Bodyline Bat (Back)

The donor's father, 28-year old Bill Clancey of Terang, Victoria, won this bat in a ‘two-bob’ raffle run by Catholic Young Men's Society at the conclusion of the 2nd Bodyline Test in Melbourne. It featured the original signatures of the England touring squad and Australian 2nd Test Team*.

Bill, who was afflicted by polio, gave the bat to his cousin Tony who played with the bat with his brother's and friends. In 1965 Tony gave the bat to Bill's son John. Mindful of the bat’s historical significance, John ‘retired’ the bat and carefully guarded it for decades wrapping it in a St Kilda Football Club towel. In 2016 when travelling to Queensland for a holiday with his wife Ann, he visited the Bradman Museum and, impressed by it, decided that he should donate the bat to the museum.

The signatures read (left side England) DR Jardine, RES Wyatt, GO Allen, M Leyland, WR Hammond, FR Brown, L Ames, Maurice Tate, TB Mitchell, W Voce, H Verity, WE Bowes, H Larwood, E Paynter, Geo. Duckworth, H Sutcliffe, Pataudi. (right side Aust) WM Woodfull, VY Richardson, Don Bradman, TW Wall, WA Oldfield, LPJ O'Brien, WJ O'Reilly, JH Fingleton, H Ironmonger, RK Oxenham, Stan McCabe, EH Bromley, CV Grimmett.

Bradman and Bodyline
The term ‘Bodyline’ was first used by the Australian sports journalist Ray Robinson during the England cricket tour to Australia in 1932-33.

Essentially, it was a tactic used by fast bowlers to take wickets by intimidating batsmen with the ball. Quick bowlers, and they had to be very swift for the tactic to work, would bowl short, rising deliveries aimed at the batsman’s body. The batsman would be forced to fend the ball off defensively to a packed, close, leg-side field who would snap up the catches commonly offered.

Don Bradman’s phenomenal success in the 1930 Ashes series sewed the seeds for Bodyline. England were widely expected to easily beat Australia but Bradman’s Test scores of 131, 254, 334 & 232 saw Australia win the series 2-1. Bradman’s series Test average was 98.66. The 1932-33 England Captain Douglas Jardine recorded that he saw Bradman flinch once or twice at short deliveries during the 1930 series. He instructed his two opening bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce (both from Nottinghamshire) to bowl what he called ‘leg-theory’ (later Bodyline). Larwood, though small in stature, was a phenomenal athlete and had the ability to bowl very quickly and get the ball to lift. Voce was similarly quick and a left-hander which made him difficult to play off the body.

During the 1932-33 series this bowling partnership, under instruction from Jardine, bowled Bodyline at regular intervals in games. It was not a popular decision with Australian crowds who loudly heckled the Englishmen. Australian batsmen, especially the openers, Fingleton, Ponsford and Richardson were struck many painful blows much to the crowds’ displeasure. Bradman was only hit once in the series, on the upper arm, but spent much of his time avoiding the ball at the expense of making runs. The tactic was working.

Feelings came to crisis point during the third Test in Adelaide in January 1933. Australian Captain Bill Woodfull was struck a painful blow by Larwood over the heart. His wicket-keeper, Bert Oldfield, was hit in the head, also by Larwood, fracturing his skull. The crowd threatened to invade the pitch and mounted police were ready to quell any violence.

At the end of the day’s play the England Manager Sir Pelham ‘Plum’ Warner visited the Australian dressing room to commiserate with the injured. The Australian Captain Bill Woodfull is reputed to have received him icily with the words; ‘I don’t want to see you Mr. Warner. There are two teams out there. One is trying to play cricket, the other is not.’

The depth of ill-feeling between the two teams led the Australian Cricket Board of Control to write by cable to its England counterpart, the Marylebone Cricket Club on January 18 1933:
Bodyline bowling has assumed such proportions as to menace the best interests of the game, making protection of the body by batsmen the main consideration and causing intensely bitter feeling between players as well as injury. In our opinion it is unsportsmanlike. Unless stopped at once likely to upset friendly relations existing between Australia and England.

The MCC took offense and a series of bitter exchanges ensued, at one point involving both countries’ governments.

In the end, England won the series and blunted Bradman to a Test series average of ‘only’ 56.57 runs per innings. There was never a formal acknowledgement from the England authorities that Bodyline bowling was unsportsmanlike but subsequent actions indicated a recognised culpability. Douglas Jardine would never again captain England against Australia while Harold Larwood never played Test cricket again, despite topping the England 1st class bowling averages in 1937. Another legacy of the tactic was a change in the cricket rules. Bodyline was banned and a law was introduced to prevent no more than two fieldsmen gathering between square-leg and the wicket-keeper.

Consequently, the 1934 Australian tour to England featured no Bodyline bowling and relations between the two teams quickly healed.