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| Test Cricket Tours - West Indies to Australia 1960-61
| Tour of Australia
1960-61 Captain: Frank
Worrell | | | | | | | | West Indies eleventh Test
tour Third Test-playing tour of Australia by West Indies (October 1960
– February
1961) | Frank Worrell’s elevation to the West
Indies’ captaincy was the culmination of a movement running since
the 1920s which gave expression to anti-colonial sentiment. It campaigned that
leadership and management should be based on merit rather than race and
class. His becoming captain coincided with the political
collapse of the West Indian Federation. In spite of this. Worrell became an
inspiring representative of pride in single nationhood in the region. With
his decency and dignified manner, he brought the players together into a team
as never before. The five-match Test series produced some fantastic
cricket situations, including the celebrated tied Test at Brisbane and two other nail-biting
finishes. The fifth Test might have been won by West
Indies or perhaps become another tie, had the umpire not ruled
against Grout being bowled by Valentine when a bail was found on the floor with
three runs to win. It looked as if cricket had turned a corner after the
dreary Test rubbers played in the late 1950s; this tour and England 1963 raised
hopes that brighter cricket had come to stay, but no other series throughout
the sixties approached them in terms of excitement. Forty years later the 20
survivors of the tied Test encounter (Grout and Worrell having died in the
meantime) gathered in Brisbane
to celebrate the anniversary and mark the start of the 2000/01 contest between
the two sides. | Other
West Indies tours Previous
tour Pakistan 1959 Next
tour England 1963 Next
tour of Australia 1968-69 | | | Members of the Test tour party (17) Opening batsmen: Conrad
Hunte, Cammie Smith. Middle-order batsmen Rohan
Kanhai, Peter Lashley, Seymour Nurse, Gary Sobers, Joe Solomon, Frank
Worrell. Wicket-keepers: Gerry
Alexander, Jackie Hendriks Spin bowlers Lance Gibbs,
Sonny Ramadhin, Alf Valentine Fast bowlers Tom Dewdney,
Wesley Hall, Chester Watson. | F C M
Alexander | Ja | 28 | RHB WK
vice-captain | | D T
Dewdney | Ja | 27 | RFM | | L R
Gibbs | BG | 26 | OB | | W W
Hall | B | 23 | RF | | J L
Hendriks | Ja | 26 | WK | | C C
Hunte | B | 28 | RHB opener | | R B
Kanhai | BG | 25 | RHB | | P D
Lashley | B | 23 | LHB | | S M
Nurse | B | 27 | RHB | | S Ramadhin | T | 31 | OB | | C W Smith | B | 28 | RHB opener | | G S
Sobers | B | 24 | LHB LFM/ SLA | | J S
Solomon | BG | 30 | RHB | | A L Valentine | Ja | 30 | SLA | | C D Watson | Ja | 21 | RF | | F M M Worrell | Ja | 36 | RHB LM captain | |
| Regional representation : B
- Barbados
(6) BG
- British Guiana (3) Ja
- Jamaica
(6) T
- Trinidad (1) Average
age of team at time of first Test
match (9
December 1960) : 27
yrs 10 months | | | Test Appearances made before the tour | Ramadhin 41, Worrell 36, Sobers 32, Valentine 29, Alexander 20, Kanhai 20, Hunte 16, Hall 13, Dewdney 9, Solomon 9, Gibbs 8, Watson 5, Nurse 1, Hendriks 0, Lashley 0, CW Smith 0. | | | | Tour Officials | Gerry
E Gomez | Manager | Max
Marshall | Assistant
manager | E Alves | Physiotherapist | | |
Max
Marshall was a former first-class player with Trinidad.
He dealt with the financial matters. He played in one match on the Tasmanian
section of the tour, while manager Gerry Gomez was captain in some of the
country fixtures. | | | | Selectors | Gerry Gomez (Trinidad - chairman), Berkeley Gaskin
(British Guiana), John Goddard (Barbados), Frank Worrell and Gerry Alexander (both Jamaica). | | | | Selection | Gerry
Alexander, the incumbent who had led West Indies against England in
1960, asked not to be considered for the captaincy. The
captain and the manager's names were announced on 18 March 1960. Unavailable: Clyde
Walcott had retired from international cricket. Tour Party Announced : 31 March
1960 (only 15 names) The selectors hesitated before choosing a fast bowler
for the sixteenth place in the squad. Initially, skipper Frank Worrell hoped
to find room in the team for Roy Gilchrist who had returned early in disgrace
from the West Indian tour to India
two years before but the West Indies Board of Control refused to consider
him. To make matters worse for him,
Gilchrist had just been in a car crash, too. Once Gilchrist's name had
been vetoed, the selectors announced on 1 May 1960 that Eric Atkinson would
be given the final place in the team. However he could not get time off work
and Tom Dewdney was then called up. Not selected : Basil
Butcher (Peter Lashley was preferred to him),
Reg Scarlett, Chester Watson. | Time between selection
and departure from West Indies 200 days (31 March - 14 October) | | | Travel KingstonQ New YorkQ Sydney Tilbury T Fremantle
‘Strathaird’ | Gomez and the four Jamaicans
(Alexander, Valentine, Watson, Worrell) flew from Palisados
Airport on 14 October to New York where they
joined Marshall and six players (Gibbs, Hendriks, Lashley, Nurse, Smith,
Solomon). Together they flew from New York,
transiting at San Francisco, Honolulu
and Nadi Airport, Fiji,
before reaching Mascot Airport, Sydney and,
after three days of rest, Perth. The league cricketers from England
(Dewdney, Hall, Hunte, Kanhai, Ramadhin and Sobers) left Tilbury on the 'Strathaird' on 13 September. They were accompanied by the team masseur
Alves and reached Fremantle on 11 October.
The complete party assembled at Perth
on Wednesday 19 October. | Time spent in Australia 143 days (19 October - 24 February) | | | On-tour selection committee | Worrell, Alexander, Ramadhin, Sobers and Gomez. | | | | Reinforcements | None, apart from getting help from the management
team of Gomez and Marshall by playing some matches. | | | | Fixtures/Results | † Bunbury | Western Australia Country | Won
inns 94 r | Perth | Western Australia | Lost
94 r | Perth | An
Australian XI | Drawn | Adelaide | South Australia | Drawn | Melbourne | Victoria | Won
inns 171 r | Sydney | New South Wales | Lost
inns 119 r | Sydney | Queensland | Drawn | BRISBANE | AUSTRALIA First Test | TIED | † Gympie | Queensland Country | Won
inns 25 r | † Newcastle | Northern New South Wales | Won
inns 96 r | Sydney | New South Wales | Lost
inns 97 r | MELBOURNE | AUSTRALIA Second Test | LOST 7 w | Hobart | Combined
XI | Won
139 r | Launceston | Tasmania | Won 6
w | SYDNEY | AUSTRALIA Third Test | WON 222 r | † Ballarat | Victoria
Country | Won
inns 97 r | † Berri | South Australia Country | Won
inns 235 r | ADELAIDE | AUSTRALIA Fourth Test | DRAWN | † Canberra | Australian
Combined Universities | Drawn | † Goulburn | Southern New South Wales | Won 9
w | MELBOURNE | AUSTRALIA Fifth Test | LOST 2 w | † Canberra | Prime
Minister's XII | Tied |
| † not first-class . Time spent in Australia
before First Test: 49 days (19 October - 9 December) Time from end of final Test until departure from Australia 9 days (15 February - 24 February) | | | Test appearances on tour | 5 -
Alexander, Hall, Hunte, Kanhai, Sobers, Solomon, Valentine, Worrell. 4 -
Smith 3 -
Gibbs, Nurse 2 -
Lashley, Ramadhin 1 - Watson 0 - Dewdney, Hendriks. | | | | Highlights | • Kanhai
played an innings of 252 against Victoria
early in the tour. In the fourth Test scored a hundred in each innings. • Sobers
scored 132 at Brisbane and 168 at Sydney, two centuries
that took him past 3000 Test runs • Alexander
scored his maiden first-class century (108) at Sydney, as well as playing five other
innings greater than fifty in the Test series. Worrell also scored 5 fifties. • Gibbs took
the hat-trick, dismissing Mackay, Grout and Misson in consecutive balls, at Adelaide. He had already
taken three wickets in four balls at Sydney. • The second
day's play of the final Test at Melbourne
attracted a world record crowd of 90 800 people. | | | | Tour Summary | | P | W | L | D | T | Aban | Test Matches | 5 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | - | Other first-class matches | 9 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 0 | - | ϯ Minor matches | 8 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 1 | - | All Matches | 22 | 10 | 5 | 5 | 2 | - |
| | | | Return to West Indies SydneyQ New YorkQ Jamaica Fremantle T Tilbury ‘Strathaird’ | It had been planned that Hunte (captain), Sobers,
Kanhai, Hall, Nurse, Watson (with Roy Marshall, Sabhash Gupte and three
Pakistanis) would make a tour of Rhodesia but this was
cancelled. Then Frank Worrell was
supposed to play in the Governor-General's XI in New Zealand but he withdrew owing
to a knee injury sustained in the last Test match and Cammie Smith took his
place. On 17 February, two days after the final Test match,
the team paraded in a motorcade of open-top cars through Melbourne.
The tour party broke up on 19 February in Canberra. (a) Six of the
professional cricketers (Hunte, Sobers, Watson, Kanhai, Nurse and Hall) flew
from Canberra at 8 am on 19 February over the
Great Australian Bight to Perth. They took the 'Stratheden' from Fremantle at 10 pm on the night of 20 February
1961. They played a match in Ceylon
on 28 February against a Ceylon Mirror XI; and sailed via Bombay,
Aden and Athens
to Tilbury. (b) Ramadhin
and Dewdney left Perth for England on 20 February by air. (c) Solomon
and Gibbs left for the United States
on Wednesday 22 February to visit relatives, joining the rest of the team in
the USA
later. They then went to Trinidad on the afternoon on 28 February en route to
Georgetown. (d) Alexander
and Cammie Smith left on Thursday 23 February for Auckland (e) Worrell,
Gomez, Marshall, Valentine, Hendriks, Lashley and Alves left Mascot Airport,
Sydney, on Friday night 24 February for Nandi,
Honolulu, San Francisco
and New York.
They then flew from Idlewild to
Montego Bay (apart from Marshall who flew direct to Trinidad). Gomez arrived at Piarco
Airport on 3 March after four days
in Jamaica. | Time away from West Indies 154 days
(14 October to 28 February) | | | Finances | Profit was £140 000. | | | | Published
accounts of the tour | "Cricket's Brightest
Summer" L D ‘Strebor’ Roberts [Jamaica, United Printers, 1961] "With the West Indians
in Australia"
AG 'Johnny' Moyes [Heinemann, 1961] "Calypso Summer" Mike Coward (ABC Books, 2000) and DVD of same name
(Fish Marketing, 2008) "An Unforgettable
Summer - A 40th Anniversary
Tribute" Alf Batchelder, Ray Webster, Ken Williams 3-disc DVD set (Melbourne Cricket Club Library, 2000) "The Greatest Test of
All" by Jack Fingleton [Collins, 1961] "Tale of Two Tests" Richie Benaud (Hodder
& Stoughton, London, 1962) is not a full tour book, concentrating on the Brisbane Test
match and Australia
beating England
at Old Trafford in 1961. "The Fight for The
Ashes" by Ron Roberts also contains a section on
the 1960-61 tour. "The Tied Test" (VHS video:
Australian Broadcasting Commission) | | | |
Postscript
| The players were devoted to Worrell and would never let him down. | | | | | | | |
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