Cricket seldom makes the front pages with a good news story. That may have happened in 1953, 1981 and 2005 but the bad news finds its way there more frequently, as we have witnessed this week.
Being in Christchurch reminds me of another time when cricket found its way to the front pages, at least those of the Mail On Sunday and the Daily Express. In 1984 England toured New Zealand; in fact that is the only series in which New Zealand have defeated England on home soil, although if Joe Root’s side are unable to win in Christchurch they will become the second England team to lose here.
That expedition, 34 years ago, was dubbed “the sex and drugs and rock’n’roll tour”, and they tell me I was on it. Actually this is an allegation I can confirm. I have a few clear memories of the tour, which include the warm relationships between the sides. We would socialise with our opponents regularly after the game.
However it all went pear-shaped in sleepy old Christchurch, on the field. The first Test in Wellington had been a high-scoring draw in which Martin Crowe and Jeremy Coney batted for hour after hour to save the match. A draw was never on the cards at Lancaster Park, the old rugby ground which is still a decrepit monument to Christchurch’s 2011 earthquake, since we soon recognised that the pitch was spicy.
Unfortunately England had an injury crisis in the bowling department, with Neil Foster and Graham Dilley unfit. So on the eve of the match we welcomed into the fold Tony Pigott, the Sussex seamer who was playing provincial cricket in Wellington at the time. Our emergency replacement had to postpone his wedding in order to win his solitary Test cap (ahead of the unfortunate off-spinner).
New Zealand were 87 for four at lunch on the first day, which sounds quite promising, but during the interval our captain, Bob Willis, correctly pointed out we had bowled total garbage in the morning session.
We were worse in the afternoon. Ian Botham seemed determined to pepper his great rival Richard Hadlee with bouncers, which was not a good idea on this surface (on Thursday they were both peppering the greens at Christchurch golf club). Hadlee smashed 99, which was gold dust in these conditions. England’s batting also left something to be desired against Hadlee, who exploited helpful conditions quite brilliantly: 82 all out was followed by 93 all out. So New Zealand won by an innings and 132 runs.
After this crushing defeat there was a bore draw in Auckland. The series was lost and there was much disappointment all round but soon the stakes were raised. The second leg of the tour was in Pakistan and it was there the allegations surfaced of a tour out of control in New Zealand. The one that drew the greatest attention had the team smoking pot in the Christchurch dressing room during the Test in which England had been humiliated.
This was the one allegation we could address directly because there was no pot-smoking in that Christchurch dressing room. There was no need for the “non-denial denial” we had grown accustomed to in the Watergate affair. The allegation could be denied specifically and with conviction.
Willis, who may have found writing a tour diary (with the consummate help of Alan Lee) a bit of a trial, said: “Some of the innuendos I found absolutely absurd, including one unsubstantiated allegation that certain players were smoking pot in the dressing room at Christchurch. How anyone can honestly believe such a thing could have happened is completely beyond me but I didn’t feel like laughing about it.”
We were not all ascetics on that tour and there may have been a bit of dope in the birthday cake we gave to our manager, AC Smith, who would stick by us nobly when the Mail On Sunday and Daily Express went to town. But there were no late-night brawls on the pavements. No one was hurt. No one was caught cheating. Yet for a while we all felt as if our reputations would be permanently stained. Within a few months the stigma receded.
It seems unbelievable now but this may – eventually – be the case with the three disgraced Australians.
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