Sport - Cricket

Mark follows Steve out
By Malcolm Conn

PORT ELIZABETH, MARCH 4. Mark Waugh, sacked as a one-day player on Monday, claimed he had no intention of retiring.

Waugh, 36, was dropped from the 15-man squad to play seven one-day matches in South Africa later this month and then three in Zimbabwe, joining brother Steve as another high profile axing.

``I just want to keep playing as long as possible,'' Mark Waugh said at the team hotel on Monday morning. ``If I didn't make runs there was always a chance I would get dropped.

``But you don't think like that. You think you're going to make runs so you just keep playing. I don't see a difference between me saying I'm going to finish or the selectors. It doesn't worry me either way.'' Generational change continued with the selection of two uncapped 20-year-olds, Tasmanian all-rounder Shane Watson and off-spinner Nathan Hauritz from Queensland. Fellow Queenslander Jimmy Maher, 28, who played two one-day internationals four years ago, gets another chance after three excellent state seasons.

Matthew Hayden has been recalled and promised an extended run at the top of the order with Adam Gilchrist to try and resettle the opening combination.

It is 16 years since neither Waugh was in an Australian one-day squad and more than four years since both missed a one-day match.

Mark Waugh is the most successful one-day batsman Australia has produced and the fourth most prolific of all time. In 244 matches, Waugh scored 8500 runs at an average of almost 40 with 18 centuries and 50 half-centuries.

However, this summer he managed only 126 runs at 21 in seven VB Series games when Australia failed to make the finals for only the third time in the 23-year history of the competition.

Mark Waugh was unable to say how long he would continue to play Test cricket but conceded that he could not afford to look too far ahead. ``It just depends on the next couple of games,'' Waugh said of the Capetown and Durban Tests over the next fortnight. ``I've got to keep scoring runs, so that's what I'm looking at this week and the week after. Whatever happens after that happens.''

He scored a polished half-century in the first Test and a swash-buckling 110 in the recent tour match against South Africa `A' but the Waugh brothers remain the only two regular batsmen in either the Test or one-day side not to have scored an international century for the entire summer.

Mark Waugh was realistic about his chances of returning for the World Cup, to held in South Africa inside a year. ``I suppose you never say never,'' he said. ``If there are injuries and loss of form the selectors might call on experience.

``If I'm playing well at that time there's some chance I guess. Realistically you wouldn't have thought they would go back to a 36-year-old but if I'm playing well and the occasion arises you never know.

``I had my chance to score runs this summer. The wickets were a little bit difficult opening the batting but I still had enough chances.''

Chairman of selectors Trevor Hohns had a similar view. ``You never close the door on anybody these days, however in the near future it's going to be difficult to go back on that decision,'' he said.

``Next season could be a different kettle of fish. It's never easy. Both of them (Waughs) are probably legends of the game in Australian cricket and it's never easy to adjudicate on their futures.''

Mark Waugh said his sacking was no great surprise given the recent omission of his brother from the one-day game. ``Obviously dropping Steve, I thought they might make a couple more changes and I'd be a chance of being one of those changes,'' he said.

``I sort of half expected it. I'm here to play Test cricket but you have to forget it and concentrate on the Test matches.

``Tomorrow's a different day. You can't do anything about it. Life goes on. Players come and go all the time. It's not a new thing, but obviously for me it's new. It gives someone else a chance and it may be a new era in one-day cricket.''

The squad: Ricky Ponting (captain), Adam Gilchrist (vice- captain), Michael Bevan, Andrew Bichel, Jason Gillespie, Ian Harvey, Nathan Hauritz, Matthew Hayden, Brett Lee, Darren Lehmann, Jimmy Maher, Damien Martyn, Glenn McGrath, Shane Warne, Shane Watson. - Reuters.

* * *

Career factfile

MELBOURNE, MARCH 4. Factfile on Mark Waugh, who was dumped from Australia's one-day side on Monday.

Born: 2.6.1965, Sydney; Right-hand batsman, occasional off-break bowler.

Teams: New South Wales, Australia.

Tests: 123, 7,833 runs, avg 42.57, 20 centuries, 46 half-centuries. Highest score: 153 not out. 57 wickets, avg 40.00. Best bowling: 5-40. Catches: 168 (world record).

One-dayers: 244, 8,500 runs, avg 39.35. 18 centuries, 50 half-centuries, 85 wickets, avg 34.56. Best bowling 5-24. Catches 108.

The twin brother of Australian Test skipper and 1999 World Cup-winning captain Steve, Mark's achievements include the title of the fourth highest run-scorer in one-day internationals in a career which began in 1988-89.

Troubled by form lapses, media pressure and further investigations into his alleged links with illegal cricket bookmakers, Mark responded with an Australian record of 173 in the second one-day final against West Indies at Melbourne Cricket Ground in February last year.

A member of Australia's 1999 World Cup-winning side, Mark's opening partnerships with wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist have been central to the team's dominance in one-day cricket in recent years, while his close-in fielding and slip catching have delighted fans around the world.

Mark's total of 168 Test catches is a world record and he has taken a further 108 in one-day internationals.

Sometimes criticised for losing his wicket with an apparently casual shot selection, Mark refutes the suggestion he does not make the most of his gifts.

He has scored 20 Test centuries and 18 hundreds in one-day internationals, including three in the 1996 World Cup. In the recent tri-series against South Africa and New Zealand in Australia, Waugh made just 126 runs at an average of 21.00 as pressure grew on the selectors to opt for younger players as they planned for the 2003 World Cup.

Mark publicly admitted in 1998 that he and Shane Warne had accepted money from a bookmaker called ``John'' for pitch and weather information in Sri Lanka in 1994.

The two players had been fined by the Australian Cricket Board in 1995, but kept quiet until the matter was exposed in 1998. - Reuters

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