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But for now, just relax.
I'm Mike Boris and this is Straight Talk.
I've never said this publicly, but what you've experienced in your life,
I mean, obviously, you've been punished.
Do you have regrets about it or do you just fuck it, just move on?
What happened with me, say, 2018, I had a lot of people calling me names.
At the end of the day, for me,
it's about how can I get better from that situation?
And it's a mindset thing.
It stems from how I grew up.
Tell me about Dave Warner, the young kid.
Like, where'd you live? Where'd you grow up?
For us, we lived in like a townhouse.
There was a lot of stuff going on in that area.
There was domestic violence.
There was drug abuse.
There was, you know, people coming out of prison.
And, you know, we had a great upbringing.
But it was how did you learn to survive there?
How did Dave Warner become a cricketer?
When I look back, my brother, who was seven years older than me,
throwing balls against the wall,
and hitting them, and playing cricket with each other,
that's where the hard work started.
What do you want to be remembered for?
Do you want to play cricket for Australia?
You want the bag of green?
You've got to work hard.
You know, only 11 players can take that field.
Dave Warner, welcome to Straight Talk, mate.
My God, I'm so, I'm really happy you're here.
And I'm actually, to be frank with you,
I'm actually thrilled that I,
if I could just take away Dave Warner, the bloke,
and talk about it.
I'm thrilled about Dave Warner, the celebrity and the legend.
I'm thrilled with the celebrity and the legend dude
sitting right opposite me.
I know Dave Warner is a much more humble person than that,
and we'll talk about that in a moment.
But I'm actually thrilled that I got that dude in front of me today.
Thanks very much for coming in, mate.
So, I should give you an update.
One, you know, you probably heard last night,
and I don't know when this is going to go to air,
but our mate Spencer, our new recruit, got eight weeks.
We're pretty knocked about.
I can tell you now I've spoken to him, he's not a racist,
but pretty tricky, the world of sport.
And you come from that world.
What is right and what is considered to be ethically right?
What is the current narrative?
How people get punished?
And when do they seek out to, the administration seek out to,
sort of, not make an example or something,
but prove to the public that supports them that,
that they are doing the, let's call it, the right thing.
So, I wasn't surprised with the Spencer Leenu the number of weeks.
He got eight weeks.
I'm not surprised.
What do you think about that in terms of what you've experienced in your life?
I mean, obviously, you've been punished about over the top stuff.
Did you have regrets about it or do you just, fuck it, just move on?
Yeah, look, it's a complex situation.
With today, in general, with everything.
So, I think the main focus is being educated.
That's a good point.
So, if you're educated in the process that's there, they facilitate that,
you've got to take all that on board and then there's no excuses.
Whose responsibility, though, is to use just, that's a good point.
Whose responsibility is it, for example, in relation to,
let's pick on racism for the moment in rugby league or in sport generally,
but rugby league.
Whose responsibility?
Whose responsibility is to build the education process?
In other words, how's it, I'm not asking you to build out the protocol,
but how's it supposed to be taught to these young guys?
Because the young guys, they might not know calling someone a monkey
is actually racist.
Literally might not know that.
We might assume they should know.
How's that education process and in particular in relation to what you got
charged with, how's that education thing rolled out
and whose responsibility?
What is that for?
I think it goes back to the first part there, Mark,
is about how you grow up as well.
So, you might have mates that feel like you can call each other whatever you want.
But then when you move out of sort of that phase of you're mates and then you're
on the field and you're playing against people that you don't know,
you probably can't make comment about certain things like that.
And I think the education process stems with, for us, it's Cricket Australia.
They put the rules and regulations in place.
You get educated on these topics.
But then as upon yourself, there's a responsibility of what am I as a person?
What language do I choose to use against people?
And you have to be mindful.
You have to be very mindful to bite your tongue around a lot of issues.
It's not just racism.
It's everything as a whole with the world that we're living in today.
And, you know, you go back to your last point there about what happened with me,
say 2018, I had a lot of people calling me names.
I had a lot of people calling me everything.
But at the end of the day, for me, it's about how can I get better from that situation?
How do I turn the tables on?
I'm not that person.
I'm actually a very generous person, a very kind person.
And I've got three beautiful kids and a beautiful wife.
Now, how can I move forward from this situation?
And it's a mindset thing.
And I think for me, it's about how I grew up.
And it stems from there.
And that's always stuck with me in the back of my mind.
So to educate others.
I think it's a responsibility of each individual to be brutally honest.
So that's very interesting.
So that's a fairly mature point of view.
And maturity is a sort of correlated to age and experiences and a lot of other things.
And also who's in your corner.
Who's talking to you?
Managers and parents and brothers and sisters and that sort of stuff.
And you said that's sort of how you grew up.
Can I go back to that?
So tell me about Dave Warner, the young kid, like where'd you live?
Where'd you grow up?
Where'd you go to school?
Brothers and sisters?
Yeah, look, I grew up in Matreville, a suburb here in the eastern suburbs, a lot of housing
Souths claim it for themselves, mate.
They claim me, that's for sure.
But no, we grew up in housing commission.
There was a lot of housing commission opportunities around us.
I have an older brother, seven years, Steven, my mum and dad, Lorraine.
And housing commission.
So for us, we lived in like a townhouse, but that townhouse had 39 other townhouses with
us and it was a community and it was so different.
Like we were very family orientated.
There's probably another five or six or so families that were very family orientated.
Then the others was, it was domestic violence.
There was drug abuse.
There was, you know, people coming out of prison.
There was a lot of stuff going on in that area.
But then on the other side, you have multi-million dollar houses.
So as a kid, you're growing up in the townhouses and, you know, we had a great upbringing, but
it was, how did you learn to survive there?
Well, how did you learn to survive?
Well, I had a few guys that were in sort of my corner that were my mates into other different
things, which, you know, I could have went down that way and it was, would have ended
But in saying that, that was early doors.
That was like 12, 13, 14 years of age.
But I have so much respect for my parents and so did these guys.
And they were older than me.
They were probably four or five years older than me.
They had a lot of respect for my parents.
Never, ever looked to engage me with anything that they were doing.
And I appreciated that in the day.
But then when you get a little bit older and you're thinking, gee, these guys are getting
cash and all this kind of stuff and I'm busting my ass.
I was doing the paper run.
You were an actual paper boy?
With the whistle?
Up and down the street?
I was an annoying little boy.
Yeah, I remember that.
Actually, pretty good Sunday morning.
And, you know, you have to start somewhere.
But that goes back to building like a relationship as well.
Went to Woolworths, packing shells up until I was 21.
And then from there, it was more about my circle of friends.
I've met new people in my life, people that are on the straight and narrow.
Do you leave behind them or do you still keep in touch?
I was always in touch with these guys.
Still when I played for Australia.
And then it sort of from there was almost like a perception or his mates are here and
his mates are there.
And that's where the switch sort of turned for me when I was about 27,
And my circle of friends condensed quite a lot.
And that was more sometimes on their behalf.
They said it was probably the better option.
From your point of view.
From my point of view.
And for what I wanted to do in my life.
And they always knew I was going to be a cricket player.
And I always wanted to do that.
So that's always sat with me.
I keep in touch here and there.
But where I am today, my circle of friends have come down significantly.
In terms of numbers.
Because you can't be friends with everybody because it takes a lot to keep
all the relationships going.
Just like literally turning up for a beer or a lunch or whatever the case may be.
Or just keeping in contact with people.
Especially in your case as you broaden.
People are sort of probably trying to attach themselves to you all the time for something.
And it might be for your benefit.
Can I just peel back a little bit though?
That level of maturity or that level of understanding of relationships.
Did your mum use to tell you this?
What your dad used to tell you this?
And what were the circumstances if you don't mind sharing?
What were the circumstances by which you guys found yourselves in the housing commission?
It was more around mum and dad's income at the stage.
Dad was in sales.
Did it for a long time.
But in general, they couldn't afford to buy a house or to rent.
So we managed to get government assistance and rent off the government,
which housing commission is.
And my mum, you know, she's just such a special human being.
She was an aged care nurse for 30, 35 years.
And we all know the wages in that are very, very minimal.
And at that stage, they were really low.
But my mum never complained once about her wages.
Never complained about anything.
Always had a smile on her face.
Came home, made our dinner.
We obviously had to help around the house with our washing and all that stuff.
And specifically playing cricket in whites.
But she only just recently retired.
And she's very, very happy.
And the happiest part of my moment was,
to get my mum and dad out of housing commission.
And that was always stuck in the back of my mind.
It was to work hard.
And if I'm going to work as hard as I can and I come into money,
that was the most important thing to me.
So they're both alive still?
And they're still together?
Yep, they're still together.
They live in Matreville.
And you bought them a house in Matta?
I bought them a unit.
Bought them a unit, 2010, 11, I think it might have been.
Bought that off the plan.
And then I think they moved into 13, 214.
I don't know if you've ever had the opportunity,
but let's say we've got the opportunity now,
because there'll be a couple hundred thousand people
listening to this, easy.
Want to give them a shout out?
What would you say to them?
What would you say to your mum and dad?
Oh, that I love them.
I think what's important, as you were just elaborating before
about getting older, just hug your parents.
Because you just don't know when the day's going to go.
And my parents are 70 and 68.
And you've got to cherish these moments.
The last 15 years, I've been travelling on the road all the time,
constantly coming home.
And as you said, trying to catch up with people.
I try my best to catch up with my parents quite a bit, my brother.
But life takes you on different journeys, right?
So we're time poor.
But you should be able to always make time for your parents.
That's important.
That's pretty cool.
Because now you're a parent.
Obviously, you've got your own brood.
And you've got your lovely wife, Candice.
And I'll talk about that in a moment.
But I'm actually curious.
During that whole conversation then, you never mentioned cricket.
You just mentioned your whites.
How did Dave Warner become a cricketer?
Or what's the deal around that?
I know you love your rugby league.
And we should put it out there straight up.
He's a rooster's diehard.
Even though he grew up in Matcheville, he's a rooster's diehard.
Where did you go to school?
Matcheville Public and then Ramek Boyce.
Well, there's a dispute over the territory.
But, you know, we'll take it at this stage.
He was a rooster.
But how did you become a mad – I'm talking in terms of skill,
but a mad cricketer.
What was the influence there?
I think when I look back, my brother, who was seven years older than me,
played with Arslan Khawaja, who is Usman Khawaja's brother.
And we both were just like playing up a way of the oval,
throwing balls against the wall and hitting them
and playing cricket with each other.
And I think it stems from there.
I think having a –
a brother that's older than you on that path of trying to play cricket
professionally, you learn a lot.
And I think because he is seven years older than me, I learned a lot.
And it wasn't just cricket ability.
He had the gift and the talent.
It was just more, I think, for him, that next level.
We talk about maturity.
We talk about in between your ears, which is your head,
making sure your mind's in it.
If your mind's not in it, you get distracted.
And then that deters you away from your talent and your gift.
And that's playing cricket.
And I think he, at some stage, sort of flicked the switch around 22, 23
and went into sort of apprenticeships.
And I think he found ease with that.
He did come through a generation of, you know, Stuart Clark, Michael Slater,
Corey Richards, a few other guys, the Ward brothers.
So he had quite a tough task ahead of him to try and sort of get into that
sort of New South Wales setup.
For me, it was just about trying to ride his journey as well for him.
And, yeah, so it happened to be I played down at East Career Club,
which was Waverley at that time.
Was it Greg Matthews around there?
Yeah, Greg Matthews.
I played my first third grade game with him at 16, I think.
It was a different experience, I must say.
Definitely a different experience.
But, yeah, from 16 years of age, I got my first great opportunity,
played with a few guys, Mark Patterson, Adrian Tucker.
Paddo was my first captain.
I played with some really cool men.
And when I say men, that's where we are today in our sport,
where we've got a lot of kids coming through.
Because Paddo would be 20 years, more than 20 years old.
He would have been 35, 36 at that time,
just coming back from New South Wales state stuff.
But what that says to me is that we don't have enough time
to come back and play great cricket anymore.
But that's where you grow as a kid.
You grow with playing with men.
At the moment, you've got all these different sports,
a lot of kids coming through.
But that's why you've got to hold on to the experience.
And the experienced guys like myself, whether it's cricket, rugby,
rugby league, AFL, we need to hang on to try and teach these kids
that it's not easy.
You have to put in hard work.
And from when I was eight, nine years of age watching my brother,
that's where the hard work started.
But you enjoyed it.
Was it hard work?
In the sense that it was grueling?
Or was it hard work in the sense that you had to be committed?
You had to be committed.
But the best thing for me was I was just having fun.
And I still today, still today, go to my game of cricket
thinking I'm playing with my mates.
That's all it is.
There, I'm having fun.
My job now is being a dad and being a husband.
That's my job now.
That's pretty cool.
So that's how I've always seen cricket.
I've always seen cricket as I'm still going to go have a beer.
I'm still going to go out for dinner.
It doesn't matter.
I don't care if it's day two of a test match.
I'm still going to do these things because I'm still living.
I've got to live my life.
And that's how I've always seen my life from a kid growing up.
I've not really cared about anyone's opinion.
I don't care what people think or say.
I'm about me and doing what I can do best.
And that's what I have to do for my family and me.
So can I ask you a question then?
And you probably know this from me, but like, you know,
our coach Robbo and previous coach said they know they're going to play opposition.
And they do a fair bit of analytics on who they're playing against.
And in your case, it's probably even more focused because, you know,
you know who you're going to be batting against, for example.
So I was going to say, do you, not obsess, but do you get into the detail?
So I'm going to be facing up against so-and-so.
I know what he does when he throws the ball.
And then do you then go off and practice in the nets or somewhere defending
or attacking that particular type of style?
I mean, is it like the fights, like styles win fights?
Is it like that when it comes to cricket?
For a batsman facing a bowler, bowling styles win the day.
How does it work?
Two guys specifically would be Marnus Labouchagne and Steve Smith.
They're constantly looking to – their way of playing cricket is by batting time
in the nets and figuring out all that kind of stuff.
For me, early doors, I was facing the bowlers in the nets,
doing everything I could, work hard, present yourself.
When you play for a long time at the highest level, for me, it was switching off.
How do you mean switching off?
So switching off, not thinking about who I'm coming up against,
not thinking about where the guy's going to bowl the ball.
I already know that.
So I want to know that when I'm walking out to the middle,
that's when I want to go, all right, I'm on.
I'm in the arena now.
That's when I focus.
If I focus too much about before I go into that arena,
your mind, like you won't be able to sleep.
You won't be able to think straight.
You go to practice and you start practicing things
that you just wouldn't.
When I go to practice, I practice volume,
practice hitting the ball in the middle of the bat,
getting my timing right.
That's all I focus on.
I don't focus about-
Things you can control.
That's the only thing I can control.
Because at the end of the day,
I find you want to keep perfecting your perfections, right?
You want to keep getting better at what you do better.
If you want to work on your weaknesses,
you're actually putting the other stuff to the side.
So I've always thought my weaknesses are always going to be there.
It's how do I sort of-
Get it out with that weakness.
What can I do to negate that?
Not about how am I going to tackle that.
I need to worry about my cover drive and my pull shot
and my reverse sweeps.
That's all I have to worry about.
Because your weaknesses, I find, if you put too much focus on that,
you'll end up still playing those kind of shots.
You'll still look to be defensive.
I'm an attacking player.
If I look to be defensive, I might as well just kick them over
It's funny you should say because it's a bit like-
That's one of the reasons I gave golf up because I started
taking golf lessons and I was more confused.
I was more confused.
I was more confused after golf lessons than I was before.
I was hitting the ball better before.
And it's so much to bloody think about.
And like I was getting brain damage from thinking about this shit,
So would it be fair to say you're like an instinctive,
instinctive batsman?
In other words, you sort of play what's in front of you.
And that's why I always talk about to the younger guys,
whenever they ask me for any advice or what do I do with training,
they always say, you know, what do you do with hitting?
I say, if I'm not in any good form,
which I mean out of runs, I hate the word form,
I would say less is more.
What do you mean less is more?
Meaning that take your mind away from it.
Go do something outside of it.
If you've got a main session, you go to your main session,
you do what you have to do, whether it's catches,
you know, I have a light hit.
Don't think you have to hit for an hour and a half.
I only hit for probably half an hour to 45 minutes max.
One session I'll probably do for an hour and a half leading
into a test match just to get volume of concentration,
a bit of fatigue with a newborn.
And watch the ball swing.
But all the other stuff, I go play golf.
As you said, you don't like it.
It's brain damage.
It's tough, right?
A lot of the cricketers play golf.
But take your mind away from the game.
That's the best thing that you can do if you find yourself out of runs.
Get yourself away from it.
Do something you enjoy outside of what you love doing,
which is cricket.
And then you'll find that your narrow point,
you'll come together.
You'll be right here in the moment.
Because when you go walk,
go out in that arena,
that's when it all comes to you.
Everything outside of that,
you don't have a worry in the world.
So just put your cricket down.
Go enjoy yourself.
Have a cup of coffee.
And just embrace what living's about.
How does, when you're a kid,
how do you manage this part?
So when you're a kid,
you're doing it with your brother,
and you've got Usman Khuraj's older brother,
and no doubt Usman was there too.
And you're all having fun.
You're sort of, you know,
at the nets or fucking around somewhere.
you might have a stump
and you might be hitting a tennis ball
or something like that.
hitting up against the wall.
And then playing cricket
and enjoying yourself.
you might be club cricket at school
or whatever the case may be.
Then you're off to East later on.
Do you remember the time
when you differentiated to when
you're having fun
to when it became a profession?
Do you remember the moments
where all of a sudden
this became Dave Warner?
Everyone's watching you.
this is your career, mate.
Really compared to
you just having fun up to that point
or has it never been the case?
It's never been the case.
I look back and just say
I sort of fell into
sort of everything that I've done.
when you make the under 19s
that's when people say,
that's where you start getting serious.
Because that next step
now when I mean men,
you're playing against
very experienced players.
to guys that are 37, 38.
James Anderson's still playing
So you've got that time frame.
You could have three years
that are pathetic
I want to get away from it.
it was just more focusing
rocking up on the weekend,
playing with my mates,
going to training Tuesday,
Thursday afternoons
and just loving the game.
And I did work hard back then.
I worked a lot on my game
and you only had probably
15, 20 minutes in,
in great cricket in the nets.
And I think that's probably
why I've started training like that
because you only had those moments
and there was the only part
you could get better.
I had half an hour a week
to try and get better
for the Saturday.
So I sort of emulated that
the hard work that went in between
from 19 to say 23, 24
when I got my first contract,
there was a lot of,
a lot of hard work.
And you do need some luck.
You do need some people to fail,
you to score runs,
people to see you,
you're scoring runs.
And in the next level,
Brad Haddon always said to me,
you're 100 away from that next step.
And it always starts,
yeah, you're one 100 runs
away from the next step
because then your name's up here.
So you're identified as a young seed
if you've got talent.
That's one thing.
had the character
and the charisma as well
to like, you know,
put it out there.
And I was always that sort of,
I won't say attack dog,
but I was always that bullish kid
that wanted to get into
So I'd hit a ball
going past the bowler
or something like that.
Just to egg the bowler on,
just to come at me a little bit.
And I really enjoyed that
But then you've got to,
as the next steps get higher and higher
and then you get your,
your bag of greens
or my first game was a 2020 game
for Australia before that.
That's when you go,
I'm with the big boys.
And then it's like,
you've got to try
and your level comes back down here again.
It's like you're restarting again.
because they're all better than you
They're more experienced than you.
They'll be there forever.
And you've got to earn respect as well.
Kind of come in there
being who I am today.
It just doesn't work.
Were you a cheeky bastard?
And when you said,
you obviously give me
a little bit of a sledge
as you just said to the bowler,
you hit a nice shot,
blah, blah, blah.
how important is,
in your career at least,
given that you are,
it's already saying that you,
you are not the technician
sort of build up this,
this big program.
So people are not going to say,
Dave Morton is like
the most crazy trainer
in the whole competition.
How important then was it
for you to get on
and sort of display
your personality,
like as being aggressive,
not taking a backward step.
How important was that?
And were you conscious of that?
I wasn't conscious of it.
it probably led to me
to some discretions
with some players on the field.
I think sometimes what happens is
massive family of friends.
So now when you play
international cricket,
you have probably played
four or five of those people
and you've shared the change rooms.
so now I look back going,
could I have been that same person
Would I have got here today
if I wasn't that person
That's what got me going
when I was out there.
And I've said this before,
if it wasn't for my wife,
I definitely wouldn't be here
Going back then too?
so going back then,
I was going out a little bit.
When I say a little bit,
I was going to pubs and stuff
and having a drink and whatnot.
I had an indiscretion
Candice reached out to me again.
I could sort of see
with the players back then
who have families and stuff,
why they weren't going out,
how everything was treated
Because I just thought,
I'm having the best time of my life.
I'm playing for my country.
I was in England at the time
how good is this?
why wouldn't I go out?
Why wouldn't I make the most of it?
I don't understand
what's wrong with it.
why people are giving you advice,
why they're telling you,
you've got to get up for training,
you shouldn't be training hungover,
all this kind of stuff.
as each year went along,
the process has changed.
Do you have a mentor?
Did you have a mentor during that period?
Is there some one person
or a couple of people?
I don't know this,
but I sort of recall it,
Billy Anderson was pretty close
And I know Billy,
he's an ex-coach,
He coached me in footy,
he was a very good rugby player.
He had a car accident
and he couldn't run anymore.
But he kicked back,
he went back into his cricket.
was there someone like that
I have a really close
called Wayne Gieber.
played cricket with my brother,
grew up with him.
he's a fitness trainer.
I could always lean on.
my manager at the time,
who sadly passed away,
As in player manager?
player manager at the time.
came over to England with me,
with both of them.
we're getting out of England.
there's too much media.
Let's go to France for the day.
I went out of France
and I got the tube
I think it was St. Pancreas.
we arrived at 9.30 in the morning
and we're walking up to
the Champs-Élysées.
three champagnes.
And they both said to me,
the reason we're over here
stop you drinking
and get you straight back on the,
that we need you to get on.
they looked at me and just said,
That's the person you are.
you take this on board
what's just happened
we know where you're going to go with this.
You're going to be fine.
But we have to come here
and give you advice
and speak to you.
And they were very comforting.
It was one of the
greatest couple of days
And I really enjoyed that.
probably from there,
when I started talking to Candice,
everything started to gel.
So it was like three people
that just came together
this is what you got to do.
This is what you have to do.
Do you think you've had a,
it sounds like you've had a sort of,
things sort of happen to you
at the right times
when you need it.
you need luck in the game.
But that's sort of,
do you think you made your luck though?
Do you think you made your luck
being the person that you are,
making yourself attractive to,
you're just talking about
your manager agent
and your brother's mate
and also made yourself attractive
to say someone like Candice
was an accomplished sports person.
Do you think it was because
you made yourself attractive
and you attracted,
just attracted the right people
or do you think it's just,
or that's absolute luck
you blessed yourself for?
I think you do attract
people with your personality as well.
that's why personalities clash.
You're never going to,
you're never going to have
two of the same of me.
That would probably be impossible
in the same group of friends.
But at that time,
it was what I needed
and it showed to me
the genuine care that people have
as we're talking about before
they want you to succeed.
They want the best for you.
But it's how you react to
what they're telling you
momentum from what they're saying.
Candice is an accomplished sports person herself
and individually,
individual sport.
When she came into my life
and saw that I was
a drink after the game
and go out and have dinner
and this and that
and sleep until 10,
11 o'clock in the morning,
you're wasting your morning,
you're wasting like five hours
that you can be getting better.
from that day that we started training,
I started getting up at five in the morning
because she was already out
by 4.30 going to swimming.
it took me about a week.
It took me about a week
let's just go to the gym.
And I'd go to the gym,
wow, how good is today?
And it sort of just stuck with me
the whole entire one until today.
It still sticks with me now.
I think it was very interesting
what you just said, Dave.
It's really, really interesting.
And I was just thinking back through then.
There's something
because Candice was swimming at Cranbrook,
because my son was,
one of my sons is the same age as her.
I think he might be a year younger than her.
And I was in the same squad at Cranbrook there.
They used to train with,
I can't remember his name,
and he used to do a 4.30.
So over many years,
swimmers like Candice,
because she was a swimmer
before she was doing other stuff
they developed this discipline
of getting out of bed at 4.30 in the morning,
getting to training at five
and training for the thing,
backing up again in the afternoon.
And then during the school holidays,
when everyone else is out drinking,
they're competing on Saturday mornings.
And so they couldn't get Friday night.
Sunday was their own,
pretty much their only day off.
They have this incredible discipline
around their life.
mates of mine who played
high level cricket,
cricketers are generally speaking,
to be honest with you,
they're being disrespectful,
it's undisciplined.
Because it's a sort of a different life.
You know, you start later,
you don't have to be as fit.
It's not as disciplined as swimming, for example.
Swimming is like an extreme thing.
Going up and down the same,
up and down the pool,
looking at the dotted line.
I don't know how, you know,
I don't know how my son did it,
but like he did it.
meeting someone like that,
as opposed to her being attracted to you,
you meeting a person like that
with that discipline,
how important is that
in terms of changing your life?
Because you just said
she started getting you up early,
you know, getting up 10, 11 o'clock in the morning.
If you're going to get up early,
you can't go to bed late.
Well, you can't have as many beers, et cetera.
And you started to work shit out.
How important was that?
Very, very important.
I think Candice fell pregnant with our first child.
I stopped drinking for two years.
Three girls, how many?
Three girls, yeah.
I stopped drinking for two years.
And she was like,
I only did it because when she fell pregnant,
when Candice fell pregnant,
I might as well just do nine months with you.
I'm going to stop drinking.
I'll just keep training and whatnot.
See if I feel any different.
But backing up from each game,
you probably didn't feel a lot different,
but your mind was a lot clearer.
And I really enjoyed that.
But a small sacrifice for a bigger gain,
okay, I'm going to try that.
I'm going to try and do that.
And it was a conversation with a mate as well
when I was over in New York,
coming back from a trip overseas.
And he said the same thing to me.
why don't you just stop drinking?
Stop drinking for a couple of years.
whether it's 12 months,
and just see what value you get out of it.
I think the value I got out of that
was actually I don't need to go,
when I say I bend,
I don't need to get on the piss
like every Friday night.
I don't need to have 30 drinks a night.
I can still have,
so what I did was I actually got into wine,
got into vodka and beer business,
which actually I understood what,
drinking was all about.
It's actually just,
it's a social thing,
wine or so with Candice.
She's not a big drinker at all.
She doesn't like it.
from there we sort of,
enjoy to drink together.
And then I didn't have an,
I didn't need to go out and have these,
Sunday nights out
and then try and play cricket.
Because it's so important to have a partner
who's like-minded to you.
Like if they're a piss head,
more likely to become a piss head.
I'm going to ask you an obvious question
because like I grew up in the Western Lake.
it's just an obvious question.
you grew up in the housing commission
Matreville was sort of,
these days it's pretty fancy,
but those days it wasn't.
And a bit like where I grew up,
you could have gone either way.
you probably got mates
who were just still on the drink,
still doing six schooners a day
down at the local pub.
Why didn't you become the typical dude?
Why didn't you become the typical Matreville guy
and I know in my case why I didn't,
why didn't you become that person?
Because I reckon I always wanted to be
it's funny because I always had,
it's going to be weird,
but I had Michael Schumacher
why I was attracted,
why I was attracted to them.
That's interesting.
It was more the thrill.
zoom around on the track,
and make sure I was watching.
I don't follow it passionately,
but it was just them,
that really stuck in the back of my mind.
But the goal for that was
I wanted the car.
So I had an ambition of mine
how am I going to get that car?
So I had to work hard,
try and do something in life
because I wasn't,
I wasn't great at school.
I didn't have the attention,
the span of probably a goldfish.
I just like literally,
what can I do with my skills?
Now I was athletic.
I had the capability
and I had a discipline of work
because I was working at Woolworths.
So I had all those things
I've got to do something with my life
and if I could do that,
that was through cricket.
But I played multi sports
up until I was about 18,
And I think that was probably the key
because then you gave yourself options,
your hand and your eyes
with different sports.
So I think that's probably
what led me into cricket
and sort of knuckling down
because I grew in Georgia.
So cricket saved me 100%.
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It's funny, you know,
I've made some money
I played a bit of cricket
because everyone did
but like the guys
who excelled at cricket,
I was in Graeme Hughes' side
the front of his face
at your eyes now,
the eyes are very square
and I often wonder
or anyone who's got
high eye-hand coordination
the tennis players will,
they tend to have
in very set position
in the front of their face.
if you've ever noticed this
some sort of genetic
that someone like you has
in terms of being
a really good batsman
or somebody who can catch as well
that cricketers have
over above everyone else
and all the rest of us.
You have something
Have you ever thought
about the genetic,
relative to your ability
to be a good cricketer?
you can probably say that
about West Indian athletes.
they're powerful.
you just want to watch them.
I want to watch these guys
I want to watch them run.
does play a role in that.
But what do you think
your genetic advantages?
it's probably not genetic
I can read things.
I can read plays.
I can sort of know
Can you tell that
by the way the bowler
runs into the bowl?
I watch a lot of cues.
normally when a batsman,
so I'll walk to the side,
but I do that for a reason
and I've never said this publicly
but I'll watch the bowler
they look to the,
so if they're going to
bowl a short ball,
nine times out of ten
they'll look to square leg
before they bowl the ball
or before they turn around
and deliver the ball.
they run in faster.
if they're running in fast
he's always going to
If it's the first
ball of his spell
he's not going to
or he's not going to
on a line and length
a different shot.
These are the little cues
with different players
and that goes back
to you talking about
like analytics and stuff.
You know the bowlers.
You've played against them before
naturally tells you,
I can read him here.
It's not going to come off
but specifically you know
when you can read a bowler
that's when you're
that's when it makes
everything out there
feel like it's in slow motion.
So it's funny that
you're sort of looking
It's like you're playing
Yeah, pretty much.
Which is probably why
Shane Warren loved
having a hand of poker
but do you think the bowlers
do it to the batsmen?
Warnie was like that.
Warnie was a genius.
that he used to just
work the batters over
and it wasn't until
the end of his career
that he actually detailed
what he was actually doing.
He talked about it.
A fair few of the players
what he was doing
but he used to just
work them across,
I think it was Cullen
and he got out for fun
as soon as he walked out
okay what's going to happen
he's going to bowl me
he's going to bowl me this
I know he's going to
he's not getting me out
That's just the aura
that he had as well
there was a little bit
of nearly hypnotic
A hundred percent.
A hundred percent.
He'd get him to do
what he wanted him to do.
And you could probably say
it's similar to me
exactly what he was
instead of me going
how am I going to
I'm thinking how am I
going to defend it
and that's what I said
If I'm going to go there
and have the defensive
mindset I might as well
In terms of your style.
Yeah but the style
when it's out there
doesn't allow you
to always attack.
So you have to have
some form of defence
one of those ones
I've just let myself down.
Who's your greatest
I don't just have one.
You've got a couple
one that I idolised.
I tried to replicate
the way that he bowled
how strong his fingers
as well so he had
as a kid trying to
just doesn't work.
Anyone that knows
cricket knows you
just can't walk in
You have to actually
He never had that
rhythm but his rhythm
and he was so good
as a kid growing up.
into your innings
he had this big stride
and his big stride
you know downfall
doing the same thing
20 balls he was on.
I think Adam Gilchrist
batter's point of view
someone with an X factor
he was something special
carefree attitude
I loved about him
that sort of reflected
upon me in my game
Can we just look at
that they're guys
blokes you played with?
Who's some of the
great friendships
who's some of the
great friendships
you've got out of
I think growing up
with Uzi from the
start and playing
all our whole team
really really well
hang with each other.
like after the game
Kane Williamson's
relationships with
against each other
the opportunities