Where the hell is this going?

Photo: Dominion Post

Wada-ya reckon? This year's Christmas Crackpot Award winner is Wada's Kiwi director-general David Howman. Whereabouts does he get off?

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SAY WHAT you like about the annual Christmas Crackpot Awards, but they're not becoming any easier to judge. I know, it might seem only yesterday that John Bracewell cantered off with last summer's title, but the task of identifying sport's most ludicrous character has, on this occasion, proved a much more demanding challenge. Some have been doggedly consistent, others have played splendidly unhinged cameos. In the end there was nothing in it.

True, this might not have been a vintage year for New Zealand sport. But at least we can now take time to sit back and give thanks to the many figures and groups who, by allowing just a glimpse of what went on between their ears, kept a spring in our step and a smile on our dials. And just to illustrate how intense the competition was, it can now be revealed that serial nominee and past winner Sir Richard Hadlee wasn't even able to make the short-list.

In fact, the Final Whistle tried to contact Sir Richard in order to explain the circumstances behind his omission but was told he was unavailable to talk, on account of a new book he was writing for the approaching year. Changing Pace Again, a sequel to last winter's publication Changing Pace, and the precursor to what we believe will be the third part of the trilogy in 2011, Yet Another Change of Pace, should be available soon at all quality book stores.

But as hard as it is to imagine a Christmas Crackpot Awards ceremony without New Zealand's greatest cricketer, it might also come as a shock to find that some other, well-credentialled candidates also missed the final cut. The Auckland Rugby Union's 2009 disciplinary committee, for example, didn't quite make it, despite a brave bid in August when it presided over the fall-out from the Kelston Boys' High School-Auckland Grammar brawl. Kangaroo courts have seen fairer proceedings.

In any other year, a disciplinary tribunal which ignored clear conflicts of interest before hopelessly discriminating against one party would have received an immediate reservation at the front table. But this has been a busy 12 months for our nation's space cadets, so much so that New Zealand Cricket Players' Association chief Heath Mills hasn't even made the grade, despite a desperate attempt last week when he claimed our country's top cricketers were underpaid.

Needless to say, the 71% of sadly misguided Close Up viewers who in February voted in the negative to the question, "should we still have a New Zealand Maori rugby team", received an honourable mention, as did those vocal but miserable Dunedinites who agitated furiously against the idea of their city receiving a sporting upgrade, on the grounds that it would add more than $60 to their annual rates bill. Wait until they separate your water charges, folks.

But the real shock to readers will be the news that New Zealand Olympic Committee secretary-general Barry Maister was only considered good enough for this year's runners-up gong. If nothing else, this should highlight the quality of the 2009 field. It's astonishing, really; that someone from the Olympic movement could attempt to take the moral high ground on any issue and not win the award. In any other year he would have been away laughing.

It was Maister, after all, who signed a NZOC letter that in October effectively threatened legal action against Taekwondo exponent Logan Campbell, and warned that using the proceeds of his K Rd escort agency to fund a 2010 Games bid was "totally inconsistent" with Olympic values.

All that, despite Campbell's business being completely legal and licensed, and despite the Olympics having morphed into one of the most crassly-commercialised events in the history of mankind; an event with an official sponsor for everything from nappies to beer, and (following Beijing) a reputation for not letting anything get in way of a good profit margin. Not even human lives.

But pressed for a winner (drum-roll please) it was impossible to go past Wada's Kiwi director-general David Howman, a man so anxious to defend his organisation's oppressive "whereabouts" drug testing policy that he started sounding vaguely like a television evangelist. Strange interpretations, a genuinely weird take on privacy; if you listened to everything he said you could be forgiven for thinking he should start testing himself.

Not only did Howman insist it was reasonable to ask elite athletes to give three months advance notice of their whereabouts for one hour every day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, he also told an English newspaper that today's young sportsmen and women shouldn't be worried about invasion of privacy issues because many of them, anyway, shared their personal details on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.

He also suggested there was a consensus in favour of the plan, when the reality seemed somewhat different. New Zealand's cricket players, rugby players, and professional footballers associations had all opposed it, not to mention the British Professional Players' Association. Leading sports figures such as Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray had denounced it, 65 Belgium athletes are challenging it in court; even Drug Free Sport New Zealand argued against it in a submission to Wada.

Now the chickens are coming home to roost. Two Belgium tennis players who went to court have succeeded in overturning their bans for missing their "whereabouts" appointments, and the International Cricket Council (with India in a leading role) this year voted unanimously against the provisions. As this column noted back in March, anyone who believes the whereabouts programme is reasonable or decent is in serious need of a hobby. Howman is a worthy winner.

rboock@xtra.co.nz

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