Top Naija News: Nigerian News, Breaking News Nigeria and World News Top Naija News is a daily news publication in Nigeria, delivering the latest breaking news in Nigeria and around the world.
Former Australian Test skipper Tim Paine has come to the defence of selector George Bailey after stinging criticism from Mitchell Johnson, calling the comments “unnecessary”.
Johnson took aim at Bailey for the continued selection of David Warner in Australia’s Test side, questioning whether the selector was too close with the veteran players he was once teammates with.
Bailey wrapped up his cricket career in 2020, and played with Warner for large parts of his 125 matches representing Australia in all three forms. He joined Australia’s selection committee in 2021.
READ MORE: Simmering state feud that could derail Aussie’s cricket summer
READ MORE: ‘Angry’ Ange wins over Premier League greats
READ MORE: $3.2m England star brutally trolled by Iceland after loss
“The handling of Warner in recent years, who played with Bailey in all three forms, raises the question of whether Bailey was simply too quickly out of playing and into the job and too close to some of the players,” Johnson wrote in The West Australian.
“(The role of head selector) seems to have moved to be a part of the inner sanctum, rather than standing aside from it”.
Bailey refused to buy into the criticism when questioned about Johnson’s comments, simply saying: “I hope he’s OK”.
Paine, who is close friends with Bailey, said it was a “fair question”, but defended Bailey’s professionalism.
World Cup 2023 team of the tournament in pictures
”I think a lot of his (Johnson’s) article, he raised some pretty valid points,” he told SEN.
“The George stuff I didn’t love, I thought that was a bit unnecessary, but was George too quickly from a player to a selector? It’s a valid question.
“He (Johnson) obviously thinks he was. I don’t, I worked with George and I think anyone who knows George would never question his integrity or his professionalism or ability to do that job … you look at the success they’ve had as a team, you can’t question that.
“But it is a fair question. He did go very quickly from a player to a coach, he is friends with a lot of those players.”
Paine touched on his own experience with Bailey when his Test career was brought to a halt as a result of a sexting scandal at the end of 2021.
”The difference with this one (Paine’s retirement versus Warner’s) was it wasn’t cricket related, the ending of my career,” he explained.
“George had a little bit of a conflict of interest, so the professional thing to do was to withdraw himself from that conversation.
“Not only are we close friends, he knows my family, he knows everything in my life … there was a lot of other sensible people sitting around the table from Cricket Australia who were having discussions.
“So that was fine by me, I don’t think it was a courage thing. George and I would always have back and forth and (selector) Tony Dodemaide and (high performance manager) Ben Oliver and (former coach) Justin Langer about when I might retire and how we are going to handle it.
“Everyone was on the same page with that but this was a different unique situation and I think George coming out of that was the sensible and professional thing to do.
“One-hundred per cent (he would have been involved if it was a cricket decision), he was, it was always open dialogue.”
