In an interview published in Wisden Cricket Monthly, Tim Paine has conceded that the team culture under Steve Smith “borderlined on abuse”.
You can read the full interview in issue 8 of Wisden Cricket Monthly, which taps into Paine’s restorative stint in club cricket and a job offer with a bat manufacturer.
Tim Paine admits that the culture of the team he now finds himself leading needs to be “reset”.
In a wide-ranging exclusive interview with Adam Collins, the new Australia captain concedes that the team under Steve Smith “borderlined on abuse”, and that he intends to foster a less overtly aggressive approach.
“We don’t want to be abusive by berating and belittling our opposition, like at times we’ve attempted to,” he tells WCM. “We want to be more respectful. Banter is part of the game but abuse isn’t.
The Cape Town fallout has since handed him the keys to Australian cricket. “I remember looking around and thinking, ‘Well, who’s going to be captain?’” Paine tells WCM two months on from the fiasco. “Then Trevor Hohns [Australia’s chairman of selectors] said it was me. So, yeah. Off we went.”
The fact that Paine is fronting an Australia team at all represents an astonishing turnaround for the Tasmanian, who was close to giving up the game completely following a horror run of injuries and loss of form.
Recalled to the Test side for the Ashes, he was one of the standout performers in that series and now, aged 33, finds himself steering the whole show. He faces a tough job rebuilding Australia’s reputation, and English crowds will offer constant reminders of the scale of the task when the tourists commence the five-match ODI series on Wednesday June 13.
“The English are going to be basking in the glory of what’s happened,” he said in Hobart on the eve of the tour. The gloveman will likely have his hands full.
