Michael Clarke 'whipped' by Lara Bingle

MARK TAYLOR/Waikato Times

WHERE? Fans with a sign at the ODI in Hamilton.

Lara Bingle

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Fairfax Zoom

Lara Bingle and Michael Clarke

Black Caps v Australia - 3rd ODI

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MARK TAYLOR/Waikato Times Zoom

Brad Haddin gets 100 runs.

Australian cricketers and their WAGs

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MICHAEL CLAYTON-JONES/The Age Zoom

Haley Bracken, wife of Nathan Bracken, arrives for Cricket Australia's gala event, the presentation of the Allan Border Medal, in Melbourne.

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OPINION: Is it agreeable to Cricket Australia that the future test captain of Australia is whipped by a 22-year-old topless model?

Apparently it is, given his employer's response to Michael Clarke's astonishing decision to quit a supposedly important tour of New Zealand to help his fiancee through her "difficult time".

How difficult can it really be to see your partially-clad picture in a magazine, when much more revealing pictures you happily posed for five years ago are easily obtainable via Google.

And how much support does she really need from her fiancee, when last week she was quite happy to have celebrity agent Max Markson by her side to guide her through her trauma and sell her to anyone who would take her?

Thanks to Markson's skills, Lara Bingle was quite happy to bare her soul to the same magazine that bared her boobs the week before - for a price of course.

But all of a sudden, with the interview done, the writ filed and amateur snapper Brendan Fevola suitably chastised by the world and the AFL, Bingle now needs her man by her side?

What this girl needs, it seems, is attention - and lots of it.

What if there is more to it though, I hear the apologists cry.

Well if there is, tell the public the full story, and don't hide behind bland press releases and one-line statements from managers.

The WAG culture - an acronym for 'Wives and Girlfriends' for the uninitiated - has seeped so far into British culture it has become a spectator sport in itself.

It is widely acknowledged the presence of Mrs Beckham and co in the German town of Baden Baden went a long way to derailing England's World Cup campaign four years ago.

And just as John Terry and Ashley Cole try to stop their private lives ruining their careers in the last month, Clarke is finding out that with great celebrity comes a significant downside.

Although being a star in the team does have some advantages, it seems.

How is it that WA's Adam Voges was made to choose between attending his wedding or attending the tour of South Africa last year, while Clarke can have his cake and eat it too?

Not that Voges' minded yesterday.

He was the man who was handed Clarke's place in the team after the vice-captain's mercy dash to Sydney.

What goes around comes around eh?

- WA Today