Lives in Cricket No 12 - Ric Charlesworth

Apart from that issue, Ric was less concerned about intractable external trends than delighted with his relatively new circumstances. The transformation of Perth into a significant metropolis had little effect on a family-centred lifestyle in the familiar western suburbs, wedged between river and ocean. After son Oscar was born in 2000 he had written that, while the quest for gold medals had been central to his life, my greatest pleasure and my greatest success is seeing my children develop. While there have been times in my life when this perspective has slipped through my consciousness, I felt in 2000 that Oscar’s birth had helped me keep my balance. Although his new job with the Kookaburras meant he had to be away at least twelve days a month, he was now enjoying being an older father of young children. ‘What would I rather spend my time doing than being with them?’ Apart from the chaotic period in India, he had more time for them and was less self-absorbed than in his first marriage, while pleased he maintained good relations with his older three children, one of whom was looking forward to getting married when I interviewed him in April 2009. On that very morning he had just been to watch son Oscar play cricket at the Hollywood primary school oval, where he himself had made his first century decades earlier. In early October 2009 he had the pleasure of seeing his oldest son, Jonathon, a medical graduate like himself, chosen in his national hockey squad. He told the media Jonathon would be treated like all other players under his leadership, but of course he was proud of him, ‘as I am of all my children!’ * * * * * Although his long-deferred ambitions in hockey had been fulfilled by 2009, Ric Charlesworth retained sufficient interest in cricket to comment on current trends and speculate about the future in our conversations. He might not have spoken at some length about Darren Lehmann, had I not asked a question prompted by a return visit to my native Yorkshire in 2008. But his observations about the Australian batsman typified his attitudes to cricket’s strengths and weaknesses in the modern professional era of the Australian and international game. Epilogue 93