Bungling Symonds gets the boot

All-rounder misses team meeting; career in jeopardy after latest fiasco

CA chief executive James Sutherland told a hastily-arranged news conference broadcast on national television that Symonds had been ordered home for alcohol related issues.
"The decision has been made after Andrew, in the last 24 to 48 hours, has broken a number of team rules," Sutherland said.

"In isolation those breaches are not significant but in the context of the commitment that Andrew has made to his team mates and Cricket Australia over the last six to 12 months they are the final straw."

Symonds was a notable absentee from Australia training at The Oval in London.
"He has let himself down, his team mates down and Cricket Australia down," skipper Ricky Ponting said. “There's no doubting Andrew's capabilities as a player, but  there are other things happening around him that made the decision we've come to a relatively easy one. This is not wholly and solely about Andrew Symonds. This is about the Australian cricket team,” he added.

Symonds’ international career remains in doubt with his contract due to expire at the end of this month. If never plays international cricket again, it will be a sad end to the career of a gifted player who never really fulfilled his true potential.

The 33-year-old's career, in the balance after a series of off-field incidents, almost certainly has ended when he was sent home on Thursday.

There was a sense of irony that Symonds, who was born in England but turned down the chance to play for his birthland, should be ordered out of England back to Australia while he was trying to rebuild his career.

Symonds moved to Australia with his family before he was one year old and almost missed the chance to play international cricket after rejecting several offers to play for England.

A powerful hitter, he made his one-day international debut for Australia against Pakistan in 1998 but it was not until the 2003 World Cup that his career really took off.
Symonds was rewarded with his Test debut against Sri Lanka in 2004 but lost his place for the last match of the series. He regained his spot in 2005 and made a then career-best 72 against South Africa in Melbourne, opening his scoring with a six.

But the first signs of trouble were just around the corner.  He was briefly dropped from the Australian one-day team touring England in 2005 when he turned up late for a match against Bangladesh still intoxicated following a boozy night.

He won a second World Cup in the West Indies in 2007 and made an unbeaten 162 against India in Sydney in January 2008 before disciplinary problems really started to haunt him.

Senior players and team management voted to send him home from a one-day series in Darwin last year after he missed an important team meeting to go fishing. Earlier this year, Symonds was fined for a drunken radio interview.

He was left out of Ashes squad but received a lifeline when he was picked for the World T20, only to be sent home before the tournament began.