http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Clarke-c51120’s leadership - Cricket News Update
Australian spearhead pacer, Peter Siddle, has lauded the contributions of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/MJ-Clarke-c1978 since the latter took on the captaincy of the national team last year.
After taking over from http://www.senore.com/Cricket/England-c56013 and further failed to retain the
World Cup trophy, after being beaten in the quarter-final by eventual champions http://www.senore.com/Cricket/India-c750.
Clarke was unanimously named the leader of the side, and under his tenure the team ended the first full season undefeated. They triumphed over Sri Lanka, India and http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754
despite trailing their opponents on both occasions.
The start of the current home summer was promising where they remained in pole position to beat South Africa in the opening two Tests, but suffered a fatal defeat at Perth. It was a first series loss under Clarke, but the Aussies quickly recovered to prove
their mettle and took the opening Test against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sri-Lanka-c758 by a comprehensive 137-run margin.
Siddle was named Player of the Match for his superlative displays with the bowl, where he claimed 9 scalps in the match. The premier pacer however, was quick to laud Clarke’s contributions which have allowed the bowling attack sizeable totals to defend.
On a personal note, Clarke’s batting has gone to a whole new level, where he has averaged a whopping 73.64 in 18 Tests since taking on the captaincy, which also include 7 hundreds.
"If you look at since he's become captain, the way he's played and performed, you always want your leader to stand up and be the one who leads from the front, and he's been phenomenal at that," Siddle said of Clarke. "He's been outstanding, it makes us better
players, he's been producing targets we can defend, and given us time to do our work.
"That makes it a lot easier, and yesterday it showed. On a wicket that was hard to score on, that he went about it his way and got us into a position that we could set a nice target, and go out there and do our business."
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