This is an archive copy of a document originally located at
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/sportsf/stories/s719533.htm
With Amanda Smith
8/11/2002
Bodyline - 70th Anniversary
Summary:
With the First Test of the current Ashes series underway, we remember
back 70 years, to another time when England toured Australia to play cricket. In
a climate of tense economics and politics between the two countries, the summer
of 1932/33 produced the high drama of “Bodyline”.
And, we’ll meet one of the veteran jockeys competing in an international Legends
Race at Flemington, for the last day of the Spring Racing Carnival. Pam O’Neill
was one of the first women in Australia to challenge the ban on female jockeys.
Plus, some gender-bending sport at the 2002 Sydney Gay Games, with a team of
netballers from Tonga who are drag queens.
Details or Transcript:
Amanda Smith: And with the first cricket Test between Australia and England
under way in Brisbane, we’re going back 70 years to another Ashes series, and
the most controversial of them all: Bodyline.
THEME
Amanda Smith: Also coming up on The Sports Factor, we’ll meet one of the veteran
jockeys who’s competing in a Legends race at Flemington tomorrow, for the final
day of the Spring Racing Carnival; she was a trail-blazer in her day. Plus some
gender-bending sport at the 2002 World Gay Games in Sydney.
Before that though, to that most sensational time in the history of cricket, as
we approach the 70th anniversary of the Australia-England Ashes series of the
summer of 1932/33. None of the players or administrators or diplomats or
politicians involved is alive now to tell the tale. But Bodyline has been
described, as we’ll hear, as the world’s first ‘Sport and politics crisis’.
First of all though, let’s just get clear what ‘Bodyline’ actually was. David
Frith is the author of the most recent book on the subject, called ‘Bodyline
Autopsy’.
David Frith: Bodyline was fast short balls bowled straight at the batsman’s head
with a lot of fieldsmen crouching nearby to catch the ball off the bat as the
poor fellow tried to defend himself.
Amanda Smith: And why was it both dangerous and unfair?
David Frith: Well it was dangerous in that Harold Larwood, the England fast
bowler who led the attack, was so accurate and so fast, that when he was with
the new ball in his pomp there was little escape. The ball was coming so fast at
the throw that you had to duck, or try and parry it, or if you were adventurous,
try and hit it. And then there was a man out there to catch it. So it didn’t
offer many alternatives, and it was thought to be unfair really because it had
never been seen before. They’d seen leg theory which was defensive, just
negative, but now, intimidation came into it as well.
Amanda Smith: Bodyline was the name that stuck, but the tactic was also referred
to by all sorts of other names: shock attack, bumping bombs, and human skittles
among them. The Australian Test team cricketer, Bill O’Reilly, who died in 1992,
remembered another name for it.
Bill O'Reilly: It was a term that was coined during the Test series, but we were
referring to it long before the fracas really started in Adelaide. We were
referring to as ‘the scone theory’. ‘Scone’ of course was the colloquialism used
for your head, and one that bounced, we used to call it a ‘sconner’, and if you
got hit, you said you were ‘sconned’.
We’d sit in the dressing room and a batsman would pick up his bat and walk out.
‘Well’, you’d say to him, ‘Good luck, mate’, and you’d say it with all the
tenderness, the sentimentality of a chap who was going to walk in and face up to
something where you might never see him again. That was the feeling that you
had. Then we’d sit along the windows, at the Sydney Cricket Ground, and nothing
would be said, and then suddenly you’d say, ‘Gee!!! Did you see that one?’
Amanda Smith: Although it was never admitted to at the time, Bodyline was used
by the England team as a deliberate strategy against Australia’s star batsman,
Don Bradman, as Harold Larwood, the spearhead of England’s bowling attack, made
clear many years later.
Harold Larwood: Our sole object was in curbing Bradman, because we’d had this
experience in 1930 within the year he absolutely murdered us. But the last time
we played at The Oval, there was some rain got on the wicket, and the ball was
flying about, and I saw Bradman flinching. We thought, you may disagree, but we
thought his leg-sided tacking was very open to it. So we thought we’d all give
it a go when we were out here and we were successful. And then after we found
out that other people were the same, one or two of them, so we kept at it.
David Frith: The major planning session actually took place in the Piccadilly
Hotel in the Grill Room, in London, and that’s where Jardine, the skipper, had
his two Nottingham-class bowlers, both big strong miners, and salt-cellars and
pepper-pots and all this sort of thing on the table, to demonstrate exactly
where he wanted the fieldsmen and where he wanted them to bowl. Arthur Carr was
there, the Nottinghamshire captain. So there you had all the heads in agreement
really, and off they went. They sailed to Australia. A few people didn’t know
about this until it actually happened, but it was certainly preconceived.
Amanda Smith: So it didn’t just evolve?
David Frith: No, it didn’t, and moreover the English war lords appointed Jardine
specifically, I believe, because he was such a tough, uncompromising man. He was
probably the only one who could have carried it through in the face of all the
Australian objection, which was very loudly voiced at the grounds once people
saw what was going on, though there were obscenities flying, even at tranquil,
serene, Adelaide Oval.
Amanda Smith: This was the third Test, in Adelaide, and things turned ugly when
the Australian captain, Bill Woodfull was hit by the ball, as the late Sir
Donald Bradman recalled.
Don Bradman: Well Billy got a very bad crack over the heart. There was an
orthodox field at the time, and the ball rose sharply off the pitch and it
really was a bad blow. But it was perfectly legitimate. It was a short-pitched
ball, and Billy just failed to cover it. That of course was a nasty incident but
that didn’t cause the trouble. The trouble occurred when Woodfull eventually
recovered and took strike again, and before the first ball was bowled, Jardine
switched to a Bodyline field, and the first ball that Larwood bowled to him
afterwards, was a bumper, straight at him. That was what riled the crowd and
started all the barracking. But it was certainly a very nasty time.
Amanda Smith: The nasty times, though, between England and Australia, had
started a bit earlier, and off the cricket field, Brian Stoddart is the
co-author of the 1984 book ‘Cricket and Empire’, which remains an important
analysis of the larger picture that surrounded the Bodyline controversy. Brian
Stoddart says the extreme Australian reaction to the cricket was influenced by
the political and economic tension that also existed between the two countries
at the time.
Brian Stoddart: Oh really tough time, and it’s accentuated by the fact that most
people who even thought about it either directly or indirectly, always assumed
that cricket was the great bridge between the countries. Cricket was the one
thing that would solve all problems, and here it was, it was almost the biggest
aggravation of all. Because what was happening for example, was a stoush over
the appointment of an Australian-born Governor-General, who also happened to be
Jewish.
Amanda Smith: Sir Isaac Isaacs.
Brian Stoddart: Yes. There was a problem over the gold standard in ’32-’33;
there was a problem over Britain recalling its loans to Australia, which really
helped precipitate the Great Depression from ’29 through to ’32, ’33, ’34, which
of course cast a great blight on Australia, so that the whole Anglo-Australian
relationship almost within a five-year period went through the toughest thing it
had ever seen probably. And that was all bad enough, the economics were bad, the
politics were bad, the social relations weren’t that terrific, and then along
comes this cricket tour which everybody was looking forward to almost as the
great salvation, and suddenly it turns into a nightmare as well, with England
apparently adopting tactics that were extremely cold spirited, not seen to be in
the spirit of the game, upset the Australians no end, and in that sense just
seemed to cap off the perfidious nature of the English mind at that time in
relation to its dealings with Australia.
Amanda Smith: Well you’ve described Bodyline as the first modern sport and
politics crisis. Can I get you to expand on that assessment?
Brian Stoddart: Yes, I think before that there had been very few, if any,
international sporting episodes that had quite so many resonances into other
areas of international life. There was one that was about to come up and that
was the ’36 Olympics of course.
Amanda Smith: In Berlin.
Brian Stoddart: There was, if you remember ‘Chariots of Fire’, there was also
potentially a bit of an issue back in the ’24 Olympics, but it was nowhere near
the sort of level that we’re talking about. There were one or two examples where
the alternative international Games in Europe, run by the Socialist States, the
so-called Workers’ Sports Movements, also caused a bit of interest say in the
foreign and colonial offices of England, but there was nothing quite like this,
certainly nothing in the Imperial world that had been there before as a model,
so ’32-’33, given that conjunction of episodes with the sport and with the
political and the economic context of it all, it very clearly got into the
political and the economic environment, and got in there in a very serious way.
BOLERO
Amanda Smith: Now of course the most famous words spoken about Bodyline, which
became known as the ‘Adelaide leak’, were said by the Australian captain, Bill
Woodfull, to the England team manager, Pelham Warner: ‘There are two teams out
there. One is trying to play cricket, the other is not.’
David Frith: Yes, he went on to say that the game’s too good to be spoiled, it’s
time some people got out of it and then Good Day to you, Mr Warner. And this
inoffensive little fellow who lived for cricket, he represented Lord’s and MCC,
he went away with tears in his eyes. Now all that was meant to be private, he’d
gone around to commiserate after Woodfull had been hit very badly in the chest
by a bouncer from Larwood. And Bill Woodfull was a very upright, dignified man,
respected by one and all. He was a Methodist of strong belief, and he kept his
views to himself. But now I’m afraid, they got out, because those words were
overheard, and they made the press on the Monday, and the floodgates were open.
Now all Australians knew that their captain disapproved of Bodyline. They
supposed he did, but he’d never actually said anything, now they knew that he
hated it too. And now the whole country was up in arms, and they started to
scream and holler on the Monday when Bert Oldfield got hit.
Now who was responsible for Woodfull’s words making them into the public print,
which incidentally horrified him. Jack Phelan got the blame for years. He was
the only journalist in the Australian side. But Fingo told me in 1968 that it
was Don Bradman, and eventually he went to print with that view and of course
Don Bradman was very upset and counter-accused Fingo, so they’re both gone now,
and we’re left to guess, except that I was left a document by Gilbert Mant who
was Reuter’s man on the tour. He lived well into his 90s and he said, ‘I don’t
want you to publish this until I’m dead, and Don Bradman’s dead, but it was Don
Bradman.’ Now you’re still left to decide whether it was Fingleton, or Bradman
or someone else, but the point I’m trying to make is that it was a good thing,
because by letting the world know, now Australians weren’t subject to a
reservation any longer. Well maybe Woodfull thinks all’s fair in love and war
and cricket. He wasn’t, he didn’t think that at all. So he was a hero, the man
who gave that story to the press, and although Bill Woodfull didn’t like it, it
had to happen and everything changed after that: protest was loud and universal.
Amanda Smith: George Hele was one of the umpires at that match, who watched with
concern as the crowd became more and more agitated.
George Hele: I saw one man with his foot on the fence to jump, and I think had
he jumped, it would have been simply all in. It was vicious.
Amanda Smith: But the reaction in England to what was going on was very
different to that in Australia; and English cricket authorities were extremely
reluctant and slow to act. After all, apart from anything else, the
communications technology of the day was pretty limited.
David Frith: Well, this is really at the core of the problem because if they’d
had colour direct satellite television as we do, then they would have seen also
how ugly Bodyline could be, but they didn’t, and they wouldn’t even accept the
reports that suggested that this was something different and not very palatable.
And it took a while, probably a year, before they really realised what the
Englishmen had been up to. And it was when the West Indians turned it on in ’33
at Manchester, Wally Hammond got his chin cut, and the nabobs at Lord’s said
‘Yes, this isn’t very attractive’, and then they started to turn round and say
‘We’ve got to do something to outlaw it.’
Amanda Smith: David Frith, the author of ‘Bodyline Autopsy’.
BOLERO
Amanda Smith: And Sir Donald Bradman was in no doubt that Bodyline had damaged
the game of cricket.
Don Bradman: If Bodyline bowling had not been curbed, I have no doubt that it
would have brought about a cessation of Test cricket and seriously jeopardised
the future of the game itself.
BOLERO
Amanda Smith: Nevertheless, cricket historians like Brian Stoddart argue that
Bodyline did change cricket, in its immediate aftermath, through to the present
day.
Brian Stoddart: On the actual legacy now, I think if you look at it, there’s
probably two things in general, with a lot of offshoots to them. The first thing
is probably that the whole notion about the sportsmanlike nature of the game,
and the philosophical dimension of the game, I think took a huge dent. You still
find a lot of commitment to it interestingly, on the subcontinent. India still
places great stress on the idea of sportsmanlike behaviour and play, but in
general it’s nowhere near as powerful as it seemed to me to have been say by the
‘20s, and that’s there. The corollary, which is probably the second point, is
that the game inevitably has become I suppose for the want of a better word,
it’s become more competitive. Batsmen effectively, after 1932-’33 became fair
game in my view. Up until then, they’d been a relatively protected species. Now
over the following 70 years, we’ve seen Thompson and Lillee, we saw Tyson and
Loder and company in the early ‘50s on the English side, we’ve seen the West
Indians Croft, Garner, Holding, all of those sort of guys. I mean fast bowlers
suddenly had much more material at their disposal in which to get rid of
batsmen, and while they’ve been playing around with the rules, effectively
batsmen since 1932-’33 have been on notice that they’re going to get some
short-pitch stuff and they’re going to have to deal with it.
Amanda Smith: At the time, though, David Frith says that the Australian reaction
to Bodyline was symbolic of our love-hate relationship with England.
David Frith: It was like the mother sort of slapping the son around the ears.
And things I don’t think were ever quite the same after that. If you want to
have an argument as will happen during this Test series in various bars across
Australia, Bodyline will be thrown in the face of Englishmen time and again,
with the insinuation that it was a disgrace, to which the Englishmen will reply,
‘Well we won 4-1’.
Amanda Smith: And the Bodyline debate goes on, probably a much more interesting
subject than the current Ashes series, where the England team are at very long
odds to win. And we heard there from David Frith, who’s the author of the book
‘Bodyline Autopsy’; cricket historian Brian Stoddart; and also, archivally
speaking, Don Bradman, Harold Larwood, Bill O'Reilly and umpire George Hele.
And for more on Bodyline, and who can get enough? ABC-TV is screening a feature
on it next Wednesday night, at 8.30.
Well now, as the cricket season gets under way, the Spring Racing Carnival is
drawing to a close. Tomorrow is the final day, and at Flemington, one of the
races is for ‘Legends’: great jockeys of the past, from Australia and overseas.
One of those riding, and the only woman, is Pam O’Neill. Pam’s based in
Brisbane, although she’s in Melbourne at the moment for this race. She’s now 57,
and in the 1970s, she was one of the first in Australia to challenge the ban on
women riding in the same races as men.
Pam O'Neill: I think you are put on this earth to do something, and my job was
to get the rule changed that women could ride against the men. And it was a very
hard struggle. I remember when I was about 18, I’d lead the horses up to the
gates at Eagle Farm and hand them over to a male, and I think that’s what got me
keen from an early age. I was a pony club rider, and it just eventuated from
there, and I just tried to keep biding the cause.
Amanda Smith: Well take us back to that struggle to change the rules and what
was involved on your part.
Pam O'Neill: Well about the early ‘60s women could ride trackwork, and I was one
of the first to ride trackwork in Brisbane, and I had to ride before a steward,
and he said, ‘Yes, you can ride trackwork’. So I put up with that for a few
years, and I said, ‘Well I can’t see why women can’t ride against the men’, and
I kept writing letters to the QTC, being up in Brisbane, nearly every month. And
they kept writing back to me that there’s a rule in racing that women cannot
ride against the men. So what they did up there in Queensland, and I went all
around Australia doing this, they used to stage a Ladies’ Race in the meetings,
and I had a lot of success at that. So I think they thought that would keep me
quiet, but if you know me, it didn’t, it just made me more keen.
Amanda Smith: Well once you got your licence in ’79?
Pam O'Neill: Yes, 1979.
Amanda Smith: Was it all smooth sailing from there, or did you still have to
hustle to get rides?
Pam O'Neill: I was very lucky in my career up there. I was finding it hard. I
rode a horse called Breakfast Creek, I won three out of four on him, and I just
got beat on him, and he pulled up lame, and they said, ‘Oh, we want a male
jockey on him’. This friend of mine, she said ‘We’ve got to form a syndicate,
and we’ll buy you a horse that nobody can take you off.’ And we did, and we came
down and bought the horse in Sydney at a Yearling Sales, and he won 23 races,
and I won 18 on him and I still hold the record in Queensland for the jockey to
win the most races on the one horse.
Amanda Smith: Well what do you count as your greatest achievement in racing,
Pam?
Pam O'Neill: Well my first day of riding, I was lucky, I rode three winners, and
it was like the end of a fairytale, and it’s a world record being for a male or
female riding their first day. So that’s got to be one. I’ve had many.
Amanda Smith: Beating great jockeys like Roy Higgins must be one.
Pam O'Neill: Yes, that was a great moment. They had a unisex race down here, and
I rode a horse called Consular, for Jeff Murphy, a very good trainer, and he
legged me on, and he said, ‘Pam’, he said, ‘when you get to the school, let it
go’. And I thought Now where’s the school? Anyhow I was very lucky, I won by 10
lengths, and Roy Higgins’ wife was on the fence and she was cheering me when I
came in and she said, ‘Good on yer, Pam’, she said, ‘he’s a male chauvinist, you
know.’
Amanda Smith: Well now, have you been in serious training for tomorrow’s Legends
race?
Pam O'Neill: I ride every day. I work down at Queensland Race Training, that’s a
bit organisation in Queensland that trains apprentice jockeys and international
jockeys to ride. And strappers, anything to do in racing, we teach. And I’m very
lucky, I get on the horses every day, and that old horse I was talking to you
about that won the 23 races, he’s the ultimate goal down at the school because
he’s not easy to ride, and so he keeps me on my toes.
Amanda Smith: So he’s still going?
Pam O'Neill: He’s 18, I could have brought him down for The Emirates Legends
race.
Amanda Smith: Well have you had a look at how the other jockeys who’ll be
competing are riding these days? I mean there’s some great names there, Lester
Piggott, the great English rider, Takine Sasaki Japan’s best-ever jockey, Pat
Hyland who rode Melbourne Cup and Caulfield Cup winners, all in their 60s now.
Pam O'Neill: I might be the baby of the field, but I don’t think so. Yes,
they’re all very keen and very fit to win I can tell you. I think the
competition’s going to be there.
Amanda Smith: You reckon you’re in with a chance?
Pam O'Neill: Well I’m trying to find out a little bit about my horse. I see
where he’s had six starts and it’s got ‘LR’ beside two jockeys, and that means
‘lost riders’, so I’m starting to find out a little bit.
Amanda Smith: Well are you starting to get a bit worried?
Pam O'Neill: No, not worried, just keen to know what’s ahead.
Amanda Smith: I suppose you’re all a bit, apart from all being older, you’re all
a bit heavier; does that make a difference?
Pam O'Neill: Yes, especially when you bend over, you find your stomach gets in
the way sometimes, but oh yes, I think when we look up that straight, it’s 1,000
metres, it’ll feel like 2,000 metres to us.
Amanda Smith: Pam O'Neill, one of the veteran jockeys who’ll be riding in the
Legends race at Flemington tomorrow.
Now the other big sports event that’s also been under way this week is the World
Gay Games, in Sydney. A mass participation event, these Games have attracted all
sorts of competitors, who you wouldn’t normally get at a sports carnival. Like a
netball team from Tonga that’s made up of men who live as women.
Earlier this week Jason di Rosso met up with some of the players from this
Tongan transgender netball team.
Netballer: With us, the Tongan team, we’re sister-girls. We’re still men, of
course, but back at home we call ourselves ‘faafafine’ which means we’re men, or
you can say drag queens, men dressing up in women’s clothes, who are attracted
to straight men. Which is different with other countries, that they’re more
attracted to gay men attracted to gay men.
Jason di Rosso: OK, and what category then do you compete in? Do you compete
against other transgender teams, or do you compete against teams made up of
lesbians or gay men?
Netballer: Well we’re competing against the women’s division too and won, and
also we’re competing against mixed teams.
Jason di Rosso: Now tell me, I’m about 6-foot tall and I sort of consider myself
to have fairly broad shoulders, but a lot of you are bigger than me; do you
overpower a lot of your opponents?
Netballer: Not really. I mean even though they’re lesbians we all feel the same
about each other. I think so, yes. We might look quite strong but we’ve got a
big heart with a small soul.
Jason di Rosso: Growing up in Tonga, what were your attitudes towards sport? Did
you enjoy sport in Tonga?
Netballer: When I was young, I used to play soccer, and I really liked soccer,
but when I came up to be like a gay, and I used to join the gay people and we
used to go and play netball, that’s why I came here today, because of the
netball.
Jason di Rosso: So you didn’t feel alienated at all from the machismo, say of
sport?
Netballer: No. I mean with me, I grew up very feminine, but when I was young at
primary school and high school, I used to be very good in rugby. And I think
they only took me because I was faster than anyone else to run. But otherwise
they all jeered.
Jason di Rosso: How has it been coming to Sydney to compete in the Gay Games,
what’s it meant to you all?
Netballer: It’s a new experience for us to do that, to play internationally. Not
only that, but for us to share cultures with other people. And especially coming
here to Australia to share culture with the indigenous people, you know where we
come from our culture is most important for us than anything else. Like for
instance, we were supposed to be playing on Sunday, but we delayed all our games
because Sunday back in Tonga it’s a total taboo. And in order for us to get the
respect for what we are, they don’t care, as long as we respect our culture. And
so we gave up our games, we attended church. Sunday’s the most important day for
families back in Tonga.
Jason di Rosso: Describe to me the prevailing attitudes, if you will, of the
Tongan society towards gay and transgender people.
Netballer: I think we don’t have any problem at all back in Tonga. We’ve done a
lot of workshops, getting everybody educated and the only thing that we almost
had a problem with, was when AIDS came over to Tonga and the elderly ministers
of the church started pointing fingers. But then, with God’s help, we did
achieve a lot of things. But we’re very well respected back at home.
Jason di Rosso: Now I understand you’ve got a very high profile supporter in the
Tongan Royal Family.
Netballer: Yes, it’s Her Royal Highness, and we must thank her for her kindness,
and she has supplied a lot of funds for us.
Jason di Rosso: So what do you rate your chances of getting a Gold Medal?
Netballer: Well our chances will just work together, stick together and with
God’s help, yes I think we’ll able to achieve it. We know all our weaknesses and
that. There’s temptations everywhere, so you can’t really get away from it, but
you have the willpower, we’ll be able to achieve it.
Netballer: Well just keep our fingers crossed. I think just working hard, and
like teamwork, I think that’s the important thing.
Jason di Rosso: OK, well good luck.
Netballer: Thank you very much. Malo aupito.
Netballer: Malo aupito means thank you very much and may God bless you.
CHEERS
Amanda Smith: And this netball team of drag queens from Tonga, strapping lads
and serious Christians all, did indeed win a gold medal at the Sydney Gay Games.
Speaking there with members of the team was Jason di Rosso.
And that’s The Sports Factor for now, produced by Maria Tickle, technical
producer is Carey Dell, and I’m Amanda Smith.
Guests on this program:
| |
David Frith - Cricket Writer and Historian
|
|
| |
Brian Stoddart - Cricket Historian and Author
|
|
Publications:
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Bodyline Autopsy
Author: David Frith
Publisher: ABC Books - 2002 |
|
| |
Cricket and Empire
Author: Ric Sissons and Brian Stoddart
Publisher: Allen and Unwin - 1984 |
|
Musical Items:
| |
Bolero
CD Title: Larry Adler - Maestro of the Mouth Organ
Artist: Larry Adler
Copyright: Academy Sound and Vision |
|
Presenter:
Amanda Smith
Producer:
Maria Tickle
©
2003 ABC
This is an archive copy of a document originally located at
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/sportsf/stories/s719533.htm
All copyright remains with the creator.
