Advance Australia unfair . . .
Michael Slater has been responsible for me copping a lot of grief from friends and colleagues over the last 16 years.
Like all good young New Zealanders, I used to loathe Australians, figuring they were bigger and better at so many things and they'd stolen Crowded House, Phar Lap and pavlova to boot.
The along came the amazing World Cup in 1992 and I became a cricket nut, and a year later I watched a clip of the Ashes and saw a fresh-faced Slater belting the English attack to all corners of Lord's as he scored a debut century.
It was what Slater did next that stopped me mid-dinner.
No mere raise of the bat for him: he tore down the pitch, ripped off his helmet, planted a kiss on the crest and exploded with joy.
I was hooked. Slats didn't just bat. He nuzzled the ball, caressed it to the boundary with a flourish. And he was always looking to attack, whether he was on nine or 99.
I both laughed and cried when he reached 96 in a test, blindly charged down the wicket to, I think, Mushtaq Ahmed and was stumped by a mile.
So that's how I became a big Australian cricket fan.
Bought Inside Edge magazine, put posters of Mark Waugh and Shane Warne next to Pamela Anderson, did the lot.
. . . and finally I've seen the light
Through Warne's drugs ban, Warne's appalling personal behaviour, the endless sledging, a procession of biased commentators, Slater's struggles and the years of taunts for being an Australian cricket fan living on this side of the ditch, I kept the faith.
But it's over. The first Chappell-Hadlee one-dayer has helped me see the error of my ways.
Capricious youth has made way for jaded cynic, and now I despise the Australian cricket team as much as you.
The incident where Neil Broom was dismissed despite (a) Brad Haddin having his gloves in front of the stumps and (b) Haddin knocking the bails off with his gloves has been my final straw.
Haddin HAD to have felt his gloves hit the wickets. At the very least, he must have had a sliver of doubt over the dismissal.
And he did nothing. Worse was to come.
Ponting, now a twitchy leader of a rapidly sinking SS Australia, leaped on his high horse at the first available opportunity and lectured Daniel Vettori, the New Zealand captain who simply pointed out Haddin's facial expression suggested the wicketkeeper knew something had gone wrong.
Haddin then jumped in and kept a straight face as he revealed his own anguish at effectively being labelled a cheat. Well, that's what happens when you cheat.
I'll always have a soft spot for Michael Slater but it will be a long time before I can watch Australia without bile rising into my throat.
Tossing a man overboard
It is scandalous that Team New Zealand boss Grant Dalton was able to force TVNZ to remove veteran commentator Peter Montgomery from the channel's coverage of the Louis Vuitton regatta.
Personally, I'm not a huge fan of old PJ. He still tends to the hyperbolic, and his call of the Evers-Swindells' race in Beijing was a low point of the Olympics.
But he knows his stuff and plenty of people love him.
TVNZ has lost sight of the fact it is not just a cheerleader for Team NZ; it is, in fact, a public broadcaster and should be acting in the interests of the public, not a boat.
Dalton, whose grasp on reality has clearly been eroded by his years spent in the bizarre America's Cup realm, can be as dictatorial inside the team's barracks as he want but he shouldn't have any say in who describes the race.
Clutching at straws
It's probably no surprise that the Otago cricket team, now it's winning on a regular basis, is copping the occasional barb from outside the region.
Before the State Shield final in Hamilton, Northern coach Grant Bradburn suggested the Volts were not helping the sport by fielding two overseas professionals.
There's no doubt Otago has recruited heavily to be consistent on a regular basis.
Craig Cumming and Aaron Redmond came down from Canterbury, Greg Todd was from Central Districts, Ian Butler came out of Northern Districts, Derek de Boorder was from Auckland and both Dimitri Mascarenhas (England) and Neil Wagner (South Africa) are foreigners.
So there is an element of the hired gun about the Otago cricket team. Big deal. Boundaries mean nothing in modern sport.
You look around for players who would fit and build a team from there.
Players like Redmond and Todd are well settled in Dunedin, and Cumming is the heart and soul of the team. He's working here, he's raising a family here and he's committed to helping Otago succeed.
You want to call him an import?
Not only real, but talented
The piece in last Saturday's Last Word about promising rugby player Aaron Clark, and the English newspaper article that got so many facts wrong, touched a nerve with some of my people in North Otago.
Colin Jackson, the estimable chief executive of the North Otago union, wrote to dispel any suggestion young Aaron had been responsible for the distortions of truth.
Turns out Clark is a highly promising hooker, just turned 18, who is a good kid and the recipient of a rugby scholarship from Meridian Energy and the union.
It's enabled him to spend three months in England training at the Worcester Academy, working at a local school and playing club rugby for Malvern.
The idea, according to Jackson, is that players like Clark will get a taste of life overseas but also be encouraged to come back to North Otago to play club rugby.
Jackson confirmed Clark went to school at St Kevins College but had no idea where the newspaper heard he had played for New Zealand Under-19.
My apologies to the Clark family for any inference their rising star had been spinning stories. We'll watch his career with interest.
