Ben Cousins was indulged at every step. He chose his own fate, writes Greg Baum.

IT IS hard to think that there has been a greater git in the history of Australian sport than Ben Cousins — and that is in the face of plenty of stiff competition.

Classically, he is the boy who had it all — a gift, good looks, glowing health, caring family, wealth, spoils and adulation — and still it was not enough.

What he lacked, and lacks still, is a sense of responsibility; few have ever obliged him to develop one.

This was never more evident than when he appeared on television in August to apologise for his excesses. He was sorry, all right: sorry that he was being made to do it.

Cousins became a monster of many makings — game, club, city — but most of all, his own. Financially, the game lavished favours on him in a way that has ruined greater men. The city indulged him. West Coast players are royalty in Perth, down to the detail that they are impervious to scandal.

Cousins' high life has been an open secret in Perth for years. He rarely slept, kept the company of gangsters, escaped from a booze bus by stripping to the waist — evidently a habit — and swimming a river.

When this became known — in Perth, that was instantly — it was smiled upon as one might a naughty schoolboy prank. One radio station proposed an annual triathlon in honour of his feat.

The club protected him, covered for him, challenged indignantly anyone who dared to ask questions about his fitness to be captain. No one, not the law, not the commentators, not AFL drug testers, certainly not opposition players, could lay a hand on him. Cousins was untouchable, and he conducted his life thus. He broke every rule — flagrantly.

Some worked to redeem him from himself. Police warned him to desist from keeping the company he did. Managers tried to counsel him about his lifestyle. As his behaviour degenerated, the Eagles put him on a series of infinitely renewable last chances.

The night West Coast crashed out of this year's finals, coach John Worsfold — who is as straight as the Eyre Highway is long — read him the riot act, saying that he had by his recklessness cost the club the chance of successive premierships. Reportedly, Cousins scurried out the door, to all appearances a chastened man.

Two weeks ago, Cousins received what should have been the sharpest jolt of all. He was with Eagles legend Chris Mainwaring on the night he died, aged just 41, in circumstances that are at the very least suspicious.

Yet there Cousins was on Tuesday, shirtless, gormless, being taken into police custody. He was charged with drug offences. His guilt or otherwise will be decided at a magistrates court hearing today, but is immaterial now.

Cousins has brought shame enough already to his game, his club, his family, but most of all himself. He is guilty already of making a fool of himself and all who care for him. His football days are done.

It is possible to sympathise with Cousins to the extent that his problem is an illness. But that cannot be an excuse. Cousins has had access to more, and more sophisticated, treatment than most with drug issues.

Possibly, this blinded him, the Eagles and the AFL about the success of his rehabilitation. His return to the game after half a season looked hasty. Now, it looks more so.

By his massive selfishness, Cousins has hurt so many others. More than any other, he has created for West Coast an image of a club addled by drugs, and recalcitrant about it. It is an awful slur on an overwhelmingly clean majority.

Chris Judd did not leave because of Cousins, but doubtless his decision was made easier than it otherwise might have been by the incorrigible former captain. Now parents of putative stars are beginning to air misgivings about sending their sons to the Eagles.

Cousins has hurt the many who care for him. He has hurt the AFL, who colluded with the Eagles to give Cousins the chance to deal with his addiction on his own terms.

He has hurt the game.

He has hurt untold thousands of fans. It is nonsense to argue that he did not choose to be a role model. Sportsmen are put on a higher pedestal than others, giving them greater rewards and privileges, so it is only reasonable that they are held to higher standards. Cousins has failed.

Cousins' return to the football field from his exile in a Malibu sanatorium late this season was instructive. Oiled forearms shining in the Subiaco Oval floodlights, he looked what he has always supposed himself to be — invincible — and played that way. Disquietingly, West Coast fans — and some commentators — hailed him as they might a conquering hero.

Cousins again had the world at his feet that night. A mature man might have been humbled, thinking about what he had almost squandered. Cousins, evidently, looked upon it as yet more proof that he could do no wrong.

But for Cousins, there will be no third coming. Tragically, few will care.

Greg Baum is a senior writer.