You are right about the cultural angle to sledging. (See Wikipedia article on sledging)

But quite often it is also used as an excuse for justifying what is actually wrong. As you pointed out, for countries like Australia, where sledging starts at the grass root levels – it is hard to change. In fact, I don’t see this happening at all.

The reverse seems to be catching on though – with even teams like India starting to sledge opposing teams.

I am not sure whether it will ever get to a stage where personal/insensitive remarks are made, though…Only time will tell.

The whole world knows that the the Australians have their own interpretation of competition and even humble souls like Dravid and Tendulkar have spoken against sledging in the past. What one can’t understand is- why can’t it be banned and the umpires do something about it. What are they doing standing in the middle anyway? Can anyone imagine one player sledging in a badmintor or a Tennis match. It should be banned- as simple as that.

Only people like Gavaskar and Kapil Dev have spoken vehemntly agains the Indian board and only then can speak against the australians. Gavaskar has also spoken against the West indies crowd and the Calcutta crowd. What is so sacrosant about the Australians.

He is an articulate man and has every right to voice his opinion though he mave chosen the wrong time.