Читать книгу At the Close of Play - Ricky Ponting - Страница 27

WE PLAY CRICKET almost all the time now. It’s difficult to believe that in the past there were years when no international side toured Australia, a time when we weren’t rushing from one tournament to another. There were times late in my career when I was lucky to spend two months at home in a year — and they were often comprised of weeks grabbed here and there. The schedule is full because cricket earns big money from television networks and players are (now) well compensated for their time. There was a time when we complained there was too much cricket, then the Indian Premier League (IPL) came along and almost anybody who could ran to that honey pot and the money ensured we stopped complaining.

That said, at times, there is still too much cricket and you can tell when it’s getting to us because that’s when things happen on the field. Sometimes, in the swirl of airports and buses and hotel rooms and long hot days in the sun the cracks finally open up and what comes spilling out is not always pretty.

I guess that might have been part of the reason I found myself being dragged out of a Kolkata (then, Calcutta) nightclub in 1998, but it is too easy an excuse. In truth I still had a lot to learn and when my Aussie rules team, North Melbourne, beat Warnie’s St Kilda I think I might have got a little too excited.

And, as I was about to learn, when you are growing up in the public eye your mistakes become very public.