I'M A proud Australian but today allow me a moment's grace to put my un-Australian hat on.
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Thankfully, this hat spends most of its time gathering dust.
But having sat and watched the Australian cricket team in the Third Test against South Africa at Cape Town, sadly I've had to brush it off.
We love our Australian cricket team.
Australian cricket has been built around a string of legendary players - from the great Sir Don through to modern day marvels such as Steve Waugh, Glenn McGrath, Justin Langer and Warnie.
Okay, Warnie has been guilty of an indiscretion or 10 in his time, but mostly those have involved his private life and that's his business when all is said and done.
Those greats played the game hard and let their actions do most of the talking.
Sadly, our Australian cricket team today has become 'ugly'. Not 'ugly' in performance but 'ugly' in antics.
The dictionary defines antics as foolish, outrageous, or amusing behaviour.
Well, the antics of some of our Australian cricketers on the Test arena of late has certainly been foolish and outrageous but it's been a little short on amusing - for me, anyway.
The expletive-laden carry on when South African batsman Faf du Plessis picked up the ball in the first innings was poor form.
After du Plessis likened the Australians to a 'pack of dogs' in a media conference later that day, some of our cricketers thought it would be a great idea to send him off with a chorus of 'woof, woof, woof' in the second innings.
What's even more amazing is that Cricket Australia chief James Sutherland deemed the incident 'childish' but 'funny'.
He's right on one front - certainly made our cricket team look like a bunch of spoiled brats.
Then there's the constant mouthful of abuse delivered by some of our bowlers to opposition batsmen.
It's a poor look, unnecessary and makes you wonder how many young children in junior ranks will be thinking, 'that's what I'm going to do next time I run in'.
If you want to make a point - rip the batsman's middle stump out of the ground.
This constant gobbing off simply detracts from on-field performance which was excellent more times than not during the South African series.
This constant gobbing off simply detracts from on-field performance
The same behaviour was on show during the Ashes tour when our cricketers decided it would be a good idea to head towards the Barmy Army and hold a finger to their lips to 'ssshhhh' them.
Just get on with the game.
These antics do nothing but take the gloss off performance.
The most disturbing thing about this is that it's our senior players leading the way - Clarke and Haddin. Aren't they supposed to set the standards on the field?
Phew, got that off the chest... time to put that hat back on the shelf.