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I am very emotional. It took me many years to recover from the death of my father. Even when I was playing cricket, I wasn't happy. I would just sit and cry. I was very young. He was too young; he shouldn't have gone. Cricket is all right. We all play sport. Good and bad days come.

Cricket was my reason for living.

One afternoon when I was 9, my dad told me I'd be skipping school the next day. Then we drove 12 hours from Melbourne to Sydney for the Centenary Test, a once-in-a-lifetime commemorative cricket match. It was great fun - especially for a kid who was a massive sports fan.

Cricket has given me everything. If I'm anything today, it is because of the game... where I have given blood, sweat, and tears.

My dad talks about the times when we'd play backyard cricket: If I got bowled out, I'd just refuse to let go of the bat and swing it at anyone who tried to take it away from me. I like to think that's been tempered a bit over the years.

My father died in 1930, but if you told him or anybody almost in that time that you'd be able to sit back in England and watch a cricket game in Australia, they'd have you put in the loony bin.

My dad died of a stroke.

Even with my father and brother dying, I didn't quite process the grief.

I always wanted to play cricket, and I have played competitive cricket to a fairly good level. I remember that my father used to come and watch me play. He used to love watching me play.

It's a source of great sadness to me that my father died without having seen me do anything worthwhile. He was constantly having to make excuses for me.