'Angry' Harris defends team culture

Recently retired Australia paceman has reacted strongly to rumours of unrest within the Australian cricket team as well as criticism of exiting captain Michael Clarke.

Clarke himself described various reports citing poor relations within the team, and the negative influence of wives and girlfriends on the tour as “absolute garbage”, and he found strong support in his former teammate.

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“Firstly there’s not a meltdown in the Australian team, I can tell you that,” Harris said on SEN’s The Run Home. “That’s a lie as well.

“All these things I’ve been reading … I’ve had to hold the thumb on tweeting some of this stuff, because it’s been really, really … it makes me pretty angry to be honest.”

Harris said he was disappointed by various statements in the media criticising Clarke’s character in different ways, but honed in on quotes from former national coach John Buchanan, who said he felt Clarke may not have wanted to adopt the ‘Baggy Green culture’.

“Players like Steve Waugh, Adam Gilchrist, Ricky Ponting and others really tried to make the 'Baggy Green culture’ something special, but I could sense it was under threat and under Michael's captaincy I can sense it has disappeared a bit and that disappointed me," Buchanan told News Ltd.

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"I can remember guys like (Matthew) Hayden and (Justin) Langer sitting him down in a corner and trying to get him to understand what we were trying to achieve.

"There were times when I felt Michael did not understand or did not want to understand.”

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Harris said Buchanan, who left the post in January 2007 – some three years into Clarke’s time in the side – had perhaps not judged the 114-Test veteran on his entire time in the Australian set-up.

“There’s a couple of Queensland boys up here have come out – Andrew Symonds and Matthew Hayden – I haven’t read everything they’ve said, I just switch off,” he said.

“One that has angered me be a bit is John Buchanan, the way he came out and slammed him (Clarke). What John’s got to probably realise is that when he had Michael Clarke he was 21, 22, 23 years old, whatever he was, he was young.

“We’ve all been there, we all know how we act at times when we’re younger.

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“He’s a guy that came into a team full of absolute legends, and they took him under his wing. He would’ve felt pretty good, he would’ve felt pretty special. He was earning good money … you’re allowed to mature over life, that’s what I would have thought and that’s what I’ve done and that’s what Michael Clarke has done.

“To hear John Buchancan come out and say that, an ex-coach, was very, very disappointing.

“Everyone’s entitled to their opinion, but to bash a guy after he’s retired and say that sort of stuff was really disappointing.

“‘Detracting from the Baggy Green’ I think (were some of) Buchanan’s words, that’s just ridiculous – his life was the Baggy Green. I think you should pick and choose what you say sometimes about some people, especially the Australian captain.”

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Harris, whose 27-Test career ended when he pulled out of the current Ashes tour before a Test had been played, said Clarke was as good as any leader he had played with.  

“I played under Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke, two of the best captains I’ve played under, along with Darren Lehmann when I played with him,” he said.  

“(Clarke) did a great job. There were times in the last few years when everyone thought Michael Clarke was gone; he was copping it on and off the field, and he’d stand up and put performances together that were just unbelievable.

“And us as a team, seeing our leader do that, it spurred the guys on.

“When he was under the pump, that innings in South Africa (Cape Town, 2014) when he broke his elbow and all that – they’re the things that, when you look at your leader, that’s what you want, and that’s what he did.” 

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