So Shane Warne has retired and it’s now time for the media to gush forth with tributes. As a Warnee I can not help but jump on the bandwagon. The trouble is, saying something different about Warne is kind of difficult. It’s all been said before and if it hasn’t it sure will be after the announcement of his retirement today.
Shaun at Sidelined has gone for the ‘Two Warnes’ angle and I think he’s right. You just can’t discuss Warne without reference to his utter genius, and utter stupidity.
I’ve used this quote before on LP but that’s not going to stop me from using it again:
He doesn’t strike me as an intelligent man – he strikes me as a f—wit, actually – and you see his bowling is absolutely cerebral: every ball is different. It’s almost as if there’s witchcraft in the ball.
As I said at the time, it’s Dorothy Porter on Shane Warne. And to answer the question some people asked at the time, she’s a poet.
I love it because it sums up the conundrum that is Warney. I’ve always loved Warney and although it has never troubled me too much that I should adore the cricket of a man who is so obviously unable to keep his pants zipped up and, let’s face it, is not blessed with the brains, it’s troubled a lot of people I know.
I seem to be able to forgive every cock-up quite simply because the man is a genius. He has single-handedly revived the art of spin bowling (and also happens to hold the record for most Test wickets – a magical 699 and counting). Thanks to him a new generation of kids are trundling in off a short run-up rather than taking off at the fence. In the 80s all the kids wanted to do was bowl like Lillee, Reid, Garner, Marshall, Holding etc. They wanted to bowl FAST. In the 90s Warney opened up the eyes of younger kids to the fact that you can scare the s**t out of batsmen without having to generate great speed and thus, fear of physical harm. Warne’s bowling was an outwitting of the opponent. It’s one thing to feel the pain of a Lee delivery in the nether regions, it’s another to be totally outwitted by a man so many consider to be a complete idiot.
The thing is, he obviously is not an idiot. On the field he is capable of not only bowling superbly, he is capable of cunning, he has the ability to out-think his opponents and the skill to follow through. Off the field he is just a bloke who has garnered a lot of attention in his life. He can do one thing stupendously well and he is feted all around the world for it. He has access to pleasures that many would envy. As Pavlov’s Cat pointed out in a previous thread on Warney, despite his sleazy image, he does actually like women. Sure, he’s gone about his life off the field in a manner that can only be described as misguided. But a lot of people have probably done fairly misguided things in their lives, they’re not world-famous leggies though. Nor are the able to bowl world-class batsmen around their legs.
Warne has breathed life into cricket for the past 15 years, he’s had no qualms in making a spectacle of himself and perform skillfully thus making cricket entertaining. I don’t think I need to say: he will be missed.
For your viewing pleasure: Warney talks through his 8 favourite dismissals of all time (filmed before taking Kevin Pietersen around his legs).
Thanks, Georgina, for a gracious and fairminded tribute to to the great, but not perfect, Shane Warne.
A very enjoyable post, Georg.
[cough] drug ban [cough]
Trackback (and a bit of synchronicity as well, when you see the headline).
With respect, sl, that’s not really a trackback since you don’t mention Georg’s post in yours…
Mine went up a couple of hours earlier, that’s why, Kim. I’ve got to go and do an update now. I just like the way we both came up (independently) with almost the same headline.
Well I hate to disagree, boring game, even more boring man.
Is Dustin Hoffman too old to play Warney in the biopic?
“The thing is, he obviously is not an idiot.”
No. A lesser man would not have dared even try the “Me Mum told me to take that pill” excuse.
A lot of people harp on about how “not a genius” Warney is. But why should he be? Steve Waugh, Ian Chappell, Viv Richards and even Sachin Tendulkar aren’t geniuses either.
No matter how much you try and talk it up Warney is expected to be a genius because he’s so successful, and that’s just tall poppy syndrome. If he was a Rhodes Scholar instead of a cricketer I can understand being disappointed at his average IQ, but he’s not.
And being a “fuckwit” is in the eye of the beholder. Would you still think he was a fuckwit if he didn’t play cricket and instead just fixed your hot water system?
Some might argue that those who comment on the book smarts of cricketers are the real fuckwits.
I hear Daryl Cullinan is coming out of retirement
Lovely post Georg. And thanks for the video goodness. Gatting’s expression as he walks off is priceless.
and Yobbo
True. But they never got caught cheating on their wives (that I know of). Multiple times. Nor (in the era of mandatory drug testing) taking a banned substance. Warney was special in that regard.
And trackback.
Fellow Larvae,
This harping on Warney’s drug taking is not thought through. He was caught with a smidge of diuretic in his system. May be he just enjoys a good slash? I know I do and that is why I drink Becks (when it’s on special). Okay, diuretics are supposedly masking agents for, what, steroids? So how would steroids make his sliders and flippers any more brilliant? I’d understand if he was a quick there’d be some rationale…
As for cheating on his wife, purleeze, let him who is without guilt cast the first stone. He is not wife beater nor abuser, like Peter Perfect was. Anyway, what is this, 1954? Stray pussy tastes twice as good when you are married or in a relationship because it is kind of forbidden. Warney would be less than human given the bulk opportunity thrown his way. He is continually in the glare of publicity. He is just human (except when he is making fools of experienced batsmen, which is when he is superhuman).
As regards his intellect, who knows? Being impulsive and on the hunt for beaver does not make him any more stupid than Henry Kissinger who is not even good looking or young. This a known unknown.
Hard evidence: Shane strings sentences together more felicitously than Richie Benaud who spouts cliches to the point of self-parody. And Richie is regarded as the wise man of cricket.
Warney may be a closet expert on Husserl’s theory of the calculus of variations. It doesn’t matter. We know the known knowns and that is enough. Brian Lara thinks so and he ought to know. Terry Jenner ditto.
Sometimes people sham idiocy: examples: Jozef Svejk, Yobbo, Harlequin (Commedia del Arte), Norman Gunston, Borat, many others… this lulls the opposition into a false sense of security. It’s the others who are cretins – they get caught every time by this simple subterfuge every time.
PS. Is Dubya shamming or is he ther genuine article?
Erm, Jet, you’re surely not suggesting that this was all a brilliant piece of satire in the Overington ouvre?
He did quite well playing cricket, apparently, and has now retired.
What interests me is why everyone’s talking about him as though he was dead.
I would have thought it quite difficult to lower the tone of any discussion about Warney, but I was obviously completely wrong.
Actually I am a bit lost for words. Where is Twisty Faster when you need her?
What people regard as stupidity is lack of embrassment gene. You know, Ichabod, like Rodney Adler. Gerard Henderson didn’t think him stupid.
It’s like some people lack a gene for feeling pain. See
It’s a kind of death. Death of cricket as we know it.
Jet, when are we going to see you over at Catallaxy? That comment would have gone down much better at our place
I’ve been spaminated everytime I try to post these days. Am I banned?
Hi,
I can no longer comment here. Am I banned?
Clearly my posts are boring, but for those who missed it: Please email us as soon as your comment doesn’t appear on the site. Don’t wait a few days, it’ll probably get deleted in that time.
What I was going to say is that I love Warnie, and don’t go for this sportsperson role model thingy.
As a professional cricketer, he should be accountable for the quality of his cricket, not his text messaging.
People are hypercritical of sporting pros. It’s as if just because they excel in sport, they aren’t allowed to trespass into the realms of being human. It seems to be some mass Freudian projection going on, where people can somehow absolve themselves of sin by attacking high profile players in the media.
Alex I just released that one from the spaminator. As to the others, when you are scrolling through hundreds it is easy to miss the few pearls and chuck them out with the rubbish.
If I were you I’d copy the comments to a Word file and do what Anna says.
I agree 100% with Alex. The guy just plays cricket. He didn’t become a high school teacher or run for Prime Minister so why get so worked up when he pulls some tart at the pub?
Jet: The motive for Warney taking steroids would be to get over injuries faster. Steroids promote muscle regrowth so his rehabilitation period would be shorter.
That said, there’s still no proof he took steroids. Just because diuretics can mask the presence of steroids doesn’t mean he took them because he took steroids.
Someone like Warne, who is not known for his high regard for sporting institutions like the AIS or what have you, might not have known or cared whether the tablet he took was illegal or not.
Contrast this with Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammed Asif who both tested positive for actual steroids (not just a masking agent), and were let off by the Pakistan Authorities.
Not that steroids would help a fast bowler any better than they’d help a spinner. Muscle mass isn’t really all that relevant for bowling. Fitness, technique and height are the most important factors for a fast bowler. They probably took them for injury reasons too.
If you see this fat old bald bloke in the pub in 2030, trying to show young girls his flipper…..
How could we all forget the “nicorette deal – then caught fagging on” scandal, another classic Warne fuck-up. Iâll miss him sucking and biting his inside fingers to get a little nicotine hit between balls. So many memories.
I somehow caught Charlie Watts being interviewed on Oz 60 minutes earlier this year, and mostly he talked about how much he and Mick loved Warnie and “how Mick has this Indian blokeâ? who comes with them, to tune in the satellite, so they can follow Warnie bowling, when they are on world tours. They probably identify with his rock-star like performances in the bedroom too.
And like his bowling, the timing of his retirement is exquisite â the Boxing Day test against England to get 700 and then finish @ the SCG where he began his test career. If there is a god, he loves spin bowling and Shane Warne, a little bit more than he should, and me too.
The whole cricketing world will be watching every Warne ball in Melb and Sydney, all of us not believing these are the last ones.
Magic cricketer – but as the woman at the petrol station said to me yesterday when I remarked that god was retiring – ” good, we need someone younger and better looking”.
I’m sure Warney probably thinks Dorothy Porter is a fuckwit……and he’d be right.
When Warney first came on the scene – before he was even any good – He was marketed as a “Sex Symbol” the same way Brett Lee is now. He was one of the youngest guys in the team at that stage and had the trademark blonde mullet.
Maybe the woman at the petrol station doesn’t like blondes – or maybe she just prefers teenagers? Unfortunately for her Michael Clarke is likely to be the youngest in the team for a fair while yet.
The response of some Australians to the phenomenon of S.K. Warne is suggestive of the madonna/whore duality applied to a bloke. Warney is a sublimely gifted athlete who happens to be the sort of cove you’d love to have holding sway in your favourite barber shop, ahead of a bit of trim. Undisputed champion of the turf and telly, but would you trust him to be straight with you when it really mattered, say, on the likelihood of a sudden and unexpected change in the weather adjacent to a test cricket strip?
Warne chose to follow in the footsteps of “shoeless” Joe Jackson when, with a nudge and a wink from corporate sponsors and the ACB, he spun his reply to the question;
“Say it ain’t so?”
I don’t care who he shtupped on the side, that’s his own business, but to a lot of people integrity matters.
Since Shane’s stint as a meteorologist, I’ve viewed test cricket the same way as one might consume World Championship Wrestling or an expensively staged pantomime.
Eminently entertaining, but I don’t believe it.
Oh look, “why get so worked up when he pulls some tart at the pub?” or perhaps
“Stray pussy tastes twice as good when you are married or in a relationship because it is kind of forbidden. Warney would be less than human given the bulk opportunity thrown his way. He is continually in the glare of publicity. He is just human (except when he is making fools of experienced batsmen, which is when he is superhuman).”
Lovely work gentlemen. Precisely encapsulates so much about Australian values about women, about personal integrity. Is is something about getting to spend all day playing with little round balls that tempts you to climb out from under the rock of social regard & regale us all with swaggering aggro derrydo?
Warne may be a good cricketer. Warne may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but Warne is a marketer’s dream. And thou none would be so naive as to imagine that that status implies a virtuous soul, a Mother Theresa selling soft drink, it is soaked with essense of role model.
Ah yes a role model who, after a career threatening shoulder reconstruction from which he publicly acknowledges he is struggling to regain form, is then tested to have taken a known masking agent for steroid use. A role model who enters into a financial contract for product endorsement, then by his actions – smoking – seems to prove the ineffectivenss of the product. A role model who physically monsters children.
& as for his personal habits as sexual sleaze, various accounts of team behaviour suggest he’s by no means alone. Just another one of the boys eh? The boys who’s masculinity is enhanced by infidelityand harassment. A good cricketer perhaps, but role model? It says far more about us, than it does about him.
Warney didn’t invent the male reptilian brain. He merely provided a megaphone to amplify some men’s furtive thoughts.
Bluebeard’s locked room is a potent metaphor. The room and its grisly contents are the darker side of the male psyche.
Women need to know what’s in the room.
Indeed, many women are driven to know what’s in the room. They suspect the worst. But they have to know.
Bluebeard wanted his wives to know because that justified destroying them.
It can be argued that the internet multiplies opportunities for women to look into many locked rooms without being caught.
But the consequence can be getting altogether too much information.
Because the possibility exists that many men cannot help being Bluebeard.
Whether they can help it or not, woe betide the woman who points it out, so one is grateful to Katz who is a bloke and therefore will not be reviled as a hairy-legged man-hating dyke for saying such a shocking thing.
But the comment above about the tasty stray pussy should leave no-one of any sex in any doubt about just how bottomless is the contempt in which many men hold women, whether they be tasty stray pussies or (presumably less tasty) cheated-on partners.
I wonder whether Jet Jackson’s partner reads this blog …
Geez you guys must have a pretty dark side or some whopping skeletons in your closets to have to use Warne as a mirror for your moral vanity.
I reckon Katz is a Woman, Pav.
He took a banned substance and changed his story about how much he took and who advised him to take it. I don’t care much, but if it’d been a Pakistani or Indian player who got off so lightly, the Australian authorities and fans would be livid.
Same with the betting scandal – he gets caught, slapped on the wrist, then we find out he’d done it before and the whole thing had been covered up by the ACB.
The womanizing is about his private life and should only be marginally relevant to his legacy as a cricketer. The drugs and betting go straight to the heart of what it means to be a professional sportplayer. I really don’t understand how he can be so celebrated, when Australia has a ‘zero-tolerence’ attitude to ‘indiscretions’ by players from other countries.
By the way, I agree. Most women are victims of the Patriarchy, and despised by men – Well maybe not despised; more likely viewed with the same admiration one views a puppy. Very cute and all, but once they’ve finished being patted, they really should behave or risk corrective retribution.
I thought it was the stray pussies that were supposed to put at risk the uncovered meat?
Katz, whichever kind of bits it is that you have, dangly or not, well said.
Katz,
Warne is a more eros than bluebeard. As PC and other women have pointed out – he’s sleazy, but he is a lover. A skirt chaser, a sex addict possibly, but no women have reported anything other than receiving unwanted txt messages asking for sex, or more sex, or talking about how good the sex was… by Paul Barry’s back of envelope calculations, the number is well into 4 figures (and counting) and there has never been any suggestion of violence or malevolence. (On the other hand…….. I imagine he must be rather good with his fingers. sorry.)
Ascribing a serial killer psychology to Warne?? Are you suggesting that all male sexuality is fundamentally about power and death?
My sources say not.
In a perfect world, of course, it wouldn’t be an issue.
You’re right of course.
*another blog crush bites the dust*
Alex said: As a professional cricketer, he should be accountable for the quality of his cricket, not his text messaging.
People are hypercritical of sporting pros. It’s as if just because they excel in sport, they aren’t allowed to trespass into the realms of being human.
Well, yes and no – haven’t sporting heroes in this country always brought their whole personalities into their sportspersonship? Isn’t that part of the appeal? It’s not a profession and they don’t leave their social selves out of how they play thier games. My great-grandfather was a Test captain in the 1920s – by all accounts he was not a brilliant cricketer and certainly not a profound one – but his straightforwardness and honesty and lack of bullshit made him an attractive personality.
I like jo’s comment about Warne’s skill with his hands. Seems pretty perceptive to me. The same things that have gotten him in trouble outside the game elevated him inside of it. It will be interesting to see how he fares now.
Warnie, at his press conference yesterday, when asked how he would like to be remembered, said “as an entertainer.”
David Brent: “You’ll never get another boss like me, someone who’s basically a chilled out entertainer.”
Just saying.
I think you’re right to a certain extent, Laura, but ‘on field’ Warnie is very different to the off field version.
On field, he is a true intellectual. As a cricket tragic, I’ve watched Warne in detail for the last 15 years, and observed his cricket brain at work. His concentration and ability to predict what’s about to happen is unrivalled. Put simply, his decision-making is impeccable.
Compare this to the off field Warne, and there’s quite a difference. If the on field Warne is defined by his excellent decision making, the off field version is known for poor decision making, acting impulsively and poor concentration. Quite the opposite really.
Well spotted csh – & if SW thinks his entertaining days are now over, he has another think coming.
Katz, I read your post again and at the end of the day, you’re right, every human is potentially capable of entering every room. Every woman a potential child murderer. Every man a potential rapist and serial killer. Everyone of us a sadist and masochist. And each a lover and nurturer.
But in the actual case of Warne, I think his sexuality, while being per-dominantly about self-gratification, is also about mutual gratification. i.e. that he would often txt women he hardly knows, after the act – and want to discuss how good the sex was – shows he cares about his performance and wants reassurance that he was a good lover, and although that reassurance is about bolstering his own self-worth, he is, by these acts, acknowledging the mutual nature of the act, and that the power doesn’t rest with him alone. That is a far way along the corridor from Bluebeard, surely.
Is Shane Warne the greatest bowler of all time? No. That honour would have to go to Andy Caddick when bowling in a dead rubber in a series which his side had lost.
Similarly, Donald Bradman, for all his batting genius, could not have matched Graham Hick batting on a flat pitch.
The theoretical physicists deeply regret that it has never proved possible to have Caddick bowling in a dead rubber to Hick batting on a flat pitch, thereby providing the chance to find out what would happen when an irresistible force meets an imovable object.
Warne leaves the game as a great, not for the fact that he will have over 700 victims, nor his ball of the century, nor his entertainment and theatrics.
Rather, he leaves the game as a man that has and will continue to inspire children to adopt leg spin, a black art that was on its knee’s as cricket moved from 5 day tranquility to the modern and popular 50 over cracket. This man has the ability to mentally torment the world’s finest willow wielders at 85kph, with guile and cunning, not the 155kph weapons that became the norm for the leather flingers.
And as for his off field indiscresions, no doubt that began with the development of the reptilian brain (thanks katz) many eons ago.
Thanks for the re-read Jo. I appreciate that.
I didn’t want to suggest that Shane Warne was anything more than an an entertaining buffoon with one extraordinary skill.
That such a skill is so marketable isn’t a commentary on Shane Warne. Good luck to him for having the right skill at the right time.
I wonder if anyone has told him that sportsmen stay retired for a long time. And unless an ex-sportsman develops another skill, life starts looking pretty dull.
No, what I meant to say is that Shane Warne public persona is a rough draft that is shaped and focussed by the tabloid media.
Like all celebrities Warne’s persona is tailored to stimulate certain compulsions. Warne’s persona is the easygoing pants-man whose exploits pullulate in the terminally adolescent mind.
.
Papers here in London are all talking about him taking up a commentary position with Channel 9. Seems like a no-brainer, really. Obviously if he can convince as many women as he has to fool around even with the tabloid reputation, the man possesses charm. He should do well.
I saw Warney walking along Albert St once – striding about three steps in front of Simone (with pram) and smoking a durry.
Just sayin…
OBITUARY
In his last message by radio to me Jet said he was hit by a high flying Mk7b Koedt-Solanas-Dworkin Femotronics Strapdown Inertial Advanced Monogamous Seeking Homing Air to Air Missile while on patrol. He went down in flames.
He went quietly, like a real man. He was always the strong silent type. He asked me to convey a last message to you all on his behalf. He posted in defence of Mr Warne because “a man’s gotta do what he’s gotta do”.
(Mrs.) Jane Jackson
He was always the strong silent type.
Oh, pigs arse.
Shit, eh? I thought they were still working on that thing.
Now Jane, dear, I know that’s where he said he was. But are you sure?
Give the man some credit, people. That was pretty fecking funny
Way to go, Jet.
That was his last message to me too, all those years ago. He said he was defending President John Fitzgerald Kennedy at the time.
He told a later “Mrs Jackson” that he died defending Rod Stewart.
Join the club, Jane honey.
Now that’s a vicious thing to say to a grieving widow, Earlier Mrs Jackson, Zoe and Pavlov’s Cat.
“I didn’t want to suggest that Shane Warne was anything more than an an entertaining buffoon with one extraordinary skill”
Even if that were true, that would give him one more than a lot of the gender confused, salvering puppies standing in judgement of his personal life here.
Its kind of bizarre, watching some of the emotional train wrecks judging someone else’s personal life or intellectual ability.
We’re not worthy!
of his charity ?