Walter Hadlee's diary a reminder of days of yore

The Skipper's Diary, Walter Hadlee, compiled by Sir Richard Hadlee, published by The Cricket Publishing Company. Book and DVD only available online www.theskippersdiary1949.com

Few cricket tours have resulted in quite as much literary treatment as that of the 1949 cricket tour of England and northern Europe.

Autobiographies of Walter Hadlee (Innings of a Lifetime), Bert Sutcliffe (Between Overs), John Reid (Sword of Willow and A Cricketing Life), Merv Wallace (A Cricket Master) and the tour book by NZPA correspondent Alan Mitchell, Cricket Companions, all helped ensure the place of the tour in New Zealand's cricket history.

While confined to three-day Test matches the tour was only ever going to produce Test victories if the New Zealanders collapsed.

They didn't because the side was one of the most skilled batting combinations to represent the country and while the first Test win over England would wait another 29 years, the foundation of New Zealand's cricket future was laid by Walter Hadlee's side on their first post-World War Two visit to England.

Blessed with batsmen of the quality of Martin Donnelly (2287 runs), Bert Sutcliffe (2627), Merv Wallace (1722), John Reid (1488), Verdun Scott (1572) and Hadlee himself (1439), the side proved highly competitive and attractive to the English public who were still getting over hosting Bradman's great Australian side a year earlier.

Hadlee Snr had toured England in 1937 along with Donnelly and Wallace, and fast bowler Jack Cowie, so was well aware of what lay ahead of the side. His diary is a fascinating look into a bygone era, an era never to be seen again, yet a reminder of the sort of devotion to the game such a tour took.

These tours involved six weeks at sea, in each direction, so three months of the year were gone already. The players were amateurs and times were tight. They were paid a basic allowance and due to their success in quickly surpassing expected gate takings they were paid a bonus.

All of it is described in Hadlee's diary, a fascinating record that has been well worth the reproduction in what is an outstanding publishing format and only available through website sales.

This reviewer did not expect to get as much enjoyment as he did out of the book which provides not only reasonable match coverage but a look at the goings on of a group of men thrown together to play international sport.

As captain, Hadlee was required to take issue with some of them at times with the resulting details coming through in his diaried comments.

But what is also obvious is the demanding social requirements of the side. Remember this was the time when Sundays were a day off and there were activities aplenty laid on to take advantage of that spare time. It wasn't all beer and skittles, or golf.

It is also obvious that as an accountant, apparently reasonably well-placed, Hadlee wasn't averse to using his contacts to his own and to the benefit of his clients back at home. What better time to hit up New Zealand's Minister of Finance about the import duty on a car bought in England and shipped home on the same boat as the team returned on, that when Walter Nash visited the side during the tour?

Numerous other business initiatives were taken by Hadlee during the course of the tour, many of them on the mornings before play started in the various towns around England. There were also the many visits to factories and warehouses were the team were able to take advantage of opportunities.

It was little wonder Hadlee required some extra storage room on the boat on the way home. There was none of that cursed extra baggage you have to pay so much for when flying home.

One interesting comment during the second game against Glamorgan resulted from his meeting Cliff Prosser, the secretary of the Swansea Rugby Club. "He told me he saw Rhys T. Gabe pull Bob Deans back from the goal line after Deans had scored a try against Wales at Cardiff in 1905 – it was a disallowed try. He hopes Gabe will publicly announce this before it is too late."

What makes the 'diary' even more compelling is the publication of the tour report and financial returns and the reflections of the players in the years after the tour, clearly taken from correspondence between Hadlee and his team.

His own summation towards the end of the book was prescient.

"It was important to learn lessons from this tour and share the knowledge for future teams and players. All the bowlers needed to learn that direction was as important as length. Length is not effective without direction and direction is hopeless without length.

"By having the emphasis on direction as well as length I was able to set some very good fields – the bowlers were asked to bowl to those fields and as a result the fieldsmen became keener and that helped team spirit. It meant that everyone was involved in the play.

"The batsmen learning the art of concentration had to be maintained. Some of our most successful efforts were due to the intense concentration in a crisis.

"I will never forget this experience and all the players will remain great friends for life," he said.

However, his subsequent career as a cricket administrator may be viewed, there can be little doubt that Walter Hadlee's legacy to the New Zealand game is significant and the publication of his diary is probably the most graphic demonstration of that. It is a commendable exercise and one that further strengthens the historical connection with New Zealand's cricket.

Deserving Congdon story in print

Bevan Congdon has a special place in New Zealand cricket history as the common denominator through the age of advancement from Saturday afternoon amateurs to a more professional, in outlook at least, unit.

From the time he was first selected in the summer of 1964-65 through until his last tour of England in 1978, Congdon was the one player to have provided the bridge from the construction phase to the near completion of the task of New Zealand's climb into the top bracket of world sides.

Some like John Reid and Bert Sutcliffe, who provided major contributions, ended their time after the tour of India, Pakistan and England in 1965. Others like Barry Sinclair, Graham Dowling, Gary Bartlett, Dick Motz and Jack Alabaster got halfway through the process while others like Bruce Taylor, Bob Cunis and Richard Collinge had phases of being in and out of the side with availabilities and injuries.

Then the likes of Glenn Turner, Hedley Howarth, Ken Wadsworth and Dayle Hadlee came in for the second half of the journey with Richard Hadlee an even later addition to the cause.

But sailing through it all was Congdon, growing in stature and confidence, playing within his limits, and occasionally extending them as on the 1973 tour of England with his successive Test centuries.

Those formative days cannot be under-stated. Years of being an afterthought on the end of tours of Australia by English and West Indian teams meant New Zealand's best players were starved by comparison to other countries.

There were the days in the  late 1950s and 1960s when four home series were played against Australian B sides with a tour to Australia to play state sides in 1967. There were also the first involvement in limited overs competitions in the fledgling Australian state competition where New Zealand's rising stature became apparent.

Congdon proved an essential part in New Zealand acquiring the knowledge that would stand them in such good stead within a generation.

It took time but eventually things came together for him. There was the run flow going off the chart in the West Indies on the benign pitches that failed to produce a result in five Tests in 1972 and there was the captaincy of the side in the first Test victory over Australia at Lancaster Park in 1974. The captaincy had been moved on to Mark Burgess by 1978 but Congdon was there when victory was achieved over England for the first time in Wellington at the old Basin Reserve.

His bowling was often under-appreciated but it grew in stature during his career and two wickets for 14 at the end of England's first innings helped ensure that while New Zealand suffered a collapse, they still had enough runs in the bank to apply pressure for win.

Undemonstrative, in public at least, but renowned for a certain trait of grittiness, being the subject of an autobiography was never really in the Congdon make-up. Although there could have been plenty of stimulus had he so chosen.

R.T. Brittenden, who saw all of Congdon's career, wrote of him in 'The Finest Years', "When he came into first-class cricket, it was as a boldly-attacking batsman, with a firm liking for the cut and the pull. He did well enough to win test status in four years. But he became outstandingly good only because of his firm resolve to improve. It was not enough to make a good score now and then. He is a perfectionist."

No bad thing that through an era when being a perfectionist wasn't always the most endearing characteristic of those who didn't understand the requirements along the road to success.

He still sits within the top 10 run scorers for New Zealand in Tests, in ninth on 3448, one behind Kane Williamson and one ahead of John R. Reid. That's the sort of quality we're talking with seven Test centuries and an average of 32.22 which says something of the tough times in the early stages of his 62-Test career.

His contribution has not been overlooked and Bill Francis has written an extended essay making a small book of Congdon's career looking at what contributed to his emergence from what we now know as the Tasman region of New Zealand and what sustained him through a distinguished playing career.

'A Singular Man' has been published by The Cricketers' Trust, which has been established by the professional players of the day and the New Zealand Cricket Players' Association, with the support of boutique cricket publisher Ron Cardwell in the publication.

It is a worthy addition to a growing resource which acknowledges the era which was the necessary forerunner to New Zealand's emergence on the world scene in the 1980s, especially, and beyond.

A Singular Man by Bill Francis. Published by The Cricketers' Trust.

Fast man Bartlett has story to tell

New Zealand cricket does not have a reputation for producing fast bowlers capable of sustaining form or fitness for the long haul.

Perhaps it's something for the physiology professors to work out. Certainly, they would have plenty of case study material from those comets who have exploded across the lower atmosphere in New Zealand.

Meteor Over Marborough - The Gary Bartlett Story by John Alexander. Printed and available from Copy Press Books, Nelson, $49.95

It is a sad fact that those who have generated speed above the ordinary have burned out all too quickly.

In recent memory Shane Bond is the most obvious example, but before him there was Murray Webb, who terrorised batsmen in domestic cricket in the late-60s early 70s but never had the good fortune to get to bowl in a Test match on a bowling belter.

Fast bowler Gary Bartlett speaks with Lynn McConnell on Radio Live Weekend Sport

Richard and Dayle Hadlee each generated lively pace, Richard for a brief period before deciding endurance was more reasonable than express pace while Dayle was never able to shake a back injury suffered almost immediately after he was exposed to international play.

The fastest of them all may well have been Gary Bartlett who had the satisfaction of being a key contributor to three of New Zealand's first four Test victories, two overseas in South Africa in 1961-62 and at home against India in 1967-68.

Comparisons between eras are difficult, especially when timing devices were not as efficient as those on the modern scene.

However, those who have had the chance to see all the possible claimants in action rate Bartlett as the fastest of them all.

But he was to suffer injuries that negated the total impact he could have made.

His story is a fascinating one and has been finally committed to print by former Blenheim sports writer John Alexander.

'Meteor Over Marlborough'  is the end product and it is a fascinating look through cricket of Bartlett's era from a bowler's perspective and which hasn't been recognised as books about John Reid and Bert Sutcliffe are the only books of significance from the time and they concentrate more on those batsmen's feats.

Bartlett was always going to be a cricketer of some reputation. He lived the classic upbringing for sportsmen of his era and before. Living opposite the home of cricket in Blenheim, Horton Park, he was ever-present at the nets and at games in the manner of many boys before him including one young fellow named Bradman who lived opposite the Oval that now bears his name in Bowral.

Bartlett also had some wise men to watch over him, Fen and Arthur Cresswell, two long-standing names in Marlborough cricket. All the contacts who helped him along the way are part of his story.

It was some surprise to the New Zealand slips cordon that awaited the first ball from Bartlett when he made his international debut at the Basin Reserve in Wellington against an Australian Second XI in New Zealand. After seeing the speed unleashed they took several steps backwards before his second ball.

Visiting Australian captain Ian Craig didn't enjoy the experience as he became Bartlett's first international wicket and he picked him five times out of six during the series. Bartlett took 5-51 in the first innings of that first game.

No wonder John Reid moved heaven and earth to have him in his side to tour South Africa in 1961-62. After all the heavy fire New Zealand's batsmen took in South Africa on their 1953-54 tour, Bartlett represented prospective payback.

Not that he was at full strength during the tour, but his mere presence in the New Zealand attack was sufficient to give his side a significant weapon.

Then in 1968 in one of the great New Zealand Test victories he took six wickets in India's second innings at Lancaster Park to set up a win, having started his destructive spell with an old ball that was like a cloth.

It is an indictment of New Zealand's failure to utilise available technical information that cricket has seemed to be perpetually inventing the wheel. Egos have too often got in the way of common sense as coaches think they know best often failing to call on expertise that has been exposed to problems that all new international players experience at some stage or another.

Bartlett is but one example of a technician who had much to offer. Certainly the number of Central Districts cricketers who have sought him should be evidence enough of the value he could be.

His story, Meteor Over Marlborough, should be not only a faithful record of a player who made a difference but also a reminder that there is nothing new under the cricketing sun, and somewhere, someone else has experienced problems and could have information to help players out.

The intellectual property available in New Zealand comes from too small a pool for this realisation to be ignored and so far as Bartlett is concerned it is a case of what might have been had he been able to work with more young bowlers.