Seventy-six for nine, declared

The Melbourne card of January 1937 has two first innings closed by declaration, both with a wicket in hand, both far short of anything a captain would normally settle for. Australia 200 for nine. England 76 for nine. Then a second innings of 564 in which the batting order is upside down, and a result line reading Australia won by 365 runs.

Two hundred for nine

Australia chose to bat and were 181 for six at the close of the first day, Stan McCabe 63. On the second day Don Bradman declared at 200 for nine, with Bert Oldfield 27 not out and Chuck Fleetwood-Smith not needed. The card gives no reason. What it gives next is England’s reply.

Full scorecard: Australia v England, 3rd Test, Melbourne, 1–7 January 1937 →

Seventy-six for nine

The ledger. Stan Worthington, caught Bradman bowled McCabe, 0, fourth ball. Charlie Barnett 11. Wally Hammond 32. Maurice Leyland 17. Jim Sims 3. Les Ames 3. Walter Robins 0, second ball. Joe Hardstaff 3. Gubby Allen 0 not out. Hedley Verity 0. Bill Voce 0 not out. Extras 7. Morris Sievers, medium pace, 11.2 overs, five for 21. Bill O’Reilly three for 28.

Allen declared at 76 for nine in the 29th over, 124 behind. Australia were 3 for one by the close of the second day, and the card’s fall-of-wickets line for that innings begins: 1-0, Bill O’Reilly. 2-3, Fleetwood-Smith.

The order reversed

O’Reilly and Fleetwood-Smith, the two spinners, opened Australia’s second innings and made 0 and 0. Frank Ward, at three, made 18. Keith Rigg 47, Bill Brown 20.

Then, at 97 for five, Jack Fingleton, the opener, came in at six, and at 443 Bradman came in at seven. Fingleton made 136 from 428 balls. Bradman made 270 from 375, in 458 minutes, with 22 fours, spread across three days and, by the record, through a bout of influenza, and the sixth wicket put on 346.

The close-of-play lines carry the shape: 3 for one after the second day, 194 for five after the third, 500 for six after the fourth. Australia were all out for 564 on the fifth day, Verity three for 79 from 37.7 eight-ball overs, and England needed 689.

What the numbers say without saying it

Two captains declared behind or barely ahead because the pitch was wet and would get worse before it got better, and each wanted the other side on it while it was worst. Bradman sent his worst batters in first for the same reason, so that his best would bat when the surface had dried.

None of that is on the card. The card has two small declared totals, two spinners opening, a number six who was an opener and a number seven who was the best batter in the world, and the arithmetic is the argument.

Three hundred and twenty-three

England made 323 in the fourth innings, Leyland 111 not out, Robins 61, Hammond 51, Fleetwood-Smith five for 124, and lost by 365 on the sixth day. The card lists the match as a 0-day match, timeless, so that the declarations could not have been about the clock. The series line reads England led 2-1. The umpires were George Borwick and John Scott, and it is Test number 257.

What the card holds

A declaration at 200 for nine and a declaration at 76 for nine. Two noughts at the top of an innings of 564 and a 270 at number seven. A stand of 346 for the sixth wicket. A first-innings deficit of 124 turned into a win by 365. And a pitch that appears nowhere on the card and decided everything on it.

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No. 9 in The Rain Rule, a series of 9.

NextThe Test that nearly stopped