Greg Chappell - just how good do people think he was?

[social]

No, Packer got the cricket he wanted.

To drag the game into the 20th-century, he'd have had to want to do that. And he didn't.

And, in the process, implemented a no. of changes that have significantly benefitted the game.

BTW, do you really think the players gave away the right to represent their countries lightly?

At the time, they were given no choice but to stake their careers and reputations on Packer because the various Boards of Control were totally intransigent.

Hell, the ICC took them to court rather than negotiate on wage increases. Fortunately, even the High Court recognised that the ICC was living in a time warp

 

[Richard]

No-one took the players to court - the players took the authorities to court because they had been banned from Test cricket, which sadly contravened emplyment-law. Cricket contracts in those days were too vague to rule-out a Packer doing what he did.

Packer himself had no intentions to improve the game, I repeat, and hence to praise him for such a thing beggars belief.

 

[Swervy]

Good came out of Nine covering the game, undoubtedly. But Kerry Packer did not have the good of the game at heart, at all.

Doesnt really matter what his motives were really. Its results that count in this situation. Did the Beatles really think we they wrote Love Me Do that they were going or even really want to change the face of popular culture? No, but you still have to credit them for what that song and the band started.

Anyway, see that pretty much all your opinions are right in line with the last few paragraphs of this article:

http://content-uk.cricinfo.com/ci/content/story/113695.html

Earlier you said a whole raft of others agree with your sentiments, care to name them? I am truely interested!!

But when you blame Packer for the SA rebel tours, because Ali Bacher stole the idea, jeez, sorry, that just is stupid. To use the Beatles analogy again, is it really the Beatles fault that Charles Manson heard messages in the White Album,which inspired him to kill people. Nah!!!!

 

[archie mac]

Doesnt really matter what his motives were really. Its results that count in this situation. Did the Beatles really think we they wrote Love Me Do that they were going or even really want to change the face of popular culture? No, but you still have to credit them for what that song and the band started.

Anyway, see that pretty much all your opinions are right in line with the last few paragraphs of this article:

http://content-uk.cricinfo.com/ci/content/story/113695.html

Earlier you said a whole raft of others agree with your sentiments, care to name them? I am truely interested!!

But when you blame Packer for the SA rebel tours, because Ali Bacher stole the idea, jeez, sorry, that just is stupid. To use the Beatles analogy again, is it really the Beatles fault that Charles Manson heard messages in the White Album,which inspired him to kill people. Nah!!!!

Yes but if you play Helter Skelter backwards you get: ad-al-bo, id-al-ob

 

[Swervy]

Yes but if you play Helter Skelter backwards you get: ad-al-bo, id-al-ob

when I play it backwards I hear 'First Chance Averages is the be all and end all'

hehehe

 

[archie mac]

when I play it backwards I hear 'First Chance Averages is the be all and end all'

hehehe

I'll pay that

 

[Richard]

Doesnt really matter what his motives were really. Its results that count in this situation. Did the Beatles really think we they wrote Love Me Do that they were going or even really want to change the face of popular culture? No, but you still have to credit them for what that song and the band started.

Equally, did they write it hoping it'd have success? Yes. Did that song in itself change the face of anything? No. Would they still have had their career without it? Yes, something else would've been their first release otherwise.

Not a good analogy.

It does matter, hugely, incidentally, because many people credit Packer with basically being a good man who did the game of cricket good - by caring about it. He didn't.

Anyway, see that pretty much all your opinions are right in line with the last few paragraphs of this article

Indeed, I learned more about the thing from that piece than pretty much any other.

Earlier you said a whole raft of others agree with your sentiments, care to name them? I am truely interested!!

You've missed the massive clan who still hate the fact that the thing happened?

But when you blame Packer for the SA rebel tours, because Ali Bacher stole the idea, jeez, sorry, that just is stupid. To use the Beatles analogy again, is it really the Beatles fault that Charles Manson heard messages in the White Album,which inspired him to kill people. Nah!!!!

So you'd say the same to Gideon?

There's a huge difference - again, not a good analogy. As Gideon said again in that excellent piece "introducing money into a sporting ecosystem cannot help but strain the bond between spectator and spectacle". It was always a dangerous precedent to be setting, and do you think Packer gave a damn about that? Well, yes, he did when it started to affect him, but would he otherwise? No, he couldn't have given a damn about Apartheid. You think if someone had told him what he'd be causing by knock-on he'd have backed-out of getting the cricket he wanted? Not a chance.

 

[social]

Equally, did they write it hoping it'd have success? Yes. Did that song in itself change the face of anything? No. Would they still have had their career without it? Yes, something else would've been their first release otherwise.

Not a good analogy.

It does matter, hugely, incidentally, because many people credit Packer with basically being a good man who did the game of cricket good - by caring about it. He didn't.

Indeed, I learned more about the thing from that piece than pretty much any other.

You've missed the massive clan who still hate the fact that the thing happened?

So you'd say the same to Gideon?

There's a huge difference - again, not a good analogy. As Gideon said again in that excellent piece "introducing money into a sporting ecosystem cannot help but strain the bond between spectator and spectacle". It was always a dangerous precedent to be setting, and do you think Packer gave a damn about that? Well, yes, he did when it started to affect him, but would he otherwise? No, he couldn't have given a damn about Apartheid. You think if someone had told him what he'd be causing by knock-on he'd have backed-out of getting the cricket he wanted? Not a chance.

Richard, you keep making statments about Packer and his intentions/love of the game which have all been refuted by people who actually knew him

Tony Greig (a "decent man" according to you) cried at his funeral - you dont do that for someone who merely pays the bills

Cricketers world-wide sent messages of condolences and were full-some in their praise.

Why? Were they hoping to be named in his will?

Some people are catalysts for necessary change and should they happen to profit from it on the way through, "good on them."

Others wear rose-tinted glasses when viewing the past and are totally divorced from reality

 

[Richard]

If Kerry Packer possessed one thing it was the ability to charm those he needed and inspire loyalty among his inferiors.

Funnily enough, such traits are common amongst self-centred media moghuls like him.

Kerry Packer had no intention of making improvements to the game of cricket and those who genuinely believe he did simply fell under his spell - yes, including even fine men like Richie Benaud and Tony Greig. People like Kerry Packer are compelling men. There have been more than a few of them in cricket. Jagmohan Dalmiya is another. Mark Mascarenhas (though I do genuinely believe he did have the game's best interests at heart... mostly)... Heck, Rupert Murdoch... you can go back further and find similar people in different contexts.

I don't believe we common folk have any reason, personally, to genuinely believe in his affection for the game of cricket.

 

[Swervy]

If Kerry Packer possessed one thing it was the ability to charm those he needed and inspire loyalty among his inferiors.

Funnily enough, such traits are common amongst self-centred media moghuls like him.

Kerry Packer had no intention of making improvements to the game of cricket and those who genuinely believe he did simply fell under his spell - yes, including even fine men like Richie Benaud and Tony Greig. People like Kerry Packer are compelling men. There have been more than a few of them in cricket. Jagmohan Dalmiya is another. Mark Mascarenhas (though I do genuinely believe he did have the game's best interests at heart... mostly)... Heck, Rupert Murdoch... you can go back further and find similar people in different contexts.

I don't believe we common folk have any reason, personally, to genuinely believe in his affection for the game of cricket.

wow!!!! The assumptions you make are incredible

 

[Richard]

Not really, the Packer\Murdoch\Abramovitch\etc. types rarely fail to fit certain stereotypes.

 

[Matt79]

Somebody was always going to do what Packer did - hell players were 'selling out' to turn pro and play in the Lancashire Leagues for decades before WSC was a gleam in Kerry's eye. To blame Packer for the South Africa rebel tours is like saying that Napoleon's efforts to conquer Europe gave Hitler the idea for WWII.

You also seem to be confering entirely too much legitimacy on the national boards - in general, through history they have shown that they do NOT deserve respect at least as much as they HAVE merited that respect. They've just as often acted in the interests of petty personal political agendas as they have for the good of the game. All organised cricket has generally been organised to make somebody money, and the establishment was just annoyed that Packer was trying to introduce some competition and in the process change WHO was making that money.

The transition from amateur to professional has happened in nearly every single major sport in the world in the last fifty years. In many senses it is regrettable, but the move has undoubtedly produced more sport for consumers like us, and generally a more entertaining quality in that sport.

An effort like the WSC can be done badly, causing long term damage to the sport, or it can be done well, leading to a stronger product and a better result for the customers. Packer deserves credit for doing what he did so astutely and delivering a superior product.

 

[Richard]

I simply cannot accept that Packer cared a jot about the game of cricket. You're certainly not wrong that there were a load of ****s on various Cricket Boards (and doubtless still are, just of a slightly different nature) but to suggest that most trustees cared as little about the game as Packer did is IMO folly. There were many, many gifted former players (Bradman and Cowdrey, to pick 2 random examples) who became fine administrators, and Ray Steele and Bob Parish, the two highest-ranking at The ACB at the time were and remained in high esteem (Parish, who died the same year as Packer, was described by Malcolm Gray, no novice in the field, as "the finest cricket administrator Australia ever produced").

I think it'd be wrong to paint a picture of the Cricket Boards being as selfish as Packer, very wrong. Mostly, the game was well-run - true, the players weren't paid as well as they soon were to be, but such a thing could quite easily have changed without a whole load of them abandoning their teams in the process. There was a superb program a while back over here called "The Men Who Changed Football" highlighting the Premiership chairmen who brought the ridiculous money we see today into the top tier of the British game. Where money is there, it will - eventually - filter down.

There's nothing wrong with cricket becoming full-time professional (it was in England as far back as the 1860s for some players) but it happened in other countries without a media moghul's intereference.

 

[Matt79]

I don't understand why you think caring about making money and caring about the game of cricket have to be mutually exclusive.

There's plenty of accounts from people's dealings with Packer that suggest he had an abiding interest in, and affection for, the game.

I was careful not to suggest that all members of the various national boards have been self-interested, but certainly many members now, and in the past, have been guilty of representing their own interests, or the interests of the parochial tribes as opposed to the interests of cricket or the players.

If you "simply cannot accept" the point of view that I and others are advancing, we might as well draw a line under this conversation and move on.

All of this is a bit of a red herring anyway. We segued to this from you asserting that WSC records weren't worthy of consideration next to Test cricket - or at least that was my understanding, feel free to correct me if I've done violence to your meaning.

As a blanket statement that seems difficult to justify to me as most of the best players from the countries involved were playing WSC rather than 'official' cricket, so I can't understand why the standard wouldn't be very very high.

I believe you've previously asserted that because they were not, in your opinion, representing their country, they would not have played to the full extent of their abilities. Again, feel free to clarify if I'm misrepresenting what you were saying.

My response to that is that:
a) lots of the players have said that they did feel like they were representing their country, and
b) it was a deliberate career move for the players involved, in which they decided that the Packer money was more important to them than being in the official teams.

Given this, and given that Packer was not at all shy about demanding the best from his stable of players (both in terms of structured prize money and in terms of carpeting and bollocking any perceived slackers), why wouldn't they be playing just as hard in WSC than in official cricket? Especially given many of the players were probably underachieving in official cricket because they were so unhappy with the situation?

 

[Richard]

It's not the playing-hard thing that I'm bothered about - the simple fact is that those matches should never, ever have taken place, and the only reason they did is because some rich TV-station owner wanted cricket for his station. I don't feel matches organised by a private entrepreneur deserve any status whatsoever. In addition, I don't mind whether players felt they were playing for their country in WSC - the fact is they weren't. The only way to play for your country is to play for your Cricket Board, there's no way around that, however piss poor the Cricket Board is.

As I say - most people are well-acquainted with the Packer types, and hardly anyone seriously believes they care about much other than themselves. As I said before - such people are also good at charming those they need, and I don't find it at all difficult to believe that Packer could have convinced those that mattered that he did care about the game, simply to bend them to his will.

 

[Matt79]

OK, but why would he need to pretend he cared to bend players like Justin Langer to his will? Langer was on a contract with Cricket Australia, which was very carefully worded, and ensured that Langer would not harm CA's interests or product if he wanted to continue earning the very good money he was on. Since 9 has had the cricket, CA's interests have pretty much been whatever Packer wanted them to be. So given that, why would Packer invite Langer and other Aussie players around to his house for a meal to talk to them about cricket?

Most things I've read about Packer would suggest he had absolutely no interest in trying to butter up or charm people - he'd either bully them or simply buy them out.

I don't see why you have an objection to privately organised games. You make it sound like the games organised by the boards are purely altruistic and are always done for the benefit of the average cricket fan, while at the same time seeming to suggest that the only one to gain any benefit out of WSC was Packer. But history shows that plenty of fans felt there was enough benefit for them in the WSC games to be willing to attend them live, or to change the channel to watch them on TV. Those fans no doubt enjoyed what they saw.

There's no logical reason why playing for your board is the ONLY way to play for your country other than tradition and common consensus. But the reality is that during the WSC period, most of the players and a lot of the fans withdrew from that consensus. Which leaves tradition as the only argument for the affected period. Tradition is a valid argument, but so is having the best standard of competition, and during that period WSC had the better standard, I think that's pretty clear. So it seems to me that you either mentally accord BOTH versions during that period status as 'legitimate', or you don't consider either version to be legitimate.

 

[Richard]

OK, but why would he need to pretend he cared to bend players like Justin Langer to his will? Langer was on a contract with Cricket Australia, which was very carefully worded, and ensured that Langer would not harm CA's interests or product if he wanted to continue earning the very good money he was on. Since 9 has had the cricket, CA's interests have pretty much been whatever Packer wanted them to be. So given that, why would Packer invite Langer and other Aussie players around to his house for a meal to talk to them about cricket?

Most things I've read about Packer would suggest he had absolutely no interest in trying to butter up or charm people - he'd either bully them or simply buy them out.

So why did Benaud and Greig like him then? I can't see those 2 falling to such tactics, you'd need to butter them up.

I don't see why you have an objection to privately organised games. You make it sound like the games organised by the boards are purely altruistic and are always done for the benefit of the average cricket fan, while at the same time seeming to suggest that the only one to gain any benefit out of WSC was Packer. But history shows that plenty of fans felt there was enough benefit for them in the WSC games to be willing to attend them live, or to change the channel to watch them on TV. Those fans no doubt enjoyed what they saw.

There's no logical reason why playing for your board is the ONLY way to play for your country other than tradition and common consensus. But the reality is that during the WSC period, most of the players and a lot of the fans withdrew from that consensus. Which leaves tradition as the only argument for the affected period. Tradition is a valid argument, but so is having the best standard of competition, and during that period WSC had the better standard, I think that's pretty clear. So it seems to me that you either mentally accord BOTH versions during that period status as 'legitimate', or you don't consider either version to be legitimate.

Personally I'd not be hugely averse to all Test-cricket in that period being considered null - I certainly think, as I've said 100 times, that it's ludicrous that The Ashes were at stake in 78\79. But I do think, contra-wise, that such games being Tests is a good counter to "Packer games were where it's at"ism.

The rules have been written in stone, really - ever since Test cricket was defined (about 20 years after it's been recognised in hindsight to have started, mind) the team could only be that team which was recognised by the national cricketing authority (this being MCC in Britain until 1968, remember). I don't see that this can ever change. It's not mere unwritten-tradition - it's something that's set-in-stone as far as I'm aware.

 

[Matt79]

So why did Benaud and Greig like him then? I can't see those 2 falling to such tactics, you'd need to butter them up.

I can only presume because he offered them a considerable salary, but more importantly, that they agreed with what he was trying to do, and his vision for cricket. To be honest, I'm confused that you credit them with being impervious to financial inducement/self interest, but think that they could so easily be duped by fake display from somebody who's actual demeanour was the matter of widespread comment and folklore at the time.

it's something that's set-in-stone as far as I'm aware.

That's my point - its only set in stone so long as the consensus agrees with it. Its unlikely that consensus will ever again be tested as severely as it was during WSC, but if it was, I think you'd find that this set-in-stone principle you're spruiking is a good deal more gossamer than granite.

 

[Richard]

I can only presume because he offered them a considerable salary, but more importantly, that they agreed with what he was trying to do, and his vision for cricket.

Or what he managed to convince them...

That's my point - its only set in stone so long as the consensus agrees with it. Its unlikely that consensus will ever again be tested as severely as it was during WSC, but if it was, I think you'd find that this set-in-stone principle you're spruiking is a good deal more gossamer than granite.

I doubt it. I$C$C have already shown their ability to twist the principle to suit their own immidate purposes.

 

[Matt79]

A scenario that readily comes to mind is that the BCCI decides that its sick of the ICC mooching money from it and being told that it has to fit in with the ICC's programmes and schedules, and decides to go its own way - maybe talking the other 'Asian bloc' teams with it. Not very likely, but certainly possible.