Good sports, bad sports
"What does it mean to be a "good sport"
Sriram Veera
25-Feb-2013
"What does it mean to be a "good sport"? Is it as obvious as simply playing fairly, or in these days of fiercely competitive professional rivalry does the very idea of being a "good sport" need renovation?" ABC's Radio Sports Factor investigates.
Major-General Michael Jeffrey, lawyer, blogger and cricket fan, Irfan Yusuf, Fairfax journalist and ABC cricket commentator, Peter Roebuck and Debbie Simms, manager of the Australian Sports Commission's Ethics Unit, form the panel.
Roebuck: The sort of outburst of nationalism that began in the 1970s when this country freed itself from English petticoats, in theatre, in comedy, in so many areas, politics, and so many areas it freed itself from that. Subsequent to that for 30 years there's been this great breast-beating tradition, chest-thumping tradition in Australian sport, in some Australian sport of course, not all of them. And that I think, I saw the SCG Test Match as basically the last statement of that, and I almost was challenging Australia to say, Well, we've sort of done that, we've established ourselves as a proud and independent nation now.
I think what happened at the SCG was partly that Australia regressed, because it's trying to be partisan I believe, but also that India started playing the old Australia, that it too is now establishing itself as a proud and independent nation, and those two, like two big bulls at each other, they came. There only used to be one bull in this paddock you know, and now there's two. And that's what happened there. So the Australians, I would submit are trying to move on a little bit; they've made some efforts in that regard. The Indians are determined to establish their right to the paddock as well, and so they're now playing, as they think, as Australia has always played.
Dileep Premachandran, writing in the ABC's Unleashed, says Andrew Symonds only has himself, and his words, to blame for his tarnished reputation in India.
Bang in the middle of a heated one-day series last October, Symonds mouthed off about the country and its celebration of an unexpected win in the inaugural T20 World Cup.
Perhaps he was motivated by envy. Perhaps he forgot to engage his brain. Whatever it was, the anger of the crowds was palpable. Some say that the targeting of Symonds with monkey chants was proof of inherent racism. They neglected to mention the adulation that followed the likes of Adam Gilchrist and Matthew Hayden around the country. The reason Symonds was bagged had very little to do with his ancestry and everything to do with the manner in which he had disparaged a young nation still trying to find its niche in the world.
Sriram Veera is a former staff writer at ESPNcricinfo