I won't go into the details of Phil Hughes' career as they will have been covered in the press several times this week and will continue to be as the full story emerges. Here in Sydney the news has come as a complete shock and is made even more devastating by the fact that not a single person has a bad word to say about the bloke. What makes it even more difficult to handle is that it was a freakish accident and one that could quite easily have happened to anyone that we play with, and could happen again to anyone.
What has really hit home for me is that I have bowled bouncers that have hit people in the head, and they weren't even wearing helmets. Granted, I am not the quickest bowler around and of course I am not going out there with the aim of injuring another player, and neither was NSW paceman Sean Abbott in the case of Phil Hughes. Aggressive bowling is part of cricket and I have been on the receiving end of this kind of bowling too, from guys that bowl a lot quicker than me. Thankfully for me, I have not (yet) taken a blow to the head with a cricket ball. Like so many things in life though, there are those that have been hit and those that are going to be. I have been hit in the neck, as an 18 year old by an Australian quick back in England. In my case it flew over the keeper's head, we ran 2 and I hit the next ball for 4 to win the game.
What is truly frightening about this is it could be your mate on a cricket field stricken by a blow. We play on a Saturday or Sunday with our mates and against them too. The images of David Warner, Brad Haddin, Shane Watson, Mitchell Starc and others with extreme distress on their faces with their mate Phil Hughes on the ground really slams it home.
What if it was one of my team-mates? How would I react if it was Chris McPherson or Pete Saliba or Dylan Dharmadasa with a bad injury on the field? Or if it was a member of the opposition? I can't imagine the devastation in Sean Abbott's mind at the moment, he must feel completely awful that his delivery not just injured but resulted in the death of an opponent, of a mate. I sincerely hope he gets all the counselling he needs as the early reports are that he has not coped well with the news.
It is not much more than a gesture, but we cancelled our training session tonight at Macquarie Uni CC. Within 30 mins of Hughes' death I requested our President makes sure all our players wear black armbands in our fixtures this weekend and I am sure the same will be done across Sydney Shires and Sydney Grade Cricket.
In the last twelve months the sporting world has had 3 notable head injuries; Michael Schumacher's skiing accident which left him in a coma for months and in a terrible condition for life, Jules Bianchi who collided with a JCB tractor recovering another car at the Japanese GP leaving him in a coma from which he has not woken, and now this.
The death of a sportsman is always tragic, and in such freakish circumstances makes it even more so. All we know is that right now the whole of Australia, and the entire cricket world is in mourning for a bloke who has been described by those around him as an "absolute champion" and there isn't a soul who would argue otherwise. He died playing the sport he loved, he finished his career unbeaten on 63 and thus will forever be NOT OUT.
RIP Phil Hughes. You are already sorely missed and will be for a long time.
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| Forever Not Out |
