Image courtesy of: news.com.au
Hussey feels responsible for causing a split in the team and the infamous scuffle between Clarke and Katich
Legendary Australia batsman Michael Hussey has revealed that his failure to attend a boat party after his final Test match led to a massive split forming in the Australian camp.
In his new book, Underneath the Southern Cross, Hussey conceded that he had told the entire team about his retirement prior to his last Test, which came against Sri Lanka in Sydney at the beginning of the year.
However, Hussey had not known about the boat party captain Michael Clarke had organised months in advance and he did not end up going since he could not take his children due to safety reasons.
In the weeks that followed, rumours and speculation started to emerge that there had been a rift between Hussey and Clarke.
Hussey noted that Shane Watson, Peter Siddle and Nathan Lyon had been concerned by the fact that he was not going to the party, but added that he had already spoken to team manager Gavin Dovey about wanting to stay at the team hotel and spend time with his family.
“All this was pretty straightforward to me,” Hussey wrote. “I said to Gavin, ‘I just want some hours to celebrate with the boys in the dressing room. I don’t want to stop them from having the celebration on the boat’. I said, ‘I reckon the boat will be great for the boys, but after we have our time in the dressing room as a team, I’ll have my time with the family’.
“We had a fantastic time in the dressing room. The team had organised for John Williamson to come in and sing True Blue to us. It was a live-in-person way of calling the team song. Afterwards, the team presented me with a watch and had organised another gift. A few people spoke some really nice words, and then the time came for everyone to go: the team to the boat, and me to my family.
“When we got back to the hotel, the boys had to be downstairs in half an hour to assemble for the boat trip. A few of the support staff had children, so we were all going to meet at the mezzanine and have some pizzas. Unfortunately, when they came down to leave, some of the boys didn’t know about my conversation with Gavin and assumed I was going on the boat.
“Peter Siddle and Nathan Lyon came up to the mezzanine and said, ‘What’s going on? Aren’t you coming?’ I said, ‘I’m staying with the family, but I want you to go, you’ll have a great time’. Sidds, who was now a teetotaller, decided to stay at the hotel. I talked Nathan into going. ‘It’ll be a great experience, you’re part of the team going forward, go on, have a good time’.”
The next morning, Hussey stated that Dovey explained how a split had been forming in the team as some of the players were disappointed to have left Hussey at the hotel, while others were infuriated that he had attended the party.
Immediately after, Hussey went and spoke to Watson and Siddle in hopes of clarifying everything.
“Sidds was fine. He said it was a bit disappointing that the whole team didn’t stay with me, but he accepted it,” Hussey said. “Watto was not so accepting. He was adamant that the team should have changed its plans and stuck with me. I kept telling him, ‘Look, I had no problems, it was fine’. It shouldn’t have been an issue.”
Hussey was also quick to deny that there had been a rift between him and Clarke, stating that the Australian captain had been “very empathetic”.
The 38-year-old also feels that he was responsible for the infamous dressing room scuffle between Clarke and batsman Simon Katich.
After Australia’s win over South Africa, Hussey was put in charge of the team song and determining when it would be sung.
“Every half-hour or so, [team manager] Steve Bernard kept coming up to me and saying, ‘Huss, when are you going to sing the song?’ I was having a good time, and in the mood to sit for a while, and said, ‘Brutus, every time you ask me, I’m going to add another 15 minutes on to it’,” Hussey wrote. “I didn’t realise that Michael Clarke had organised a bar for the post-dressing room celebrations. Feeling under time pressure, he was asking Steve to get me to hurry up and sing the song.
“I wished in hindsight that he’d come up to me and said, ‘Huss, can we sing the song, we need to hurry up and go’. I would have been more than happy to sing the song straight away and let them go. While I was completely oblivious to Pup’s mounting panic, Kato was on the other side of the room with a clear view of Pup talking to Steve Bernard and getting frustrated.
“Then, out of nowhere they came together in the middle of the room. There was a big confrontation and I thought, what the hell is going on? This had come out of nowhere. We’d all been having a laugh and a chat. It got broken up pretty quickly. Kato was put back down in his seat and Pup left the dressing room altogether. We were all in a bit of shock. I certainly didn’t know what the hell had gone on. Kato was very apologetic.
“It was the first Test match for Doug Bollinger and Andrew McDonald — who had, coincidentally, replaced Andrew Symonds, who’d played his last Test in Melbourne. Kato was saying to each of them, ‘I’m really sorry for what happened. I just want you to enjoy this win, I’m really sorry, I don’t want to ruin your first Test match’. Andrew McDonald broke the ice beautifully. He said, ‘Don’t worry, mate, this happens all the time in Victoria’. Everyone burst out laughing and cheering.
“We all started drinking again and didn’t think about it. I said, ‘We’d better get this song done.’ Half an hour later I called it, and asked Brute, ‘Where’s Pup?’ ‘He’s gone.” I felt completely responsible. I felt it was a black mark against my name that one of our brothers was missing for the team song. We’d won the Test match together, but he was gone. I felt dreadful about it, and the next morning tried calling him but couldn’t get through. I sent him messages. He eventually got back and said it wasn’t my fault, don’t worry, he’d sort out his differences with Kato.”