NOTTINGHAM, England – Australian coach John Buchanan has denied adocument proclaiming “psychological control” over England wasintentionally leaked to the media ahead of the third Ashes Test at TrentBridge
Will Swanton31-Jul-2001NOTTINGHAM, England – Australian coach John Buchanan has denied adocument proclaiming “psychological control” over England wasintentionally leaked to the media ahead of the third Ashes Test at TrentBridge.However, Buchanan admitted to caring little that in-house correspondencewas now in the public domain, including most back pages of Englishnewspapers.His memo, which relates theories from fifth-century BC Chinese warriorSun Tzu’s book “The Art of War” to Australia’s Ashes campaign, wasslipped under the door of journalists as well as his players by areceptionist at the team’s Southampton hotel on the weekend.Conspiracy theorists claim Buchanan may have wanted the thoughts of theAustralian camp to become public, but he denied this was the case.”I don’t think I’m a devious sort of person,” Buchanan said.”It’s a fairly common practice, I put material under the door ofplayers.”It seems I’ve put the material under the door of a lot of media at thesame stage.”I don’t see it as a mistake, it’s just unfortunate that somehow itescaped our normal channels.”Buchanan gives his players motivational material as often as once a weekand often delivers it himself but occasionally he asks hotel staff todeliver the papers to the appropriate rooms.The heart of the receptionist responsible for the gaffe in Southamptonmust have missed a beat this morning when the story dominated newspaper,television and radio reports.”It’s always in the back of my mind that it might sneak out, not that Iwant it to happen,” Buchanan added.”There are ways and means of getting around it I suppose but maybe I’mnot worried about that, either.”The beliefs of Tzu were accompanied by hand-written notes from Buchanan.Alongside Tzu’s direction to “forestall an opponent by seizing what heholds dear,” Buchanan scrawled: “Overall, this English team is hangingonto excuses (eg injuries, toss, bad luck, dropped catches, etc). Bygradually taking each of these away, ultimately there is no place tohide.”He stood his ground on that claim.”In the end we’re in a more comfortable position and therefore it isdifficult when you’re not winning games and you are trying to assess whythat’s not the case,” he said.”Ultimately you’ve got to be responsible and accountable for what goeson out on the field.”Buchanan said he would be satisfied if only a handful of his 17-mansquad actually read the memo.”I don’t for one minute think that it’s going to be the bible for 17players, that’s for sure,” he said.”All it’s intended to do is focus our attention not only on this gamebut the rest of the series, and also beyond the series trying to extendpeople a little bit and get them to think a bit differently, look atthings differently.”Australia, expected to announce an unchanged XI from the side that wonat Lord’s by eight wickets, and England trained at Trent Bridge today.
