Comment: Hard decisions needed to rescue dismal Tigers

Sports reporter ADAM SMITH looks at what has brought Tasmanian cricket is on its knees.

Tasmanian Tigers coach Dan Marsh inherited the best side in the country at the end of 2012-13, when Tim Coyle stepped down but their results since have been a disappointment. Picture: LUKE BOWDEN

TASMANIAN cricket is on its knees.

The Tigers’ humiliating defeat to South Australia inside three days in Adelaide has left the sport in the state at rock bottom.

It is almost impossible to believe a side can crumble for 98 — and be 4-19 in its second innings — while between that the opposition piles on 481.

Unfortunately it’s an all too common theme for Tasmania under Dan Marsh.

Marsh inherited the best side in the country at the end of 2012-13, when Tim Coyle stepped down after guiding the state to its third Sheffield Shield triumph in seven years.

We had a host of national representatives and others knocking on the door.

Since then the wheels have completely fallen off.

In 32 games as coach, Marsh has just seven wins (21.8 per cent) and 20 losses (62.5 per cent). And the Tigers don’t just lose, they get humiliated.

Since February last year, they have lost four games by an innings, two matches by 300 or more runs, one by 10 wickets, one by nine and another three by seven.

Most of those didn’t reach the scheduled fourth day and two of them didn’t last more than two days.

Losing is one thing, consistently being uncompetitive is another and much harder to accept.

Yet it didn’t stop Cricket Tasmania reappointing Marsh — after a big win against Victoria last season — for a further two years.

Leading into 2016-17, all the talk was how the group, and the batsmen in particular, had been mentally challenged.

Perhaps a bigger focus should have been on the technical side.

The likes of Alex Doolan and Andrew Fekete were either in the Test team or on the fringes two years ago but now find themselves in and out of the state side. Jordan Silk scored four centuries and three half-centuries in his first seven Shield matches but has struggled since, Ben Dunk’s blistering form pre-Christmas last summer has evaporated and for all the talk of “development”, just three home-grown players — Beau Webster, Doolan and George Bailey — were part of the crushing defeat to the Redbacks.

For too long mediocrity has been rewarded and until some tough decisions are made, things are unlikely to change.

Originally published as Comment: Hard decisions needed to rescue dismal Tigers