by David Lloyd
However, this was going to turn out anything but a jolly. Of course, we were quite confident about our prospects given our performances against India and Pakistan at home that summer. But results in our own conditions against that kind of opposition didn’t necessarily tell us where we were at compared to the team Australia was putting together. We arrived feeling that we would be very competitive, and this feeling was reinforced by our early results.
Unfortunately, as several eminent Australians later reminded me, I had made the mistake in the build-up of claiming I could play their attack with my manhood. From what we had seen, it was hardly a bowling line-up to strike fear into an international opening batsman. How those words would come back to haunt (not to mention hurt) me, and given what was to happen, I should perhaps explain why I said it in the first place.
First of all, few anticipated Dennis Lillee being declared fit, and when he was, on the eve of the series, it undoubtedly gave the Australians a boost. The main thrust of the pre-series talk had been that Lillee was not going to play. He had suffered a serious back injury, spinal fractures that had caused him to be set in plaster from his backside to his shoulders for six weeks earlier in 1974, and he was rumoured to be behind schedule in his recovery.
In his absence, there appeared to be little to fret about, and if anything Australia’s bowling stocks seemed thin. Gary Gilmour and David Colley, with a handful of caps between them, shared the new ball for New South Wales against us ahead of the first Test.
And the name Thomson that kept recurring held little fear for us. As well as this beach bum Jeff, who had gone round the park for a ton without success versus Pakistan a year earlier, there was Victoria’s Alan Thomson, otherwise known as Froggy because of the way he sprang to the crease and bowled off the wrong foot. He had featured on England’s last visit four winters previously, but hardly covered himself in glory with figures of 17-0-85-0 against us for his state this time around. Unfortunately, it was the man who would forever be known as Thommo who would force us into a rapid reassessment.
Thomson had only recently arrived on the scene, and proved a potent weapon for Australia not only due to his slingy action, which made the ball nigh-on impossible to pick up until very late, but because of his indefatigable spirit. He just charged in all day long and provided no respite. Mentally, countering him was made tougher by the fact that in Australian first-class cricket they were still using eight-ball overs. You would get through four and then realise the job was only half done.
Queenslander Thomson had looked nothing like the ferocious beast unleashed for just his second Test appearance, when he lined up on his home ground for the tour fixture with England just a few weeks earlier. His tactical coasting was on instruction from Australia captain Ian Chappell, who was keen for his new tyro to get a look at our batsmen but deny them a proper study of his true self.
Occasionally, you are pitched against bowlers who make it more difficult for a batsman to be able to do that because of slight quirks in their actions. With Thommo it was almost impossible, because he didn’t let you see the ball at all as he wound up to wang it down. With other people, you knew where their hands were going and you could watch the ball all the way because it was visible. But with him, you just never saw it because the way his arm dragged behind him, with his body tilted backwards before uncoiling like a giant spring, meant it remained behind him until the last possible moment, and then it was coming at you with frightening velocity.
So unrefined was this hoodlum from out in the sticks that he didn’t even have a measured run-up when he first started his professional career. During net sessions, he just shuffled up and slung it down, which is probably why he overstepped so often. There were thirteen no-balls from Thomson in that first Test and plenty of others we reckoned too. Word had it that Chappell was on his shoulder after the first couple, realising that his inexperienced paceman was struggling with his stride pattern.
‘How many paces do I do, skipper?’ Thommo asked him.
‘What do you mean? I’ve no idea. Don’t you know?’
‘Nah, I’ve always walked back to where the tree is at this end – but they’ve cut it down!’
This one-man sonic boom, as someone rather aptly coined him, was such a pure talent that it had never occurred to him to get the tape measure out, as is the contemporary tendency for the fast men. These days a measure and tape, plus some white spray to mark initials in the grass, are essential accessories in a player’s kitbag. But marking out meticulously just wasn’t in keeping with Thommo’s maverick style.
So when that most wonderful of fast-bowling combinations came together for the first Test, we were taken by surprise. We had fallen for the local propaganda that suggested this gruesome twosome were by no means certain of starting the series. Lillee, possibly a yard slower than the bowler the world had witnessed in the 1972 Ashes, was the artist and Thomson the artisan.
And how the great Tony Greig made us pay for his actions too. No Test cricket series possesses so rich a rhetoric as the Ashes, and the war in this chapter was started by the Poms, according to Lillee. For it was Greig’s decision to bounce Lillee in the first innings of that first Test in Brisbane that got the blood pumping below that hairy chest and medallion.
As Lillee regained his feet and brushed past Greig, having been caught behind attempting to hook, he said to his adversary: ‘Just remember who started this.’ Now, forget who picked the fight, there was no question who finished it, although at the same time Greig for one never shirked any sign of confrontation.
In such an arena things can get fractious to say the least, but there was no talk of bringing the game into disrepute, no physical gesturing or in-your-face ranting, after this quiet verbal exchange. The Australians played unbelievably hard but they were fair, and to his credit Greig never lost his showman image in the heat of battle, signalling his own fours whenever he opened those big shoulders of his, much to the chagrin of his Australian adversaries. It all added to the drama. Not that the wonderful new-ball craftsman Lillee appreciated it when Greig uppercut to the fence and then dropped down or leant forward to wave his right hand to the audience like a music hall conductor.
It was actually fairly extraordinary that the opening defeat took place at all, because in the build up to that Gabba contest the weather had been horrific. All kinds of storms had hit Queensland and the ground had been under water, but the mayor of Brisbane stepped up his efforts to get the game on. The great Richie Benaud told a television audience he feared it would be a ‘mud heap’ following the most controversial pitch preparation in Anglo-Australian history, after the use of a heavy roller led to fears that this had caused a dangerous ridge at the Vulture Street end. You see Alderman Clem Jones, the mayor in question, doubled up as groundsman, one of the stranger job shares you will come across, surely.
Having sacked the local curator, he had taken over ground duties himself, and there he was slaving away in a cork hat, pair of shorts and vest by day before switching into his chains and robes to host the two teams at an official function on the evening before the series began. So sodden was the square, in fact, that as the clock ticked down to the first ball, it was difficult to ascertain which strip the match would be contested on, and it only became visible on that penultimate day.
These fears about the pitch proved misplaced. However, the match was full of short stuff from both sides as the bowlers tested out the underprepared surface’s bounce. Six Australian batsmen were out hooking or pulling after Ian Chappell won the toss and batted first, a decision that spoke of his assessment of the surface.
Australia scored 309 and a 44-run first-innings advantage was more than handy on a pitch that was bound to deteriorate as the sun dried it out. For those of us who had questioned why we should be fearful of a bowler who had taken none for a hundred and plenty in his only previous Test, we found out during that first innings as Thomson bowled frighteningly quick – into the wind!
The thunderbolts proved even
deadlier in the second – which courted controversy when the debut umpire Robin Bailhache ordered Ian Chappell not to bowl him and Lillee on the fourth evening as he was concerned that with a storm brewing it was not acceptable light for their three-bouncer-an-over policy. Thomson took six for 46, figures he would never better in Test cricket, we went 1-0 behind and, after what had just unfolded, were destined to discover the quickest pitches possible at each of the other established Australian international venues.
Several England batsmen received painful blows to their person during the series and it wasn’t like we hadn’t been warned. The whole of Australia knew what was coming courtesy of their television coverage. Every evening there seemed to be an interview screened with one Australian player or other during which they spelt out how they were going to marmalise the Poms.
Arguably, the most memorable was when Thomson declared: ‘Truthfully, I enjoy hitting a batsman more than getting him out. It doesn’t worry me in the least to see the batsman hurt, rolling around screaming and blood on the pitch.’
As an opening batsman you are bargaining from a position of weakness, but I always liked to keep relations with those hurling that leather sphere down at me at the speed of light on an even keel. Dennis Amiss took the same approach, and so the pair of us tried to maintain a certain friendliness, for self-preservation as much as anything else. We were united in the opinion that dealing with short stuff on those encouraging surfaces was an inevitability, so why antagonise our opponents into sending down any more.
Others among the touring group were more feisty, including Essex’s Keith Fletcher, whose enthusiastic response from gully at a Greig bouncer clattering into Dennis Lillee’s elbow was: ‘Well bowled, give him another.’
Lillee’s response was to turn his head in Fletcher’s direction and warn: ‘It’ll be your f***ing turn soon!’
In case Gnome was in any doubt that he was on Lillee’s hit list, he was reminded in the post-play interviews when the interviewer alluded to relationships between the two teams.
‘The Poms are a good set of blokes, I get on with all of ’em,’ he said, before looking down the camera lens. ‘Except that little weasel Fletcher, that is. I know you’re watching, Fletcher, and you might as well know I am going to sort you out.’
True to his word, Lillee roared in to him whenever he came to the crease and, having received a painful blow on the elbow earlier in the tour, he was now dodging bouncers helmetless as Lillee sent down the full artillery in Sydney, culminating in one that failed to get up as much as the rest which took a chunk of bat and struck him straight on the head, flooring the England No. 5 batsman in the process, and careering the ball to Ross Edwards in the covers.
‘Blimey, he’s only gone and knocked St George off his ’orse,’ gasped Geoff Arnold, in reference to the emblem on the front of the MCC caps, as we sat in the dressing room watching the drama unfold.
The tour may have meant misery in terms of results, but I did not view the whole Australia experience in the same vein. Sure, it would bring my Test career to a shuddering halt, there was the nagging neck injury to contend with, but as a young shaver on tour it was an eye-opening adventure whenever we ventured into the bush away from the cities.
My only England tour was also an environment for making lifelong pals in some cases and strengthening friendships with others. Because of the number of established pros in the group – men such as Cowdrey, John Edrich, Fred Titmus and Brian Luckhurst – there was something natural about my 27-year-old self’s gravitation towards the younger clan. Tony Greig was the gregarious leader of every party going, a real life-and-soul character, while Bob Taylor, Bob Willis, Chris Old and Mike Hendrick all offered great companionship.
It wasn’t that I disliked the combative nature of the competition – contrary to opinion elsewhere, sledging didn’t exist, at least not when I was on the field, and I was for four of the six Tests. I knew Ian Chappell, the Australian captain, through Lancashire League cricket and his brand of leadership was tough and uncompromising for opponents. Crucially, however, it never passed the threshold into abuse. My only beef from a cricket perspective was that I couldn’t do better.
Greig was the one with the character best suited to stand up to the Australian bravado, his wonderful all-round ability notwithstanding. Alan Knott’s nuggety style also had its merits when England came under the cosh, which is something Lillee and Thomson and a troop of wonderful batsmen ensured we did on a regular basis. There was the languid strokeplay of the Chappell brothers, big contributions from Ross Edwards and Ian Redpath, and the irrepressible Doug Walters, who smoked like a chimney but had the talent to be dubbed the new Don Bradman, and emulated the Don by hitting an Ashes hundred in a single session at Perth.
Only once when the series was alive, in the first innings of the drawn third match – Melbourne’s maiden Boxing Day Test after the Australian authorities rearranged their fixture calendar to accommodate a six-match affair – did we manage a lead on first innings. And even then only by a single run. It was not the first time that Knott top-scored with a useful contribution towards the end of an innings.
For its even-contested nature alone, the match in Melbourne was by far the best of the series, and offered the prospect of all four results as it concluded. Set 246 to win, Australia headed into the final fifteen overs with 55 runs required and five wickets intact, but were contained by our Steptoe and Son combination of Fred Titmus and Derek Underwood before Australia made a late dash against the second new ball.
Despite some powerful hitting, Tony Greig, who had caused typical crowd uproar with his theatrical pointing to the pavilion upon dismissing Rod Marsh, was given the ball by Mike Denness and when it ended up in his captain’s hands at cover when nine runs were needed from three balls with three wickets left, it kept the series alive. Our chances of victory remained to the end, but Australia finished on 238 for eight, eight runs shy of their target.
My personal experience of the Australian crowds that winter was that the banter that flew about was mainly of a good-hearted nature. The infamous Bay 13 at the MCG was marvellous actually, although not necessarily if you were the one positioned on its boundary edge, as Derek Underwood happened to be on one occasion during that Ashes series. They broke Deadly pretty quickly, to the point where he protested about fielding there.
Typically of the man, Greig said he would go down there and take the verbal slingshots. True to the old adage, the words never hurt him, but it was a ritual for the Bay 13 lot to start throwing sticks and stones once into a mild state of inebriation. This lot could be loutish when stone cold sober, and in the absence of actual sticks and stones would use anything else they could get their hands on. The bombardment normally began with lumps of ice. More often than not it went from single ice cubes, to handfuls of ice, finishing with the final assault of the remnants of their cool boxes. Tony was not one to walk away from confrontation, so he naturally started lugging these frozen missiles back with interest.
Dennis Amiss and I had shared a century stand at the MCG, and I followed my 44 there with 49 in England’s first win over Australia on the tour – the one-day international arranged on New Year’s Day 1975, immediately after the Test had concluded, and organised because of the success of the hastily carded corresponding fixture in 1970-71.
From a personal perspective, I’d had my strokes of luck – caught behind in Perth on 17 in the second innings, Australia failed to appeal, then Ian Chappell sportingly owned up that a catch had not carried in Melbourne – yet also departed to a couple of blinders during that series to Greg Chappell in the gully and Jeff Thomson in the deep. All part of the swings and roundabouts of Test cricket, I guess.
A draw and a win in Melbourne was undoubtedly a balm to our spirits and we headed to Sydney with greater belief. Unfortunately, the pendulum of power had swung only temporarily and another roasting meant the Ashes had gone. At that stage, my average for the series remained on the right side of 30, but a pair of sing
le-figure contributions in the Australia Day Test in Adelaide sent it south. Like the team I was representing, I was not good enough and those scores of four and five were to be my last in the Test arena.
Aggravation of my neck injury in our second meeting with New South Wales did not prevent me turning out at the Adelaide Oval, but it became clear that it needed rest so, as the sixth and final Test opened in Melbourne, I was preparing to fly home early. The law of the sod was on hand with another cruel twist of fate: their endeavours over the series had taken their toll on Thomson, who also missed the match, and Lillee, who contributed only six overs before limping out of it, and without them it was a totally different ball game.
England, in my absence, stacked up 529 – comfortably more than we had made across two innings at the Adelaide Oval – the tour ended in a run-fest, a victory and the saving of both face and Test places for some. I was on a different path. My Test chance had come smack bang in the middle of my career – nine years after debut, nine before retirement. I was privileged to answer Donald Carr’s invitation to tour Australia in the affirmative, but I was realistic enough to reflect that for all the high praise about my ticker when under siege, I was operating at full capacity to hold back the dam. It had burst and there would be no more tours.
CHAPTER 9
Jack of all Trades
Intuition told me that I was soon to become an ex-Test cricketer, and when you’re willing to even consider that prospect there is only one way your career is realistically heading. At least that’s what I thought in those initial months after returning from Australia, for it later became apparent in fits and starts over the next, and final, nine years of my career that there were other goals, albeit lesser ones, to achieve. I had reached the zenith of my career that previous winter and there was contentment in doing so, just as there was frustration that I was now returning to the rank and file of county cricket.