Herein lies the nature of sport, these three: Physical endurance capabilities; Emotionally balanced with a supportive family; Politically within the loop.
These three are touted as key ingredients to all successful elite athletes and perhaps the most important, as strange as it might seem, is the third.
The first two are mandatory and depend largely upon the elite athlete and his surroundings from childhood all the way through to the years of prowess. A dedication to training and physical well-being is certainly that of the athlete's endeavours whereas strong family support with encouragement and stability are incredibly important.
As elite athletes get to their more mature sporting years, and as children come along, so too the demands upon the athlete is greater – regardless of the sport – motor racing, golf, cricket, football, hockey, netball, basketball, track and field, the ruggers' and so the list can go on. Here a supportive spouse along with the wider family becomes imperative to a calm emotional situation.
What is nigh impossible to control is the politics. Sporting history recounts time and time again where the first two were in order, but the third was in melt down and the reasons are legion and sometimes quite unfathomable.
It could be that a selector or a coach or an administrator, or a Board member's spouse or whoever, takes a dislike to an athlete. Or the athlete has overstepped an unsaid 'mark in the sand' which has got somebody's nose out of joint. The reason may make some sort of sense, or it may be completely bewildering to the athlete, their supporters and the media commentators.
Sporting commentators have made a life time's work out of deciphering such anomalies whereby they examine and study very closely the drama behind the scenes, as it were. Quite often they smell a rat and follow it to its source only to find that it might well be in the realms of defamation to spell out the realities. Or maybe it's simply a case of an athlete having reached their zenith and now their looking to the future to blood someone afresh although the athlete in question is performing well and within the stated parameters of retention.
There is a case to be made for those coming up through the system who forcibly break through to the elite ranks by sheer persistence of performance. Someone has to make way for such prejudice talent and an older athlete maybe in the wrong spot at the wrong time just as the younger athlete is in the right spot at the right time.
In recent years since the Mark Taylor and Steve Waugh captaincy eras and the post retirement of seven or eight top line national cricketers, Australia's performances have been scrutinised hither and thither.
Cricket commentators have given their two-penneth over several years now, and all three factors mentioned above have come into play with this or that cricketer. Australian cricket is in transitory period and the lack of a settled combination has created much disharmony, not least there are now three forms of the game and three quite separate Australian cricket teams.
This is the nature of sport. There will be cricketers who feel they have not been given a fair go. There will be those who many feel have been there too long. There will be those who some believe were given the baggy green too early. In fact, such have been the calamities that a special task force was established by Cricket Australia to make some far reaching recommendations.
This is the nature of sport. And as sport is a reflection of life, so too is it a reflection of what happens in the corporate world, at the work place, in politics, with relatives and within one's own family. But one day, all will be revealed where all such great wrongs will be identified for the entire world to see, accompanied by a great shame and hopefully the words of Jesus: " …….. is mine". The alternative is too horrible to contemplate.
As the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years to 2000 and as from 2001 'Life After Cricket', my message is one of hope, forgiveness and reconciliation with the Saviour, Jesus. Without such an expectation, he who has the most toys wins, and such a theology and philosophy creates a world without any hope.