Christmas cricket Down Under
In this week’s edition of In Search of West Indies Cricket, Roger Seymour recounts a Test match played during the Season of Christmas.
The journey
On 25th October, 1950, the West Indies Cricket Board of Control (WICBC) accepted an invitation from the Australian Cricket Board (ACB) for the West Indies to visit Australia during the next season. The offer arrived hard on the heels of the team’s departure from England on 23rd September, following their 3 – 1 conquest. The team for the 1951/52 Tour of Australia and New Zealand was selected after the Quadrangular Tournament in midMarch and announced on 27th April, after the WICBC’s proposal for fees and expenses had been accepted by the professional players engaged in League Cricket in England.
The tour party departed for Australia in three separate groups. The first batch comprising Barbadians Captain John Goddard and Denis Atkinson; Trinidadians Cyril Merry (Manager), Sam Guillen, Prior Jones, and Wilf Ferguson; British Guiana players Robert Christiani and John Trim, left Trinidad on 30th August, aboard the ‘S S Akaora’. On 8th September, the ship arrived in Colon at the end of the Panama Canal, where they were joined by Alf Valentine, who had flown from Jamaica. On 24th September, ‘Akaora’ docked in New Zealand. Three days later, the team boarded the ‘S S Wanganella’, traversed the Tasman Sea, arriving in Sydney on 1st October.
The Lancashire League professionals – Barbadians Roy Marshall, Clyde Walcott, Everton Weekes, and Frank Worrell; Jamaican Ken Rickards, and Trinidadian Sonny Ramadhin – departed from Tilbury Docks in London on ‘S S Strathmore’, on 11th September, arriving in Fremantle, Western Australia, on 9th October. The cricketers, minus Marshall (who had tonsillitis and joined the team five days later), flew to Sydney the following day.
The stragglers, Trinidadians Jeffrey Stollmeyer and Gerry Gomez, and Jamaican Allan Rae, who took his Bar finals in London the last week of September, travelled via aircraft. Stollmeyer and Gomez flew to San Francisco on 5th October, where they were joined by Rae. They arrived in Sydney on 10th October, via Honolulu and Fiji.
High expectations, poor planning
According to the 1953 Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack summary of the series: “So much advance speculation described the visit of West Indies to Australia in 1951-52 as a tour designed to decide the unofficial ‘cricket championship of the world’ ...”. The expectations had been built around the fact that both teams were undefeated since the Second World War. The West Indies had beaten England twice, home and abroad, and India away. The
Autographed photo of the West Indies Cricket Team in Australasia 1951/52
rampaging Australians had swept all and sundry in their path. In 26 Tests over six series, they won 19 times, lost once and retained the Ashes in three series, defeating New Zealand, India and South Africa in the others.
However, the tour itinerary the WICBC had consented to – which Captain Goddard was very critical of, much later – was far from ideal for a contest of such billing. Weather permitting, the vanguard had practised before the arrival of their teammates well aware of the poor schedule. The tour commenced with a suggestion from the WICBC, the staging of a testimonial match for William “Fergie” Ferguson, the West Indies scorer and baggage man. Fergie had scored for Australia, England, West Indies, South Africa and New Zealand since 1905, and was well known and loved. (Fergie, who is attributed with several innovations to recording the game, worked 208 Test matches over 43 tours.) The two teams were a West Indies XI (actually the Second Test XI) and a Combined XI comprising the rest of the West Indies players and a few Australians.
Ferguson Testimonial, 20 October, North Sydney
Oval. Scores: West Indies, 251 for 5 declared; F Worrell, 130*. Combined XI, 120; R Marshall, 56*, W Ferguson, 6, S Ramadhin, 6 for 28. West Indies won by 131 runs.
Prime Minister’s XI, 22 October, Canberra. Prime Minister’s XI, 229; M Donnelly, 72, W Ferguson, 7 for 94. West Indies, 142 for 2. Rain. Match drawn.
New South Wales Country XI, 26, 27, October, Newcastle. NSW Country, 139; J De Courcy, 64, A Valentine 5 for 40 and 201 for 9 declared, A Valentine, 5 for 73. West Indies, 166; J Goddard, 53, J Bull, 6 for 60, and 176 for 2, A Rae, 54. West Indies won by 8 wickets.
Queensland Country XI, 30, 31, October, Townsville. West Indies, 460 for 5 declared; K Rickards, 192, F Worrell, 98, R Christiani, 73*, R Marshall, 51. Queensland Country, 128; D Watt, 51, A Valentine 5 for 27, and 127 for 8. Match drawn.
Four non-first-class fixtures is not the way to begin a five-Test tour labelled the “cricket championship of the world.” The West Indies made a few tough decisions heading into the only first-class fixture before the First Test. The tour selection committee opted to rest spin twins Valentine and Ramadhin, favoured a strong batting lineup, and chose only two bowlers of repute, Ferguson and Jones. The lack of proper match practice showed as the West Indians slumped to an embarrassing loss, narrowly avoiding an innings defeat following rash shot selection. It was an ominous sign.
West Indies versus Queensland, 3, 5, 6, 7, November, Brisbane. Scores: West Indies, 198; C McCool, 6 for 83, and 282; G Gomez, 97*, R Christiani, 50, V Raymer, 6 for 69. Queensland, 455; A Carrigan, 169, C Harvey, 90, K Mackay, 79, and 29 without loss. Queensland won by ten wickets.
First Test, 9, 10, 12, 13, November, Brisbane. Scores: West Indies, 216 and 245; E Weekes, 70, G Gomez, 55, D Ring, 6 for 80. Australia, 226; R Lindwall, 61, A Valentine, 5 for 99, and 236 for 7, S Ramadhin, 5 for 90. Australia won by three wickets.
The West Indies were undone by frailties against Lindwall’s barrage of bumpers, weak fielding and poor tactics. The Australians, perplexed by the spin of Ramadhin and Valentine, were let off the hook as the hapless West Indians floored five chances off Valentine in under half an hour in the first innings. With Australia on the ropes at 149 for five in their second innings, Goddard’s poor tactics were exposed; he continued in vain to the bitter end with Ramadhin and Valentine.