KEY POINTS:
So it's getting worse for Australian cricket. The best bowler the game has known, Shane Warne, is finishing. Now the most successful fast bowler the game has known, Glenn McGrath, is also heading into retirement.
The impact of the loss of these two will have on the world's best cricket team goes way beyond the fact that they have taken over 1250 test wickets between them. They have two more tests to go in the current Ashes series and McGrath will retire from all forms of the game after next year's World Cup in the Caribbean.
But, while we are being statistically-minded, cop this (as the Australians would say): Warne and McGrath are the most successful test bowling duo in the long, complex, genealogy of the sport. Between them they have played 102 tests together so far. In those tests, they have taken a total of 963 wickets.
Pause there and, for a moment, imagine yourself to be the captain of Australia. At your disposal are two bowlers who average - average - over nine wickets a test. That basically means that, before you set your captainly foot on the playing field, you can pretty much guarantee that these two will basically bowl the other side out at least once. They'd do it cheaply - their wickets came at a joint average of 23.53. The next most successful duo is West Indies greats Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh who jointly captured 757 wickets at 22.73 in 95 tests.
It's not a bad position from which to start a test match and it's the reason why many Australians are squinting rather fearfully into this cricketing sunset.
They remember, you see, 1984 when Dennis Lillee, Rod Marsh and Greg Chappell all retired together, ushering in a three-year period when Australia became everyone's whipping boy before they built a new team.
Although McGrath's departure was different from Warne's - the lanky fast bowler fended off reports of his retirement as premature before admitting it yesterday - they join batsman Damien Martyn in retirement. Now the tongues are wagging about who is next: opening batsmen Matthew Hayden (35) and/or Justin Langer (36), who have both had creaky form of late; and wicketkeeper-batsman Adam Gilchrist who is now 35?
Gilchrist, who only recently hit the second-fastest test century in the history of the game, adamantly maintains he is not retiring and he has the weight and the speed of that almost incomparable century to back him up. But various pundits say that, even if Hayden, Langer and Gilchrist remain intact, Australia is bound to enter a different era with Warne and McGrath absent.
Richie Benaud, former Australian captain and the world's most recognised cricket commentator, told Channel Nine: "It's a remarkable thing that after the fifth Test in Sydney - and we're talking about Warne and McGrath possibly (retiring) at the moment - the Australian players won't play another Test match for 11 months.
"Now there are going to be a lot of fellas looking at their contracts wondering what they're going to do, are they going to keep in training, are they going to work hard all the way through the year, and perhaps deciding that they might go before the selectors say so."
Benaud added: "Don't forget, with people talking about the retirements of Lillee, Marsh and Greg Chappell, that was only one bowler - a wicket-keeper and a batsman as well, but it was only one bowler. This could be two bowlers, and between them they've taken 1250 wickets for Australia. I think there's going to be a big gap."
Gilchrist differed, saying: "I think it is possible to remain the No 1 team in the world but it is going to be extremely difficult to maintain the playing style or types of standards we've hit under the guidance of Warne and McGrath, whenever they're both not there together.
"We've been without them before, though, and still been able to win. Maybe it's not been quite so comprehensive or more of a fight but that's just natural."
WHETHER HE'S right or not, Australia are going to have to see whether new paceman Stuart Clark is indeed the ready-made replacement for McGrath. Warne is irreplaceable, of course, but Clark's accuracy and ability to move the ball just enough to get the edge made many think that he might be McGrath Mk II.
"Might be" is the operative phrase. Clark shows signs of being an uncommonly good bowler but he has a long way to go before being able to fill McGrath's voluminous boots.
A gangly, skinny kid from the New South Wales bush who was once told by a coach that he'd never be a good bowler, McGrath built up his pipe-cleaner body. He refined a smooth action that has allowed him to remain longer than anyone else in a role which stresses the body so badly in the back, knees, ankles, arms and other critical spots.
McGrath's signature is his precision. As he aged, his speed dropped down to the comparatively mild 130km/hr on view during this Ashes series, but that in no way muted his threat. He still hit the pitch and bat heavily, gained bounce and cut and was able to impart consistently - and at will - just enough subtle movement to beat the batsman and take the wicket.
Other bowlers - like his Australian team-mate Brett Lee - might be fire and brimstone and of express pace. At his best, Lee beats the bat with deliveries that swing and fly off the seam. But in cricket you get no prizes for beating the bat by a wide margin and, while Lee might make the batsman play and miss or duck the bouncer, McGrath made them nick it or miss it, with the rattle of the stumps often following.
Lee has played approximately half McGrath's number of tests and has 219 test wickets. McGrath has 555, the third best in history. Lee's average is over 32 per wicket; McGrath's is 21.65.
McGrath, 36, took eight months off this year to look after his children while wife Jane was undergoing treatment for cancer.
"It's a tough decision because I still love playing. The body feels great and I couldn't be happier with the way I'm bowling so everything's exactly where I want it to be," he said.
"But on the other side, it's an easy decision because of everything else that goes with it...the training, the travel, the time away from home. It is getting tougher to leave home, especially with Jane and the kids.
"But I would say that with respect to Jane, her health has nothing to do with the decision I've made here today. We're a family and that's what it's about."
His other "family" - Australia's cricket team - will miss him. Badly.
"Pigeon's" pigeons
Glenn 'Pigeon' McGrath's most prolific victims:
19: Mike Atherton (Eng)
15: Brian Lara (WI)
12: Jimmy Adams (WI)
11: Sherwin Campbell (WI)
10: Alec Stewart (Eng)
9: Mark Butcher (Eng)
8: Stephen Fleming (NZ)
8: Gary Kirsten (RSA)
8: Nasser Hussain (Eng)
McGrath made his test debut against New Zealand in 1993, was hit for 3-142 and was immediately dropped.
- HERALD ON SUNDAY
