Nero's Spot Might Soon Be Threatened

Is it just me, or are Australians (and Australian fans) sounding more and more arrogant by the day? True, they have always been riding the higher end of the Arrogance Spectrum throughout their era of dominance, but lately they've gone right off the charts. Ever since McGrath and Warne retired, it's like they're not even trying to hide it anymore. The thin layer of faux-humility has been erased, and we start hearing comments like this:

"Hobart is somewhere that probably will favour slow bowlers late in the game and it's somewhere where we might bat twice, so (Muralitharan) will have two cracks at us." -- Ricky Ponting

(You know, they might bat twice -- they might even be forced to last the whole five days, god forbid. Worst-case scenario, of course. If half their squad comes down with explosive diarrhea on the day of the match, and Symo stumbles onto the ground with a flask of last-night's-rocket-fuel in his hand, and Haydos' femur breaks trying to hold the weight of his gargantuan chest as he takes his guard... then, you know, they might have to bat twice. They just might.)

As if that wasn't bad enough, yesterday we got John Buchanan's ridiculous calls for a complete revamp of cricket at the international level. From what I can tell, Buchanan seems to be saying that Australia is just so damn great and produces so much pure talent that the only way for cricket to remain competitive is for every international squad to just load their lineup with surplus Aussie players. (In other words, Buchanan is telling the rest of the world, "even our rejects are better than every person in your shitty, underachieving little country." Thanks, John.)

Looking at the Arrogance Spectrum, I'd say at the moment the Aussies are somewhere between "Jay-Z after hearing his latest album made it to the top of the charts, giving him more No.1 records than any artist except for Elvis," and "Donald Trump at the best of times." If they beat Sri Lanka easily in Hobart, who knows how far they could go up. We might even have to recalibrate the scale just to handle Ponting's trophy ceremony speech.

Comments

[Joseph Rinella]

Yeah man, those guys need to check themselves. What the hell was with them declaring today? They'll more than likely go on to win, but with no sign of rain around, that was as poor a declaration as i've seen. Sri Lanka were one bowler down, and Gilchrist and Symonds were out in the middle, in prime whacking form. The could have easily batted out the day, and got another 150-odd, to put the match completely beyond doubt. Like i said, they'll still probably win, but they've put themselves in a position to lose.

Flat ass pitch, Sri lanka put on 500, then it's game on. Very poor captaincy. Reminds me of the declaration against India in 2001 (different circumstances, but same arrogance and short-sightedness). I'm really looking forward to tomorrow...

[Brentmeister General]

the second decleration should now be under question. sri lanka are still in it if they can get the balls to take on australia.

as for hussey's average, i couldn't agree more, shame he isn't listening... his last two innings have knocked his average up a whole 2 runs to over 85.

and as for arrogent australians, i ran into a guy i play soccer with today and asked the score at the end of the day, when he told me sangakarra was still in on more than 100 i clenched my fist and pulled a brent face showing my love for the final day score. then, with the most natural reaction, he seemed to pull a 'you wanna fight' face before realising that was never gonna happen and smiled... gotta love that blind patriotism.