Tour of India & South Africa 1969-70             Captain: Bill Lawry

33rd Australian Test tour

(October 1969 - March 1970)

Fourth Test-playing tour of  India by Australia

  (previous tour  1964)

Seventh Test-playing tour of South Africa by Australia

(previous tour  1966-67)

The Australian Board’s original plan was to make a visit to India followed by a tour of Pakistan but the Pakistan leg was cancelled because of political upheavals and the two Cricket Boards' inability to come to a financial agreement.  The South Africans, whose Test matches the  previous year had been cancelled because Basil D'Oliveira was included in the M C C team, eagerly filled the gap. Australian trades union leaders unsuccessfully demanded that the South African section of the tour should be cancelled as an anti-apartheid demonstration.

The first section of the tour in India was punctuated by trouble from spectators. When Venkat was wrongly given out caught at Bombay, the crowd mistakenly thought the Australians had cheated. At Calcutta spectators unable to get a ticket fought battles with the police and there was more trouble when a local photographer intruded onto the playing square and Lawry pushed him away with his bat. The tourists’ bus was stoned as they left the ground. Richie Benaud was among those calling for the players to terminate the trip.

Since the whole trip began with two weeks in Ceylon, this became (as recorded by cricinfo) one of the most arduous tours made by an Australian cricket team.  In its later stages the team became tired and stale, which contributed to the 4-nil defeat against the Springboks.  Lawry's statement that Ian Chappell was the best batsman in the world acted as a spur to the South African fast bowlers who cut him down to size (his aggregate being 92 in four Tests), while Australia's leading bowler Graham McKenzie was jaded because he could not shake off an illness picked up during the Indian tour. 

The South African Board’s proposal that a fifth Test should be played was turned down flat by the senior players because the financial terms were so mean despite the tour having produced huge revenues. Lawry’s report to the Australian Cricket Board on return urged that no Australian team should undertake a double tour again.

Other Australian Tours

Previous tour

England 1968

Next tour

England 1972

Next tour of India

 1979-80

Next tour of South Africa

1975-76 cancelled

1993-94

Members of the Test tour party  (15)

Opening batsmen:  Bill Lawry, Ian Redpath, Keith Stackpole

Middle-order batsmen:  Ian Chappell, Jock Irvine, Paul Sheahan, Doug Walters

Wicket-keepers:  Brian Taber, Ray  Jordon

Spin bowlers:  Johnny Gleeson, Ashley Mallett

Fast bowlers:  Alan Connolly, Eric Freeman, Laurie Mayne, Graham McKenzie

State representation

  Sheffield Shield teams

NSW   New South Wales (3)

Qld  Queensland (0)

SA   South Australia (3)

Tas   Tasmania (0)

Vic   Victoria  (6)

WA  Western Australia (3)

Average age of  team at time of first Test match

   (4 November 1969) :

 28 yrs  0 months

Test Appearances made before the tour

Lawry 53,  McKenzie 49,  Redpath 28,  Chappell 22,  Connolly 19,  Walters 16,  Gleeson 14,  Sheahan 14, Stackpole 12,  Freeman 8,  Taber 7,  Mayne 3,  Mallett 2,  Irvine 0,  Jordon 0.

Tour Officials

Selectors

Sir Donald Bradman,  Neil Harvey,  Jack Ryder.

Jack Ryder retired from the panel in 1970.  This was also the last Test touring party chosen by Sir Donald Bradman (apart from the Rest of the World XI in 1971-72, which was unofficial).

Bradman took part in choosing 14 Test touring parties, every side between 1938 and 1969-70 with the exception of the tour of England in 1953.

Selection

Mr Fred Bennett, who was New South Wales representative on the Australian Board, was appointed manager

Unavailable:  Barry Jarman.   Bob Cowper (he retired at the end of the domestic season to concentrate on business, at which he became a millionaire, as well as later being Australian representative at the ICC).

Tour Party Announced :   3 March 1969. 

The choices of Irvine, Mayne and Jordon came as a surprise.

Not selected :   Queensland batsman Sam Trimble, overlooked again, led another Australian representative team to New Zealand in Feb/March 1970.  Greg Chappell, Dave Renneberg and John Maclean  were also omitted and all were chosen for New Zealand tour instead.

The names of the captain and vice-captain were announced on 5 March.

Time between selection and departure from Australia   

   234 days

(3 March  - 15 October)

Travel

Sydney   Q  Colombo

Bombay   Q  Johannesburg

The tour party assembled at Sydney on 14 October 1969 and next day took off on a flight from Kingsford Smith Airport, Sydney, Irvine joining the flight in Perth.  Twelve tourists arrived at Katunayake Airport on the morning of 16 October where they were entertained by Kandyan dancers.  McKenzie, Mayne and Connolly who flew from England for Colombo on 18 October were stuck at Calcutta for three days, unable to get a connecting flight. 

After the brief tour of Ceylon the Australians flew, via Madras, to Santa Cruz Airport, Bombay, on Tuesday 28 October.

The team boarded an Air India flight out of Bombay on 1 January 1970 and touched down at Nairobi Airport, Kenya, where there was a 24-hour stay before BOAC carried the team on, arriving in Johannesburg on Friday 2 January 1970.

Time spent in India

   65 days

(28 October  - 1 January)

Time spent in South Africa

   80 days

(2 January   - 23 March)

On-tour selection

Bill Lawry (captain),  Ian Chappell  (vice-captain),  Brian Taber.

Reinforcements

  None.

Fixtures/Results

The Australian Board had asked the South Africans about touring there as soon as it was known that the Pakistan tour was cancelled in December 1968

The Madras Test match included play on Christmas Day

† not first-class

Time spent in Ceylon & India before First Test: 

  19 days

(16 October - 4 November)

Time spent in South Africa before First Test: 

  20 days

(2 January - 22 January)

Test appearances on tour

(v India 1969-70)

5 -   Chappell, Connolly, Lawry, McKenzie, Mallett, Redpath, Sheahan, Stackpole, Taber, Walters

4 - 

3 -   Gleeson.

1 -   Freeman, Mayne.

0 -   Irvine, Jordon.

(v South Africa 1969-70)

4 -   Chappell, Connolly, Gleeson, Lawry, Redpath, Sheahan, Stackpole, Taber, Walters.

3 -   McKenzie.

2 -   Freeman, Mayne.

1 -   Mallett.

0 -   Irvine, Jordon.

Match appearances

T  Test match

x other match 

W won  L lost  D drawn  

N no result   A abandoned  

u unknown result

Australia’s six previous Test tour results:

in England 1968 (5 Tests)

 - drawn 1-1

in South Africa 1966-67 (5 Tests)

 - lost 1-3

in West Indies 1965 (5 Tests)

 - lost 1-2

in Pakistan 1964 (1 Test)

 - drawn 0-0

in India 1964 (3 Tests)

 - drawn 1-1

in England 1964 (5 Tests)

 - won 1-0

Highlights

•   Graham McKenzie started the Test series against India taking 5-69 including the first four wickets.

•   Keith Stackpole scored a hundred (103) in the opening Test at Bombay

•   Paul Sheahan’s first Test hundred (114) in the second Test at Kanpur included 20 boundaries.

•   Ian Chappell made 138 at Delhi and followed up with 99 in the next Test at Calcutta.

•   Bill Lawry carried his bat for 49* while Australia were dismissed for only 107 to lose at Delhi

•   Doug Walters survived a stumping chance when 4* at Madras and went on to score 102.

•   Ashley Mallett captured ten wickets in the match at Madras (5-91 and 5-53)

•   He followed up with five more wickets for 126 in the first Test against South Africa at Cape Town

•   Alan Connolly took 6-47 at Port Elizabeth but South Africa won by their record margin of runs.

Tour Summary

F  Fixtures   W  Won   L  Lost  

D Drawn   NR   No result  

Aban  Abandoned with no play

Canc  Cancelled

Return to Australia

Johannesburg   Q  Melbourne

At the end of the tour the team flew from Jan Smuts Airport, Johannesburg, on Sunday 22 March 1970.  They arrived in Melbourne on 24 March after a 15-hour flight.

Connolly took a holiday in South Africa before flying to England to play county cricket for Middlesex.

Time away from Australia  

 160 days  

(15 October  to 24 March)

Finances

The Australian Board wanted the players to take part in a fifth Test, one more than they were contracted to play.  Although at first agreed by the tour manager, Ian Chappell, backed by Doug Walters and Graham McKenzie, refused and the proposed match was dropped.

On 2 September 1970 the Australian Board disclosed that the tour profit was $A 130 000.  Of this $103 500 was the guarantee from the Indian section of the tour.

Written accounts of the tour

“Souvenir of the Tests"    [Rand Daily Mail]

“Book of the Tests: South Africa v. Australia 1970”  by Eric Litchfield

chapters 3 and 4 in “Spin Out”  (1977)  by Ashley Mallett  (pub  Garry Sparke Associates)

Postscript

This was the last time Australia won a series in India, but victory came at a price. There were too many incidents and the Indian cricket board made an adverse report to their Australians counterpart about Lawry’s conduct and his criticisms of their arrangements, including hotels and security. Tour manager Fred Bennett put in an unfavourable report about Lawry, too, and without the Board’s backing it became inevitable he would lose the Australian captaincy as soon as results flagged during the next Test series.

Long-serving Jack Ryder, now 81, decided it was time to retire as an Australian Test selector and Bill Lawry was contemplated as Victoria’s representative to replace him until the Board abruptly substituted Sam Loxton’s name instead.

1969-70 was also the last time any Test side visited South Africa until ‘readmission’ (when India made the ‘friendship tour’ in 1992-93).