Roy, shut up.

The Vics have won the toss and batted in the domestic T20 final, aka the Kan't Fucking Cook Big Bash, but that's not really the issue. Not since Birmingham-born occasional Australian international cricketer Andrew 'Roy' Symonds decided to make the issue about whether it was morally or ethically legitimate for NSW to sign Otago and NZ wickie-batsthug Brendon 'Baz' McCullum for the purpose of winning the game. His argument, initially, was that this could disadvantage the selection prospects of emergent NSW prospects in the positions of opening bat and keeping wicket. He developed this argument further in recent media commitments on national radio where he chose to compare McCullum with used food, loudly and unfavourably. Admittedly aforesaid media commitments were on Roy and HG's new Triple M show, and Roy (as in Symonds) did appear to be somewhat confused over what his actual point was:

“They're trying to use him [McCullum] as the out because he's a Kiwi. Yep, we love to hate them, but he's the lump of shit, sorry, lump of cow dirt, that people are thinking of. Now to get away from that, the actual topic is about playing cricket and getting into a final. To get yourself to that position and if you haven't brought anybody in, personally I wouldn't be changing a winning team. It doesn't matter about McCullum, mate, he could have been Irish, he still would have got it.”

Erm, what the fuck?

Incoherent, incomprehensible and almost definitely inebriated though Roy's outburst was, he still gets a great big fuck-off soapbox to express it, so he doesn't get off as lightly as... well, as he always seems to when he busts shit like this out. Fellow bogan Quoinslandaaaa and sea kitten murdering enthusiast Matthew Hayden also threw his ten cents' worth in, but the gist of his spray was that if the ICC were up to much more than rolling around in piles of cash at their Dubai digs while dusky Arabian handmaidens fanned them with feathers and fed them peeled grapes, NZ might actually have an international schedule and Baz wouldn't need to go on work experience, which was disturbingly close to reasonable sense from the celebrity chef and serial God-botherer. No such risk from Symmo, however. Which brings us to our Weak In Sport Special Feature:
O How Roy Can Just Shut The Fuck Up, Let Me Count The Ways.

1. Roy is a Queenslander. As such, has no business making any comment on things that important thinky states like NSW do, because he clearly has trouble understanding the big words in the press release.

2. Roy isn't playing. For Queensland, Australia, the Delhi Dirt Trackers, the Super Kingly Royal Super Daredevil Kings of Leon or even the Sunnybank-Logan RSL team. If he had, Qld might not have capitulated in the semi like an ordered stoichiometric array of busted arses to a Victorian side with less creative talent than the Ting Tings and less attacking threat than a dugong armed with a wet sock. If you're not playing in the final, your opinion as regards who should be playing in the final is less relevant than the Reverand Fred Nile.

3. Roy is the highest paid motherfucker in the IPL. He gets paid a very large amount of money by whichever of the eight identi-fucking-kit IPL franchises he occasionally can be arsed turning out for, quite a lot more than he should be being paid, and needless to say, quite a lot more than Baz McCullum - despite Baz's 158 off 73 in the first game of the IPL last year. To paraphrase Spaceballs, Baz isn't playing for NSW for money. He's playing for NSW for a shitload of money. Not from the T20 final - his NSW match fee of a couple of gorillas is being donated to Otago Cricket to buy bats and pads for kiddies - but from the ICC Champions Trophy, given his IPL lot went to shit when he buggered off to join the BLACKCAPSLOCK's tour of England after the first few games last year, and could very well perform with similar distinction this term, meaning he'd be out of the Champions tournament, and unable to perform/get paid on the big stage. He wants cash, NSW want a big-shot international star - where's the issue? Sure it's mercenary as fuck, but who the hell is Roy Symonds and his $1.4 million dollar salary to say it?

4. Roy could probably do with keeping his head down at the moment. What with getting booted from the team for going fishing instead of turning up to team meetings (which I suppose is an advance from getting booted from the team for turning up absolutely shitfaced), starting a war with the entire country of India last summer, only playing a handful of games this summer, and playing some pretty ordinary cricket in the games he did turn up for, the last thing we need to hear from Roy is how his heart bleeds for whichever up-and-coming NSW opening bat or keeper misses out because of howwibwle mercenwy Bwendon McCuwwum from the evil land of the sheep-shaggers. Last I checked, NSW's regular T20 opener and keeper were in the Australian ODI side, and fitting in very well thanks very much, largely by playing fucking ordinary cricket (Warner's sixty-odd last night was a minor exemption, but Haddin's persistent case of dropsy needs some form of medical intervention.) Roy needs to concentrate on turning up for the games he's picked in. Baz McCullum even turns up for games he isn't - he flew out of NZ camp the morning of a domestic one-dayer a couple of days ago and got a cab to the ground just in time to pad up and open for Otago against the hated Cantabs. Got a third-ball duck, but that wasn't really the point. And getting out for 10 off 11 in the T20 final (reportage AS IT HAPPENS!) wasn't really the point, nor that he was being comfortably outshone at the time by Test opening prospect Phil Hughes. The point is, if NSW need him in the Champions Trophy, he'll be there. And it cost them next to nothing to do that. What Roy's latest dump-in-public will cost him is yet to be determined.

Nah, you're right, probably fuck all like usual. Who else is going to turn up in homoerotic Solo ads getting into a bit of rough with an amateur nudist if Roy isn't around the place?

The Doctor is OUT, as are the Vics if they don't get Hughes very sharply.