My thanks to the following: John Arlott*, Dennis Amiss, Jack Bannister, Ali Bacher, Robin Bailhache, Richie Benaud, Chester Bennett*, Fred Bennett*, Alan Barnes*, Eddie Barlow, Big Sid*, Henry Blofeld, Michael Bollen, Allan Border, Don Bradman*, Sir Ron Brierley, Tom Brooks, Bill Brown, Ian Brayshaw, Dr Donald Beard, Jack ‘the Flea’ Butler, Bill Brown, Kevin ‘Crazy’ Cantwell, Cos Cardone, Amanda Chappell, Barbara-Ann Chappell, Greg Chappell, Jeanne Chappell, Ian Chappell, Martin Chappell*, Trevor Chappell, Ben Cheshire, David Colley, Colin Cowdrey*, Jack Clarke, Richard Collinge, Dr Brian Corrigan, Mike Coward, Jeff Crowe, Martin Crowe, Sir Roden Cutler*, Barry Curtin, Alan Davidson, Cec Davies*, Ed Devereaux*, Jack Dunning*, Ross Duncan, Tony Dell, Geoff Dymock, Ross Edwards, Stephen Fry, Jack Fingleton*, Geoff ‘Goomfer’ Forsaith, Brian ‘Banger’ Flaherty, Les Favell*, Lance Gibbs, Trevor Gill, Clarrie Grimmett*, Arthur Gilligan*, Frank Gardiner, Neil Harvey, Neil Hawke*, Ian Healy, Jonathan Herreen, David Hookes*, Rodney Hogg, Ray Illingworth, Brian Illman, John Inverarity, Graham Koos, Bill Lawry, Arthur Lance*, Dennis Lillee, Clive Lloyd, David Lloyd, Sam Loxton, Stephanie Luke, Benjamin Mallett, Dennis Miller, Keith Miller*, Rodney Marsh, Bob Merriman, Kevin McCarthy, Alan McGilvray*, Dave ‘the Doc’ McErlane, Ian McLachlan, Tom Moody, Pastor Dr Douglas Nicholls*, Max O’Connell, Bill ‘Tiger’ O’Reilly*, Kerry Packer*, Len Pascoe, Bob Parish, Wayne Phillips, Wayne Prior, Erapally Prasanna, Viv Richards, Phil Ridings*, Albert ‘Dusty’ Rhodes, Ray Robinson*, Austin Robertson, Barry Richards, Peter Roebuck, Vic Richardson*, Des Selby, Rex Sellers, Garry Sobers, David Sincock, Keith Stackpole, Naomi Steer, Ray Steele*, Paul Sheahan, Faith Thomas (nee Coulthard), Garry ‘Darky’ Thompson, Jeff Thomson, Mark Waugh, Doug Walters, Graeme ‘Beatle’ Watson, Shane Warne, Phil Wilkins. Special thanks to my wife, Christine, for her editing and sage advice. Thanks also to Ian Bowring, Patrick Gallagher and Rebecca Kaiser of Allen & Unwin for their encouragement, suggestions and professional expertise with this project.
___________
* deceased
Peter Roebuck
IT TAKES ALL SORTS
Celebrating cricket’s colourful characters
In It Takes All Sorts, Peter Roebuck revisits his 25-year career in reporting cricket to reveal the people and the personalities who have touched his life and contributed to his life-long passion for the game.
Roebuck provides warts-and-all insights into the greats and not-so-greats, their debuts and retirements, the controversies of recent professional cricket and some impressive innings in between. Roebuck has seen it all and isn’t afraid to comment: he’s interviewed Sir (or is it Saint?) Garfield Sobers’ mum, was on the scene (and on the front page) when Gilchrist ‘walked’, poked gentle fun at Inzamam’s fielding, and touched many with his account of young Sri Lankan boys playing on the beach in Galle.
Roebuck pulls no punches—whether friend or foe, all his subjects are linked by the great and noble game of cricket and he is not afraid to tell it how he sees it.
ISBN 978 1 74114 542 7
Alexander Buzo
LEGENDS OF THE BAGGY GREEN
Dubious behaviour and achievements from cricket’s
chequered history
Full of brigands and bogans, legends and sledgends, Legends of the Baggy Green is an acerbic commentary on the codes and manners of cricket behaviour. Part sociology, part blooper tape, this book takes sports comedy back to where it all began.
The sins of modern cricket—sledging, chucking, match-fixing, plus the heinous practice of putting the ball in the freezer to make it bounce higher—are all here, along with a rogues’ gallery that includes everyone from ‘Horseshoe’ Herby Collins to Salim ‘The Rat’ Malik.
From the watermelon presented to Syd Gregory to the brown paper bag full of cash that was given the late Hansie Cronje, there is full disclosure in Legends of the Baggy Green, as well as comment on the commentators who have observed cricket’s transit from Lord’s to Hollywood, and from the Gabbatoir to the Elysian, desalinated fields of Sharjah.
There is ample scope for both humour and criticism here, and playwright, satirist and genuine cricket ‘tragic’ Alexander Buzo has sharpened his pen to provide plenty of both.
ISBN 978 1 74175 201 4
This book is based on extensive interviews with Ian Chappell. Many others—family, friends and colleagues of Ian Chappell—have spoken to me over the years. Their recollections are used throughout the book.
Philip Bailey, Philip Thorn and Peter Wynn-Thomas, Who’s Who of Cricketers, Newnes Books, 1984
Jack Bannister, Innings of My Life, Headline, London, 1994
Denzil Batchelor, The Book of Cricket, Collins, 1952
Ian Botham with Peter Hayter, Botham: My autobiography, HarperCollinsWillow, 2000
Bradman: The Don declares, ABC Radio biography of Sir Donald Bradman with Norman May
Bradman’s First Tour: Articles and cartoons from Australia’s 1930 tour of England, introduced by Sir Donald Bradman, Rigby, Adelaide, 1981
Ian Brayshaw, The Chappell Era, ABC Enterprises, Sydney, 1984
John Bright-Holmes, The Joy of Cricket, Secker & Warburg, London, 1984
Ian Chappell, Chappelli: Ian Chappell’s life story, Hutchinson, Richmond, Victoria, 1976
Ian Chappell, My World of Cricket, Jack Pollard Publishing, Sydney, 1973
Ian Chappell, Tiger Among the Lions, Investigator Press, South Australia, 1972
Ian Chappell, Austin Robertson and Paul Rigby, The Best of Chappelli, Swan Publishing, Byron Bay, 1982
Mike Coward, The Chappell Years: Cricket in the seventies, ABC Books, Sydney, 2002
Bill Frindall, The Wisden Book of Test Cricket: 1876–1978, Macdonald & Jane, London, 1979
David Frith, The Golden Age of Cricket: 1890–1914, Omega Books, United Kingdom, 1978
David Frith, The Slow Men, Horwitz Grahame, Sydney, 1984
Tony Greig with David Lord, Tony Greig: Cricket, the men and the game, Ure Smith, Sydney, 1976
Chris Harte, The History of the Sheffield Shield, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1987
Chris Harte, The History of the South Australian Cricket Association, Sports Marketing, Adelaide, 1990
David Hookes with Allan Shiell, Hookesy, ABC Books, Sydney, 1993
Dennis Lillee, Lillee: An autobiography, Hodder Headline, 2003
Adrian McGregor, Greg Chappell, Collins, Sydney, 1985
Ashley Mallett, Bradman’s Band, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, 2000
Ashley Mallett, Lord’s Dreaming, Souvenir Press, London, 2002
Johnny Moyes, A Century of Cricketers, Angus & Robertson, 1949
M.A. Noble, The Game’s the Thing, Cassell & Company, 1926
Bill O’Reilly, Tiger, Collins, 1985
Michael Page, Bradman: The illustrated biography, Macmillan, 1983
Jack Pollard, Six and Out, Jack Pollard Publishing, Sydney, 1971
Jack Pollard, Australian Cricket: The game and the players, Hodder and Stoughton, Sydney, 1982
V.Y. Richardson with R.S. Whitington, The Vic Richardson Story, Rigby Limited, Adelaide, 1967
Ray Robinson, On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia, 1975
Shane Warne with Mark Ray, My Own Story, Swan Publishing, Perth, 1997
Pelham Warner, Book of Cricket, Sporting Handbooks Ltd, 1947
Roy Webber, The Phoenix History of Cricket, Phoenix Sports Books, 1960
Bernard Whimpress and Nigel Hart, Adelaide Oval: Test cricket 1884–1984, Wakefield Press, Adelaide, 1984
R.S. Whitington, An Illustrated History of Australian Cricket, Lansdowne Press, 1972
Wisden Cricketers’ Almanacks (various) including the years 1949, 1973 and 1976
Ian Wooldridge, Travelling Reserve, Collins, London, 1982
At the time I wasn’t too fussed about the idea, but a couple of days
later I thought, ‘Why not?’ So I took a piece of paper and wrote,
‘My ambition is to captain Australia’.
Ian Chappell, the man they call Chappelli, became the Australian Test cricket captain on Thursday, 4 February 1971. As was his habit at lunchtime, away from duties as a sales representative with WD & HO Wills, Ian had ducked into Adelaide’s Overway Hotel for a schnitzel and beer when the barman called him to the phone.
‘Congratulations Chappelli, well done,’ The News reporter Allan Shiell called down the line. ‘You are now the Australian Test captain.’
Ian reached for his wallet and took out a crumpled piece of paper. He looked at the words: ‘My ambition is to captain Australia’.
It was in 1959 that Ian Chappell, aged 16, was picked to play in the South Australian State Schoolboys’ Team of the Year after he showed good form in a match between metropolitan juniors and country schoolboys. The reward for his selection was two days’ coaching at the Adelaide Oval from then state coach Geff Noblet. ‘We had the coaching,’ Chappell says, ‘but I remember being very disappointed that we didn’t get the chance to bat against some of the state squad bowlers. That would have given us all a good indication of how much we needed to improve, how much work we needed to do to get to district level.’
During a break in training, Noblet took all the boys out onto the main ground, Adelaide Number Two Ground, to have a look at the wicket. There he stood, with the others, on the lush green of magnificent Adelaide Oval within divine reach of St Peter’s Cathedral, which stands majestically beyond the Moreton Bay fig trees to the north-east of the ground. This place was an inspiration, a young cricketer’s dream.
Noblet then led us up the stairs to the inner sanctum of the South Australian dressing-room. We had another good look around, then he said, ‘Now boys, as you are walking down these stairs, make a little mental note to yourself that you want to be back here walking out to play for South Australia one day.’
When we got to the bottom of the steps, he spoke again: ‘In fact, the best thing for you all to do is to write down your cricket ambitions on a piece of paper, then stick the piece of paper in your wallet and carry it with you always as a constant reminder of what you wish to achieve in this game.’
At the time I wasn’t too fussed about the idea, but a couple of days later, I thought, ‘Why not?’ So I took a piece of paper and wrote, ‘My ambition is to captain Australia’.
Frankly, to this day I don’t know why I wrote down those words, because I don’t think I really had any great ambition to be captain of Australia. I think what happened was that I thought: ‘What was the highest thing you could achieve in Australian cricket?’ The answer was, logically, to captain Australia. So that’s what I wrote on my piece of paper. I still had that little piece of paper in my wallet the very day I learnt that I was picked to be Test captain in 1971. It had done its job, so after some time I tossed it away.
Ian Chappell went on to play 75 Tests for Australia. He scored 5345 runs at an average of 42.42, with 14 centuries and 26 50s. He led Australia 30 times—winning 15, losing five and drawing ten—and is regarded alongside Mark Taylor and Richie Benaud as one of Australia’s most outstanding captains. As a batsman, he hit out with belligerent joy, taking the attack to all opposition bowlers. And he hits out still, as a commentator on the game of cricket and, more recently, as a crusader for worthy causes such as heading the drive to have Cricket Australia officially recognise the Australian Aboriginal cricket team which toured England in 1868, and lobbying for fair treatment of asylum seekers. Ian Chappell is totally honest—in fact brutally so, for he doesn’t hold back. Like his father, Martin Chappell, he pulls no punches and will not curry favour with anyone.
Chappell’s mother, Jeanne, says, ‘Mart would say absolutely what he was thinking and sometimes it was pretty rude. Sometimes people didn’t take it the right way, which made it rather embarrassing. It wasn’t my style. I wouldn’t say things to hurt people, but he didn’t care whether he did or he didn’t.’
Ian Chappell is not an easy man to describe, for he is a lot of things to a lot of people. He could be rude when refusing to sign his autograph in a crowded bar, but as a batsman and a captain he was smart. He learnt from his mistakes and he had the knack of empowering his players. He never bawled anyone out on the field.
When relaxed Chappell is articulate, with interesting and provocative ideas about the game and the direction in which it is heading. Unlike many former cricketers, he doesn’t think that all the players from his era were better than the players of today. He lauds the likes of oldies such as Garry Sobers, Keith Miller, Richie Benaud and Graeme Pollock, the spin of Indian maestro Erapally Prasanna and the pace of Dennis Lillee, Andy Roberts and John Snow, but equally he marvels at the skill of the moderns, among them Ricky Ponting, Adam Gilchrist, Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath, Sachin Tendulkar and Brian Lara. Alan Knott is his choice as the best wicket-keeper he has seen, just ahead of Rodney Marsh.
Loving nothing better than a debate on sport, Chappell is in his element with someone similarly passionate. But what Chappell calls a debate, others might call a heated argument; his discussions with Allan Border are legendary on the cricket circuit, invariably ending in a blazing row, yet there has never been any animosity between the pair. Whether playing cricket, tennis or backgammon, it is ‘game on’ with Ian Chappell. The fighting spirit fairly exudes from his being; a smack-in-the-face combativeness that can be compelling to watch, but intimidating to face.
He is perceived by many as being the tough, uncompromising cricketer who led the ‘ugly Australians’ in the 1970s and thumbed his nose at authority. In reality, Ian Chappell led a highly committed bunch of cricketers, possessing a collective desire to become the best cricket team in the world. His men were not ‘ugly’ in the sense that they verbally abused opponents on the field. The talk was mostly gamesmanship. It could be brutal, but it was usually clever and funny. In England in 1972, after repeatedly playing and missing, the captain of Combined Universities found he had a bootlace undone and gestured at Chappell with a request to tie it. The Australian captain’s response was: ‘You’re not doing anything else out here pal; do it up yourself!’
In his book Innings of My Life, English cricket writer Jack Bannister wrote, ‘If I wanted someone to bat for my life, it’s Ian over Greg. Just. That is if I am convinced he thinks my life is worth saving’.
Former Test team-mate on the 1972 tour John Inverarity said:
Ian Chappell was the embodiment of the warrior. He is a man with a strong and compelling personality, a man who is drawn to contests—pitting his will, his physical prowess and his psychological assertiveness against opponents—like a moth to a flame. As a player and a captain he used his very considerable cricket skills and his team-mates to seek and engage in battle. He loved it all and inspired others to ‘go there’ with him. There are many reasonably good captains, and a very few outstanding ones. Ian Chappell was most certainly an outstanding captain.
Ian was always Ian: forthright, fearless and with no time for deference. It was a happy coincidence for Ian and for Australian cricket that he won the captaincy of South Australia and then Australia in 1970/71 at a time of significantly changing social attitudes; the 1960s and all that came with it. There was a harmony from which a powerful force arose. He was the central figure in the development of one of Australia’s finest and most talented teams: the team of the 1970s.
Ian Chappell was destined for greatness in sport. Weaned on a potent mix of cricket and baseball, sport was in the blood.
The eldest of three boys born to Jeanne and Martin Chappell, Ian took his first stance in this world on 26 September 1943, 12 months to the day after his parents married. Throughout his childhood, Ian’s father taught him lessons that would not only help him cope in sport, but in life generally. When Ian was about nine or ten he used to score for the Glenelg third-grade team. Martin was captain and young Ian was ever the optimist—not many scorers wear whites to matches, but Ian was hoping that he might get a game if someone failed to turn up. He was fitted out in his cricket gear, just in case.
Well, one day one of the players didn’t turn up and I ended up getting a game to make up the numbers. I was in seventh heaven. I batted about number nine. The fast bowler for the other team was a fiery redhead called ‘Blue’ Ballantyne. When I was thirteen Blue seemed like an enormously big bloke and I thought he was frighteningly quick. However, I was able to stay in for about 45 minutes. I didn’t make many runs, but I was delighted that I had been able to stay in so long.
In the car on the way home I kept expecting Dad to say something like, ‘Well done,’ or to give me a pat on the back. But there was nothing. We sat down to dinner later. Still no word from Dad. I was mulling this over when Dad finished his dinner, pushed his plate away and spoke for the first time. ‘That’s it son, you’re not playing C grade any more.’
I was stunned and just managed to mutter, ‘Why? I batted for 45 minutes and I reckon I did all right.’
He said, ‘No, you are not playing because you are scared. Until you learn not to be scared you’re not playing with the men any more.’ I questioned him, asking what he meant about being ‘scared’.
He replied sharply, ‘Well, you backed away from one delivery from Blue Ballantyne and until you get behind everything you are not playing in C grade again.’
It would be a pretty fair guess that Ian Chappell never again backed away from any fast bowler in his whole career. To the contrary, he loved the thrill of the battle against the quick bowlers and he was always looking to cut or pull or hook the short stuff. The quicker the better, it seemed. His body language was ever an open invitation to any bowler: ‘Bring it on, the faster the better.’
Martin came up with a novel way to help his sons catch a ball. Years later he explained: ‘I worked out that if you stand in front of your son trying to get him to catch a ball his eyes follow yours and therefore he doesn’t watch the ball at all. So I decided to experiment. First try worked. I showed Ian the ball, then tossed it gently underhand against a brick wall. Ian’s eyes followed the ball and he easily caught it. I taught Greg the same way. Both of the boys could catch a cricket ball long before they had reached the age of three.’
Martin never used a soft ball. It was always the hard cricket ball, and Ian revelled in the play.
Cricket was in the blood. Jeanne was the daughter of Vic Richardson, a great all-round sportsman and captain of both the South Australian and Test cricket teams. Martin played district cricket as an opening batsman and off-spin bowler for some 22 years. He was in the South Australian state squad one season and had a reputation for being a tough character on the sports field. Martin represented South Australia as a baseball catcher as well. There was never a hint of having been pushed into cricket. I just loved it.
Martin sensed the need to have Ian coached, but he was wise enough to seek someone else to do the job. In Lynn Fuller, a former AIF player and a good country cricketer, he reckoned he found the perfect coach for his lad.
Lynn had a good reputation as a coach. He was a retired farmer and came to live in the city, and through his two sons he became involved with the Glenelg Cricket Club as curator and coach. It all started one day at Unley Oval when Dad and one of Lynn’s sons were playing B grade for Glenelg. I was sitting in the stand with Mum and Dad, and Lynn was there too.
Dad introduced me to Lynn and said to him, ‘I’d like to have Ian coached … When do you think would be the right age for him to start?’
Lynn asked how old I was and Mum told him I was five. Lynn said, ‘You might as well start him now.’
So every Sunday of every summer from the time I was five until I had reached the age of 17 I went around to his home for coaching.
Lynn Fuller worked hard with Ian on correct technique—elbow up, front and backward defence—but, whenever Martin was throwing a few balls to him in the backyard, Ian would play correctly for a while then lose patience and hit the ball over the fence.
Dad used to get annoyed with me when I whacked one over the fence and, after the blast from Dad, I’d play correctly for a while then I’d let fly again. Because Lynn told me not to hit the ball in the air, I never did while I was with him. If I did accidentally, he would say in his calm manner that it was the wrong way to go and eventually I just didn’t want to hit the ball in the air when I was with Lynn at his coaching sessions. He was very patient with me and spent hours working on perfecting my forward and back defence. He would say, ‘Son, you can’t make runs sitting in the pavilion … You’ve got to be able to keep the good ones out.’ He also explained that if I could get the forward and back defence right, all the other strokes would develop from those two basic shots.
Lynn would bowl to me for long periods. Despite his age he was an accurate medium-pacer and would send them down to me for an hour or so, sometimes for even longer spells.
Ian’s brothers Greg and Trevor were also coached by Lynn Fuller. Greg remembers Lynn as a real student of the game, particularly on batting technique: ‘There we would be at Lynn’s place with three or four other kids and Lynn would be working on our batting technique, especially in the area of defence. Afterwards Dad would throw the ball to us for half an hour or so to give us practice at hitting the bad ball.’
Martin’s baseball years had given him a strong throwing arm—a necessity for all those hours chucking the ball at the boys in the backyard net. When the boys were still very young, around 1960, Greg reckoned it was time to upgrade the net. The worn patches in the lawn were covered with a bag of black soil the lads had secured from the club ground down the road. However, a few scattered bits of soil was hardly satisfactory for a decent net so, with help from Lynn Fuller, they brought in a few trailer loads of rich, black soil—enough to make a proper wicket about half the normal length and twice the normal width of a pitch. The extra width gave the boys lots of room in which to move the stumps, limiting the wear in one particular spot. The boys all chipped in and helped, taking turns to prepare the track with the aid of an old tennis court roller, also from Lynn Fuller.
Those backyard ‘Tests’ were fiercely competitive and, at times, tempers became frayed. Jeanne Chappell was forever coming out to intervene. According to Ian, ‘Most of the time, it seemed to me, Mum would settle any argument in Greg’s favour, probably because he was younger. She’d say, “Let him bat and get on with it … and keep the noise down.”’ However, Greg reckons he invariably paid for his mother’s intervention in his favour: ‘We never used pads or gloves in those days and whenever Mum gave me the benefit of the doubt and I batted on, I’d pay with whacks to the legs and the hands. I remember that when the track got too slow we wet the wicket a bit to liven it up. One particular day Ian gave it a bit too much water and the ball leapt all over the place. Inevitably he hit me on the fingers and I went down in a heap. Ian stood over me: “Don’t worry about the fingers, mate,” he said. “Next time it’ll be your head.” ’
By the time Trevor was old enough to face his brothers in the backyard he found the same competitive edge. Greg had learned the hard way playing against Ian, and he, in turn, gave Trevor the ‘treatment’. Knocks to the fingers and too much water on a good length contributed to Trevor also developing a thick hide. There was a time when Trevor became so incensed with Greg’s antics that he chased him around the backyard brandishing a tomahawk. Luckily for Greg, Trevor and Australian cricket, Greg proved too elusive to get the chop. Trevor says of his brothers Ian and Greg: ‘Ian always stood up for me against Greg, or so Ian tells me anyway. Because of the nine-year age difference between Ian and I, we didn’t battle each other directly that often in the backyard. I can remember facing some short-pitched bowling off the Leak Avenue ridge from Ian and losing a few fingernails in the process. I wasn’t wearing any batting gloves and after the first whack I said to Ian that I wanted to put on some gloves. Ian said that wouldn’t be necessary as it was an accident and that he wouldn’t bowl short again. Stupidly, I believed him.’
The backyard net was used for most of the year—an estimated 300 days. When it rained and the wicket was too wet to bat on, the boys would get out the baseball gloves and have a throw. If it was too wet to venture outdoors Martin might take the opportunity to give the boys a blackboard lesson on rules and strategy, the importance of concentration, or tactics in batting, bowling and fielding.
Over the years the pitch at Lynn Fuller’s place became a good deal higher than the surrounding grass, through constant top dressing.
Where the roller rode up from the lower level onto the pitch, part of the wicket was nicely rounded and made it a perfect spot to bang them down and get them up. One day Dad said to me, ‘Right, now, you’ve got to learn to defend yourself.’ He proceeded to ping the ball at me off the rise. That’s how I learnt to hook. I don’t remember being taught to duck or get out of the way. It was just a matter of hooking the ball or pulling it.
As Ian Brayshaw writes in The Chappell Era, those early years for Ian, Greg and Trevor were invaluable.
If you sat down to write a script for the creation of boys who would in time go on to become champion cricketers, you surely couldn’t do a better job than describing the development of the Chappell boys. They were born with the right pedigree, were fed and trained right, given all the encouragement and opportunity they could have wished for … and they ended up winning the blue ribbons!
Ian was chosen for the South Australian State Schoolboys (under 14) team during his last year at St Leonard’s Primary School. The team travelled to Perth and there he played against Graham McKenzie, even then a huge, muscular lad. Chappell recalls, ‘I think Graham McKenzie got me lbw in one of the matches we played against one another. The ball hit me just below the kneecap and as well as being out they had to cart me off the field because I couldn’t walk.’
When Ian played his first Test match, McKenzie was already the mainstay of the Australian attack—a lion-hearted fast bowler who ultimately ended his career with 246 wickets. The following year young Ian went on to Prince Alfred College. As a result he played only one year for the South Australian State Schoolboys’ team, as that honour could only go to students attending state-run schools.
Ian Chappell is understandably grateful for what his parents did for him, and for Greg and Trevor. They were devoted parents in every sense and travelled thousands of miles back and forth through the suburbs of Adelaide to watch their boys play cricket. And later they travelled interstate and overseas to watch their sons as Test cricketers. ‘Mum and Dad gave up a lot to give us a chance to play international cricket,’ Chappell says. ‘After I retired I recall saying to Mum, “I know you gave up a lot for us and I hope you feel it was worthwhile.” She said, “We would not have changed a thing.”’
Recently, Ian read an article by Sydney-based cricket writer Phil Derriman, who claimed that Steve and Mark Waugh had the best cricket education of all time.
I felt like ringing Greg and saying ‘Phil Derriman doesn’t know much.’ The Waugh twins had parents who were tennis players. We had a parent who was a very good club cricketer, good enough to be picked in the state squad one season. We had a mother whose father captained the Australian Test team. We had Lynn Fuller, a good country cricketer, who coached us. I had a coach at St Leonard’s Primary School who was smart enough to know I already had a coach and didn’t try to influence my batting technique.
Then when I went to Prince Alfred College [PAC] in Adelaide there was a magnificent cricket environment. The headmaster, John Dunning, was a former New Zealand cricket captain. Former South Australian player Bill Leak coached PAC Firsts for a year, then I was fortunate enough to come under the influence of a new coach, Chester Bennett, who played for Western Australia. There was Ray Smith at the school, who played for Kensington in the days of Bradman and Grimmett.
I can see where Phil was coming from in that he figured that the Waughs would have always had a batsman and bowler to battle it out in the backyard because they were the same age. However, Greg and I were only five years apart and we grew up in such a brilliant cricket environment where there was constant encouragement and support. Every time there was a family function, people would be forever talking to Vic about cricket, the old days, the players of his time.
School master and PAC First XI coach Chester Bennett had a significant calming influence on Ian, as he did later on the other two Chappell boys when they attended PAC. Bennett was a man of solid character. He was a good talker and a good listener. He didn’t rant or rave and he didn’t attempt to instruct Ian in batting technique, for he knew he was already being tutored by Lynn Fuller, but he was able to help in other ways. In 1960, Ian’s last year at PAC, he was made First XI captain. This was at a time when the PAC Firsts played in the South Australian Cricket Association (SACA) district B-grade competition. It helped to bring good young players on very quickly.
I recall, in my last year, captaining Prince Alfred College against Kensington Bs. They had a pretty strong and experienced team, and we very nearly beat them, losing by only three or four runs in the first innings. I remember being furious that we just missed out and I was still cranky and upset as I sat with the pads on as number three waiting for a turn in the second dig. There were only a couple of hours to go in the match, not sufficient time for an outright result.
When the first wicket fell, I stormed onto the field, determined to rip the Kensington attack part. But I only scored a few runs then holed out. I angrily stormed off the field and into the dressing-room. There I threw my bat in my bag, pulled out my box and hurled it at the wall and swore my head off. Then I received a gentle tap on my shoulder. There standing behind me was Chester. I thought I was ‘in for it’ for having sworn and carried on, but Chester just stood there, his hand on my shoulder.
‘Ian, I know exactly how you feel. You’ve thrown your wicket away because you’re upset at the fact that we didn’t win. Just remember Ian, nothing is ever achieved in anger.’
I acknowledged his words with a nod of my head and he carried on: ‘You are right to be upset by that, but you’ll learn that it doesn’t do any good. Just remember one of the big things with this game is to keep persevering. The game will get to you at times, but never forget that perseverance is a great thing.’
Chester was dead right. I never forgot his words. It was a great lesson in having the right attitude.
The Chappells’ famous grandfather, Vic Richardson, did not seek to have a hands-on role in the coaching of the boys.
Vic would say, ‘I’m not going to have anything to do with coaching you, Ian. You’ve got Lynn Fuller. You should only have one coach, otherwise you can get mixed up. Each coach has different ideas from the next and it would be easy to become confused.’
Vic took a back-seat position with our cricket. Sometimes I’d come home from a game and Mum would ask whether I had seen Vic at the ground. I’d say ‘no’ and she’d tell me he had been there, parked in the shade of a tree watching from a distance. Then he would ring, but he wouldn’t stay on the phone long—he hated telephones. He would say, ‘Well done,’ and the phone would go dead. He’d hang up, just like that.
Occasionally he would talk cricket and I remember three things he told me: ‘If you can’t be a good cricketer, at least look like one,’ something I think rubbed off better on Greg than me. Another time—I reckon it was after I became vice-captain of Australia—he said, ‘If you’re lucky enough to captain Australia, don’t captain like a Victorian.’ I don’t think Vic was aiming at Bill Lawry when he said that, I suspect he was referring more to Lindsay Hassett than anyone else. The other thing which I recall Pop telling me was round the time I was vice-captain for both South Australia and Australia: ‘Just remember, when you win the toss, nine times out of ten you bat first … on the tenth time you think about putting the opposition in, but you still bat first.’
I guess I always regret not having gotten to know Vic better. It was only in the last years of his life that we had much to do with each other. I used to love the stories of the old days, and after I had become a Test player he introduced me to the old New South Wales and Test batsman Allan Kippax. That was a special moment. I was very proud to be Vic’s grandson and whenever I did anything wrong I used to say to myself, ‘I wonder what Vic would think about that.’ He once advised me never to abuse umpires and I’ve always felt guilty about the times that has happened. But if I ever get the chance to meet up with Vic, wherever that might be, I would like to think that we could sit down over a cold beer and he would say to me, ‘Well then, Ian, there were three or four things you did that I didn’t agree with, but on the whole I thought you did a pretty good job.’
I have always said the season with Ramsbottom in 1963 improved
my drinking and swearing and set my cricket back a couple of
months. I went from never being more than twelve stone when
I left Australia to being 14 stone-plus upon my return.
By the summer of 1961/62 Ian Chappell had just turned 18, but his batting had greatly matured. He was touted as the rising star of South Australian cricket. Success at A-grade level doesn’t necessarily guarantee a state berth. Cricket selectors don’t always get it right, but the astute ones look beyond a player’s ability to score runs and take wickets; they look closely at a player’s ability to cope under pressure. In addition to his ability to perform consistently, the player needs a good temperament to have a chance in succeeding in the first-class arena. Selectors Don Bradman and Phil Ridings saw all those qualities, and more, in young Ian Chappell. They had been hearing glowing reports from the school and from Ian’s club, Glenelg, for some time.
Because Ian was playing for Prince Alfred College (PAC) in B grade, he didn’t play A grade for Glenelg until he left school. At 17 he left PAC and played the last half of that season in the Senior Colts team. During his stint with PAC in the B-grade competition, Ian faced the leg spinners and wrong ’uns of West Torrens’s Brian ‘Banger’ Flaherty, who claims to have clean bowled Chappell twice for a duck: ‘I was about 17. Martin Chappell was then captain of the Glenelg Bs and Ian shouldered arms to my wrong ’un. I got him out the same way for a duck in both innings. Next time I caught up with Ian was in an A-grade match about a year later and he belted the hell out of me, and the rest of the West Torrens attack.’
The Colts team was disbanded before the next season so I played for Glenelg [in 1961/62] and after about ten matches I was chosen to play against Tasmania, then New South Wales, then Victoria in the final game of the Shield season. I guess I first got the feeling that something special was round the corner in my sixth or seventh A-grade match for Glenelg. I scored a century against a West Torrens side that included state bowlers Alan Hitchcox and Peter Trethewey. The state selectors were about to pick a Second XI to play a combined country team at Mount Gambier and I thought I might have a chance of getting into that side. Each Sunday I used to go to the beach with a few of my cricket and baseball mates and it was there that I found out I had been selected not for the second team, but for the South Australian Sheffield Shield side.
Glenelg keeper Des Selby, who batted with Chappell during the century against West Torrens, remembers the innings: ‘Ian must only have been 17 or 18. He was aggressive even then and he was really serving it up to the fast bowlers. This pair [Trethewey and Hitchcox] opened for South Australia and they both chucked. Chappelli and Hitchcox especially were at it. West Torrens took the new ball and Hitchcox immediately bounced him. He hooked his first ball for four, with the rejoinder, “Fancy you opening the bowling for South Australia.” The quick bowler was fuming and he bounced him another three times in succession. Ian hooked all four in a row for four, to move from 84 to a hundred. It was magnificent cricket. For a bloke so young to serve it up to the experienced guys was one thing; for him to be able to hook so brilliantly was another. I was at the other end. I saw the whole thing. Here was a guy who was special, ready to play big cricket. Phil Ridings [a South Australian, and later in 1971 an Australian selector] was at the ground and could not have failed to be impressed by that superb knock.’
Glenelg stalwart and successful businessman Jack ‘the Flea’ Butler, a sprightly bloke who looked a bit like diminutive cigar-smoking Danny DeVito, was over the moon about Chappell’s state selection. A long-time member of Glenelg Cricket Club, Butler wrote to Chappell:
Dear Ian,
On an occasion such as this I feel that it is much nicer to write to you than call you on the telephone. I cannot remember being so thrilled over an Interstate selection as I am right now. Firstly, you have earned state selection, and more important, you are ready to play state cricket, and I am confident that you will handle the situation very successfully.
Confidentially, the selectors at the moment have in mind to play you and make Rex Sellers twelfth man. Do not be too disappointed if they change their mind between now and Friday, because they do this sort of thing occasionally.
Good luck on Friday, and I know that everybody at Glenelg will be with you.
Meanwhile, Ian was trying not to get too far ahead of himself.
I was twelfth man against New South Wales when Sobers made 251 and then he had to return to the Caribbean to play in a Test series, so I came into the eleven against Victoria—hence I always say I replaced Sobers in the South Australian side. Against a Victorian attack of Meckiff, Guest and Connolly I made two and 59. South Australia was murdered in that game, but I remember Bill Lawry coming to the door of the South Australian dressing-room as he was leaving the ground and he said, ‘Where’s young Chappell? I guess he’s already left. Tell him well played.’ I was sitting in the dressing-room having a beer—Bill didn’t know me too well at that stage.
Garry Sobers had left the country by the time Ian had completed his gritty 59. However, Chappell later played a number of matches with Sobers and he has an enduring admiration of Sobers the cricketer and Sobers the man. Ian calls the champion ‘Sobey’.
I learnt a hell of a lot by just watching Sobey, but he was always helpful. One of the things I admire about Garry, apart from his ability and that he was the senior man in the side, he always treated me as an equal. Here was this 18-year-old nobody and he’s just arrived as the best cricketer in the world, and yet he was happy to give me some advice.
The next summer Ian lost his leg stump to a ball from Ian Meckiff, the Victorian and Test left-hander. He had obviously moved too far across his stumps.
I said to Garry in the dressing-room, ‘I’ve obviously got a problem, do you have any suggestions.’ He said, ‘Go and get a bottle of beer son and we’ll talk about it.’
He asked what guard I took, which was middle, and he then suggested that I take leg stump because, he said, ‘Like me you have a back and across movement and so it’s better to start from leg.’ He also said it would help my on-side play because, ‘You know anything at the pads is going to miss leg stump.’
Sobey also suggested I bat with both feet outside the crease to the quickies, because my first movement was back and across. I followed his advice and never changed guard again, and always batted with both feet outside the crease to the fast bowlers.
The game in which Chappelli made his first Shield century, Sobers showed the way against hostile spin from Richie Benaud in the South Australian second innings:
We were chasing just over 200 in the second innings and we needed them in a hurry. Whereas in the first innings I had played Richie fairly comfortably by jumping down the track to him, it was very different in the second dig. Benaud came around the wicket and bowled into the footmarks. I wondered what the hell had hit me. I played and missed a few from Richie, and at the end of the over Sobey came down and said, ‘Don’t worry son, it’ll soon be over.’ I thought, ‘Yes, you’re right. I’ll be out soon.’ Sobey then hit four fours and took a single off Johnny Martin, hit a couple more boundaries off Richie and then got another single, and then he belted the winning runs off Martin and it was over in a hurry. We put on 45 of which I got nine.
Garry Sobers’s immense skill and confidence rubbed off on the South Australian players. The captain at that time, Les Favell, also had a lasting effect on his men. Favell was all-out attack and his confidence was such that he thought absolutely no one he came up against could bowl at all. ‘In addition to Les [Favell], Garry did a lot to change the “underdog feeling” in the SACA dressing-room, especially when we played New South Wales with their near-Test line up,’ Chappell says.
And what did Sobers think of Ian Chappell? Mike Coward quotes Sobers in Cricket in the Seventies as saying:
I watched Ian in the South Australian dressing-room before he even played for South Australia. He used to come in and sit down and listen for hours and hours … listen to the fellows talk about the game and their jokes. Ian was always a student of the game and was always going to be a good captain. To me he was a good leader of men, one of the best.
Ian played three matches in 1961/62, scoring 92 runs at 18.40 with a highest score of 59—that courageous knock against Victoria which so impressed Bill Lawry. Then in 1962/63 he played in ten matches for South Australia, scoring 491 runs at 35.07. He hit a brilliant 149 against the strong New South Wales side at Adelaide Oval in December 1962, only his fourth Shield match.
Richie Benaud, then New South Wales and Test captain, was intrigued by Chappelli’s facial expressions when facing him. According to Chappell, in the wake of Chappelli’s brilliant century, Benaud said to Barry Jarman over a beer in the dressing-room:
‘What’s young Chappell like? He’s not a smart-arse is he?’ Jarman immediately assumed that I had said something to Richie, which I wouldn’t have done, and Richie said, ‘No, he didn’t say anything. He just kept grinning at me while he was facing up.’ Jar laughed and explained that I always gritted my teeth when I was batting and it looked like a smile.
Martin would have been happy because he often told me, ‘Grit your teeth son and do your best.’ I must have taken him literally, although I think I got out of that habit after that episode.
At the end of that first successful Shield summer, Ian headed to the United Kingdom, playing for Ramsbottom in the tough Lancashire League. He made 510 runs and took 60 wickets, but the team finished last and at the end of it all he was glad to be going home. Ian did not believe the Lancashire League experience provided him any great benefit, in the cricketing sense. However, it was an experience overseas and he got to know a little more about England and the attitudes of English cricketers. He did not think much of the English club cricket experience:
I have always said the season with Ramsbottom in 1963 improved my drinking and swearing and set my cricket back a couple of months. I went from never being more than twelve stone when I left Australia to being 14 stone-plus upon my return. It took me a couple of months to shed the excess weight. Glenelg played Sturt first game of the 1963/64 season and I had been batting for about an over when Jack Lill asked Murray Sargent, the Glenelg captain, ‘What happened to young Chappell who used to bat at number three?’, and Sargent said, ‘That’s him up the other end.’
In the 1963/64 season Chappell established himself in the South Australian team and his name was high on the list of emerging Test cricketers. He scored 596 runs at an average of 54.18, with a personal highest score of 205 not out against Queensland in Brisbane, the first time he batted at number three for South Australia. In all first-class games he hit 662 runs at 60.18. That summer the Test selectors were to pick an Australian Eleven to play the visiting South Africans at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). Chappell believed he had the form to win selection for that game, a golden chance to press claims for higher honours.