Thanks Pigeon. Thanks Warney.” Everybody at the Sydney Cricket Ground knows what these words mean.
They are a tribute to Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath, the two Australian stars who are retiring from Test cricket after the final Ashes Test.
It’s already old territory, and the match has only just started. But there is no way the commercial powers that be will let Australian people forget what this match is supposed to mean to them.
Where 'Sydney CBD' or ‘Bondi’ (or wherever you may be) would normally appear on a mobile phone display, the sentiments at the top of this blog are digitally plastered onto peoples' mobiles at the SCG.
This is fine if you’re at the ground, but I feel sorry for any tourists in the surrounding areas who, perhaps lost, will think they’ve wandered onto the wrong side of the tracks, which is where a place called ‘Thanks Pigeon’ inevitably would be.
It doesn’t stop there, either. The advertising logos at the southern and northern ends of the grounds have the words ‘Thx Shane’ and ‘Thx Glenn’ emblazoned under the insignia of mobile phone company 3, which is quite clever.
These acts of homage were obviously planned well in advance, but then Justin Langer had to go and make things complicated by pulling up stumps, as well. Not to be remiss, whoever is responsible for these things arranged for a ‘Thx Justin’ to appear at mid-wicket, with still-drying paint mixing with the morning rain.
I wonder if the vacant area at mid-wicket on the other side of the ground is a direct snub to Damien Martyn (what have you done for me lately, perhaps), but it could be Cricket Australia’s way of keeping an ace up its sleeve. Who knows how many more retirements could take place before the end of this Test match?
They’re even giving away copies of the Sydney Morning Herald inside the ground. The front page, of course, was consumed by images of Warne and McGrath (less so of Langer), along with a lead story that suggests Australia is ‘Leaping into a new era’.
The line, that Australian cricket’s future is bright despite the impending loss in personnel, will be viewed as propaganda by visiting English fans, but it’s no less than you’d expect at the start of a week that the locals are hell-bent on making a celebration of Australian cricket.
On the evening of New Year’s Day, Channel 9 televised a special titled ‘Goodbye Warnie’. It was a big, long back-slap for the peerless leggie, with everybody from John Howard to Ravi shastri to Michael Parkinson saying the right things.
It rated through the roof, according to a station press release. Of course it did. It’s not every day the most famous sportsperson in the land fronts up for his last week in the office.
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