deliveries on the line of the leg stump took hold and a strategy to defeat him, and thus the Australians, was born.
The success of the tactic would rely on England fielding bowlers who could deliver balls with great venom and accuracy. A meeting with Nottinghamshire’s captain, Arthur Carr, and his two pacemen, Harold Larwood and Bill Voce, was arranged. Could they repeatedly bowl at leg stump and get the ball to rear up and into the batsman’s body? Both agreed they could and felt it might be an effective tactic. A cordon of close fielders would be set on the leg side. The facing batsman would have to choose between ducking, being hit, fending the ball off or executing a hook shot. The last two options are risky with fielders set for catches close to the wicket and deep on the boundary. Fast-pitched balls on the line of leg would also ensure scoring was kept to a minimum.
There was nothing as radical in this as the eventual outcry would suggest. Leg theory had been utilized in the county game and in Australia in previous seasons, although not at the same intensity, and the main criticism it drew was that it always proved an unedifying spectacle for the watching crowds.
Larwood and Voce set about practising Jardine’s plan during the remainder of the 1932 season. On 17 September 1932 the MCC team boarded the Orient liner Orontes at Tilbury and set sail for the Australian port of Fremantle.
Their arrival in Western Australia was a good-natured affair; they were greeted by a large crowd and the crew of Australian cruiser Canberra lined the side and sang ‘For They Are Jolly Good Fellows’.
A press conference with the manager of the MCC side, Pelham ‘Plum’ Warner, was arranged. Warner had led two tours to Australia before the First World War and had a deep respect and liking for the country and its people. In addition to which few men have had such a profound love for the great game and its central ethos of fair play as Warner. On the face of it, he was the ideal spokesman for the team and the perfect team manager. But even now the central issues that would dog the series arose in the press conference.
At the time there was a real danger that the player whom every Australian wanted to see and who was expected to carry all before him would be absent from the series. Bradman was in dispute with the Australian Board of Control after he had entered into a contract with the Sydney Sun to write for them during the forthcoming series, a practice the Board of Control had banned all players selected for Test duty from doing. Bradman was adamant that he had signed a contract and was duty-bound to honour it. For a while it looked as if Hamlet would be without its prince. Warner refused to comment on that issue but a follow-up question was rather more prescient. Asked about the recent and excessive use of ‘bump balls’ by Bill Bowes, Warner played it straight back: ‘Bowes is a splendid bowler and have not fast bowlers bumped the ball before?’
The first sight Australians had of fast leg theory (the term ‘body-line’ was yet to be employed) was during a warm-up game in Melbourne in late November. The England side was led by Jardine’s deputy, Bob Wyatt, who deployed the full leg-side tactic for the first time on the tour. Woodfull resorted to unorthodox shotmaking with what looked liked an overhead tennis smash action and England were convinced their tactics were sound, but the crowd’s vocal displeasure was a harbinger of what was to follow.
Australia lost badly by ten wickets in the First Test at Sydney. Although Bradman’s dispute with the Board of Control had been resolved, he was missing through illness. Larwood roared in, taking ten wickets in the match. Only an innings by Stan McCabe, who stood resolute hooking and pulling with scant regard for his personal safety, salvaged Australia’s pride.
The Melbourne Test began with questions about who would captain Australia. Woodfull’s captaincy was confirmed only minutes before the game, delaying the toss; it has been suggested that the Board of Control were considering replacing him in the light of his steadfast refusal to retaliate by allowing Australian bowlers to bowl in an intimidatory manner. Vice-captain Richardson had advocated overt retaliation, but Woodfull had immediately responded by saying, ‘There is no way I will be influenced to adopt such tactics which bring such discredit to the game.’
In a low-scoring match, Bradman was dismissed on the opening day for a duck (not to a bodyline ball, it should be noted) to the shock and dismay of the Melbourne crowd, while Jardine was openly exultant at his nemesis’s demise. However, Bradman would score 103 not out in Australia’s second-innings score of 191, ensuring that the Australians beat England handsomely by 111 runs. Many jubilant Australians thought they had found the tactics to overcome the hostility of the English attack, but it would prove to be Bradman’s only century of the series and Larwood, in particular, had been badly hampered by a slow pitch (and an injury).
The series moved on to Adelaide, to perhaps the most beautiful cricket ground in the world, which was shortly to witness scenes that would reverberate all the way back to Lord’s – and whose aftershocks can, arguably, still be felt today.
On a hot 14 January 1933 a record crowd of nearly fifty-one thousand packed into the ground. It was the second day of the Test and England’s innings closed with 341 runs on the board, which represented a good recovery after a particularly poor start.
After Australian opener Jack Fingleton was dismissed by Gubby Allen for a duck, Bradman joined Woodfull at the crease. Larwood had discovered that in the conditions he was able to swing the ball into Woodfull, rather than moving it away, as was usual when he bowled at right-handers. In the third over of the innings, Larwood’s sixth ball, short and on the line of middle stump, hit Woodfull over the heart. He staggered away, clutching his chest. The England players gathered around in sympathy, but Jardine’s clearly enunciated, ‘Well bowled, Harold!’ – a remark he later claimed was solely designed to unnerve Bradman – horrified Woodfull and dismayed many who heard it. The spirit of the game was in severe danger of being compromised.
Woodfull recovered and the match resumed. As soon as it was his turn to face Larwood again, there was a break while the field was adjusted. It has remained unclear to this day whether Jardine or Larwood initiated the change, but in any event, the infamous leg-side field was now set. The crowd were deeply antagonized – angrier even than when Woodfull had been hit. They inevitably saw this deliberate use of fast leg theory, against a player who had received such a serious blow, as hitting a man when he was down and viewed it as completely unsportsmanlike. The catcalls and jeering became so pronounced that the England players felt physically threatened and thought the police presence badly insufficient to protect them if the crowd decided to riot and spill onto the playing field.
Larwood soon knocked the bat out of Woodfull’s hands and, although clearly unsettled (he would be hit several more times), he would go on to score 22 before falling to Allen. Bradman had departed for just 8. Bill Ponsford had joined his Victoria state captain and would also be repeatedly hit on his back and shoulders as he turned away in an attempt to shield his bat to avoid giving up catches.
Later that day, there occurred the fateful visit by the England manager, Pelham Warner, to the Australians’ dressing room, where he was rebuffed by Woodfull with perhaps the most famous quote in cricket: ‘I don’t want to see you, Mr Warner. There are two teams out there; one is trying to play cricket and the other is not.’ Adding, ‘This game is too good to be spoilt. It’s time some people got out of it.’ Warner, it was reported, was physically shaken by the admonishment and was seen hurrying away close to tears.
On the third day, Bert Oldfield was hit a sickening blow on the head that caused a fracture – although, again, the ball was a legitimate non-bodyline delivery that he top-edged. Oldfield later admitted that it was a mistake entirely of his own making; nevertheless, the crowd was yet again incensed.
On the fifth day it would be the ill-thought reaction of the Australian Board of Control – who in deciding to send a cable to the MCC used the injudicious word ‘unsportsmanlike’ – that
