Cricket: Hardest task is to stay tough at the top

GUESTS VISITING Australia are soon acquainted with the heat and humidity and the flies; repelling the ever-present squadrons of the latter made a fortune for the inventor of an effective spray that was marketed with the slogan: "When you're on a good thing, stick to it."

Over time that slogan has become the catchphrase for any Australian asked to explain why he's a winner and, after Australia's sixth successive Ashes were achieved ahead of time, no local was in a mood to reflect negatively on the state of his national game.

In less joyful moments, those Australians prepared to recall their own decade of embarrassment against the West Indies will ponder Alec Stewart's Ashes excuse: "It goes in swings and roundabouts." The future status of Australia (as distinct from "Mark Taylor's Australians") as Test cricket's world champions raises two questions:

Have Australia really hit on some magic winning formula?

If so, can their success match that of the fly spray?

The Australian team are driven by two characteristics, talent and toughness, each the product of a long- established development process. The final two steps of the process have been competitive club cricket and a strong Sheffield Shield and only daydreamers will see any magic in something as fundamentally basic as that.

More recently the Cricket Academy has been credited with adding some unique super-sheen to Australia's present strength. That's political spin because the academy is federal-government funded and, in considering the real strength of Taylor's team, the truth is there is no academy influence whatsoever.

The backbone is Taylor himself, Steve Waugh and Ian Healy. What might this team be without Taylor's cool man-management and the tactical flair that sees him turn dust into diamonds? And there may be tougher cricketers in the world than Waugh and Healy but can you nominate one, let alone two?

None of the three is a product of the academy, each being from the "old school" where a cricketer grew his talent and his toughness by paying close attention to the actions, words and advice of the most experienced around him. Cricket's dressing-room is like life's school-room. Each developed his Test career among some hardened tutors, Bob Simpson, Allan Border, David Boon, Geoff Marsh and Merv Hughes. Yes Merv, a major in courage. So, the theory is that, post-Taylor, nothing should stop Australia continuing on their winning way. Ancient history disagrees. Shouldn't Lindsay Hassett and Ian Johnson have done better in the wake of Bradman's Invincibles?

Richie Benaud's team were successful, but not those of his successors Simpson and Lawry. And, we still squirm over what happened when Greg Chappell, Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh departed the scene. The last example provides the clue: the post-Chappell team certainly had talent (Kim Hughes, for instance), but the toughness at the top was absent. Over time it redeveloped (Allan Border) and winning fortunes were revived - Stewart's swings-and- roundabouts theory.

But Stewart might be ignoring modern history. What if the game is changing at such a pace and in such a dramatic way that toughness - which is clearly what sets a winning Test nation apart - permanently disappears? How long is it since England have been tough? The West Indies are getting less tough and the South Africans only talk tough. New Zealand are a basket case, ditto Zimbabwe. Pakistan are doing it tough, but India and Sri Lanka are getting tougher. Can Australia tough it out and remain Test match champions longer than the historical cycle would suggest?

The most dangerous challenge to Australia's Test status, and therefore their toughness, is the one-day plague. The country is promoting a state of confusion apace: the national selectors maintain that some cricketers (Michael Bevan) are "one-day players only", yet their state counterparts quite happily choose them in the longer form of the game. How might this conflict of interest impact on any particular player's mental approach? What is the selectors' message for the next generation? What if more and more young cricketers are attracted only to the one-day format? What if future fast bowlers prefer the prospect of bowling a maximum 10 overs on a hot, humid day to bowling 50 in a Test. That's the soft option. Australia could have as much trouble developing another Glenn McGrath as England have had finding another Frank Tyson, a John Snow or even a Bob Willis.

Already some of the toughest, mature cricketers from NSW - the champion state - are deserting first division club cricket to play second division, because second division money is better. Their experience is being lost to the game where it's most needed, the level below Sheffield Shield. And bear in mind the Sheffield Shield has already lost some of its edge because the Test players are rarely available. We are squeezing the life out of the Sheffield Shield, which has been the lifeblood of our particularly robust Test game.

In trying to account for England's dismally soft Ashes performance, Alec Stewart said: "I don't think English cricket has got worse, other countries have improved." First question: Why is English cricket standing still? Next question: If the rest of the cricket world is improving why has it decided to play more one-day cricket, develop more "instant" cricketers and a pay-scale akin to that of a public service?

Australia's cricket commentators are quick to demean England's playing standards and demand a three-Test Ashes series, but they are missing the point: England are leading the way... to world cricket mediocrity.