Great Cricket Stories Yarns and Quotes

Ian Redpaths last Test series was against the West Indies in Australia
Before his 2nd last Test match he had scored 4398 runs

The innings where he hit the 2 career zacs he made 103
That WI attack consisted of
Andy RRRRRRRRRRRRoberts
Michael HHHHHHHHHolding
Keith Boyce
Vanburn Holder
Lance Gibbs

Redders was not a noted hooker
Perhaps he tried and got top edge sixes of the faster bowlers ?
Or more likely he hit the off spinning star Lance Gibbs for the maximums ?
Overthrows ?!!!

Whilst on Ian Redpath , I had always thought he was a very under rated cricketer
Tests
66 matches
4737 runs
43.45 average
8 tons
2 sixes !

That he exceeded his FC average of 41.99 in test matches speaks volumes of this gritty, determined , and well respected batsman

He finished his Test career in a flourish
His last 2 Test matches he scored :
103 +65
101 +70
Thus being in the record books as a batsman who scored a ton in his last Test match
Redders opened the innings in those 4 digs against Andy and Whispering Death , a couple of reasonable fast bowlers

Redpath made 97 on debut against South Africa in 1964 at the MCG
He almost got the double , the debut and last test hundred double
A team mate of Redders has this distinction , Greg Chappell
Greg scored a hundred on debut against England, and a last test hundred against Pakistan

Scrappy wrote:Redders was not a noted hooker
Perhaps he tried and got top edge sixes of the faster bowlers ?
Or more likely he hit the off spinning star Lance Gibbs for the maximums ?
Overthrows ?!!!

Whilst on Ian Redpath , I had always thought he was a very under rated cricketer
Tests
66 matches
4737 runs
43.45 average
8 tons
2 sixes !

That he exceeded his FC average of 41.99 in test matches speaks volumes of this gritty, determined , and well respected batsman

He finished his Test career in a flourish
His last 2 Test matches he scored :
103 +65
101 +70
Thus being in the record books as a batsman who scored a ton in his last Test match
Redders opened the innings in those 4 digs against Andy and Whispering Death , a couple of reasonable fast bowlers

Redpath made 97 on debut against South Africa in 1964 at the MCG
He almost got the double , the debut and last test hundred double
A team mate of Redders has this distinction , Greg Chappell
Greg scored a hundred on debut against England, and a last test hundred against Pakistan

Very, very good player, Ian Redpath. At least one of his sixes was off of a spinner, probably Gibbs. He lofted him over mid wicket and was caught in the members by a vigneron, I think from Langhorne Creek who got his picture in the Advertiser next day.

You mention Greg Chappell's maiden test century. His partner for the whole of that innings was Ian Redpath. Redpath shielded Chappell early in his innings from the rampaging John Snow. Chappell said he learnt more about batting against quality bowling that day than he ever had before. Chappell also has said that he has met many, many cricketers who would die for the baggy green cap, but only one, Ian Redpath who would have killed for it. Yet in a monumental selection blunder the selectors left out Ian Redpath from the 1972 Ashes touring team. They also left out Bill Lawry. In their place they took Bruce Francis, Graeme Watson and John Inverarity. I know we drew the series and were dudded at Headingly, but with Lawry and Redpath I think that we would have regained the Ashes.

Day 3
India V Australia
3rd Test 2013

It might have been history ?
Smith 92
Starc 99
2 batsman out in the 90s on the same day is a cricket space oddity

India batted on the same day to reach 0/283
The cricket world saw that amazing debut innings of Shikhar Dhawani
Dhawani was 185 not out at stumps, with a strike rate over 100

Dhawani was dropped in the gully a few runs short of a 100 , [when about 96 or 98 runs]
Had the catch been taken , 3 Test cricketers would have been dismissed on the same day of a Test match in the nineties
Im seriously doubting this would have ever happened in Test Cricket history

Question
Have 3 nineties ever been scored on the same day of a Test match ?
Or , has it occurred at First Class Level ?

Scrappy wrote:Day 3
India V Australia
3rd Test 2013

It might have been history ?
Smith 92
Starc 99
2 batsman out in the 90s on the same day is a cricket space oddity

India batted on the same day to reach 0/283
The cricket world saw that amazing debut innings of Shikhar Dhawani
Dhawani was 185 not out at stumps, with a strike rate over 100

Dhawani was dropped in the gully a few runs short of a 100 , [when about 96 or 98 runs]
Had the catch been taken , 3 Test cricketers would have been dismissed on the same day of a Test match in the nineties
Im seriously doubting this would have ever happened in Test Cricket history

Question
Have 3 nineties ever been scored on the same day of a Test match ?
Or , has it occurred at First Class Level ?

I can confidently say that it has never happened at test match level. There have been a couple of tests where 4 90s have been made it the match, New Zealand vs England at Dunedin in 1991-92 and England vs West Indies at the Oval in 1995, but in the first match the 90s were all scored on different days and in the second match I think Hick and Jack Russell made 90s on the first day, Richardson on day 4 and Atherton day 5.

There was the famous match in Karachi in 1972/73 where Majid Khan, Mushtaq Mohammed and Dennis Amiss all made 99. Majid and Mushtaq were both dismissed on day 3 and Amiss commenced his innings that day but wasn't dismissed until the next day.

In Shield cricket one innings where we had a 98, 97 not out and 87 was the last day of South Australia's famous 6 for 506 victory against Queensland in 1991-92. Blewett made 98, Peter Sleep was 97 not out and Jamie Siddons made 87. In the same innings Andrew Hilditch did make 137.

I don't keep records on this sort of thing so I don't know where you could definitively find the answer.

Hedley Verity
Was this player the best English spinner of all time ?

England v Australia
Lords
2nd test
June 1934

Australia 1-0 up in the series

EG 440
Ames 120
Wall 4/104

AU 284
Brown 105
Verity 7/61 [36]

AU Follow on 118
Woodfull 43
Verity 8/43 [22.3]

Stumps day 1
EG 5/293

Stumps day 2
AU 2/192

At stumps day 2 you would think Australia was favored to win this game
On day 3 Australia capitulated and lost 18/210
On day 3 Hedley Verity destroyed Australia and took an astonishing 14 wickets in a days play
This is a record amount of dismissals in a days play in Test Cricket by an individual bowler
Verity also took 17 wickets in a day in a County Cricket match

Verity
Test matches
144 wickets
24.37 average

Wisden almanac of 1944 said of Verity :
It was Verity who kept Bradmans average under 150

Don Bradman had this to say about the left hand spinner
" I could never claim to have completely fathomed Hedleys stratergy, for it was never static or mechanical."

To show a measure of Veritys greatness he bowled to Bradman in 16 Test matches
Bradman scored 401 runs against Veritys bowling
Verity dismissed the Don on 8 occasions
That means that Bradmans average against Verity was 50.12
That is almost half of Bradmans career average
How good does that make Verity ?


Veritys bowling average is 22.86 if we deduct the Bradman duels

Bradmans test average is 106.37 if we deduct the Verity duels
And to think that Eric Hollies gets the accolades for keeping The Dons average at less than 100 !

That Hedley Verity could restrict The Don head to head to a good cricketer is quite an achievement

Yes, a great cricketer. Yorkshireman, I think?

redandblack wrote:Yes, a great cricketer. Yorkshireman, I think?

Yes a great Yorkshire cricketer
Started off as a medium pacer, changed to spin
That change ends up being a verityable stroke of genius
He represented Yorkshire from 1930 -1939


Yorkshire v Nottinghamshire
Headingley
July 1932
3 day County match

NOTT 234
Larwood 48
Leyland 4/14
Verity 2/64

YORK 9/163 dec
Holmes 65
Verity 12
LLLLLLLLLLLLarwood 5/73

One would think Nottinghampshire with a 71 run first innings lead were favored to win
With Yorkshire batting last, and against the Harold LLLLLLarwood and Bill Voce , Notts would have had a degree of confidence in winning

NOT 0/44 on day 3 and well on top with a lead of 115 runs
But ....

NOT 67 all out
Lose the 10 for 23
Hedley Verity was the destroyer
19.4 overs
16 maidens
10 wickets
10 runs

You have to give Hedley Verity 10 out of 10 for this performance

YOR had to chase down 139 against the much vaunted pace duo of LLLLLLLLarwood and Voce

YOR 0/139
Holmes 77 not out
Herbert Sutcliffe 54 not out

Yorkshire were actually 9/163 at stumps day 2 and declared
That ends up being one of historys great cricket declarations

Nottinghampshire's Willis Walker , Charles Harris and George Gunn made history in this game
They were involved in a Hedley Verity hat trick on day 3

Hedley Verity First class bowling stats
1956 wickets
14.90 average
42.22 strike rate per wicket

Thats an astonishing bowling career
He ends up taking Don Bradmans in Test wicket more than any other bowler as well

The more I read and hear about former Australian wicketkeeper Wally Grout, the more interesting "Grizzly" becomes.

On his way to the 1959-60 tour of the Indian subcontinent, Grout bought a pith helmet in Singapore. Wherever the team went in India or Pakistan, he would turn up to the team bus wearing the helmet.

On the final day of the tour, Grout turned up to airport for the flight home when someone asked him about the helmet. Grout took it off his head, looked at it and said, "What am I carrying this bloody thing for?", and throws it in the bin

After the Cricket season of 1913-1914 South Australia was seeking the services of a new coach

In May 1914 an approach was made for the superstar batsman Charlie Macartney
An initial offer was made but declined by Macartney as there was a lack of security, and also no long term employment was offered

SA considered approachiing others
In June 1914 another offer was made to Macartney
This time he was offered a 5 year contract and a choice of jobs
Macartney would have the choice of working at the SACA as a clerk , or work at Harris Scarfes
This offer to Macartney was convincing

There were further correspondences between SA and Macartney
Charlie Macartney eventually accepted an offer in late August 1914 and asked when he could start

South Australia was to gain the services of one of Australias all time great batsmen
But the offer was recindered
Conflict was escalating in the Northern Hemisphere , leading to WWI
SA withdrew the proposal to Macartney , due to the war
SS cricket was played in 1914-1915 , and SA was to miss out on Macartneys services

Oh what might have been

Offer and acceptance = contract.
He should have sued them for a breach or frustration of it!

Charlie Macartney once talked to a man who talked to a man who talked to me

Charlie Macartney talked to Clarrie Grimmett
Clarrie Grimmett talked to Redandblack
Redandblack talked to Me

Some great cricketers in that sequence

LOL, Scrappy the best one of the lot?

Scrappy, good link and yes, I did talk to Clarrie Grimmett.

Only problem with your statement about all those being great cricketers is that some don't rate MacCartney.

redandblack wrote:Scrappy, good link and yes, I did talk to Clarrie Grimmett.

Only problem with your statement about all those being great cricketers is that some don't rate MacCartney.

I know that you are only kidding but this is what Denzil Batchelor, a famous English cricket journalist of the first half of the 20th century said about Macartney :

"It is legitimate when choosing your favourite batsman of all time, to name neither Bradman nor Hobbs, to pass over Trumper, Ranji and Hutton, and opt for Charlie Macartney."

Like Trumper before him and Bradman after him he scored a century before lunch in the 1926 test at Leeds. Bardsley had been dismissed first ball by Maurice Tate. On the fifth ball of the test Macartney tried to cut Tate got an edge which England captain got two hands to but dropped. What a miss. You would think that almost being two down in the first over might have curbed Charlie, but not so. A century before lunch certainly changed the direction of the match. This was the middle century of three in a row he made in tests in that year. And he was 40 years of age!

A question for redandblack and Scrappy (and anyone else interested - and I don't know the answer to this one) - Is Bardsley the last Australian to dismissed first ball of an Ashes test? I know that Keith Stackpole was against New Zealand in 1974, Worthington for England was in an Ashes test of 1936-37 and South Africa's Jimmy Cook, after a lifetime of waiting to play test cricket suffered the indignity the first ball of South Africa's return to test cricket.

Australia v England 2011
5th Test
SCG
Mitchell Johnson experiences the ignominities of cricket
Johnson top scored in the AU first innings with 53
Johnson took the most wickets in the EG innings with 4/168
Johnson made a first ball golden duck in the AU 2nd innings

Australia v England 2010
2nd Test
Adelaide Oval
Simon Katich, in the 1st innings run out for 0 with facing a ball
Ricky Ponting out next ball for 0
But what might be a historical trivia concerns Ryan Harris
Harris was dismissed in both innings first ball !

Australia v England 2010
1st test
Gabba
Prior
Broad [Ends up being Siddles hat trick ball]

England v Australia 2009
The Oval
5th test
Doc Clark

England v Australia 2009
Leeds
4th test
Peter Siddle
Graham Onions , This is prob the last EG batter to score a golden duck v AU[he made a pair in this match ]

England v Australia 2009
3rd test
Birmingham
Mike Hussey
Mitchell Johnson AGAIN

Thats an awful stat if correct
Of the last 12 golden ducks between Australia and England , Australia have 9 and England 3


Another way to ascertain how many batsman have made golden ducks, is to find the last 2 victims of hat tricks

Ducks

Zero Test match ducks in Test Career
44 Jim Burke [AU]
40 Reggie Duff [AU]
38 Brijesh Patel [IN]
37 Robert Christiani

Most innings b4 a Test duck 50 + innings
78 A B De Villiers [SA]
75 A De Siva [SL]
58 Clive Lloyd [WI]
54 Jimmy Anderson [EG]
51 Alan Davidson [AU]
51 Geraint Jones [EG]

The first 2 have the prefix of De in their names
Jimmy Anderson is an outstanding effort, for a tailender

rig, referring back to McCartney, I was still at aschool and Clarrie Grimmett coached Adelaide DCC. He used to drive me from the No 2 ground into the city now and again.

Naturally, even though he was over 70 then(?), I was rapt and asked him questions.

The one thing I clearlt remember was that I asked him who the best cricketer he had seen was, fully expecting him to say Bradman.

"Charlie McCartney, without doubt", he said.

i gathered he wasn't a Bradman fan.

Scrappy wrote:Charlie Macartney once talked to a man who talked to a man who talked to me

Charlie Macartney talked to Clarrie Grimmett
Clarrie Grimmett talked to Redandblack
Redandblack talked to Me

Some great cricketers in that sequence

Someone once told me that Barry Jarman at about 14 years of age played a 2nd or 3rd grade match against Kensington which included Clarrie Grimmett who would have been about 58 years of age.

Then in about 1980 Barry Jarman captained a Kensington side which included a 14 year old Tom Moody.

I can't verify this, but if it is true Jarman played in matches involving two test players who were born about 63 years apart!!!!

At first I thought this couldn't be true but I have found a newspaper clipping from March 1945 where it states that Clarrie has announced his retirement from first class and international cricket. The article does say that Clarrie is only 52. It goes on to say that he had just taken 8 for 80 for Kensington against University in the last district cricket game of the year. So if Clarrie was still playing a grade at 53, I guess he could have easily been playing lower grades a few years later.

redandblack wrote:i gathered he wasn't a Bradman fan.

It is amazing that, as a cricketer who aparently gained world wide admiration and was obviously a cricketing freak, there's not a lot of love for him from a number of people who played in his era.

Adelaide Hawk wrote:

redandblack wrote:i gathered he wasn't a Bradman fan.

It is amazing that, as a cricketer who aparently gained world wide admiration and was obviously a cricketing freak, there's not a lot of love for him from a number of people who played in his era.

Lindsay Hassett, who was loved by most of his teammates once said that Bradman made an unequalled amount of runs, made an unequalled amount of money ou of cricket and made surprisingly very few friends from the game.

Yet when Hassett died Bradman said that no one could have ever had a better lieutenant!

According to Ian Chappell, Keith Miller had absolutely no respect for Bradman, the man, as opposed to Bradman the cricketer, yet one of his last requests was that John Bradman representing his late father speak at Keith's funeral!

Getting back to Grimmett and Bradman, I have heard a number of times that Grimmett never forgave Bradman for Grimmett not being chosen in the 1938 touring team of England.

Vic Richardson often told the story that the SACA put on testimonial match for Grimmett and Richardson after they had retired. As was the tradition the gate takings after expenses was to go to Grimmett and Richardson. Apparently Bradman had stated that Grimmett had lost his wrong'un. Anyway last over before lunch Grimmett was bowling to Bradman. Many people used to work on Saturday morning and then would flock to Adelaide Oval to watch Bradman bat. Vic breathed easy knowing that Clarrie would deliberately not try to get Bradman out because the size of the profit they were to make relied on Bradman batting in the afternoon. Anyway Clarrie bowled Bradman in this last over before lunch and rushed up to Vic saying "that will teach the B*st*rd to say I had lost my wrong'un." Vic replied "You've just lost us a thousand quid." Vic reckoned Clarrie tried to look sorry for Vic's sake but in reality his triumph meant more than any amount of money.

I guess it's a long winded way of saying that as in many spheres of life the successful men have huge egos which often clash.

I think the Keith Miller situation was based upon life's experiences. He flew Mosquito fighter-bombers during World War II, and never took cricket all that seriously. Once asked about pressure in cricket he responded, "Pressure is having a Messerschmitt up your ****, there is no pressure in cricket". I think he and Bradman were worlds apart in their attitude towards the game.

I think the Chappelli thread emphasises this point.
What his Grandfather said puts in complete perspective for me.

Vic said in response to being asked about Bradman, "Great batsman".
And that is all, and years after he had retired.

The more I read on this era, the more I wonder how much Bradman was respected as a leader amongst his peers.

Nobody can honestly question his batting prowess, but as a leader both in cricket and administration, I think the jury is well and truly "out".

Chambo Off To Work We Go wrote:I think the Chappelli thread emphasises this point.
What his Grandfather said puts in complete perspective for me.

Vic said in response to being asked about Bradman, "Great batsman".
And that is all, and years after he had retired.

The more I read on this era, the more I wonder how much Bradman was respected as a leader amongst his peers.

Nobody can honestly question his batting prowess, but as a leader both in cricket and administration, I think the jury is well and truly "out".

From what I have read Bradman was very, very respected as a captain because of his shrewd cricket brain. The difference, of course, is that he wasn't liked but he was respected. I guess it was a different generation, the boss was always right. It used to happen with footy coaches. I can think of a number of coaches, even in our time who have been hated by players but their teams still won flags.

This dictatorial style of leadership doesn't work as much these days.

I recall reading a comment made by Vic Richardson after one of Australia's successful tours where he said something like, "We could have played anyone without Bradman and still won, but we couldn't have beaten the blind school without Grimmet". You get the opinion Vic wasn't a huge fan

When I used to go to Adelaide DCC as a kid, their team contained a number of well-known players. I think the captain was Bob Lee, who won a Reserves Magarey Medal with Westies, KG, who often used to drive me most of the way home and Leon Hill, who later played for Queensland.

A year or so ago, I attended a reunion of Pulteney Old Scholars CC (I didn't go to Pulteney, went to Marion HS, but coached POS to a Premiership in the one year I didn't play for Fulham). Ian Chappell was the guest speaker and said that as a young player he always remembered some prescient advice given to him by Leon Hill.

Adelaide is a small place - Leon Hill gave me my first cricket bat.

Lovely memories.