Tour of  Australia & New Zealand 1950-51      Captain : Freddie Brown    

  (M. C. C. tour)

©Test Cricket Tours  2015

England’s 39th Test tour

(September 1950 -

                   April 1951)

22nd Test-playing  tour of Australia by England

Fourth Test-playing  tour of New Zealand by England

  (previous tours 1946-47)

Neither Norman Yardley nor George Mann was prepared to take on the tour captaincy and Freddie Brown was asked to do it.  The results of the Ashes series was 1-4, an “elusive victory” in the final Test providing some comfort after losing two Tests unluckily and then two more when key players were injured. Australia was favoured both by the weather and the umpiring

The team was handicapped by selection errors, taking inexperienced young batsmen who were expected to cope against Lindwall and Miller while Robertson, Edrich (Brown was supposed to have said “I’ve enough on my plate without taking him”) and Ikin were left behind. Even worse, once Laker, Wardle, Jackson, Ridgway and others had been ignored, there were only three Test-class bowlers in Bedser, Bailey and Wright.

The 1946-47 tour report had recommended that M.C.C. should send two joint-managers, an experiment that was then not repeated. On 6 February, following a dinner with the Governor of South Australia, Freddie Brown and manager, Mike Green, were involved in a traffic accident near Adelaide, when Brown drove into a concrete post in avoiding another vehicle. Green spent a week in hospital.

Other England tours

Previous Test tour

South Africa 1948-49

India 1949-50 cancelled

Next Test tour

India 1951-52

Next tour of  Australia

1954-55

Members of the Test tour party (17)

Opening batsmen:  Len Hutton, Cyril Washbrook, Gilbert Parkhouse

Middle-order batsmen Denis Compton, Reg Simpson, John Dewes, David Sheppard, Brian Close

Wicket-keepers: Godfrey Evans, Arthur McIntyre.

All-rounders:  Trevor Bailey, Freddie Brown

Slow bowlers: Doug Wright, Bob Berry, Eric Hollies

Fast bowlers: Alec Bedser, John Warr.

County representation:

Ex  -  Essex (1)

Gm - Glamorgan (1)

Kt  -  Kent (2)

La - Lancashire (2)

Mx - Middlesex (3)

Nth - Northamptonshire (1)

Nt  - Nottinghamshire (1)

Sy - Surrey (2)

Sx - Sussex (1)

Wk - Warwickshire (1)

Yo - Yorkshire (2)

Average age of  team at time of first Test match

(1 December 1950): 

30 yrs  1 month.

Test Appearances made before the tour

Hutton 44,  Compton 37,  Evans 30,  Washbrook 28,  Wright 27,  Bedser 26, Hollies 13,  Brown 9,  Simpson 6,  Bailey 6,  Dewes 3,  Berry 2,  Parkhouse 2,  Close 1,  McIntyre 1,  Sheppard 1,  Warr 0;  Statham 0,  Tattersall 0.

Team Officials

M.C.C. appointed the joint-managers on 6 July 1950. Nash was in charge of finance, accommodation and transport.

Selectors

Bob Wyatt (chairman),  Brian Sellers,  Les Ames,  Tom Pearce,  Freddie Brown, Norman Yardley, Sir Pelham  Warner.

Selection

Not considered:  On behalf of the M.C.C. committee, Colonel R.S.Rait-Kerr (Secretary of M.C.C.), Pelham Warner and Harry Altham asked Bill Edrich to withdraw his name from consideration for selection because he returned to the team hotel late at night during a Test match in 1950. Edrich refused to do so and subsequently he was not considered for a tour place. Chair of selectors Bob Wyatt is sometimes held responsible for the omission, as Wyatt’s room was adjacent to Edrich’s and he was kept awake by raucous partying.

The captaincy choice fell on F R Brown when Cyril Washbrook, who might have become M.C.C.'s first professional captain, decided not to accept an offer. Brown himself was hesitant at first about leading the tour. In July the Press had even got hold of a story that Doug Insole would take the side.

Denis Compton, the first professional to act as vice-captain on an M.C.C. tour, was appointed on 27 August. When on tour Brown turned to Hutton for advice and barely consulted with Compton. Godfrey Evans said “when Denis captained the side, his strategy was sometimes successful, sometimes not; when it was not he seemed to lose his grip on the game owing to his inexperience as captain.”

Unavailable : Norman Yardley (business); Cyril Washbrook (later changed his mind). George Mann (director of a sports firm – he turned down his place and Brian Close was invited instead).

The captain and eleven other players were invited on 27 July ; three more (Berry, MacIntyre, Sheppard) on 15 August ; Warr, having been invited with Washbrook on 27 August, took the last place on 6 September.

Washbrook was re-invited on 27 August and given permission to fly out later rather than travel by sea.

Tour party announced :  6 September 1950

Brian Close became the youngest M.C.C. tourist. Close had to obtain release from national service with Royal Signals to join the tour.

Not selected:   A Commonwealth tour of India took place in 1950-51, allowing players who narrowly missed selection like Les Jackson and Jim Laker, to go abroad and play during the winter season.

Time between selection and departure from England

   18 days

 (27 August - 14 September)

Travel

Tilbury    T  Colombo, Fremantle

             ‘Stratheden’

The team sailed from Tilbury on the ‘Stratheden’ on 14 September. The number of pressmen (22) exceeded the number of players. Reg Hayter was the representative of the English press and Tom Goodman of the Australians.

Calling at Colombo on 1 October (where a match was played) the ship finally arrived at Fremantle on 9 October.

Cyril Washbrook flew out on 17 October. Replacement players Statham and Tattersall arrived on 15 January.

At the end of the Australian tour, on 4 March sixteen players flew by seaplane from Rose Bay, Sydney, to Auckland, New Zealand

Time spent in Australia

    146 days

(9 October -  4 March)

Time spent in New Zealand

    28 days

(4 March - 1 April)

On-tour selection panel

Freddie Brown (captain),  Denis Compton (vice-captain),  Godfrey Evans,  Len Hutton,  Cyril Washbrook.

The make-up of the committee was decided on board the “Stratheden” and announced on 20 September. Brown wrote : “Our Test selection committee  was made up of myself, Hutton, Compton, Washbrook and Evans but for all matches outside the Tests, I took on a dictatorial role, the others being quite willing to leave the job to me”

Reinforcements

Manager Green wrote that at the start of the tour “Bailey was so unfit and showed so little inclination to get to work that his return to England was discussed… but he was constantly improving from Adelaide onwards as a bowler and in temperament.”

The tour committee sent an SOS for fresh bowlers when Wright (groin muscle) and Bailey (fractured thumb) were unfit.  Also, Close missed several matches through a muscle strain.

The M.C.C. Committee back in England chose Brian Statham and Roy Tattersall on 8 January. The flew in via Singapore and were met at the airport on 15 January by Walter Robins and John Woodcock ("Both looked winter pale and poplar thin").

Eric Bedser, as on so many M.C.C. tours, accompanied his brother, Alec, and was drafted into the side for one match against Tasmania.

The tour party had consequently grown to twenty players and, even though there were continual injuries occurring, the committee decided on 20 January that Berry, Close and Hollies would not go to New Zealand

Fixtures/Results

† not first-class

Time spent in Australia before First Test:   2 days

(September - 17 November)

Test appearances on tour

(v Australia and New Zealand 1950-51)

7 -    Bedser,  Brown,  Evans,  Hutton,  Simpson,  Wright.

6 -    Bailey,  Compton,  Washbrook.

5 - 

4 -   Tattersall.

3 -   Parkhouse,  Sheppard.

2 -   Dewes,  Warr.

1 -   Close,  McIntyre,  Statham.

0 -   Berry,  Hollies.

Match appearances

T  Test match

x other match 

∙  played for opposition

W won  L lost  D drawn  

N no result   A abandoned  

u unknown result

Highlights

•  T

• 

• 

• 

Tour Summary

F  Fixtures   W  Won   L  Lost   D Drawn   T  Tied  Canc  Cancelled  Aban  abandoned

Return to England

Melbourne    T  Tilbury

                ‘Strathaird’

Auckland  Q  New York

New York  QLondon

“As the New Zealand Cricket Council had booked the trip for sixteen players and by this time we had Tattersall and Statham on the strength, we had to send three men home to England. I asked for volunteers but the only one I got was Eric Hollies who is allergic to air travel. I therefore had to nominate two men to accompany him.” (Brown, Cricket Musketeer ). Brown had evidently tired of Close and was maddened by him playing golf while unfit for selection; yet Brown joked years later about sneaking out to play a round of golf himself while he was supposed to be acting as a twelfth man.

Berry, Close and Hollies sailed home from Melbourne on the ‘Strathaird’  and reached Tilbury on 9 April, which was later than the rest of the team’s return from New Zealand by air.

The New Zealand authorities had booked passages on Pan American Airways and on 1 April the team flew from Auckland via Nandi, Honolulu and San Francisco.

When the party, with Denis Compton in charge, arrived in New York, a BOAC official suggested to Denis that it would be a good thing to ‘fly British’ and the party should transfer to a BOAC plane at no extra charge. They arrived back in London on 3 April.

Manager Mike Green left NZ two days after the main party (and was given the same native welcome party in Fiji). He followed the same route but stayed in America, not reaching Heathrow Airport until 12 April. John Nash arrived home from Port Said by air on 28 April.

Brown flew back to Australia to spend time in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth before departing on the Orontes to Marseilles, and then overland to Calais and Dover, arriving home on 3 May.

Time away from England

  201 days  

(14 September - 3 April)

Finances

The tour made a profit of £4,000.  Because of uncovered wickets in a wet summer, the finances were set back. The Australian Board proposed covering  but M.C.C. declined as the tour conditions had been set in advance.

Accounts of the tour

Chapters 1 and 2  in  “Cricket Musketeer”  by Freddie Brown  (Nicholas Kaye, 1954)

"In Sun and Shadow"   by Denis Compton (Stanley Paul, 1952)

"Brown and Company"   by Jack Fingleton  (Collins, 1951)

Chapters 11 to 16  in  “Sporting Campaigner”  by  Brigadier Mike Green (Stanley Paul & Co, 1956)

"In Quest of the Ashes"  by Bruce Harris (Hutchinson, 1951)

“Ashes to Hassett”  by John Kay (John Sherratt, 1951)

“Catch: an Account of two Cricket Tours”  by Keith Miller & R S Whitington (Latimer House, 1951)

"The Fight for The Ashes 1950-51"  by A G 'Johnnie' Moyes (Harrap, 1951).

“Cricket Task-Force”  by Bill O’Reilly (Laurie, 1951)

“English Cricket: What’s Wrong and Why” by Herbert Sutcliffe (Banks, 1951)

"Elusive Victory" by E W Swanton (Daily Telegraph, 1951)

“The Story of the Test Matches”  (Times Newspapers, 1951)

 “Ashes To Ashes”  by Rex Warner & Lyle Blair (MacGibbon & Kee, 1951)

“No Ashes for England – The Story of The Ashes Tour 1950-51”  by E.M. Wellings

Postscript

Brown later wrote in Cricket Musketeer  “We did not select quite the right or the best possible side …I think I would have selected the same bowlers but I would probably have left several of the batsmen behind” Sheppard, Parkhouse, Close, Warr, Berry, Hollies and Dewes were all failures while Compton was a disappointment in the Test matches though he scored well in state games. “The young players were not yet good enough for this class of cricket” (Green)

After the 1946-47 Australian tour two managers were recommended for Australia in 1950-51 so John Nash and Mike Green were appointed but they felt that neither of them had enough work to do to justify both being there, and in 1954-55 there was only one manager, Geoffrey Howard.

Other Test tours in 1950-51

None

©Test Cricket Tours  2015

Acknowledgements

To general reading of The Times newspaper digital archive (Gale Group);  Jamaica Gleanor archive;  National Library of Australia Trove; Papers Past NZ.

From former British Newspaper Library, Colindale and online:  The Age, Melbourne Argus, Bangladesh Daily Star, Barbados Advocate, Canberra Times, Daily Telegraph, Dawn, Eastern Daily Press, The Hindu, The Independent (Dhaka), Indian Express, The Island (Lanka), Lahore Times, New Nation, New Zealand Auckland Herald, Sri Lanka Daily News, Stabroek News, Straits Times, Sydney Morning Herald, The Telegraph (Calcutta), Times of India , The Tribune Chandigarh, Trinidad Guardian, The West Australian.

cricketweb.net;  ESPN cricinfo;  cricket archive; www.cricketcountry; www.coverpoint

Magazines/periodicals including Australian Cricket, B & H West Indies Annual, The Cricketer International, Cricketer Quarterly, Indian Cricket, Indian Cricket Field Annual, Playfair Cricket Monthly, Shell Cricket Almanack of New Zealand, Wisden Cricket Monthly, Wisden Book of Test Cricket, Wisden’s Cricketers’ Almanack.

Men In White, A History of Australian Cricket (Harte), A History of Indian Cricket (Bose), A History of West Indies Cricket (Manley)

Biography and tour books (own collection and at the M.C.C. Library at Lord’s Ground)                                 ALL CONTENTS OF THE TEST-CRICKET-TOURS.CO.UK WEBSITE  ARE COPYRIGHT