Australian cricket team suffering from too much pampering

GREAT sporting teams like the All Blacks have cottoned on to the fact that greatness doesn’t come from being handed everything on a platter. Paul Kent says Australian teams needs to adapt.

All Blacks players Ali Williams, captain Richie McCaw and Luke McAlister look dejected after France defeated New Zealand in their 2007 World Cup quarter-final in Cardiff.

THIS one should be bottled and stored, but never kept on the shelf.

After the All Blacks failed at the 2007 World Cup, another great let-down for a country priding itself on being the best, they realised all that meant nothing if they weren’t the best when it counted.

So after limping out of their fourth straight World Cup as beaten favourites, New Zealand Rugby drove change. Leading coaches, business leaders, anybody they could find with a history of success was invited to address the team.

And one day a man came in and spoke about the three states of being, as he saw them.

The first, he described, was Space Mountain. That is the Disneyland ride in Anaheim where you get on a rollercoaster that operates in the dark and hang on for dear life.

Once aboard, as anybody who has ridden it knows, you have no idea where you are going and no control over what happens next.

As an athlete, he said, that was the worst state to be in.

The second was whitewater rafting.

In this state, athletes were on the raft and obstacles were coming up, but they had a life vest and a paddle and together they could work to overcome those obstacles and navigate their way through.

The third he called America’s Cup.

This was state of the art. The best equipment, wanting for nothing, no expense spared in the pursuit for success.

The state the All Blacks were in, he said, was America’s Cup, which made everyone feel pretty chuffed.

Everything was laid out for them. While on tour, for example, they would rise in the morning and breakfast before boarding the bus to their next destination.

Meanwhile, background staff would pack their clothes to load on a separate bus so by the time they arrived in their next city it was already unpacked in their new hotel rooms.

Then he dropped a small grenade.

Where the All Blacks needed to be, where he said all elite sports teams need to be, was whitewater rafting.

Given you can’t control your opposition and what problems they might present, teams needed to find ways to overcome adversity to be successful.

Now after two World Cups, a record 18-Test winning streak and a winning percentage somewhere in the vicinity of heaven, the All Blacks clearly figured it out.

There is a lot to admire about it.

This America’s Cup mentality, the hidden curse of professionalism, is a virus ailing elite sport the world over and in Australia particularly.

Look at our cricketers.

If they can’t be flat-track bullies they struggle to win.

Our swimmers have never been so bad than since we realised they were so good.

Funding, sponsorships, a waterfall of money and opportunity, it all came

They now go to the Olympics as the rockstars within the Australian team and haven’t performed to expectations since Athens in 2004. How often do we see the No. 2 Aussie seed out-perform their counterpart?

The Wallabies know all too well this All Blacks story and have tried to duplicate it.

There were 40 theories written this week about the state of Australian cricket and what needs to be done to return Australia to the top and most got close.

But they addressed the symptom, not the cause. Our cricketers are in America’s Cup mode.

They are rested for playing too much cricket even as more matches are scheduled, even when they don’t want to.

They are spelled for bowling too many overs even though they are supposed to be at the cutting edge of fitness.

They practice batting on top practice wickets yet struggle the moment the pitch begins to do a little.

Where was the extra effort in the first Test, when a mountain of overs remained with no win possible and they needed to dig in and bat it out.

They were out chasing shots in Perth, quietly acknowledged for being “positive” when the match situation called for them to dig in.

Overcoming adversity is the heart of every great sport story.

Nobody cares for Rocky if he flukes a lucky first-round knockout. He has to take his beating first.

The Bad News Bears had to be truly awful so we could appreciate where they came from to win.

It is not a failing of the Australian players but of those around them who have looked past what’s important in the chase for the professional edge.

The struggle.

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