A Beautiful Game

by Mark Nicholas

  It was one thing to sit down next to Richie but quite another to do so for the Nine Network. Nervousness hardly begins to describe it. The palms of the hands go clammy, the mouth dries up and simple disciplines such as listening to the director via your earpiece go out of the window. Channel Nine’s cricket coverage had held me captive since WSC had caught us all off guard. It set a standard that inspired a new way of thinking about televising sport. The four full-time commentators—Benaud and Chappell, Greig and Lawry—could form and divide opinion, educate in the ways of the greats and entertain in a fashion that encouraged imitation and parody. The comedian Billy Birmingham had made the four of them cult figures with his Twelfth Man albums. The hair, the hats, the clothes and the voices were public property. The game was the soundtrack of summer and these four men were its face, feel and sound.

  Thus, I was beyond nervous. Thankfully, I knew a bit about the Indian team and offered some offbeat stuff that went down okay. As the match progressed, I calmed down. Over the five days, the team were generous to me and we got through. I said goodbye and travelled north to the Sunshine Coast for a look around. A couple of days passed and I was in the process of booking flights back to the UK when Gyngell called. He wanted me to stay for the Adelaide Test, starting the following week. ‘Kerry is flying in for that weekend, to listen to you!’ Thanks, Gyng.

  I had a golden moment in Adelaide, suggesting that Anil Kumble should switch to bowl over the wicket to Adam Gilchrist, who was swatting his round-the-wicket offerings into the stands. I said he could knock him over from around the wicket and if so, the boost to the Indians might well inspire them to go on and win the game. Well, Kumble switched to around the wicket and bowled Gilchrist next ball. It was a magnificent Test match, won against the odds by a buoyant India. Within 24 hours Gyngell called asking me to stay on again: ‘This time for Melbourne and Boxing Day,’ he said.

  I flew to Melbourne for Christmas and played golf with Shane Warne at the Capital—a private club owned by Lloyd Williams, who had built Crown, the magnificent hotel in which the commentators stayed. Lloyd played with us and during the round Warnie gently suggested to him that Packer should think seriously about me coming to work for Channel Nine. They were great mates and, apparently, Lloyd did just that to surprising effect. Thanks, Warnie.

  On Boxing Day morning I walked nervously into the commentary box. Three times I had shaken hands and said goodbye to these guys and now it was g’day again. After Christmas salutations all round, Lawry looked up from his lead commentator’s seat and said: ‘Merry Christmas, Mark. You’re not having my job, however hard you try!’ The Brisbane Test had been a breeze, not that I knew it at the time. Melbourne was trickier—the more often I turned up, the more I trod on eggshells. By the Fifth Test in Sydney, I felt in everybody’s way.

  I was staying with Michael Slater at his perfectly positioned Bondi apartment. He had been unwell and was fighting back. We had long breakfasts, hung around in the sunshine, were in and out of the surf and linked up most evenings with Jo, the girl who was to become his wife and who did more than anyone to get him back on track. Most of all he wanted the chance to commentate on Channel Nine, having made an excellent impression with Channel 4. We spent hours talking about the future, imagining a day when the two of us, along with Taylor and Healy, might inherit the mantle of ‘the tight four’, as Greigy liked to call the group who had been at it since Packer won the rights.

  At the end of the summer, Gyngell offered me a contract for the following season. The network would try me in front of camera, he said. Slats seemed pleased, pointing out that at least we knew there was a way through the door.

  Thus, back to Australia I came for the 2004–05 season. Koos put me in front of the camera for two minutes each lunchtime to ad lib a summary of the morning’s cricket. It was a screen test. Then I started presenting segments, such as tea. This was especially awkward for O’Donnell but he barely raised an eyebrow. Hats off to him, for never once did he indicate that he felt compromised. What he felt deep down is entirely another matter.

  The second match in the VB one-day series was in Hobart on a cold and damp mid-January day. While calling a quiet passage of play, I sympathised with the spectators, who were wrapped up, and the Pakistani fielders, whose bodies refused to do as they were told in the conditions.

  As the players were leaving the field for the break between innings, Koos’s mobile phone rang. He looked around the commentary box and mouthed, ‘It’s Kerry . . .’ The red telephone was long gone; the boss had not called in a while.

  ‘G’day, Mr Packer . . . Sure . . . let me look . . . No I think he’s gone to lunch . . . Ah no, he’s here, hang on.’

  And he mouthed again: ‘Mark, it’s Kerry, for you.’ Even Richie looked up with interest.

  My heart thumped, wanting to burst from my chest. Beads of sweat gathered above my brow. My legs went to jelly. I searched for saliva but found none.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Son, it’s Kerry Packer.’ His voice was throaty, like gravel, and low. ‘Son, stop bagging the fucking game.’

  ‘Pardon, Mr Packer? I’m sorry, I missed that.’ It was a bad line. I moved across the room.

  ‘I said stop bagging the fucking game, son. Celebrate the game, talk it up.’

  ‘But Mr Packer, people tell me I’m too busy talking the game up and that I should toughen . . . ’

  He raised his voice. ‘I’m not people, son, I’m the boss. You listen to me.’

  By now, I’m bent sideways at the far end of the commentary box, dying of humiliation and desperately in search of a better signal.

  ‘I’m trying, Mr Packer. It’s not a great line. I think it’s better here. I think I’ll hear you better now.’ I wished I could not have done.

  ‘Son, stop telling us how fucking cold it is in Hobart and how the fielders’ are wringing their hands and how people are wrapped in anoraks and having a shit time. The only people having a shit time are those of us at home who have to sit here fucking listening to you.’

  Kapow!!!

  And he wasn’t finished.

  ‘And son, we’re a commercial network. We sell the game. It’s not over till it’s over. I don’t care how far in front the Aussies are, it’s never over. Our business is numbers, son, eyeballs.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Packer.’

  He was on a roll now.

  ‘And another thing, when you’re next in Sydney, come and see me. Ring my secretary and make an appointment.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Packer, when should I . . .’

  ‘Are you fucking deaf, son? I said come and see me when you are next in Sydney. And son, bring those two other young blokes, Taylor and Healy, with you.’

  ‘I will, Mr Packer.’ I promise I will.

  ‘Goodbye, son.’

  And down went the phone.

  The world stood still. Contorted and beaten, I stayed rooted to the spot in shock. The room was quiet. Most of the guys were at lunch. Koos had stayed behind and came to . . . well . . . console me, I suppose. He tapped my shoulder and prised the phone from my fingers. Max Kruger, the scorer and statistician for longer than most could remember, asked if I was all right. Yes, I was fine. Koos said the call sounded pretty hardcore. I said it was. He asked how I felt about going back on camera after the break and I admitted I wouldn’t be comfortable. He suggested giving it a miss and that he would come straight up with the commentators who could fill the couple of minutes’ overlap until play began. Then he told me to go for a walk and get some air.

  I wandered aimlessly towards the beach, which is right behind our commentary position. Having taken off my shoes and socks, I walked along the sand, all hopes and aspirations lost in translation. Packer’s perception of me was so far from my own that I weighed them up against each other and came down in favour of his. Confidence shot, I reckoned I’d be on a plane back to the UK within a week.

  I did one half-hour commentary stint in the run chase but didn’t trust myself to say much more than
the occasional ‘Good shot’. Benaud gave me a few conciliatory looks. Greigy jumped all over it saying that Kerry got everybody once, even Lawry. ‘He puts a marker on most people who represent the network,’ said Greig. ‘Take his call as a compliment.’

  Bill told the story of Kerry calling him on the red phone during the first year of WSC and telling him to ‘Stop copying Benaud and start fucking talking.’ He added that he hadn’t stopped talking since. ‘After all,’ he says, ‘Kerry was paying the wages, not Richie.’

  Lawry is a wonderful man; tough, of course, but kind of heart. He was a plumber by trade and delights in telling the rest of us that we have never done a day’s work in our lives. He and Greig struck up an unlikely friendship. They had dinner together most evenings, Greig with his huge glass of shiraz and Bill on something soft. Their on-air chemistry was a mystery but it worked so well, and was so funny, that some television folk swore they must have had a scriptwriter.

  Taylor and Healy were pretty cool. They said they were looking forward to the visit, though they wouldn’t have betted on quite how soon it would come.

  At almost the very minute I landed back in my Hobart hotel room, the phone rang. It was Gary Fenton, then Nine’s head of sport and an ally.

  ‘You okay, my boy?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m fine now, Gary. Thanks for calling. Look mate, you tried, Gyng tried, we tried. Some things are not meant to be. I really appreciate your support these past two . . .’

  ‘Hang on, it’s not that bad!’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh, it’ll be fine. Kerry just wants to get his claws into you blokes. I’ve rung to say you’re booked on the eight o’clock flight to Sydney in the morning with Tubby and Heals. The boss wants you at his office in Park Street at midday. I’ll meet you in Starbucks across the road first. See you then, mate.’

  As I was digesting this news, the phone rang again. This time David Gyngell.

  ‘I hear the old man gotcha.’

  ‘You could say that, Gyng.’

  ‘Must have been a good one, mate, even by his standards, because James [Packer] was sitting with him watching the cricket and heard him going hard at you. James just rang to tell me, reckoned you copped it and could do with a call.’

  ‘Well, that’s good of him. And of you, Gyng, thanks.’

  ‘Anyway, call him back and tell him he’s talking shit.’

  ‘I’m sorry . . . ?!’

  ‘Call him back and tell him he’s talking shit. Seriously, it’s the only way with Kerry, and he’ll respect you for it in the end. He wouldn’t have you on the network if he didn’t think you were up to it, so call him and stand your ground.’

  ‘Are you fucking mad?’

  ‘No, mate, I mean it.’

  ‘No way, Gyng.’

  ‘Your call. Anyway, glad you’re okay. Make sure you give as good as you get tomorrow. If it’s any consolation, I get one of these a month. I’ve learnt to give it back to him. It’s the only way. You’re doing a good job, mate, hang on in there. Catch up soon.’

  And he was gone.

  I mean, honestly, call him back and tell him he’s talking shit? Mind you, Gyng was Packer’s godson; I guess that helps.

  PARK STREET, SYDNEY

  Taylor and I drove to the airport and met Healy in the Qantas lounge. A night’s sleep had bestowed courage upon us.

  ‘I’ve got Fujitsu, the board of Cricket Australia and numerous other things to get on with. I’m not taking any shit from Kerry. If he doesn’t want me, fine, I’ll be off to do something else,’ said Taylor over a strong cup of coffee.

  ‘Yep,’ followed Healy, ‘I’ve got the car-wash business, the travel company interests, the board of the Cricketers’ Association. I’m right.’

  ‘Yeah, me too,’ I added. ‘I’ve got Channel 4, the Daily Telegraph, and work in South Africa and India. I’m outta here too and good riddance.’

  Fenton was waiting for us in the Starbucks opposite Packer’s office in Park Street. He had the old commentary manual with him, sepia-toned and frayed at the edges, the one David Hill had put together at the start of WSC in 1977. ‘Kerry wants you to read this before you go up.’

  ‘He’s kidding isn’t he? This thing is so outdated, Richie has forgotten it.’

  Fenton told us to keep calm. He needn’t have bothered; our early morning fizz was going flat. By the time we crossed the road, entered the lobby and pressed the button for the lift, silence and the shuffling of feet had taken over. Then Tubby said: ‘You got Channel 4 remember, Nicko, and you the car wash, Heals.’ ‘Yeah, right,’ we said, and giggled like schoolkids outside the headmaster’s office.

  Packer kept us waiting for half an hour—did so with most people, apparently. Intermittently, we talked in hushed tones but apprehension had taken hold. We wondered what was about to happen to the rest of our lives. Then the secretary invited us in.

  He was standing at the door of his office, a most impressive man. It was the first and only time I met him. Though diminished by age and illness, he was tall and still strong enough to intimidate. He looked over his glasses at each of us, shook our hands one by one in a solemn sort of way, and ushered us to seats on the other side of his fine desk. He sat down and lit a cigarette. His suit jacket hung by the door. He wore a white shirt, tie and braces. The time was 12.30 pm.

  I had to pinch myself. This was the man who, pretty much single-handedly, dragged cricket out of its past and into its future. Writing after his death, one eminent correspondent suggested that Packer mirrored Oscar Wilde’s definition of the cynic: ‘A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.’ He knew the price all right, but the thing about Packer was that he knew the value too. Cricketers have been thanking him ever since. And those who haven’t, should.

  Without warning, he launched into a spellbinding attack on our commentary. He talked quietly but firmly and with a sense of threat. His words were less advice than instruction and the long and short of them was: stop telling us something is interesting, the viewer can decide whether it’s interesting; don’t use that word ‘clever’—it’s a game of cricket, that’s all; stop asking questions of other commentators and excluding the viewer; stop telling us about shit weather; cut out the in-jokes—we’re not interested in your tennis and golf games or your fish and chips; keep women, kids and blokes who don’t play the game in the loop by keeping it simple and explaining it for dummies; call the fucking game, not the peripherals; tell us about the game but don’t analyse everything—it’s not science, it’s a game, and all that analysis is boring; call the game; know the players, know the figures, know the conditions and take us inside the game. Don’t lecture. Call the bloody game.

  There was a good half an hour in those messages and then he asked if we had read Hill’s commentary manual. We murmured that we hadn’t. He said to do so. Whereupon, he turned on Healy. ‘The other night you called the game against the Kiwis over when they needed 13 an over and they got up. It’s never over, son. Listen, you blokes, we’re a commercial network. We survive with good ratings and good revenue. Never, ever call a game over until it’s over, son. You called the game against the Kiwis over.’

  ‘No I didn’t, Kerry.’

  Oh my god, did he just say that? And Kerry? Did he call him Kerry?

  ‘You fucking did, son.’

  ‘No I didn’t, Kerry.’

  ‘Son, I’m not an idiot. You called it over when they needed 13 an over.’

  ‘I didn’t, Kerry. I was rostered off the game. I wasn’t even there.’

  ‘You fucking were, son.”

  It was a robust exchange. I gave the points to Healy. He was right, he wasn’t there, which would have been funny at any other time than this. It was me who called the game over.

  By now, Packer had his feet up on the desk. He chain-smoked and studied Taylor and Healy closely. He barely acknowledged me, preferring to use the time to work forensically through two men who were to drive the machinery behind Australian cricke
t for a while to come. Maybe he thought he had covered me on the phone.

  He finished with Healy and switched to Taylor, focusing on his position within Cricket Australia. He wanted to know everything. Tubby let some general stuff loose and kept the big issues of the day to his chest. When Kerry challenged him, he replied that it was Kerry himself who approved Taylor joining the board and that he couldn’t now betray it. He asked how Taylor saw the future of cricket television rights and, rather than skim across something he knew relatively little about, Mark returned the serve. For the first time, Kerry half-smiled. He figured they were going to be ‘fucking expensive’ next time round but that Cricket Australia shouldn’t take him for granted. He wanted that one taken back to the boardroom. ‘You can tell them, son.’ And Kerry was right, of course.

  Then he reverted to Healy and to the Cricketers’ Association, of which Healy was chairman at the time. He didn’t want to see another battle between the players and their employers like the one in the late 1990s. Were the current players happy, he asked, and if so, why were they always on the take? Healy knew his arguments and put them across with typical conviction. They sparred with each other. Kerry listened, as he had to Taylor. Then he said that the players shouldn’t take anything for granted either, and certainly shouldn’t get greedy. Healy agreed and said he would let them know. It was riveting stuff.

  It began to occur to me that Packer was taking us under his wing. Perhaps he knew how ill he was and saw the chance for a last throw of the dice with three young fellas who were to carry the torch he had first lit when we were wide-eyed teenagers. The longer we sat there, the greater the privilege became. While writing this book, I called Tubby to see if his memory of the day matched mine. It pretty much did, and he added: ‘The main message that I felt he wanted to get over was that “he” was always watching, that the three of us were the new custodians of the commentary box, and that the game needs continuous monitoring with as much positive noise as we can give it.’

  The message came over loud and clear, after which Packer opened up the conversation. The future of limited-overs cricket was a particular concern. Were we serious about this 20-over stuff, because it was no good to him—could hardly fit the ads into the breaks and, anyway, it was all done in three hours, so what sort of a commercial-television model was that, he asked. Then bonus points in one-day matches, then fielding restrictions. After that, bats, helmets and over rates in Tests. Then no balls and Bradman’s take on the back-foot law. From there came back-foot play.