getting the same output from each individual. Australian cricketers of the '70s would have crawled over broken glass for Ian Chappell, because he was a great leader of men. I get the impression that maybe Arthur & Clarke don't get the same level of respect from the current players, which has to place a question mark over their leadership ability.

It would not be unusual to have one player fall out of line e.g. Andrew Symonds, but to have 4 players do so points to a bigger, underlying issue.

 

[damochandler]

i'm just waiting for the gov to come on and tell us gregg ritchie would have done it better