Category Archives: Bradman

Some Assessments of Muralitharan as Cricketer … and Philanthropist

ONE = Simon Barnes: Muttiah Muralitharan as Cricketer of the Year 2006″

writing in 2007 on the year 2006 =  https://www.espncricinfo.com/wisdenalmanack/content/story/350915.html

The time has come to grasp the nettle, to remove the mental and†, to reject the frown, the shrug, the pursed lips and the quizzical look. Muttiah Muralitharan was, without qualification, the finest cricketer on the planet last year and, by implication, is one of the best cricketers that have ever played the game.

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Bradman’s Last Hurrah! A Duck!

Dan Coliasimone, in ABCnet, 1 February 2020, where the title runs The inside story of Don Bradman’s final innings duck”

“Out from the pavilion came the short, slight, little figure whose name will still be in bright lights as long as cricket is played.” This is how a contemporary newspaper report set the scene for Sir Donald Bradman’s last innings.

Bradman b. Hollies… 00 — Photo supplied by State Library of South Australia

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In Appreciation of Neville Cardus, son of a whore and a discerning cricket writer

Roger Alton for the Daily Mail, 1 August 2019,  with title “Pitch Perfect”

THE  GREAT ROMANTIC  …… by Duncan Hamilton (Hodder £20, 400 pp)

A FIELD OF TENTS AND WAVING COLOURS …………….  by Neville Cardus (Safe Haven £14.99, 240 pp)

The last days of summer may soon be upon us — give or take an Ashes tour — but, with these two beautiful books, the sky will always be silky blue, the sun shining down, thousands pouring into Old Trafford for a bitterly fought Roses match and Bradman 160 not out at tea.

Duncan Hamilton is already a multiple award-winning sports writer, but it is hard to imagine he will write a better book than this superb, elegaic portrait of the sociable, feted, but ultimately unknowable, man who virtually invented modern sports writing. Neville Cardus was born, illegitimate, into poverty in 1888. His real name was John Frederick Newsham, but he never knew his father. Both his mother and his aunt worked as prostitutes, and the young Fred Newsham was lightly educated to the age of ten.

Two beautifully written books reflect on how sports writing was impacted by Neville Cardus (pictured) who became one of the best-paid journalists in historyTwo beautifully written books reflect on how sports writing was impacted by Neville Cardus (pictured) who became one of the best-paid journalists in history

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Errol Fernando’s Discerning Thoughts on Today’s Anitpodean Cricket

Errol Fernando in Melbourne

Two handshakes today at Wellington,New Zealand.One for Angelo Mathews and the other for Kusal Mendis. They batted all day  and each is a hundred not out. Herculean effort to bat all day under pressure and Tuffy would have rushed up to them at stumps.I cannot praise them too highly.More hard work for them tomorrow to save the match Must bat for two more sessions.

WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND – DECEMBER 18: Angelo Mathews of Sri Lanka bats during day four of the First Test match in the series between New Zealand and Sri Lanka at Basin Reserve on December 18, 2018 in Wellington, New Zealand. (Photo by Hagen Hopkins/Getty  Images)

PERTH, AUSTRALIA – DECEMBER 17: Virat Kohli of India and Tim Paine of Australia bump into each other during day four of the second match in the Test series between Australia and India at Perth Stadium on December 17, 2018 in Perth, Australia. (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

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Neil Harvey: Wonderful Batsman, Simple Man, Modest Earnings

Gideon Haigh, in The Weekend Australian, 7 October 2018

Today, the world’s best batsman is a 29-year-old multi-millionaire with a sizeable portfolio of premium Sydney real estate — he also, of course, languishes under a year’s ban from cricket. Sixty-five years ago, by contrast, the world’s best batsman shared a bedroom with his younger brother. That summer of 1952-53, Neil Harvey had a season even more prolific than Steve Smith’s last: 834 runs in five Tests against South Africa and 1659 runs in 16 first-class matches, a total exceeded only by Donald Bradman.

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Don Bradman and Old Aloysians: Chance Exchanges

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Bodyline Bar Adelaide Oval

Amateur Photographs in bad light while play –on field and in the bar –continued

  Woodful hit by Larwood

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Don Bradman out for Nought

Abhisek Mukherjee, courtesy of Cricket County where the title reads “Don Bradman and his ducks”

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Don Bradman as Youth

Ashley Mallett, courtesy of CRICKET MONTHLY and ESPNcricinfo where the title of this article is “Bradman as a Boy”

At Bowral Primary School in the summer of 1915-16, Don Bradman, not yet eight years old, built a reputation as a cricketer. When the bell tolled to end another school day, Bradman didn’t dally to chat with others. In a desperate rush to get home, he ran helter-skelter through the small township of Bowral, turned into Shepherd Street, hurdled a white picket fence, breezed through his front door, and tossing his school bag in the hall and grabbing his cricket bat, yelled, “C’mon Mum, how about bowling me down a few?” Emily Bradman smiled. She discarded her apron, shifted the kettle on the stove and dutifully followed her son into the backyard. As Mrs Bradman wheeled down her own brand of left-arm deliveries, she could never have imagined that the small boy facing her at the other end of the back lawn would one day become the greatest batsman the world has known.

 Bradman at 21, about to set sail for the 1930 Ashes, with a trophy for his world-record 452 made earlier in the year

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Outstanding Cricket Songs

Benjamin Golby  ….. https://benjamingolby.bandcamp.com/track/in-memoriam-p-m-r

So far as I know, there are two great cricket songs.  Writing on Roy Harper’s ‘When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease’ in (the now defunct) The Word magazine, David Hepworth said that it,  summons the shade of every village cricket pitch we have ever gazed hungrily upon or glimpsed from a passing car… Both John Peel and John Walters wanted this song played after their deaths. There is scarcely an Englishman who wouldn’t wish for the same honour. [1]

Like most reflections on cricket, the song is more than the mechanics and narrative of the game. From depicting everyman’s park cricket match in dear, gentle hues, the lyric strides to the elevated plain of existence and death. The game is not used merely as an allegory though. It would be a dull, unsporting soul who held so. Rather, cricket is recognised as the superb use of existence that it is, as delivered in the second verse,

… as those footsteps trace for the last time out of the act
Well this way of life’s recollection, the hallowed strip in the haze
The fabled men and the noonday sun are much more than just yarns of their days.

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