Katich renews old feud with fresh swipe at Clarke
Simon Katich has renewed his feud with Michael Clarke, lashing his former captain’s opinion on Australia’s new nice-guy approach.
Clarke launched an impassioned spray of the Test team’s controversial behaviour, saying on Tuesday that the current team must “play tough Australian cricket” against India this summer.
He claimed Tim Paine’s desire to play fair wouldn’t lead the team anywhere.
“Australian cricket, I think, needs to stop worry about being liked and start worrying about being respected,” Clarke told Macquarie Sports Radio on Tuesday.
“Play tough Australian cricket. Whether we like it or not, that’s in our blood.”
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He added: “If you try and walk away from it, we might be the most liked team in the world, (but) we’re not going to win s***.”
“We won’t win a game. Boys and girls want to win.”
But Katich was having none of that when he responded on Wednesday.
The pair infamously came together in the SCG dressing room in 2009 and they’ve taken pot shots at each other ever since.
Lacing his comments with a distaste for Clarke, Katich’s thinly veiled comments suggested the ex-skipper was partly to blame for the nation’s downfall.
“Once again we find someone missing the point,” he told SEN radio.
“What’s been forgotten in all of this is we blatantly cheated and the the reason we’re at this point now, and what led us to this point, and we talk about the line that was talked about for so long.
“The point is, we were caught for blatantly cheating and we have to rectify that as soon as possible to earn back the respect of the cricketing public in Australia and worldwide.
“We’ve been a disliked team for a number of years through that on-field behaviour and it obviously came to a head in Cape Town.
“It’s a tough battle for this team taking on the burden of what’s come before them.
“They can still play the Australian way in terms of playing competitive and playing fairly, but not going over the top and going across the rules like they did in Cape Town.”
The series against India promises to be monumentally different to recent contests between the two nations.
Australia will be without suspended trio Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft, with Warner having sparked numerous spot fires against India over the years.
As if to confirm Katich’s point, Clarke yesterday lauded Warner’s old ways and even acknowledged ‘the line’.
“It’s his style, he’s very upfront, in your face. What you see with David Warner is what you get,” Clarke said.
“Your greatest strength can be your greatest weakness. To me I always loved having him in the team I was captaining because he brought that aggression that I wanted.
“In saying that there was always a line, he knew that. We had a number of conversations one-on-one about that line he couldn’t overstep.”
with Yahoo Cricket