I want to talk briefly about my crew……My crew has basically been the same since Barmy Army. Matty Weiss ( the boss ) /Jake Avent - not sure what he does even after 3 shows together/Myles Carney – my main man who organises all of us and my best mate Hugh Jackman (apparently wearing his Wolverine claws whilst doing the Voice Overs) have been on all the shows plus the editor John Cameron and his team back in Sydney.

I have always loved John Cameron as he is the main man when it comes to editing the show, he tries his best to make the show as good as possible. We have had two different cameramen, one called Stu Wilson and a Victorian called Chris but called Boner!!!

Matty Laing who takes the shots of me in the crowd has been with me since Bolly and we share a lot of time together during the shows…I could not think of a better bloke to share the experience with me.

The show is a team event and the people that work on the show are sensational, without them we could not make the show. Thank you guys, plus all the teams behind the scenes at Seed Productions and Granada Productions.

We had more players/ex players and legends in the show overall than the other shows combined. Starting with Viv and ending with Boony with Big Bird Joel Garner/Punter/M Clark/Mitch Johnson/Mike Hussey.

We wanted me to face another international bowler to bowl to me as Warney did in Barmy Army and Bing Lee in Bolly. We asked Mitchell Johnson and he said ‘yep/no worries’ but the only day that we could do it was rain/rain and more rain…..I fancied myself against him 2!!!! May be in the Ashes Return…that’s the plan…

Let’s hope we can all do it again!!!

Warner Park Stadium - 2 games - 1 close finish/1 drubbing - the cricket spoke for itselfI lost gravy to the city after that tight win we had in Game 4 of the series…I had a few beers with him off camera then let the big fella to be with his old mates.
I was up to around midnight which was enough for me after drinking all day. Gravy went all night and I saw him next at the game in the morning looking fresh as a daisy…what a legend on the drink….just does it for a living.
The railway took us to the bottom of Brimstone Hill which has a British fort on it. The Slavery issue - we believe had to be touched on. I felt a little uncomfortable bringing it up with Gravy.Gravy’s attitude to slavery, which I thought was fantastic, was: it was in the past…‘move on positively that is the best way of dealing with it’.
Saying goodbye to Gravy was 2 minutes in the show but was many hours off camera. We stayed at that bar that we shot the final goodbye at but we also went with the crew to a beautiful restaurant right on the water for a crew dinner that night.
We had a great feed and a few wines and it gave us all a time to reflect on what a great trip that we had all had done over the 7 weeks. Mike Hussey had given the boys one of his one dayer shirts and had signed it for me. The boys presented it with me before dessert and I proudly put it on over my ‘Sunday best’ and wore it for the rest of the night…even in the casino till 5am!!

Lance Gibbs V The PM

After watching the show tonight all the memories of the boat trip between St Vincent and Grenada came flooding back!! If you get seasick you will know what I mean…if you don’t…you’ll think I’m soft.
The Spanish lady who owned the boat, to put it nicely, was a dead set shocker!!! She was so strict on how things had to be done that after a couple of hours one of the producers Jake who does not suffer fools had to have a word...explain to her that we were making a TV show and that we needed to use the entire boat, always with respect but we could not be made to feel like we were invading her space or continually asking for permission to do anything. Anyway, it all worked out. While I was throwing my guts up for a whole day!
Flintstone was Gravy’s and my guide for Granada, another great guy who could not have done anymore to make us feel like a million bucks. He basically lost everything in the Hurricane and his outlook on life could not have been brighter. That, I reckon, is true inspiration. He is normally a taxi driver and has just got into taking tourists around the island – look him up if you ever go to Granada, he’ll be in the queue at the airport waiting for tourists!!!
My Family in Granada – The Roberts – Brenda/Arial/Robert (Robert Roberts? Ed) – what sort of people invite a stranger in, make him feel so welcome and also allow a film crew all over their house at all times of the day? Special people who wanted to show how a normal West Indian family live! They even provided me with my own little bar – The Bar Under the House AKA The Headache bar We had a party every night in this little room!!!

Do you remember when I was having a chat with the PM at the cricket and Lance Gibbs came along and wanted to have a chat with him? After the cameras stopped rolling he had a heated debate with the PM about how embarrassed he was that the match had been 15 mins late in starting because of the sightscreens not working! He was going on about how they didn’t get it right for a match that was going live all around the world! It was so weird! To have a true legend of the game having a heated conversation with the PM in front of everyone…can u imagine Allan Border or Steve Waugh going up to our PM in the middle of a packed VIP area at the cricket here?

Beers, Rum and…Cricket?
Calypso crowds at last!!! And a game of cricket for me!!!The game with The Fanatics was fantastic fun, a great bunch of blokes who played the game in the right way. To get some runs was a bonus especially after being dropped first ball!!! My main man Andrew was keeper. And the worst cricketer ever!
After the match I had one beer then I had to go back to the house and soak in a tub and go to bed. I was really meant to rest for a week after the heart scare but I was bored and we were getting behind schedule with the show. Plus I thought it would be sweet playing a game of 20/20 cricket. Little did I realise that it would take so much out of me. After being in the field for over an hour then batting for an hour, I was really struggling.

The next morning was a boat cruise, Matty Weiss said to have a lay-in so the crew didn’t collect me ‘til about 10am.The cruise was fantastic. I’m not a fan of boats as I get sea sick but the water was crystal clear blue and it was calm!!! There was a family on the boat that had all arrived from the US to attend a marriage. The bride and groom were there and I had a sing off with the groom for his bride…he won. We had a swimming race into shore…he won. Bloody Americans!
Before I arrived in the West Indies, when I thought of cricket in the West Indies I thought of crowds mayhem/rum/sun/noise/dancing – bar a few moments in the party stand in Antigua and Barbados during the Tests, it hasn’t happened.
When I turned up with Gravy and Andrew for the 20/20 match in Barbados it looked like rain would prevent any play but we decided to make the most of it and just get stuck into any activities that the party stand had to offer. Beach Volleyball/cricket/drinking/eating/drinking and more drinking…rum and beers in the rain with a couple of new mates plus all the Aussie supporters that we had met in Antigua.
Hours of drinking…and not thinking that we would have a game came to a grinding halt as the crew got word that the match would be a 11/11 match!!!
By the time the match started my ‘care factor’ was minimal…I was having a fantastic time in the party stand and because it was only a 20/20 match I was not that worried if the cricket happened or not. 20/20 to me is fun, it’s not proper cricket. Only in a 20/20 World Cup would I be worried if we win or not.
When the cricket did start I really enjoyed it….I really enjoyed the West Indies crowd’s passion, excitement and belief that their team was going to knock over the Mighty Australians. The Aussies have not quite worked out 20/20 cricket and we certainly have not worked out the 11/11 game!!!
The Windies WON the match with about 3 overs to spare….the moment I thought I was back in India!!! The West Indians crowds were happy, they were really pumped and that made me happy…..bring on the first of the One Dayers!!!
Bye Barbados…hello St Vincent…and Gravy is coming with me. He made a quick call to his wife to get a leave pass but then he was on the rest of the tour with me!I am now in St Vincent with Gravy and another mate of his…Winston who ends up being one of the nicest blokes I have EVER meet in my life.
The one dayer in St Vincent was all about me learning about the ‘bumper’ dance in the crowd. You saw Winston explaining it tonight…just hold on like a jockey baby!!!! You just stand there and girls come up behind you and grind away...it’s not a bad way to watch the cricket let me tell you!!!
Australia 1 West Indies 0 - best of 5 - 4 to play

Gravy…what do u guys reckon? Champion? Legend? And can you do the bumper dance!!!???

Heart Attack in Barbados

Well…what a night! It was tough looking back on that, especially when my kids got all teared up watching daddy go through a ‘heart attack’ on the TV. I had to explain to them that it was months ago and daddy is OK but they still needed a cuddle!
It is the first time that I have seen the footage that the crew took when I was sick in Barbados.When I first got the pains I thought that they would pass but it just got worse and worse and the medic area was the safest place for me to be. What happened after that was a blur.

The crew went from a mild concern to a real panic as it became clear that they might actually lose me and once I was taken to hospital it was tools down, they all came out to the medical centre to sit in the waiting room to see if I was going to be OK. Six hours of tests and observation came up empty but we think it was a reaction to the fresh fruit and nuts I was eating before lunch.

I was on my way to the local hospital in Barbados but Myles Carney (Milo) our Series Coordinator explained to the medical staff at The Kensington Oval that ‘Granada’ and ‘Seed’ our production companies had full insurance, that meant I went to the private medical centre on the west side of Barbados – he part where Oprah or Bill Gates would go to get fixed if they were sick in Barbados if you know what I mean.

I rang my dad and told him what happened but I couldn’t ring my wife or mum, I don’t know why, I just couldn’t. It was only just before an article in Sydney’s The Sun Herald came out a week or so later about my health problems that I had to step up and tell them, I didn’t want them reading all about it in the paper.

As you saw, I spent a couple of days in bed listening to the cricket and I also watched the entire “Underbelly” series through my boss Matty Weiss’s iPod. Still to this day I do not know exactly what was wrong with me. I have had all the tests known to medical science but still no 100% diagnostics. I carry a few extra kilos and I am on a plan to get myself back to around 100kg – two stone to go. This will help me in all facets of my life and should make me fitter for our next adventure – I hope you watch next week as the Calypso spirit comes to play as we hit the limited over’s cricket!!!

Gus’s Top 5 Cricket Heroes

When I watched Episode 1 the thing that came out and smacked me in the face was...how good is my life! Getting to hang with Viv Richards!

Viv was my childhood hero and I remember my mates and I were always trying to be him when we played backyard cricket...“I’m Viv...I’m Viv” we shouted as we argued about who we were going to be in the match. And whoever got to be Viv, got to be KING! The rest would be Lillee, Thommo, Greg or Ian Chappell. Hookesy was popular too but Viv was THE MAN.

What was shown tonight was only a small part of the day I spent with Viv. I had NO IDEA that he was going to collect me. My Executive Producer Matty Weiss (the boss on a TV show ) just told me to get through customs and go and wait outside near the taxi rank outside the airport in Antigua. When I was tapped on the shoulder I honestly could not believe it, one of my childhood heroes, right there in front of me. Viv.

He was genuinely happy and excited to show me his country. As you saw on the show we cruised around in his soft top car and the people in the streets shouted out at him. There is only so much that you can capture on the show and the stuff that hit the cutting room floor in the edit suites is the stuff that I’ll always remember.

We chatted about his life now as a SIR, what it is like to be a living legend, his thoughts on the West Indies side now and the future of cricket with 20/20 having such a big impact on our game.
The guys in the crew were also in awe of Viv as they all had him as a hero. After we shut the camera down Viv happily chatted away with us, posed for photos and signed the odd autograph. He was exactly the same on camera as off it. Sometimes you can get to close to your heroes… but they can let u down.

So without any further adieu, my top 5:

Viv – of course
Lillee
Thommo
Ian Chappel
Hookesy

Agreed?

EVERY PARENT'S NIGHTMARE, and MIND-BLOWINGLY INAPPROPRIATE are just some of the reviews the new season of Gossip Girl has received.If you somehow missed the point of the ads which blatantly scream SEX! SEX! And yes, MOOOORE SEX! The message should be clear after watching the first episode of the new season. Gossip Girl contains (GAAASSSP!!!!) SEX!

What do you expect? The show centres around a group of hormonally fuelled teens who will jump on anything that moves, so I like our chances of witnessing one or more of these encounters. And let’s face it, it is after all the PG, TV kind of love making which usually consists of a bit of choreographed bump and grind mixed to a soft rock love track and topped off with just the right amount of effective mood lighting (hey, it gets me in the mood)...

ANYWAY...my point is, I find Gossip Girl’s so called sex scenes no more offensive than a modern day music video. If 'Madge' can share her 'Vag' with the entire universe, then so too should theUpper East Side teens be left in peace to dirty dance with whomever they please!