Cricket legend Mark Taylor fears he and fellow former players are being ostracised by the current crop of Test stars.
His comments came a day after his former teammate Justin Langer quit as coach of Australia’s men’s teams, following a meeting with Cricket Australia heavies on Friday at which he was reportedly offered a measly six-month contract extension.
In the hours after the Langer bombshell dropped, hordes of his one-time Test teammates came out all guns blazing, taking aim at Cricket Australia and at the players who failed to publicly back their coach.
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The most scathing came from firebrand quick Mitchell Johnson, who labelled Test captain Pat Cummins “gutless” in a fiery newspaper column.
Taylor is also unhappy with the current playing group, who he believes agitated for Langer to be ousted following a tense 12 months that began with last summer’s dismal loss against India.
“The problem at the moment is the current crop of players are creating a divide between them and the older players,” Taylor told Nine’s Today.
“Ricky Ponting’s not happy, Steve Waugh’s not happy, I’m not happy, none of us are happy because of the way the game has been dragged through the mud.
“People like Justin Langer, who has just gone into the Hall of Fame, has been dragged through the mud. That disappoints us all.
“The players have to be careful in that regard that they don’t isolate the rest of us from jobs like this.
“Ricky Ponting is going to be very hard to get (as the new coach). I think he would be great for the job, but is he going to want to jump into the shoes of Justin Langer?”
The players’ concerns with Langer were aired mid-last year, when Cricket Australia mediated a discussion between the coach, Cummins, then-Test captain Tim Paine, and white-ball skipper Aaron Finch.
It was there that Langer agreed to relinquish some coaching duties and hand some power back to the players.
Taylor believes the issues should have been ended then and there, rather than fester to the point Langer decided to quit in anger.
“It’s extremely disappointing to say the least,” Taylor said.
“This has been brewing since July or August last year, when there was player unrest about the way Justin Langer approached his coaching, and the way he conversed with players.
“Most of us hoped it was sorted out last year over a few frank discussions, which is the way it should have been handled. It shouldn’t have been handled through the media.
“The disappointing thing from Cricket Australia’s point of view is they obviously knew about this, and it seems to me Justin Langer’s cards were already marked, he was going to finish up this year.
“It would have been really nice for the game of cricket for Justin Langer to depart a much nicer way than him resigning… that’s the disappointing thing for me.
“I think all people involved in this – it’s not just Cricket Australia, it’s the players and it’s their representatives – need to do far more of this discussing around positions and the way they’re going to play the game… done behind closed doors, not through the media.”
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