Beachcomber’s classic definition of ‘bombshell’ as ‘the exclusion of a cricketer from a team’ was rooted in fact. Nothing is quite so calculated to cause umbrage and indignation as a selection or exclusion apparently undeserved or misguided. Cricket fans can usually explain to themselves why they did not go further in the playing of the game, but all cricket fans fancy themselves as selectors.
Mike Brearley once said that selectors were like modern families – only noticed when there was blame to apportion. It’s almost true, but not quite, for selectors are surely noticed by those they favour, who bless them for their wisdom and insight. This chapter looks at selection from all sides: the pickers, the picked and the picky.
Selection for one’s country, recalled Bert Oldfield, is historically a great moment.
We were at our evening meal when Charlie Kellaway, who lived nearby in Glebe Point, a suburb of Sydney, called and told the good news. My mother, whose face was wreathed in smiles, rushed back into the dining-room and the members of the family wondered what it was all about. After a while she came over and kissed me and loudly whispered, ‘How wonderful, Bertie, you’ve been picked for the First Test!’ I was so excited I could not finish my meal. I saw myself wearing the much-coveted green cap bearing the Australian coat of arms and walking out onto the field in the select company of such celebrities as Noble, Armstrong, Macartney, Kellaway, Bardsley, Cotter, Ransford and others whose skill had won for them international fame.
Behind the Wicket, Oldfield
And for Michael Slater it still is.
Not long after arriving at the NSWCA office on 2 April [1993] I was buzzed by Bob Radford. ‘Come into my office, young fella,’ he barked down the intercom line. I knew that a media release was sent out a couple of hours before the official announcement of the Test side so my mind was racing when I sat down in Bob’s office. I could see that he had the press release, and I thought I could read the name Slater upside down. Bob started going on with all this stuff that I wasn’t that interested in hearing, then suddenly he said, ‘You’re in. You’re in the fucking squad. Ring whoever you need to then we’re going to lunch.’
Slats: The Michael Slater story, Slater and Apter
Sometimes it’s not so great, as when the 1890 Australians found themselves a wicketkeeper heavy.
Monday morning saw most of the team about town together, and then it was discovered that Kenny Burn had, to use his own words, ‘never kept wickets in his life’. The mistake was the result of a curious misconception. Blackham had seen in print that ‘Burn’ had stumped men in Tasmania, but that Burn was Kenny’s brother and quite an inferior player. However, the team was consoled by the reflection that the Tasmanian has the reputation of being a fine batsman, a fair bowler and a good field. Extraordinarily heavy work will fall on Blackham’s shoulders, or should I say his hands, but like the keen cricketer he is, he looks forward cheerfully to the task.
The Australasian, 26 April 1890
And sometimes it can be quite scary, as Mike Whitney found when called up for the Fifth Test at Old Trafford in 1981 while playing as a Gloucestershire reserve.
Fred Bennett the manager had just rung. I was to get off the field and speak to him. I was to report to Old Trafford immediately.
I was elated to have been considered, but when Geoff Lawson had broken down, Hoggy the same, Carl Rackemann also injured, Thommo had gone home and Len Pascoe was recovering from a knee injury, I really was the only one available.
I made the trip up to Old Trafford and was met by Fred Bennett. Upon arriving at the dressing-room we were joined by Kim Hughes. He congratulated me and told me what he wanted me to do tomorrow – bowl line and length.
I said, ‘What do you mean?’
He said, ‘Haven’t they told you? You’re playing in the Test tomorrow!’
I couldn’t believe it, having played just seven first-class games and a few John Player League games. It didn’t hit me until the third day of the Test. Another thing that was amazing was that Ray Bright had moved out of his room so I was going to room with Dennis Lillee.
They gave me my cap and jumper and we left for the ground. It was a great thrill to walk onto the ground in the company of Marsh, Lillee and company. After Lillee and Alderman had bowled about 15 overs, Kim Hughes said this was it. I did all the stretches and limbering up for the cameras. Waved to my mum in Australia. Kim said, ‘Bowl line and length and don’t be nervous.’ I really hadn’t time to be nervous. I bowled my first ball and Chris Tavaré played it out to square leg, and down came the rain! All that exercising for one ball! Peter Philpott came over and said, ‘That was a great ball.’
Wisden Cricket Monthly, January 1982
As the time for selection of a touring team nears, pulses always quicken.
On the eve of the announcement of the party to tour England in 1953, Alan Davidson was fielding in a Sheffield Shield match and heard a bellow from the bowels of the SCG’s Sheridan Stand, ‘Hey Davidson! You can pack your bags.’
Davidson’s ears pricked. ‘You beauty,’ he thought. ‘I’ve been picked.’
‘Yep,’ continued the anonymous orator. ‘You can pack your bags for a boat trip!’
‘Gee, he means it,’ Davidson thought. ‘I’m going to England.’
‘Yeah, you can pack your bags for a boat trip,’ the voice advised. ‘To Manly!’
Two days later, however, the telephone rang at Davidson’s Strathfield flat. It was his aunt from Epping: he’d been picked. There was silence at both ends of the line for a time, and Davidson replaced the receiver shaking. ‘A dream come true,’ he says.
For every dream come true was an ambition thwarted. When that Ashes team was read out in the Australian dressing-room after the Fifth Test against South Africa on 12 February 1953, teenager Ron Archer’s pleasure at selection was muted by knowing that it had been at the expense of 36-year-old Geff Noblet. ‘Geff was a much more experienced player than me. A much better bowler, too. The sort of guy they said’d do well in England. I happened to be next to him when they announced the team: I was picked and he wasn’t. I could tell he was really disappointed because it was his last chance to go, but I can also remember how gracious he was congratulating me. It was a great lesson.’
The Summer Game, Haigh
Some selectors don’t fill one with confidence, like Jack Ryder when he saw off the 1964 Australians . . .
When the Board held a farewell dinner for the team in Melbourne, Jack Ryder greeted South Australian leg-spinner Rex Sellers as Ray and Novocastrian medium-pacer Graeme Corling as nothing at all. ‘I know someone who didn’t vote for us,’ thought Sellers.
The Summer Game, Haigh
. . . or Sir Leonard Hutton, as Graham Gooch recalled on his Test debut in 1975.
At breakfast in the hotel dining-room Sir Len Hutton stopped to have a word with me. He seemed a kindly man, but a dry one. ‘Good luck,’ he said. ‘Er, tell me young man, have you ever played against the Australians before?’ I thought he was making fun of me. ‘Yes, sir,’ I said. ‘You’re one of the selectors who picked me after I scored 75 against them for MCC at Lord’s last week.’
The Autobiography, Gooch and Keating
Other selections puzzle players, and in January 1987 it was uncapped Mark Taylor’s turn.
The day before the announcement I was up in Newcastle playing against Tasmania. Someone from Channel Nine came up and said, ‘Look, if you get into the Australian team would you mind coming for an interview on the Today show?’
We were back in Sydney the next morning and I get a phone call at five past six saying, ‘This is the Today show. You’re in the Test team. Can you come in?’ So I raced to the shower and I’m thinking about all the things I should say on TV, but I got another phone call about fifteen minutes later, ‘Mark, is there a P. Taylor who plays for New South Wales?’ I said, ‘Yes, there’s Peter our off-spinner.’ ‘Has he played this year?’ I said, ‘Well, he played the last game against Tassie.’ They asked, ‘Could it be him that’s picked?’ And I said, ‘It quite possibly could be.’ Then they said, ‘Will you still come in?’ ‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m not coming in.’
Extra Cover, Egan
One man’s gain, after all, is another man’s loss, and for Mark Waugh in January 1991 that man was his twin brother Steve.
‘Congratulations,’ he said. ‘You’re in.’ Finally I asked, ‘Who’s out?’ Steve replied, ‘Me. But I’m just another player.’ We sat there stunned for about three minutes. Obviously I’d rather have taken someone else’s place, but I thought my turn could come in a Test if I kept scoring runs. Of all the wickets in the world to make your debut on you’d have to pick Adelaide. I’d played two previous first-class innings there and got 70-odd and 172. I roomed with Merv Hughes and if I had any tension he relieved it and I had a good night’s sleep before the Test. Merv is a great fun sort of fellow.
The Bedside Book of Cricket Centuries, Smith
Sometimes, too, you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone, like Bob Simpson in England in 1993.
Simmo was hitting fly balls, calling out a player’s name and usually thumping the ball well away from him. Up goes the ball. ‘Deano,’ shouts Simmo. Nobody moves. Up goes the ball again. ‘Deano.’ And again it plops to the ground. Simmo is looking a bit annoyed when Merv shouts, ‘He’s not here, Simmo. You didn’t pick him . . .’ Old habits die hard.
Deano: My call, Jones