Adelaide says goodbye to Waugh

Lehmann 83, Mark Waugh 76.

Okay, so scores from an ING Cup (Australian domestic one-day) match are hardly the most meaningful head-to-head comparison or assessment of Australia's third highest Test run scorer and his successor in the national team. But in what more closely approximated an Australian all-star game or international trial fixture than a domestic limited-overs match, Mark Waugh demonstrated he can still play and Lehmann that he was in form. Not that that was really what the occasion was about.

On a day when protestors marched to South Australia's Parliament House to rally against the proposed war on Iraq, a few thousand cricket patrons said goodbye to a different kind of Waugh at the Adelaide Oval last Saturday.

As is seemingly the case everywhere, domestic cricket is not really something you attend for the atmosphere or excitement. This game, though, was slightly different. In addition to the calibre of players on show - this being the only hit-out for Steve Waugh, McGrath, Lee, Lehmann and Gillespie between Sharjah and the Ashes - Saturday's New South Wales-South Australia game was also Mark Waugh's first since being omitted from the Australian team and announcing his retirement the previous Monday.

One suspects a few of the 4,721 Adelaideans and tourists who watched the match would have come primarily to pay tribute to Junior. I know I did. The sustained applause that greeted his dismissal for 76 was not because local hero Jason Gillespie had just snared a big and badly-needed wicket for his side. One just knew that the prolonged standing ovation by the Adelaide Oval members as Waugh ascended the pavilion steps past them was a show of appreciation for a wonderful career and a display of thanks for the memories.

It's not significant, perhaps, but this could have been Waugh's last innings here. NSW have already played their Pura Cup (first-class) game here this season last week, and though he may play on next season, this represented a fitting time to say farewell.

Four years ago, when Waugh walked out to bat on this ground for the third Ashes Test in 1998 just days after the bookmaker revelations, he drew boos. On Saturday, at the ground where he also made his debut hundred, he received only appreciation.

Both the score and the innings was a typical Mark Waugh offering. There were some classy shots - the easy flicks, drives, and lofts over the infield, which one still takes for granted despite knowing it will no longer be seen on the world stage - and some streaky shots, like the slog nicked past the keeper up at the stumps and the gloved hook shot to the boundary. In fact, it was typical Waugh to the end, when he threw his wicket away skying a catch by swiping across the line at Gillespie when a hundred beckoned.

Though Waugh was the main attraction, he was only part of the occasion. Australia -- sorry, NSW -- this day boasted, in batting order, Mark Waugh, Corey Richards, Bevan, Michael Clarke, Steve Waugh, Katich, Brad Haddin, Brett Lee, Stuart MacGill, Nathan Bracken, McGrath and Stuart Clark (competition rules allow 12 players per team). Barring rising youngster Clarke, Richards and Clarke (both former Australia 'A' representatives), that line-up has, at various times and in different forms of the game, been an Australian one.

SA weren't half-bad, either, with new recruit Damien Fleming -- unwanted even by David Hookes's Victoria, who were soundly beaten here in the opening first-class fixture - playing his first game for his new state, and claiming a wicket in his first over. Besides Fleming, South Australia (in red and black, and known as the Redbacks) included Greg Blewett, incoming Test batsman Darren 'Boof' Lehmann, and Gillespie, attempting to prove his recovery from a calf strain ahead of the first Test. If that line-up can't draw people to domestic cricket, nothing will.

South Australia have had an unhealthy dependence on Blewett and Lehmann in recent seasons so when Blewett became an early McGrath victim, caught behind for 18, it did not bode well for SA. As he always seems to do, Lehmann held the innings together, combining with the hard-hitting Mark Higgs (45 from 38), a recruit from NSW, for a partnership of 76 for the sixth wicket that saw SA reach 246.

After Fleming snared Richards in his first over with a lovely outswinger, SA did commendably well to restrain Waugh and Bevan through Gillespie and strongly-built medium pacer Ryan Harris. As he does for his country, Michael Bevan moved along inconspicuously while Waugh gradually flourished. Their partnership was worth 127 when Waugh departed, followed by a benevolent Bevan for 46, having trod on his leg stump.

Never mind. NSW had Steve Waugh at four and, just for kicks, classy youngster Michael Clarke at five. The bloke next to me remarked "these guys would beat most countries," and it's probably true. The NSW side could, on a good day, beat several one-day international teams, and it's still slightly surreal to think Steve and Mark Waugh, not to mention Stuart MacGill, are not playing for one or both of their national teams.

Clarke, after two hundreds to open the season, was recently pushed as a contender for Mark Waugh's Test spot and played his shots impressively. Seeing the Clarke-S. Waugh partnership was to witness the old and the new, as at this point in time Clarke probably shapes as Waugh's eventual successor, possibly as soon as the end of this season.

One almost has to hold one's breath watching Gillespie bowl and, sure enough, in his eighth over the speedster began grimacing and stretching between balls. Dare England have hoped? No. Despite the exercises, Gillespie remained on the field and later returned to complete his spell, apparently fit.

NSW should have won comfortably but provided an interesting finish when Clarke and Steve Waugh threw their wickets away looking to hasten the end, Clarke stepping away to have his stumps rattled by Fleming for 48 and Waugh, still lacking some fluency, brilliantly caught at deep mid wicket by a running and diving Harris for 47.

Greg Blewett, something of a golden arm as a medium pacer, proceeded to enliven SA's extremely unlikely comeback, bowling Haddin, Gilchrist's replacement in an ODI last season, for nought and trapping Lee leg-before. Last year's Ashes debutant Simon Katich kept his composure, however, and with three needed off five balls, swept Blewett for the winning boundary. Mark Waugh is gone, but Australia's finest appear ready for the Ashes.

Also read:
A case for compassion
Mark's Gone - a photo feature
Mark Waugh quits international cricket

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