Arthur Crabtree wrote:Maybe the 'Mr. Cricket' tag suggests he didn't fit in with the team culture. Though it's hard to imagine Ponting's Aussies were anything other than obsessive winners. Still, unbelievable Hussey didn't get a game in the '05 Ashes with the Aussies under pressures, form variable and with key injuries. And Clark too.
I am not aware of anyone who has said anything remotely bad about Hussey, and plenty of influential captains or players who played against/with him who have nothing but positives to say about the man. I have heard Ponting say he was the perfect team mate on more than one occasion, a man who set examples with his obsessive standards he demanded of himself, but who was understanding, patient and supporting of other team-mates, who he would go out his way to help. I get the impression he was a popular and respected guy in the dressing rooms he played in.
Whether or not that fit with the "team culture" at times is up for debate, because the team culture under Clarke disintegrated into toxicity, and its clear this didn't sit well with Hussey. While Huss has never taken the bait to slag off Clarke, even painstakingly trying to paint their relationship as positive and misunderstood, he has made it clear he didn't enjoy being there under Clarke because on the environment - but then again, it seems pretty obvious that was shared by his colleagues. And the examples of the boat trip on the night of his retirement, and the Katich v Clarke dressing room fight, seem to point out that the team sided with Hussey - after all, both of these are incidents which arise from his team-mates seeing Clarke's actions as disrespectful to Hussey (badgering to sign the song, having the team not stay with Hussey on the night of his retirement).I have always thought Hussey retired because he didn't like playing under Clarke. I think Clarke might have even been jealous of the respect that Hussey had, and the popularity he had in the dressing room.
Faf de Plessis said of his famous match-saving 100 in Adelaide that the thing that sticks out in his memory most, was the fact that as the Aussies got frustrated, certain players started turning on Mike Hussey in the field (and by off the record comments to journos from others there, we can read Clarke from "players") .... Hussey and Faf de Plessis had played IPL together, and Hussey would talk to Faf off the field or not sledge him because they were mates. Clarke didn't like that, and Faf basically says Clarke spent two sessions shouting at Hussey that him and his boyfriend should get a room or other insults. Faf says he was a bit stunned by it - he'd never seen someone sledge their own players.
Hussey announced his retirement a few weeks later - worth noting he has just scored back to back 100s, and was on the form of his life. Always felt like that was the moment he said sod playing for this prat. Also the point that Shane Watson and Clarke start coming to butt heads, and Watson seems to have been a close friend of Hussey.
