HUW TURBERVILL: With a host of players missing due to World Series Cricket, England outlasted Australia with their second Ashes success down under of the 70s
“Rick Darling was on the floor and no doctor seemed to be rushing out. We’d been taught first aid at Middlesex, so I gave his chest a few thumps, then a few more. It got him breathing again, but I should have checked if he had any gum in his mouth. He did, so then we had to clear his throat. I’ve no idea if it was the right thing to do. I’ve never spoken to him since. With today’s culture of litigation, I’d have to think twice about doing it now.”
For the first time in 42 years, England won the opening two Tests of an Ashes series. But they were making hard work of retaining the little urn as the series went on.
An Australian side stripped of many of their best players who had defected to ‘Packer’s Circus’ had fought back gallantly to win at Melbourne, and only a magnificent revival by England at Sydney allowed them to go 3-1 ahead with two Tests to play.
The tourists – without a few Packer players as well of course in Tony Greig, Dennis Amiss, Alan Knott, John Snow, Bob Woolmer and Derek Underwood, were again under pressure in the fifth Test at Adelaide, bowled out for 169.
Bob Willis found himself bowling the fifth ball of the innings in the first over after tea on the opening day. Australia had yet to score a run, and Darling was facing. It was a brute of a delivery, cutting back to strike the South Australian just below the heart. He slumped to the ground in shock. Some reports say he swallowed his tongue, others say the gum he was chewing became lodged in his throat.
I tracked down three of the England players who saw the incident: Geoff Miller, John Lever and John Emburey, the latter providing the quote above.
“Bernard Thomas, the England physio, came on and gave Darling the kiss of life,” said Miller. “John had also just completed a first-aid course back at home, and was pumping his chest to get his heart started again… I don’t know if he’d swallowed his tongue, but his face was blue, I remember that.”
Captain Mike Brearley was at first slip, and he said: “We didn’t realise at first how serious it was because when the ball hit him it didn’t seem a bad knock. But then Rick just collapsed and we knew then he was in trouble.”
Tony Greig was among the hot of playing missing from the series
Lever added: “It followed on from Ewen Chatfield being hit by Peter Lever in 1974/75 (thankfully the New Zealander recovered). That was still fresh in everyone’s memories. When Darling started to choke, it was pretty scary.”
He was unconscious for 10 minutes. He was taken to hospital where X-rays revealed no serious damage, so he resumed his innings the next morning. Later he claimed he could not remember anything about the incident.
It was a serious interlude in a miserable winter for the hosts. True, they would discover fast bowler Rodney Hogg, who had eclipsed the Australian record of 36 wickets in an Ashes series that same afternoon (he would finish with 41). But their lack of strength in depth was underlined by the fact that, despite only managing 169, England still led by five runs on first innings at Adelaide. That was extended significantly in the second innings, and they won the match by 205 runs to go 4-1 up.
It was the first time England had won four matches in a rubber in Australia since 1932/33. When they triumphed again in the sixth Test at Sydney, Brearley became the first captain to win five Tests down under, and only the second England captain after Len Hutton to regain and defend the Ashes.
The next time England were to return, the following winter, the Australian Board had brought the big names back, after making peace with Packer.
In 1978/79, though, his World Series, after a limp first season, had really taken off. The Chappells, Dennis Lillee, Jeff Thomson and Rod Marsh were all performing under the wealthy businessman’s banner, rather than against England.
Even though Australia’s international cricketers were being paid more than their English counterparts, according to Mike Denness, and had seen their match fees doubled since 1974, they had become aggrieved, believing that they were not being sufficiently rewarded for what had been a boom period in Australian cricket.
It was an era that saw Australian sports being increasingly influenced by their American counterparts; there were vast crowds and bumper sponsorship deals. Australia’s cricket administrators, in the eyes of the players, had become complacent and old-fashioned. Though the Board argued that they were ploughing money into the grassroots of the game, Packer saw his chance and exploited it.
Bob Willis was at the centre of the main flashpoint of the series
Colour television had been introduced to Australia in 1975, and by 1978 it was estimated that seven out of 10 Sydney households owned a set.
Packer was annoyed that the Australian Broadcasting Corporation had again been awarded the television rights until 1977/78. He wanted the exclusive deal, even though his Channel 9 did not reach all parts of the country as ABC did.
In retaliation, during the final few months of 1976, Packer had begun working on staging his own matches. He secretly signed up 39 players on handsome deals for a programme of five and two-day matches between Australia and a Rest of the World team. A third side, the West Indies, were added later. Greig was to captain and recruit players for the World XI, and Richie Benaud was paid by Packer as his consultant. It was one of the game’s gravest periods, and the parallels with today’s international cricket-versus-Twenty20 franchise leagues tussle are obvious.
“It was an unusual time,” Brearley wrote in The Observer. “We were in the strange position of competing for attention and significance with the radical new offering, with its drop-in pitches, coloured clothes, day-night matches, and brash TV coverage. We represented tradition and the establishment. Channel 9 advertised World Series by showing short-pitched balls thudding into the rubs. Douglas Jardine would have felt vindicated.”
In March 1977, however, while many feared the crisis was impending, a fabulous reunion was held at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, to showcase the five-day game.
Hans Ebeling, a former Australian Test bowler who was now a vice-president of the Melbourne Cricket Club, suggested a match to mark the 100-year anniversary of cricket’s first Test. In 1877, England and Australia had met on the same ground – then known as the Richmond Police Paddock – with David Gregory’s Australians defeating James Lillywhite’s professional England side by 45 runs.
Invitations to the 244 living cricketers who had played in Test series between Australia and England were sent, and all but 26 were able to accept. Former England players accounted for 79 of the guests. The oldest Australian was 87-year-old Jack Ryder. Percy Fender, who was 84, flew from England.
Along with The Queen and Duke of Edinburgh, they saw a compelling match, with both sides struggling in their first innings, only to make big totals second time round. Extraordinarily, Australia won by the same result as 100 years previously – 45 runs.
Rick Darling was unconscious for 10 minutes but resumed his innings in the fourth Test the next morning
“Again the hosts suffered an early injury blow, losing Rick McCosker to a fractured jaw when a ball from Willis flew off his hand into his face,” Miller recalls. Australia made 138, and England, led by Greig, could manage only 95 in reply, Lillee taking 6 for 26 and Max Walker 4 for 54.
Marsh made an unbeaten 110 as Australia made 419 in their second innings, and England came close to an unlikely triumph, man-of-the-match Derek Randall scoring 174. Although Lillee took 5 for 139, he had a frustrating time bowling to the quirky Randall, who tennis-batted a bouncer to the fence through midwicket.
The match was played in good spirit. When Randall had made 161, umpire Tom Brooks gave him out, caught behind, only for Marsh to state that the ball had gone to ground, and the batsman was recalled.
“The wicket did a lot and then flattened out,” said Miller, who was 12th man. “We’d been to India and then Sri Lanka that winter, and were then given a warm-up game at Perth. It was a completely different surface – the quickest and bounciest in the world, so you had to readjust your lengths, batting structures, everything. Both sides bowled exceptionally well, but the pitch went slower and lower, and there was very little turn.
“Then Randall played his fantastic knock – he took the battle to the opposition, to Dennis, doffing his cap to him and asking him if he could get it to bounce a bit more. But it wasn’t just the spectacle of the game, it was events on the periphery; all those great players coming to the MCG – Don Bradman, Tiger O’Reilly… it enhanced the occasion; it was very special, even to be 12th man.
“There weren’t that many rumblings in the changing room about Packer… one or two things had been said, but I was one of the juniors in the side, so I didn’t take much notice of it. Eddie Barlow was at Derbyshire, though, and when I got back from that Centenary Test, he told me, ‘The game is going to change’. I said to him, ‘What do you mean?’ He said: ‘You’ll see in a couple of days’.”
A full-strength Australia side, with the exception of the absent Lillee, still came to England in the summer of 1977, though, and although Greig played, Brearley had assumed the captaincy. England regained the Ashes, beating Greg Chappell’s Australia 3-0. It was noteworthy, with a Test at Lord’s marking the Queen’s Jubilee opening the series. Geoffrey Boycott returned from his self-imposed exile to score 107 and 80 in the third Test at Trent Bridge, with Botham making his Test debut there.
The series was played out against a backdrop of speculation, for although the International Cricket Conference, as it was then known, invited Packer to talks in June, they warned that a breakaway could ‘seriously damage’ world cricket. Benaud met the ICC’s sub-committee at Lord’s, where he relayed Packer’s demands to the Australian Cricket Board: that Channel 9 be awarded the next domestic television contract. The ACB said they could not give him that guarantee. After the fifth Test, 12 players from the match defected to World Series Cricket.
The depleted Australians beat India 3-2 the next winter in what was an enthralling series (while Packer cricket struggled in its first season, partly because it could not use the established cricket venues). The Australian ‘2nd XI’ then lost 3-1 in the West Indies. England drew 0-0 in Pakistan and 1-1 in New Zealand, before beating the same opponents at home by 2-0 and 3-0 margins respectively, with Brearley developing a fine reputation as captain.
The third Test welcomed the arrival of Allan Border
For the 1978/79 series, he had formidable support behind the scenes. The experienced and efficient Doug Insole was appointed tour manager, while Ken Barrington brought experience and enthusiasm to the role of assistant. Thomas also ensured it was the fittest England side to visit Australia.
Graeme Yallop, a decent left-handed bat from Victoria, was to prove no match as Australia’s unimaginative captain, with many arguing that the more experienced John Inverarity should have been in charge.
“Our nickname for Yallop was ‘Banzai’ – he was all up and at ’em – attack, attack. It was all talk, he couldn’t back it up. Our captain was streets apart,” said Lever.
“We had a good side, but we didn’t go to Australia thinking, ‘They have a massively depleted side, we’ll wipe the floor with them,’ said Miller. “We won the series 5-1, but the Tests were much closer than that – it wasn’t a thrashing. Certain aspects made us win by that margin. One was the captaincy. Brearley was excellent. Yallop was a fine player, but not as good as Brearley as captain.”
Lever agreed that the England team were not expecting it to be a walkover. “It’s never easy going to Australia, even if they did have a weakened side,” he said. “They are a nation of sportsmen, always coming up with new players. We were expecting a battle.”
He was looking forward to the trip, though: “Australia was the place to go! West Indies was frightening, with all those fast bowlers trying to knock your head off, and without helmets.”
The cerebral Brearley, who had grown a beard, was called the Ayatollah by some Australian fans. “He was baited by the crowds, who clearly thought he was as stuffy a Pom as Jardine,” said David Gower, “but as a captain, he had a very hardcore to him.” Even Hogg was an admirer, saying Brearley had a ‘degree in people’.
England suffered a surprise defeat by South Australia, where they met Hogg for the first time. “We’d never heard of this fella,” said Miller. “He bowled quick and straight. Just ask Clive Radley what he was like to face him. He bowled a short ball at Clive that hit him, splitting his forehead.”
The gritty Radley had been expected to play in the Tests, but did not get a game. Lever recalled: “Clive laughed afterwards, and said, “If they all bowl like that I’m f*****!”
England went into the Tests in good spirits, nevertheless. Ian Botham was fit to play after putting his hand through a swinging pub door at a send-off party. He then suffered the night before the first Test after eating a dubious plate of oysters.
The first Test marked 50 years of Test cricket at Brisbane, and to commemorate the occasion, three skydivers landed on the ground carrying a specially struck coin for the toss. Australia won it but soon regretted their decision, slumping to 26 for 6 in steamy conditions. They rallied to 116 all out, one of several notable late-order recoveries in the series, arguably made easier because Brearley and Yallop had agreed that their bowlers would only bowl bouncers at recognised batsmen. Willis, despite suffering from skinned toes and blistered feet, took 4 for 44, while Botham’s figures were 3 for 40.
Randall’s 75 helped England to 286 in reply, with Hogg, operating in short, sharp bursts, taking 6 for 74. His new-ball partner Alan Hurst, a strapping right-armer from Victoria, took 4 for 93.
Australia fared better next time around, making 339, with Yallop scoring 102 to become the second Australian to hit a century in his maiden Test as captain.
England won by seven wickets, though, their first victory at the venue since 1936/37, with Randall making 74 not out.
A 21-year-old David Gower top-scored for England
Miller, whose selection had not been universally lauded, made his mark with two wickets in the second innings, on his way to 23 wickets at 15 apiece in the series.
“Derek Underwood had moved to World Series, so it was me, John Emburey and Phil Edmonds as the spinners,” he said. “I was thrilled to go on my first Ashes tour. We had more variations in our bowling… Willis, Botham, Lever’s left-armers, lots of overs from Chris Old and Mike Hendrick, plus three spinners, so we could go in all directions. It was a good unit, as was the catching, especially Derek Randall, and a strong slip cordon.
“Yallop and Kim Hughes were going well in the second innings and we thought the game could slip away from us and be a draw. They got level with us three wickets down and then Bob brilliantly caught and bowled Yallop [to break a fourth-wicket stand of 170 – he also then dismissed Hughes].
“I removed John McLean. He scored 94 against us for Queensland, and he got the nod as keeper/batsman, but he hardly scored a run in the series, and I got him out four times in the first four Tests. We knew more about their players after that first Test. There were no laptops or anything like that – what we saw about a player we wrote down. Hughes we’d seen, Hurst a bit, but eight or nine we’d never seen before.”
Brearley said Inverarity had helped him see the light over Hendrick. “He pointed out that clearly, Mike was the best of our seamers, something that until then I had not taken fully on board. I think we’d come to Australia with the idea that he was more dangerous in English conditions. He was the perfect foil for Willis and Botham, though.”
Lever said: “Australia must have been thinking they were fielding effectively fielding a second string. England had not lost so many players to Packer. Hughes was still very raw. He had such talent, but then he would run down the wicket and miss one. His temperament wasn’t all there. You just felt they were missing the extra pace of Thomson, and class acts like Lillee, Greg Chappell and Marsh. McLean was also no substitute for Marsh, who was approaching legendary status.”
England were in trouble early on in the second Test at Perth, slipping to 3 for 2 after being put in. Gower and Boycott played contrasting innings to haul their side to 309, with Hogg taking 5 for 65. Gower’s 102 was much more entertaining than Boycott’s 77, which spanned 337 balls, his only four coming from overthrows. Gower was just 21 years old but was the only batsman on either side to score more than 400 runs in the series, at an average of more than 40.
Australia managed only 190 in reply, and although Hogg took 10 wickets in the match, Australia were set 328 to win. They slumped to 161 all out, losing their last six wickets for 20. Peter Toohey made 81 and Willis took 5 for 44.
“Boycott had an ordinary tour by his own standards,” said Miller. “This was his highest score of the series. He had a lot on his mind. He wasn’t the run force that we thought he’d be. Hogg [four times] and Hurst [six] got him out quite regularly. There were some lbws there, so his feet movement wasn’t what he wanted it to be.”
Boycott was upset after losing the captaincy of Yorkshire in what he says were “appallingly spiteful circumstances following the death of his mother”. He wrote: “I performed well below my normal standards because I could not clear my mind of the troubles with Yorkshire. I told Gower, ‘I wish I could bat like you’. He made batting look so simple.” He also ran into trouble for calling umpire Don Weser ‘a cheat’ after he had turned down two apparently plumb lbw shouts by Botham against Hughes.”
Machine-made balls were used for the first time in Tests that winter, adding to Boycott’s problems. Made by Kookaburra, they had big seams, and were a factor in the low-scoring series.
Rodney Hogg took an astonishing 41 wickets
Gower found facing Hogg a challenge. “He was as quick and mean a bowler as any I’ve faced, and he also had the temperament to match,” he wrote. “When I was leaving the field with a century to my name in Perth, the fact that I’d edged and missed a few against him early on had clearly been festering with him, and he came up and called me ‘an effin imposter’.”
Lever remembers an altercation between Brearley and Phil Edmonds during this Test. “Edmonds was 12th man and being his normal obtuse self,” he said. “The 12th men would take dirty socks away, get clean shirts ready and so on; it was an important role, crucial for maintaining team spirit. England probably have loads of people around to do all that now.
“We came off after a frustrating session, and Brearley said to Edmonds, ‘Where’s lunch?’ And he had his feet up and was reading a newspaper. He said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of that’. They squared up and I had to go between them. I tried to push Edmonds away, but he was 6ft 2ins and 14 stone, so I pushed Brearley away instead!”
Emburey also remembers the incident. “Phil thought being 12th man just meant helping out on the field, and did not mean anything else – he left everything else to me and Clive Radley. They were jabbing each other in the chest – it was a typical Middlesex dressing-room scenario!’”
Because of that county connection, Emburey and Edmonds were upset to be behind Miller in the pecking order: “It was disappointing as I thought Brears, after playing with us for so long, would know what we were capable of.”
Lever was enjoying himself on his first Ashes tour. “I remember sailing up and down the Swan River with John and Clive in Perth on a catamaran,” he said.
“The Aussies we met in the grounds were the ugly ones, while everyone outside was nice and friendly. Coming to cricket changed their focus. They’d say, ‘I’ve seen better-looking heads on a crab’, or they would throw cans of warm p*** at you!
“One or two of our lads were also getting quite picky about their food, Gower especially. Willis liked his wine and Beefy was going that way. He decided to stop drinking beer to keep his weight down, and switched to white wine, but I’m not sure it made much difference! He was a superb bowler, though; he bowled a heavy ball and a great bouncer.
“We had a good side, but we didn’t go to Australia thinking, ‘They have a massively depleted side, we’ll wipe the floor with them,’
“I have great memories of touring with him, so many laughs. He would take the p*** out of ‘Fiery’ [Boycott], but he’d always be the first to come up to someone and slap them on the back if they did well – a great team man.
“He was hard work for the management, though. Kenny Barrington used to be meticulous about the balls used for nets, and he banned Botham from them because he was slogging it everywhere. ‘For f—-’s sake, Beefy,’ he’d shout. They had great respect for each other, though.”
Lever also remembers how close the players were to the press back then. “We’d even phone the newspaper boys up and ask them for a drink. People, like Pat Gibson of the Daily Express and Alan Lee of The Times. I remember a story breaking – don’t recall what it was – and Gibson chatted to me. He said: ‘Can I use it?’ And I said, ‘No, it will get me into trouble’, so he didn’t. I’m not sure that would happen now. The problems arose when Beefy signed up for The Sun.”
When Lever spoke to me, he’d just returned from a golfing weekend in Spain with Willis and Botham – just like old times!
Despite his 4 for 28 in the second innings at Perth, Lever lost his place for the next Test at Melbourne, making way for a second spinner in Emburey. “I was not injured. We had a lot of seamers, and Brears was a big Hendrick and Old fan. I was not quite as quick as them, but I thought my left-arm variation would get me in, but that’s the way it goes.”
Australia hit back at Melbourne, winning by 103 runs in a match that saw Allan Border make his debut. It was Brearley’s first defeat in 16 Tests; losing the toss was crucial. It was the 10th time in a row Yallop had won it in all matches.
The hosts made 258 thanks to Graeme Wood’s 100, the only score above 49 in the match.
England replied with 143, Hogg taking 5 for 30. Australia then scored 167 and dismissed England for 179, Hogg’s figures of 5 for 36 giving him a match analysis of 10 for 66 (unlucky numbers for the English). He had taken 27 wickets in his first three Tests. England’s most potent counterpart, Willis, failed to take a wicket in the match, though.
“Wood batted a long time in a low-scoring game,” said Miller, who himself spent 110 minutes making his first three runs on his way to seven in the first innings. “It was a low wicket, very difficult to bat on, and that innings was the difference between the sides.”
England were in real danger of letting the series slip in the fourth Test at Sydney, only to stage one of the great comebacks to win by 93 runs, thus retaining the Ashes. With players weakened by a virus and heat exhaustion, they scored only 152 in the first innings, Hurst taking 5 for 28. At the end of day one, with Australia 56 for 1, England called a team meeting. Bob Taylor suggested that every day should be regarded as the first day of the tour.
It worked. Australia were all out for 294, Darling making 91. England amassed 346 in the second innings thanks to Randall’s patient 150. It was the slowest 150-plus score in Tests in terms of balls faced.
Australia were then bowled out for 111 by the ‘off-spin twins’, Emburey taking four for 46 and Miller 3 for 38.
“We’d played really well for two Tests,” Miller said, “but then we had this aberration at Melbourne. We got to Sydney and were in big trouble after the opening day. Strong words were said in the changing room – one or two people talked about the pride of being English and so on, and how we started so well that we shouldn’t let it slip, and how we were better than what we’d been showing.
“I remember coming off the field after they had got a lead of 142 and saying to Boycott, ‘The way this wicket is going, if we get a lead of 200, we’ll win, Embers and I will bowl them out on here’. They got a lead of 204, and we just ran through them, but notice Border – not out 60 and not out 45 – he showed that he was a good player.”
Yallop received the approval of his board to bring in a local Aussie Rules football coach to motivate his side for the fifth Test at Adelaide, but the tourists still won by 205 runs. England’s top order again struggled, though, and were 27 for 5 before Botham turned the match around, scoring 74, and then taking 4 for 42. At 132 for 6 in the second innings, England were far from safe, but they rediscovered their resilience, and Willis found his rhythm again, taking three wickets. Hogg took seven wickets in the match, overhauling leg-spinner Arthur Mailey’s record of 36 from 1920/21.
England won the sixth Test at Sydney just as comfortably as they had the fourth there. Australia’s total of 198 in their first innings was poor on a blameless pitch, with Yallop’s 121 lacking support. Graham Gooch then played his best innings of the series to score 74 as England made 308, before Emburey, with 4 for 52, and Miller (5 for 44) routed the Australians again.
Graham Yallop led the Australia resistance with the bat
“It was said that Australia couldn’t play finger-spin, although they were all right playing spin when it turned away from the body, and events in that series certainly bore that out,” said Miller.
England needed only 34 and won by nine wickets. Oddly, Australia used an old ball from the start, despite Brearley pointing to Law 5 that stated either captain may demand a new ball. The hosts had not totally lost their humour, however, Hogg greeted Randall by putting a fake snake on the pitch.
“You can only beat the opposition that is put in front of you,” said Emburey. “We won comfortably, but Packer had not been all bad news for Australia. Two greats, Border and Hughes, were given their chances much quicker than they would have been.”
The tour represented the end of an era. For the first time, the tourists were not playing as MCC in the state games. Eight-ball overs were bowled for the last time in an Ashes series, and it was also the first tour to Australia since the War that England did not then immediately depart for New Zealand to play a Test series.
One-day internationals were taking increasing prominence. Australia winning won the four-match Benson and Hedges Cup 2-1, after the first game was ruined by the weather.
“Traditionally we would have played a Test in a city, then the state at that same ground, before going to play an up-country XI in a one-day game,” said Miller. “England went to places like Bundaberg (Queensland), Renmark (South Australia) and Geelong (Victoria). We played against people who would never get a chance to face international cricketers – it was nice and relaxing, and it gave a chance for other tour members to get some time in the middle. Those games were being phased out now as one-day internationals came in.”
The Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack said: “Though visits to the remoter areas occasionally come under attack, they are an essential service to the game at large and must remain an integral part of every touring programme.” Alas the call went unheeded.
“I loved Australia; as long as you appreciate their humour, and what they thought about the ‘Poms’, and you give as much as you were given… superb,” said Miller. “And obviously it is nice to win 5-1 in Australia!”
Our coverage of the Ashes is brought to you in association with Cricket 22.
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