From My Desk

I say Aussie sport loosely, as it is certainly no longer sport, but big business.

And our major summer and winter sports are in the news for all the wrong reasons.

We’ve all been anxious about the Australian cricket team’s tour of India - and it has now blown up alarmingly.

The team performed really well against South Africa and deservedly, received plenty of accolades.

But the warning signs were apparent  with some inconsistency in the top order batting.

Against Sri Lanka, the flaws were further exposed, despite a triumphant series.

But now during the toughest tour in world cricket in India, the cracks have become huge....fissures.   

The amazing interest now in 20/20 cricket, and even to some extent, the one day games, has really shifted the focus of our leading batsmen.

Test cricket is still No. 1, so they tell us, but our top players are also interested in the big dollars to be earned elsewhere - and consequently, their batting techniques are no longer honed specifically for the five day game.   

They have made adjustments to pick up the dollars in the shorter form of cricket and gradually, they are found wanting when it comes to being out in the middle in a tight Test match.

I can’t see our batting stocks - in Test cricket - improving either.

We are facing England in the ultimate contest for The Ashes in the near future and we will need to find another Michael Hussey quickly if we are to be competitive. 

The quicker-scoring batsmen can deliver on odd occasions, but the consistency of the Husseys and Pontings (thankfully we still have Clarke) seems a thing of the past.

And the rugby league season has only just started and all the attention is again for the wrong reasons - drugs in the sport.

I think the way the drug investigation has been handled has been appalling - with a cloud hanging over the entire sport.

No one has been named, but everyone is on edge.  It is grossly unfair.

If there are culprits who have abused the system, they should be named, but their team mates should not be walking on egg-shells if they are clean.

The season is shaping as a a beauty, but this black cloud hanging over it is doing nothing to enthuse the players or fans.

If the evidence is there, it should be produced and offenders dealt with; then we can all get on with cheering the mighty Dragons!

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CHANCE  TO 

SAY THANKS

It’s Seniors Week next week and a chance to think about the amazing contribution they make to our community.

Sadly, I think we tend to ignore our older residents far too much and more often than not, they are left to fend for themselves.

Thankfully there are many groups which offer activities to keep them busy.

But in the main, I think they struggle, mainly if they are restricted in what they can do because of financial and physical constraints.

Some don’t have family to look after them - some have family who don’t look after them.

From what I have seen, loneliness is possibly the worst thing which can befall our seniors.

Our modern world also seems to ignore them.

I’m back on the technology bandwagon again.

Just about everything nowadays is dependent on people having access to a computer. 

What is not being considered is that many of our older residents don’t have computers so basically, they miss out.

Just another example are probate notices.   They are no longer published as ‘public notices’ so people can make their claims; there is now a website specifically for probate notices.

As far as many of our elderly are concerned (and some not so elderly) that eliminates them.

I’m a long way from becoming elderly (having just turned 50, I think it was), but it’s looming as a scary world if everything is going to be so heavily reliant on a computer to survive.

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END OF TORTURE STILL THREE 

WEEKS AWAY

The queries have already started.

When is my favourite (yuk) time of the year about to end?

Daylight Saving of course.   Well in answer to the many enquiries, it is still here and will be for another three weeks!!  We’ll all be walking around with torches by then.

DS ends on the first Sunday of April - which means they are squeezing every bit of DS out of us.   The official time is at 2am on Sunday, April 7. 

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THOUGHT FOR

THE WEEK:

‘Some people make it happen, some watch it happen, some say what happened?’