Lives in Cricket No 12 - Ric Charlesworth

Epilogue Throughout his career of constant national and international travel, Perth had always been Ric Charlesworth’s preferred home. His national hockey appointment made his base there secure for the foreseeable future. Both the city and the state were much changed since his childhood years – and since I had arrived in early 1973. Ever-expanding mineral exports, first to Japan and more recently to China, which had helped quarantine Australia from the global financial crisis of 2008/09, had seen Western Australia overtake Queensland as the fastest growing state, with population reaching 2.2 million in September 2009. Over 1.6 million now lived in a metropolitan area spreading almost 50 miles up and down the coast, from north to south. In a Perth that had cast off much of its small-town character the days of influential networks of professionals, who had known each other all their lives, had faded. Perth’s only university had been joined by four new ones since the 1970s. The northern mining boom had introduced inter-state and international newcomers into its business community. Outsiders had also transformed local sport. Elite hockey players from around the country were based at the national headquarters now presided over by Charlesworth at Curtin University. Inter-state recruits outnumbered West Australians in the two professional Australian Rules teams. And a professional rugby team in the provincial Tri-Nations competition depended on both imported players from the eastern states and a support base of inter-state migrants and large numbers of English, South African and New Zealand immigrants. Although Geoff Marsh had sons in and on the fringe of the West Australian cricket team, long gone were the days when Charlesworth’s near-contemporaries and near-neighbours followed fathers into the Western Australian side: Graham McKenzie, Ross Edwards, John Inverarity and Ric himself. And a state that could boast of McKenzie, Lillee and Alderman seemed ever more dependent on fast bowlers recruited from the east, especially Queensland. Even the University cricket team had been allowed to succumb to outside influence, following the trend that saw numerous English 91