South Australian Blind Cricket Team took on State Members of Parliament in an exciting exhibition match at the iconic Adelaide Oval. Leon Bignel, Speaker in the South Australian House of Assembly was in the game and Peter Greco hears how it all went.
Well, a big day for our cricketers for the national Cricket Inclusion Carnival at the Adelaide Oval. The blind cricket team played the Members of Parliament, including guest speaker Leon Beck. Who's on the line? Leon, thanks for your time and welcome.
Thank you so much, Peter. An absolute pleasure to be with you and your audience today.
How was the day?
It was amazing. It was one of the great days in my life. I mean, what a great bunch of people that we played cricket with. Well, as they might have said during Bodyline, there was only one thing that they were playing cricket and that was with us. We were comprehensively thrashed. We were hopeless. But it's such a hard game, you know, to try and bowl along the along the deck. And then I reckon even harder is trying to, you know, hit the ball when it's just coming along, uh, along the ground at you. The. It was such a challenging day, but such a great day. And we all just loved everyone who went, who turned up on both sides, I think just had an amazing day.
And of course, a fabulous setting, the Adelaide Oval.
Yeah. Look, it's every kid's dream, isn't it, to get out there on the oval. And I know talking to the players on both sides and at the presentations after the match, many of us recounted our, you know, first time we went to the Adelaide Oval with our dads or mums and, you know, some of the things that we might have experienced there over the years, whether it be cricket or football, and to get out into the middle and actually, uh, well, I was going to say Will the Willow, but I think that would be uh, in my case, uh, maybe, maybe just sort of clotting away, you know, would be the best thing. But I tell you, a lot of the people on the blind team would the willow, they they were one for 288 after 20 overs was a T20 game. The night before, the strikers had set a record for a T20 game. The Adelaide Oval and, uh, the blind team just walked kicked that out of the park by about. I reckon they exceeded by about 30 runs.
Yeah, Leon, it was a great day all round, wasn't it? I'm not sure for how much of the day you were there, but the three teams that represented South Australia represent at the National Cricket Inclusion Carnival, athletes who are deaf, athletes with a With an actual disability, and outside the blind they all play different teams. The deaf team played the Lord's Taverners, who have been great supporters of sport for people with disabilities for for decades, and the team with the intellectual disability played the South Australian Police. And of course, as I said, the blind team played the South Australian parliamentarians. So it was a great sort of promotion of the game in all sorts of areas.
Yeah, it was terrific and I think we probably need to think back. Don't, don't we. Are they? I think they've done a good job in bringing different groups together, you know, police, politicians and Lord Taverners. Then of course, when all the teams were for people who, you know, the blind theme, the deaf theme, intellectual disability theme, and I just sort of think they need to be recognised because, you know, they could all have been just sitting at home on that, that Sunday and not doing anything. But they were there from, uh, the CEO, uh, and they were all out there, you know, giving up their day so that we could all have a lot of fun. And and for the blind team, it was really important because they were off to the nationals. So, um, it was a good, good hit out. And one of the great things of the day was, um, I was honored with the, uh, the duty of handing over the caps to the Australian, uh, members of the blind team. And that was a terrific thing. And to get to know a few of the the players as well was was terrific.
Now, Leon, you spoke about, uh, well, shall we say your less than impressive batting performance and I believe you got out in a rather interesting way or to a rather interesting bowler.
Well, I was bowled by a constituent, a young fellow from, uh, down at Odinga. And I know his wife really well. She works in the local, uh, health food shop. So, um, that was good. And he was pretty pumped. So, you know, to get a get a scalp like, uh, like mine. But, you know, cricket, you know, normal cricket. I'm a, I'm a bowler and and, um, never much of a bat, but I played, I reckon, the most correct innings of my life, because when it's just rolling along the deck like that, all you can really do is, you know, try and block and block. Well, anyway, he was. He had a bit too much pace for me. And, uh, he went straight through me and and bowled me. But I must admit, I looked up at the scoreboard and, and at that stage we needed, um, 30 runs and over to get there, and I just block for free. Hadn't hadn't scored a run. I got a leg by I think the umpire was a bit kind to me and not giving me out because I got hit in my back foot, right in the toe, and I reckon it probably woke me up, but I think he could see that they were going through our team, so he gave me another chance, I think. But yeah, I thought I'd better just try and lift the run rate. Anyway. I did and it was just hopeless. It was just a track through me and I heard that the death rattle, you know, when the, when the, the stumps get hit by the ball with the, uh, but it was just great. It was so enjoyable. And, you know, the things that you pick up on, you know, obviously the the ball with the like ball bearings in it that makes the noise and then the I'm really uncoordinated. This is, this is what brought me undone. You sort of think I was just bowling a bit. Right. But in the nets I was bowling just from a standing start, and I should probably take a few steps and then come in. But when you're uncoordinated and you've got to do 4 or 5 actions, so you had to say ready, then take your steps. Then as you're about to bowl, you hit, you say play and then you've got to bowl four things at once. That just threw me. I bowled, I think 5 or 6 wide to my over. It was just anything, a bowl of wide. You're just putting it down, you know, like a like a lawn bowl. So it was very, very challenging. But but I loved it. I loved the interaction between the bowlers and the wicket keeper, um, and blah blah, blah, blah, blah blah or Michael, Michael, Michael, you know, and they'd be doing that just to get a sense of where everyone was and, and of course, that makes sense when you see it and you hear that. But I hadn't thought of that before. You know.
It's actually quite interesting. You mentioned that, Liam, because there are surprisingly few, uh, players that run into each other. You've got a team who have, uh, full of people or blind have low vision. But incredibly, the communication is so good that there's few sort of, uh, Steve Waugh and Jason Gillespie clashes.
Yeah. It's incredible. I you know, I keep forgetting because instinctively you're fielding and you pick up the ball and you throw it back. And a couple of times I threw it to people who couldn't see. And I thought, well, that's not that smart. What they were doing is they were rolling it along the ground to them, you know, and it was a bit of a slow learner.
I mean, how did the team get selected? The parliamentarians, did you know you get your name drawn out of a hat or, you know, the best, you got to go.
They did an email around and, um, a lot of people were actually away, and there was a few songs I was a bit harder probably to get people. But Katrina Hillyard, who's the sports minister, she was our skipper, Josh Teague, who's the new deputy leader of the Liberal Party. He was there. I nicknamed him the Senator and he was quite handy in the covers. They're a pretty, uh, flashy sort of filter. So I think he did did pretty well there. I think he, he was he was pretty good with the bowling too. Pretty economical. But, um, I think like me, he might have scored one. I reckon Katrina might have scored one or a duck, you know. Um, uh, you know, Nadia Clancy played. She managed to run two of her teammates out. So, uh, we got all day, and, um, uh, I think you you might have got a run, I reckon, but, uh, yeah, we had fun. We we just really. And it was good for us. You know, you got people from different sides of the political spectrum all playing together. You know, the truth is, we get on pretty well at Parliament House. But to get out of that Parliament and do something completely different, something challenging in a way that the, you know, different to what we normally do in our day to day job was really good. We all got a real kick out of it.
I was going to ask you which part of the game you found most challenging, but it sounds like you were all around it. You found it all challenging.
Yeah, yeah, I did, absolutely. I'm not gonna lie. Um, it was even the fielding, um, because that ball curves. So, you know, I'm, I'm 58. I'm not as, uh, fit as I once was, and, you know, and the body's a bit stiffer. I don't do a lot of physical activity. So the ball would be sort of coming towards me. I'd get down, you know, in the classic sort of fielding, um, thing, you know, where you get down on one knee and you've got your leg there so the ball can't get past you. Anyway, I got down and then the ball was actually moving away from me in like an arc. And so then I was crawling across the ground to try and get to it, up it. So, um, we had a fair few laughs and afterwards we didn't. None of us was there to take ourselves too seriously, you know? It was good fun.
I know in a previous life you were a journalist. Had you seen the game played before? Because it's changed a little bit over the years. Blind cricket, I mean, the game is similar to what it was, say, 30 or 40 years ago, but the balls are a bit different and the the way the game is played is a little bit different.
I don't reckon I had seen it. I've definitely spoken to people who played it and been involved in the game, but I don't reckon I'd seen it before. Yeah, but it was good. You know, I really I probably enjoyed the net fishing when I first got it. I hadn't got back in her in the backyard with my son when he was a young fella and a teenager, but he's 27 now, you know. So it's been a while since a pretty good ten, 15 years that I picked up a bat. Even at even at the beach or anything. So I actually really enjoy it. I think, oh, maybe I'll get down and play for the Yankalilla C-grade or something like that. I think they got a bit of a social scene down that way. So, uh, yeah, I don't know. I really enjoyed it. It was just a terrific day. It was pretty warm. Um, but we kept our fluids up and, uh, drink plenty of water, so, uh. Yeah, it was good. It was good. And again, you know, Charlie and, uh, jazz and all the things, they did an amazing job to accommodate us all and and give us all a great thrill to be out there on that Adelaide Oval.
We speak quite often to, uh, different areas of cricket. As I say, uh, the deaf cricket players with a disability and the blind. And certainly over the last few years there's been enormous. And indeed Cricket Australia have been supportive, uh, enormously as far as, uh, you know, funding the sport and giving opportunities. And they say the, the nationals and these sort of things, even international competition. So as far as cricket for uh, players with uh, different disabilities, it's come a long, long way.
Yeah. That's terrific to hear. Really, really good that they're getting behind it and supporting. And yeah you think of the cricket bowling 58 I'm not ancient, but it changed a lot in our lifetime, hasn't it? You know, with the women's game? Yeah, it was disability games, you know, the accessibility. I think even the way they approach it with the kids now, you know, I mean, they want to get them out there learning some skills. It doesn't necessarily have to be a game of cricket when you're those real young young kids, sixes and sevens. But, you know, just to get them around the holding a ball and all that sort of stuff and learning a few skills, I think they do it really well at all levels.
Well, Leon, as a cricketer, you make a very good speaker of the House.
Uh, instead of just getting out like chuck people out, you know?
Yeah, that's the easiest part I learned. I really appreciate, Tom. It's great of you to join us. And, uh, well done to all those that took part. It's obviously a great way to raise awareness right throughout the community about cricket. Uh, I guess we can say. Yeah, cricket was the winner.
Absolutely, absolutely. Thanks so much for your time. We really appreciate it.
Leon Big Navarro, one of the people who took part as far as the parliamentarians went, play against the South Australian blind cricket team last week at Adelaide Oval and the well done to the Saka and all those that took part.