Women in men’s sport, Aussie cricketer’s assignments and Josh Dugan

I haven’t blogged the last couple of weeks, so this blog will cover some things that might seem a bit old.

Women competing in men’s competitions is something that has always annoyed me slightly. I’m not talking about local level and junior sport, but elite and professional sport. I’ve played and coached with and against girls in sports like rugby, rugby league, cricket and Oz Tag, plus others in classes like P.E. at school. From these experiences i know that girls can compete and often out-do boys in a lot of sports.

I’m all for gender equality but think that when it comes to professional sport, men and women need to be separated, and i question how beneficial it really is for a female to ‘step up’ and take on the men. What got me thinking about this again was the story of Lauren Silberman, the first female to try out at a regional level American football combine. Lauren had a background in playing soccer and had not played in a competitive game of football before. After a lot of publicity, often hyping up how important this was for female athletes to be given a shot at competing with the men, Lauren only managed 2 kicks of about 20 yards and had to withdraw due to a leg injury. After reading her story, I’m not sure whether this was a publicity stunt from the NFL to get some media attention during their off season, or a genuine chance for an elite female athlete to have her shot at playing in one of the biggest leagues in the world. I question how beneficial Lauren’s case is for other women wanting to compete against men. In my opinion, seeing her success would be motivating for other women, having seen that ‘hey, if she can do it i can do it’. However what actually happened is detrimental, and i think that it may cause some women to think twice about trying to take that next step up.

The first example i can think of, although im sure there were many before her, is golfer Annika Sorenstam playing against the men at a tournament in 2003. At the time she was the best golfer in the world, having dominated the LPGA for the last couple of years and had her chance to put it to the men. She finished 96th out of 111. In 2008 Michelle Wie skipped a LPGA major, the British Open, to compete against the men at a regular tournament. Sorenstam was quoted saying ‘I really don’t know why Michelle continues to do this’, as at the time Wie was yet to win an LPGA event. I think that this example of Wie missing one of female golf’s biggest events is even more downgrading for women’s sport, especially when she failed to make the cut at the men’s event.

It might just be my ignorance, or it isn’t as highly publicised as the opposite, but i can’t think of an example of a man competing in a female sport at the pro level. I think it would be interesting to see how a man playing netball in the ANZ championship would unfold for example. Perhaps occasional mixed gender competitions spread out over the year will give the chance for female athletes to take on men, without the added controversy of competing in male competitions and forgoing female events.

The next issue thats happened over the last week or so is the standing down of 4 Aussie cricketers for failing to hand in an assignment assessing the team’s play in the first 2 Tests and ways to improve. I can understand this policy for school or university sports, but not for adults playing professional sport for a team that is struggling big time and already under scrutiny. I can see from a coaching standpoint how giving each player the mission of assessing the team’s play and thinking up ways to improve can be beneficial in presenting new ideas, but when the punishment for not doing so is to drop them from the team regardless of performance is too harsh for me. A fine seems the most simple form of punishment and only effects the player; while dropping them is effecting the whole team. It would be interesting to know if the players knew what the punishment would be should they not complete the assignment. Surely these guys, who have sacrificed a lot and worked hard to make it to international level would complete their homework if they knew what would be taken from them.

The last thing i wanted to cover was the Raiders sacking Josh Dugan, which i think is a brave and good move. They may have sacked probably their best player, but they’ve showed some guts and sent a message to their other players about what will happen if they break club policy/muck up time and time again. Its refreshing to see they didnt take the ‘send player to rehab, claim they’ve reformed’ approach which seems to be the way to go for clubs dealing with unruly players recently. I know that that method can be helpful for the player and shows that the club does care for its players (thinking about my previous blog about Ben Barba here), but its good to see a club say its had enough and sack someone. Its just unfortunate that another club will possibly benefit from the Raiders tough decision to sack him. I look forward to seeing how the new rugby league commission handles Dugan signing with another club, and if they register his contract, or show some tough love like Canberra has and have him sit out a year, like Todd Carney a couple of years ago.