The Picador Book of Cricket

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The Picador Book of Cricket Page 42

by Ramachandra Guha


  We were to find next day that the innings had barely begun. As Nourse came in with Dooley Briscoe, a sharp nor’ westerly was stirring up dust, and O’Reilly and Grimmett inspected happily the now very worn patches at both ends. This was the first time this pitch had been used. It had stood up well to all the pounding feet but now it was breaking.

  Nourse, immediately and majestically, moved to his century with a push for two off Grimmett. The crowd rose to him. O’Reilly was troubling him, the big fellow spinning and jumping the ball up smartly from the turf, but Nourse eventually got him square for four and then thumped him to the off for another four.

  The sun was blazing and Nourse, too, warmed up, peppering our hands on the off side. It was exhilarating to be in the middle of this and Billy Brown, Darling and I, on the off side, pitted our wits and our speed against Nourse, trying to anticipate his shots, trying to manoeuvre him away from the strike. We were earning our biltong!

  Gradually Nourse became dominant. He hit Grimmett off for Fleetwood-Smith; he took 7 in successive balls from O’Reilly; he drove Fleetwood-Smith straight for four; he murderously pulled him. Then, in the 160s, he hopped into Fleetwood-Smith, missed, was stranded, and Oldfield, for once, didn’t pick the turn of the ball. It was the left-hander’s bosie, deceiving batsman and keeper, and Nourse scrambled back as Oldfield fumbled.

  Nourse hooked O’Reilly for four and Nicholson hit him high into the pavilion for six. At lunch the score was 5 for 370, Nourse 179.

  Dark clouds came up during lunch and the mineral-laden sky looked ominous. The light was now bad and rain came. For 15 minutes we were off while a swarm of natives covered the pitch. Fleetwood-Smith took the ball and a handful of sawdust. Three times, off successive balls, Nourse hit him to the leg boundary. A single then, and Nourse was 200 in 276 minutes.

  Now Nourse began to loft the ball. He hit Grimmett back over his head while Nicholson went and Langton came. Langton hit Fleetwood-Smith for six and Nourse now surged boundaries in all directions until it became a flood. He swept past all South African records, and, on this worn pitch against some of the greatest spinners ever, he humbled us well and truly.

  Richardson tried to control the game, but it was no use. ‘Got any ideas, Chuck, about Dudley?’ he said once to Fleetwood-Smith.

  ‘Yes,’ said that bowler, ‘Shoot him.’

  We just had to wait until the end of Nourse came.

  It came at last, McCormick brilliantly catching him at point. A. D. Nourse, c McCormick, b McCabe – 231. This score should be entered in the cricket book of all time, in letters of gold.

  Nourse hit 36 fours and batted for 298 minutes. As we were leaving the field for tea we lined up to meet General Smuts. ‘I, too,’ he said with sparkling eyes, ‘have done some hectic chasing in my time!’

  Bob Crisp (then a journalist, now a farmer in England) had a merry 35 and the innings finished for 491. It was the Australians, now, who were dragging the chain.

  Vic Richardson was the best possible captain to play under. He never stood over his men, but jollied them along and gave them credit for knowing the game. No long string of tedious orders from Victor.

  ‘Now then, you two,’ he said as Brown and I padded up, ‘work it out for yourselves in the middle. It’s going to be tough. I’ll leave it to you.’

  We needed 399 to win on a fourth-innings pitch, and at the rate of almost a run a minute. As we had managed only 250 in the first innings, 399 was something stiff.

  ‘G’luck, Nugget,’ I said to Brown as we walked towards the middle, with me to take strike.

  ‘Same to you, my friend,’ said Brown with a smile.

  ‘One thing, Bill,’ I said, ‘is that ‘‘Buster’’ Nupen would have made our job much harder here.’

  Bill Brown nodded in agreement. We had been regaled since our arrival with tales of how great a bowler Nupen had been on matting pitches. Now that turf had come to all South African Test pitches Nupen had been put aside – and that was a consoling thought as Brown and I went out to bat. The truth was that Nupen was a great spin bowler on any pitch!

  You would never wish for a better opening partner than Bill Brown. He always came at your call, you could rely on his, and he never hogged the strike. His smile, however, was a little wry. We both had an idea it was going to be hard going.

  It was not Bill’s day. Nicholson soon snapped him up behind off Crisp. Then came Stan McCabe, with his quick walk, always anxious to start proceedings. Stan was a bad ‘pavilion waiter’. He had much waiting to do with Ponsford and Bradman in England in 1934, as they piled up huge partnerships, and he was always pleased when his job commenced.

  Nourse had been superlative in his final stages, but now McCabe began to play, from the very beginning, every bit as wonderfully as Nourse had done. He batted with effortless ease. He never lunged; he always stroked. He was built very much like Nourse – medium height, solid, square shoulders – and there was a definite similarity between their styles. McCabe had whippy, powerful wrists and he was a master of placement.

  It was 4.20 o’clock on the last day but one, with Australia 1 for 17 and the light wretched, with dark black clouds looming for the certain storm, and the pitch thoroughly unreliable. But in 40 minutes McCabe never made a false step, stroke or error of judgement. In 40 minutes he made 51–40 of them from boundaries.

  I left it all to McCabe. At 4.55 the light was shocking. It was a ticklish position for us. We still had a long way to go and we knew that we had a very long tail. Stan was vice-captain and we had a midwicket conference.

  ‘I can hardly see the ball,’ said Stan.

  I smiled. ‘No foolin’?’ I said.

  ‘Well, you mightn’t think so,’ said McCabe, in his modest, shy manner, ‘but I’ve got my work cut out to see it. We have all day tomorrow. This is a good start. I think we had better give the light a go.’

  ‘Umpire,’ I called, ‘how is the light?’

  We got the appeal immediately and left the field 1 for 85, of which McCabe was 59.

  ‘Well done,’ said Richardson, as we got in, ‘you did the right thing. I didn’t want to lose another wicket tonight.’

  This last day should have been a battle all the way against the clock as well, yet inside an hour, on a turning, dusty pitch that was a bowler’s dream, McCabe tore the Springbok attack to tatters. Sometimes the ball would rear and turn amazingly, but McCabe was either right out or right back, and every time he played a stroke he seemed to find a gap in the field. My orders were to hold tight and leave it to McCabe.

  Our hundred came up in 85 minutes, with boundaries coming from McCabe at an almost incredible rate. He ran to his own hundred in 90 minutes. An appeal was made for a slip catch, but the umpire was with McCabe.

  With the total 194, Mitchell spun one off the dust round my legs and just flicked the leg bail. I had made 40 in a hard struggle to keep out shooters and big and sudden breaks – which made McCabe’s innings at the other end seem like a crazy dream to me. He had made 148 of our partnership of 177.

  The Springbok attack was well tamed, but not beaten. McCabe’s wicket was the one they wanted. If they could get him, they reasoned, the other Australians should be easy.

  Darling came to give McCabe support, and to see the 200 go up in 166 minutes. McCabe ran to 150 in 145 minutes and at lunch he was 159. He had made his century before lunch, joining Trumper, Macartney and Bradman in achieving this feat.

  At lunch we were 2 for 217. The clock, too, was beaten. But, though we now looked certain to win, we knew that this match could well be over in an hour.

  The light, after lunch, was as murky as a tunnel. In the distance, vivid flashes of lightning lit the sky, and now the prospect was certain rain.

  A new ball was due and McCabe and Darling had to fight hard. McCabe got a high one luckily through slips and then, in quick succession both he and Darling were dropped in the slips.

  McCabe brought up the 250 in 199 minutes, but Darling, who had commenced delightfull
y, was now hard put to it to sight the ball. Thunder was crackling and erupting and the forked lightning was almost frightening to behold. McCabe snicked one again into the slips and Robertson, diving, failed to hold it.

  Then came an historic appeal. Herby Wade, from the field, appealed against the light! The umpires agreed, the players came off, the rain tumbled down, and in fifteen minutes the pitch was under water. We Australians were only 125 off victory, with three hours left for play.

  So ended what I still think was the greatest Test I have known. It had every ingredient of exciting, fighting Test cricket, with the fortunes changing almost hourly. The bowling, the fielding, the tactics were always interesting, and in Nourse’s 231 and McCabe’s 189 not out (he hit 29 fours) it gave cricket two of its greatest innings ever.

  Said Wade at the finish: ‘It has been a wonderful game of ups and downs, both sides being on top at different periods. The Australians were definitely on top when bad light and rain brought the close. The game was played in the best spirit. These Australians are a splendid lot of cricketers. I want to congratulate McCabe on his classical innings and Grimmett on his great bowling.’

  Said Richardson: ‘Unfortunately, a very fine finish was nipped in the bud by bad light and rain. The South Africans fought back splendidly in their second innings and set us an almost herculean task to collect 399 runs on a dusty, wearing pitch; but it is a pity that, despite McCabe’s individual record Test score and a very fine knock by Fingleton, which set us well on the road to accomplishing that task, finality was not reached.’

  In retrospect, I think it best that the game ended as it did. Both sides deserved to win: neither side merited defeat.

  ⋆ ⋆ ⋆

  Three years after Fingleton wrote about the 1935 Johannesburg Test, he was made to relegate that match to ‘second-best’ status. Open to revision, as the best scholars and writers must be, he wrote a book on the 1960 Brisbane Test called The Greatest Test of All. That work I heartily commend to the reader. However, for this anthology I have chosen to include instead an account by a man who captained one of the sides in that singular match. Like Fingleton, Richie Benaud was a trained journalist who wrote every word that appeared under his name.

  RICHIE BENAUD

  The Last Day at Brisbane (1962)

  233 to win and 310 minutes to play . . . In retrospect, surely the most nerve-racking 310 minutes of all time . . .

  I made a bad start at the ground. When I walked through the gate and along the side of the pavilion to the dressing rooms I could see white flowers dotting the turf; clover flowers. It was obvious that the ground hadn’t been mown this morning.

  I ask for a mowing but the curator tells me there was a heavy shower just after seven o’clock and he hasn’t been able to get the mower on the ground . . . now he hasn’t time to do it. Short of getting the mower and doing it myself it seems that the grass will not be mown today. I don’t s’pose it matters a great deal really, we’ll only have a bit over 200 to make.

  So I thought at the time – but how wrong can one be?

  It was a dismal morning for Australia. With only one run on the board, Simpson was caught at short leg off Hall. The fast bowler landed the ball short and for some reason Bobby went to duck instead of swaying away from it as he had been doing. When he changed his mind, and tried to play a stroke, it was far too late. All he could do was push the ball weakly to short leg. Harvey made 5 before he was out to an absolutely brilliant catch by Sobers at slip, and we were 2 for 7 . . . bad but not irretrievable, for the next man in was O’Neill.

  Just two years before I had seen this brilliant player massacre the MCC attack on the last day of the first Test to give victory to Australia. Now Norm was in fine touch again, for his near double-century in the first innings had given him confidence, so I settled down to watch him take this West Indies attack apart.

  ‘Have a look and then thrash them!’ was the only advice I offered as he went out. But he just couldn’t do it this time, and neither could Col McDonald, who battled till lunchtime for a handful of runs.

  Hall called the tune for almost the whole of this pre-lunch session, and the West Indies were completely on top. We had taken over an hour for less than 30 runs and from lunch we had to score at the rate of nearly 50 runs per 100 balls to win the game. But we had eight wickets left, and I thought we still had the chance of victory in the remaining two sessions.

  Lunch nowadays at the Brisbane Cricket Ground is a pleasant affair. Unless of course you happen to be one of the not-out batsmen who ‘just don’t feel like food’, or the captain of the side, who spends most of the time preoccupied, calculating runs per minute and runs per over.

  The batsmen come off the field weary from concentrating and sweaty from the steamy tropical heat that had brought the early-morning showers.

  ‘What about it, Benordy?’ O’Neill wanted to know. ‘What do you reckon about the scoring?’

  ‘We’re going much too slow,’ was McDonald’s comment. ‘Sorry, but they’re bowling pretty well out there.’

  ‘I know they’re bowling well,’ I said, ‘but we’ll have to step it up a bit if we want to get there . . .’ and mentally realized that it was very easy to say that but not quite so easy to carry it out against Hall with his pace and length of run.

  ‘Just see what you can do and watch the short ones . . . we want to win this one,’ was all I said as Norm and Colin went out to resume after lunch.

  Immediately they went berserk against the big Barbadian, and took 28 from four of his overs. The main run-getting came from O’Neill, who took 3 fours and a three from him.

  But O’Neill and McDonald were suddenly dismissed within a few balls of each other, the former in trying to cut Hall and the latter bowled by Worrell. Favell made only 7 before being caught off Hall (a little unluckily, for he tried to hook and the ball flew from glove to short leg).

  We were 5 for 57 and most of the afternoon left to play. The situation didn’t look too good.

  Mackay and Davidson added 35 of which ‘Slasher’ made 28 in pretty good style, too, before he tried to drive Ramadhin’s leg break and was bowled. I passed him on the way out, and he managed a wry grin as he said: ‘Sorry – she turned a bit.’ Now the only names left on the scoreboard were Davidson and Benaud – the two batsmen in – Grout, Meckiff and Kline. Five names between defeat and victory for Australia, and mine was one of them.

  It’s a lonely feeling to walk on to a Test arena to do battle with eleven players from another country. Lonely as you walk to the centre with the thousands of eyes focused on you from the stands – the twenty-two eyes of the opposition fixed on you as you near the stumps. Lonely . . . exciting . . . and challenging for both the batsman himself and the opposition. I hadn’t made many runs lately but if ever they were to come along, today would be the best time I could possibly imagine.

  Ram’s bowling and Val’s on the other end, I thought. They’re very good . . . but not as good as they used to be, although the little fellow has probably got his tail up from bowling ‘Slash’ . . . forget it and concentrate . . . concentrate . . . concentrate. Don’t do anything silly . . . but keep your head down and concentrate. You can bat better than any of these jokers can bowl . . . but concentrate!

  You feel better once you’re right out in the centre and not many of the thousands watching anxiously would guess that you’re nervous all the same. Perhaps a little quiver of the bat as you ask for leg stump and the urge to shuffle the feet a little before facing up to the first ball, but apart from that you’re OK. Just that empty feeling in the pit of the stomach as Ram gives that little skip before his flurry of shirt sends the ball on its way.

  The first one hit the middle of the bat but the second produced a cry of anguish as it skirted to top of middle and off and flashed past Alexander for wonderful runs – byes. Davo at the other end was steady as a rock but took his chance to capture 5 runs from Valentine’s next over. I’d got the strike again and was still on 0 . . . never had
a half-volley looked so good and I smashed it away to the cover fence as the clock showed tea time.

  There were 92 runs on the board . . . and 6 wickets down . . .

  I sat with Davidson at tea in the players’ section and we were joined by Sir Donald Bradman, who was obviously enjoying himself. He said what a wonderful game it had been over the four days and that today was building up to a great last session.

  Then he added: ‘What are you going for, Richie – a win or a draw?’

  ‘We’re going for a win, of course,’ I replied.

  His answer was a direct ‘I’m very pleased to hear it.’

  Later I realized what a good thing it was that the Chairman of Selectors had spoken as he did at the team meeting . . . that he was obviously completely against any ideas of playing for a soulless draw . . . but there was little chance to think of that at the time.

  With Davidson, I had to concentrate on trying to get the 123 runs still needed in even time if we were to win. As we walked back on to the field neither ‘Davo’ nor myself had any knowledge that we were to play a part in one of the most fantastic cricket sessions of all time.

  Davidson had already performed heroically in the match . . . 11 wickets for 222 runs from 55 overs and a near half-century when we batted in the first innings. Now as we followed the perky Kanhai and quiet little Joe Solomon on to the field he was needed again. What will happen when he’s not around to bat, bowl and field for Australia brings a furrow to my brow . . . but on 14 December 1960 he looked as dependable as ever as he strode to the wicket, his shoulders thrown back, and bat tapping the turf as he went. He didn’t say much . . . we’d already discussed the plans of taking short singles and thrashing at anything loose . . . and then more and more short singles.

  They’ll crack, if only we can get the pressure on them. Pressure and more and more pressure and they must crack . . . they’ve done it so often before.

 

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