Tour of England 1909            Captain : Monty Noble
	Thirteenth Australians     Twelfth Test-playing tour of England by Australia.       (March - November 1909)	Following a series of trial matches, this was the first side to be selected by a committee of the Australian Board of Control.  The panel was chaired by Percy McAlister. The Board then  controversially voted that McAlister would hold four roles: vice-captain; tour selector; the Board's representative to the new ICC; and he would act as Treasurer which would ensure that the management of money would be according to the Board's wishes. The Australians were invited as part of a Triangular Tournament but declined to take part and their invitation to tour was at risk of being cancelled. Then on 29 July 1908 the resolution was withdrawn by MCC and the counties.  The Australian Board also resisted a request to stop and play a match in South Africa on the way to England but did play matches in Colombo on the way home (the team had sailed in two separate groups and each played a match). The Australians triumphed in the Test series winning two matches before batting England out of the two remaining drawn Tests. At the end of the tour player-manager Frank Laver declined to submit a tour report to the Board of Control, which the Board used as grounds for excluding him from the 1912 tour.	Other Australian Tours     Previous Test tour England 1905     Next tour England 1912
	Members of the Test tour party (16)     Openers:  Victor Trumper, Warren Bardsley, Percy McAlister. Batsmen:  Syd Gregory, Warwick Armstrong, Roger Hartigan, Vernon Ransford, Charlie Macartney. Wicket-keepers:  Hanson ('Sammy') Carter,  Barlow Carkeek Slow bowlers: (Armstrong and Macartney) Medium-paced bowlers: Frank Laver, Jack O'Connor. Fast bowlers: Albert Cotter, Bert Hopkins, Bill  Whitty,	W W Armstrong Vic 30 RHB   RFM/ LB   W Bardsley NSW 26 LHB  opener   W Carkeek Vic 30 second WK   H Carter NSW 31 WK   A Cotter NSW 25 RF   S E Gregory NSW 39 RHB   R M J Hartigan Q 29 RHB   A J Y Hopkins NSW 35 RFM   F J Laver Vic 39 RM   C G Macartney NSW 22 RHB   SLA   P A McAlister Vic 39 RHB  opener    vice-captain   M A Noble NSW 36 RHB   RM   J D A O'Connor SA 33 RM   V S Ransford Vic 24 LHB   V T Trumper NSW 31 RHB   W J Whitty SA 22 LFM	Average age of  team at time of first Test match  (29 May 1909) :     31 yrs  1 month     Representation: NSW - New South Wales (8) Q  - Queensland (1) SA - South Australia (2) Vic - Victoria (5).
	Test Appearances made before the tour	Gregory 46,  Noble 37,  Trumper 33,  Armstrong  25,  Hopkins 18,  Laver 11,  Cotter 7,  McAlister 6,  Carter 5,  Macartney 5,  Ransford 5,  O'Connor 3,  Hartigan 2,  Bardsley 0,  Carkeek 0,  Whitty 0.
	Team Officials	F J Laver Player-Manager W Ferguson Baggage / scorer Dr AK Thompson Medical Advisor
	Selectors	Frank Iredale, Percy McAlister and Clem Hill. Monty Noble and Victor Trumper had put themselves forward for election as selectors but were unsuccessful.
	Selection	The Board of Control meeting held on 18 February appointed Frank Laver as manager, Monty Noble as captain and Percy McAlister as vice-captain (by 6 votes to 5) Unavailable:  Clem Hill said he would not go because of the new financial arrangements (see Finances below), while at first Trumper, Noble and Armstrong refused to sign their tour contracts McAlister and Carkeek were the last two to be selected.  McAlister, as the Board's representative, would act as Treasurer. The Board then considered the selectors' recommendation that A J Hopkins be taken as a 15th player. The Board would pay only £200 towards his costs and it was left to the other players to decide whether to afford his place from their share, which they did.
	Travel	The Orient liner 'Orontes'  left  Sydney Harbour on 17 March and docked at Melbourne, Adelaide and Fremantle on its way to Ceylon, Suez and Naples (23 April) where Bardsley and McAlister disembarked. Six of the team (Noble, Carkeek, Cotter, Hartigan, Hopkins and O'Connor) disembarked at Plymouth on Friday 30 April after a rough passage through the Bay of Biscay and took the train to London. Gregory proceeded in the 'Orontes' reaching London the next day.  Armstrong had arrived at the team's headquarters, the Inns of Court Hotel, London, the day before.  Bardsley and McAlister had already arrived overland and had even played a match at Esher on 1 May. The team practiced at Lord's Ground between 3 and 5 May then travelled by railway (not Carkeek, Hopkins or McAlister) to Nottingham for their first match.
	On-tour selection	Noble (captain),  McAlister (vice-captain),  Gregory  (whom the Board preferred to Trumper as third selector)
	Reinforcements	None
	Fixtures/Results	Trent Bridge Nottinghamshire Won inns 6 r Northampton Northamptonshire Won 9 w Leyton Essex Drawn Kennington Oval Surrey Lost 5 r Lord's M C C Lost 3 w Oxford Oxford University Drawn EDGBASTON ENGLAND  First Test LOST 10 w Leicester Leicestershire Drawn Cambridge Cambridge University Drawn Southampton Hampshire Won 6 w Bath Somerset Won 2 w LORD'S ENGLAND  Second Test WON 9 w † Glasgow Western Union Won inns 188 r Bradford Yorkshire Drawn Old Trafford Lancashire & Yorkshire Drawn Edinburgh Scotland Drawn HEADINGLEY ENGLAND  Third Test WON 126 r Edgbaston Warwickshire Drawn Worcester Worcestershire Won inns 112 r Bristol Gloucestershire Won inns 5 r Kennington Oval Surrey Drawn Sheffield Yorkshire Drawn Derby Derbyshire Won 10 w OLD TRAFFORD ENGLAND  Fourth Test DRAWN Hull Lancashire & Yorkshire Drawn †  Cardiff South Wales Won 8 w Aigburth, Liverpool Lancashire Won 47 r KENNINGTON OVAL ENGLAND  Fifth Test DRAWN Blackpool England XI Drawn Cheltenham Gloucestershire Drawn Canterbury Kent Drawn Lord's Middlesex Drawn Hove Sussex Won 1 w Lord's M C C Drawn Leyton Essex Drawn Uttoxeter J Bamford's XI Drawn Scarborough Lord Londesborough's XI Lost 133 r Hastings South of England Drawn Bray (Wicklow, Ireland) SH Cochrane's XI Drawn † Inverness North of Scotland Won 3 w † Titwood, Glasgow West of Scotland Abandoned   † Colombo Noble's XI v Ceylon Drawn † Colombo McAlister's XI  v Ceylon Drawn	† not first-class
	Test appearances on tour	5   -  Bardsley,  Carter,  Cotter,  Armstrong,  Gregory,  Macartney,  Noble,  Ransford,  Trumper 4   -  Laver 2   -  Hopkins, McAlister 1   -  O'Connor,  Whitty 0   -  Carkeek,  Hartigan.
	Highlights	•  Armstrong was the star all-rounder, taking 5-27 in the first Test and 6-35 in the second. He was the only bowler to take more than a hundred first-class wickets on tour (133), as well as scoring 1451 runs •  Ransford, on his first tour of England, scored a century (135) at Lord's though he was dropped three times. •  Macartney took 11 wickets in the match at Headingley (7-58 and 4-27) •  Laver took 8-31 with his medium-pacers at Old Trafford - the best bowling by an Australian in England. •  Warren Bardsley, also on his first tour of England, scored a hundred in each innings (136 and 130) at The Oval, becoming the first person in Test cricket to do so.
	Tour Summary	excluding Ceylon matches  P  W L  D Aban Test Matches   5   2 1   2 - Other first-class matches 32   9 3 20 - Minor matches    4   3 0   0 1 All Matches 43 14 4 24 1
	Return to Australia	After the final match the tourists took a fortnight's holiday in the Scottish Highlands and returned to Glasgow to play a match on 5 October but rain prevented any play so they caught the train for London. The tour party split in two to return home.  Noble, Armstrong, Cotter and Hopkins left London’s Charing Cross Station by boat train on 13 October to catch the ss 'Orsova'  (which left port on15 October) arriving at Marseilles one week later. On 30 October a one-day match was played against Ceylon (involving Armstrong, Cotter, Hopkins, McAlister, Noble) The rest of the team had sailed on 8 October 1909 on ss'Mongolia' which sailed to Sydney, via Singapore. There was another match against Ceylon, starting on 8 November (involving McAlister, Bardsley, Carter, Carkeek, Ransford, Whitty).
	Finances	The Board would take a share of the income and distribute the rest of it to the players, whereas before 1905 the players and their chosen manager would take the risks and keep all the profits they could make.
	Written accounts of the tour

Powered by Create