The death last year of Tom Maynard robbed the sport of an exciting young cricketer but the sickening details, briefly aired in the media, were swiftly brushed under the carpet. Until this week's inquest. The sequence of events leading up to his death makes for depressing reading on so many levels.
Firstly, he and his Surrey team-mates Jade Dernbach and Rory Hamilton-Brown were in a pub getting smashed. Secondly, they went back to his home with some girls and got even more hammered. Maynard then left his home after 3am and rang his girlfriend while driving a high-performance Mercedes. Police spotted him driving erratically (surprise, surprise!), tried to stop him only for him to evade his pursuers by jumping on a live electrified rail. We don't know whether electrocution, or the impact from an Underground train, caused Maynard's death but either way it's an unpleasant way to go.
Of course Tom Maynard's life should not be defined by the manner of his death but the culture amongst some professional sportsmen of binge drinking can't be excused by the old chestnuts; "it's only high jinks", "he's young, needs to let his hair down" or "lots of blokes his age do it these days". What would have been the reaction had Maynard, while four times the legal alcohol limit and high on Ecstasy and cocaine, ploughed into a group of people on the pavement or swerved into into another car killing the occupants? Thank God it was so late at night and nobody else was hurt.
Yes, maybe lots of young people do take drugs, get pissed and drive their car but that doesn't make it right. And when that young person is a top sportsman and a potential role model to millions of children, it becomes even more dangerous. Factor in the bad publicity it brings to cricket, and it is no wonder that the ECB, with the players' union PCA, has announced plans to increase the number of drugs tests it carries out. Hopefully this will include out-of-competition examinations for so-called recreational drugs, substances which may not enhance performance on the pitch but are known to affect mental abilities and are, let's face it, illegal.
Michael Vaughan and Ian Bell have spoken in favour of this move, sending an important message to other current or future cricketers that the sport is cleaning up its act. Blimey, if football can do it, surely cricket can! The only sad part of the ECB statement was its rider that it accepts that Maynard's drug taking was a one-off, despite the medical evidence that he had almost certainly been a frequent coke-sniffer for months. His mates and girlfriend said in the coroner's court that they had been unaware of Tom Maynard's drug abuse. Hmm. Well, I leave them to face their own consciences.
The batsman's demise last June understandably left Surrey CCC in a state of turmoil and grief. Flatmate and county skipper Hamilton-Brown moved on to Sussex soon afterwards and both he and Dernbach must have felt particularly bad about Tom's death as they had been drinking with him and failed to stop him heading for his car and driving off in what must have been a dreadful state.
It's now the ECB and PCA's turn to show leadership and demonstrate to cricket players and fans that you can be one of the lads and a responsible role model, so that something positive may come from Tom Maynard's shocking death.
