Seven years after staring down a possible prison sentence, former Kiwi cricket star Chris Cairns says he's no longer consumed by the cloud of match-fixing allegations that dominated his past.
Cairns was acquitted of charges of perjury and perverting the course of justice following an eight-week trial in London's HighCourt in 2015 and said the "anger and animosity" he felt in the following years had now been replaced by a new lens – brought on by his brush with death.
Cairns suffered a heart attack in August that resulted in an aortic dissection — a rupture of the aorta, which is the main artery that carries blood from the heart. He underwent four open-heart surgeries and had a spinal stroke, which left him wheelchair-bound and paralysed in his legs. Then in February he revealed he had been diagnosed with bowel cancer.
"I carried a lot of stuff off the back of that [2013-15 court cases] because it consumed my life, it was the number one thing in my life," Cairns told the Between Two Beers podcast.
"I harboured a lot of anger and frustration, but I carried that silently. I dug my hole in Australia and got on with life and that's what I did – but I was angry. And I perhaps wasn't quite so angry seven or eight months ago but it was still seething in me. But now, after the last seven months, it's so far down my thinking. It's not a priority. It seems like another time, another place.
Chris Cairns arrives at Southwark Crown Court with an overnight bag as he wait for the verdict in his trial for perjury in London in 2015. New Zealand Herald Photograph by Chris Gorman.
"Maybe during that time it built up the steel in me that allowed me to survive what I went through - because it was about survival at that time. I was on my own, cast as the villain, that was my role. Building that resilience up, who's to say that wasn't a contributing factor in helping me fight."
In March 2012, Cairns successfully sued former Indian Premier League commissioner Lalit Modi for libel, after Modi posted on Twitter in 2010 that Cairns had been involved in match-fixing during 2008. Cairns won costs and damages. In 2014 the Metropolitan Police announced they would charge Cairns with perjury stemming from the Modi libel trial.
Across that period Cairns lost his Sky TV commentary job, speaking engagements and written work, and spent time driving trucks and cleaning bus stops.
So in hindsight, does Cairns regret taking Modi to court?
"No, you have to stand up for what you believe. Lalit did his thing by firing that off. He was the most influential name in the game of cricket and the unintended consequence of that set things in motion. That's what you have to defend. If you had asked me that question in July of last year, I know there would be a different response. Now, I see it as just another layer in my resilience and fight that you have to have inside you in life."
Cairns described the eight-week trial in London's High Court as horrendous.
"When you're in the dock and you've got a QC in London, they're wordsmiths, so eloquent with their command of the English language, they can turn anything you say upside down, it's horrible. It strips you bare of everything you have.
"Coming out of that I had anger and animosity towards people, but now I've had the aortic dissection, I've had the spinal stroke, I've had bowel cancer. I'm alive, that type of thing that happened to me, which was one of the big things in my life before that, is now inconsequential to me. I don't think about it anymore."
During the trial in 2015, former teammates Lou Vincent and Brendon McCullum testified against Cairns, who says he sees that through a different lens now.
"The one thing I learned going through that process is you can never take anything at face value. Everybody has a reason for doing something, and often you have to look behind what's occurring to find out what that might be.
"For me where I sit today, I bear no grudges at all. I simply don't have the bandwidth or capacity to look at that at any other way than that was just a part of my life.
"I've had people reach out to me who were perhaps of a different opinion during that time, who have now reached out and said, 'Fuck it, let's forget everything'. Death allows you a different perspective. "
Chris Cairns Cairns doing some rehab work in Canberra. Photo / Instagram
Cairns is now working as the chief executive of Smart Sportz, a company specialising in virtual sport, and says his priority in life is his five kids and wife in Canberra.
"I have a massive road ahead. Will I walk again? I don't know. I'm in a wheelchair. I can stand, but I have to put my hands on the table to do that. But we're talking years of fighting, hardship, tears, that's the battle now. But I shouldn't be here and I'm really lucky.
"If I had talked to you in July of last year, I would've said, 'Fuck, lay off the court case stuff, there's no point in going there, you don't need to'. But it's so low on my priorities now that I have no issue talking about it because it's not a factor in my life. If you can have that open genuine aspect to how you live it is easier to talk about. You're not hiding anything."
