Jack Fingleton

Template:Infobox Historic Cricketer John Henry Webb Fingleton OBE (born April 28, 1908 in Sydney; died November 22, 1981 in Sydney) was an Australian cricketer turned political and cricket commentator. A stubborn opening batsman, he scored five Test centuries, representing Australia in 18 Tests between 1932 and 1938. He was also known for his involvement in several cricket diplomacy incidents in his career, being accused of leaking the Bodyline clash between Australian captain Bill Woodfull and English manager Plum Warner. He was later accused of causing sectarian tension within the team by leading a group of players of Irish Catholic descent in undermining the leadership of the Protestant Don Bradman. In retirement, Fingleton became a prominent political commentator in Canberra, with links to Australian Prime Ministers. He was regarded as one of Australia's finest cricket writers, with a perceptive and occasionally sardonic style, which was marked by persistent jibes at Bradman.

Style

A right-hand opening batsman, Fingleton was noted primarily for his obdurate defense rather than for his aggression. Like most successful opening batsmen, he had a small back-lift and was rarely surprised by the quicker half-volley or yorker. Fingleton was often described as "courageous", in particular for his defiant batting against Bodyline. He was also an athletic and gifted fieldsman, who built his reputation in the covers. Later he became noted along with Vic Richardson and Bill Brown in South Africa in 1935-36 as part of Bill O'Reilly’s leg-trap. Neville Cardus, once described the Fingleton-Brown combination as "crouching low and acquisitively, each with as many arms as an Indian God".

Early years

Born at Waverley in the inner eastern suburbs of Sydney, Fingleton was educated at the Roman Catholic St Francis's School, in the inner city suburb of Paddington before moving to Waverley College. His father James was a tram driver, becoming a member of the New South Wales Parliament. The elder Fingleton died of tuberculosis when Jack was twelve, and he left school at the age of fifteen to begin a journalism career, with a cadetship with the now defunct Sydney Daily Guardian. Later, he moved to the Telegraph Pictorial where he worked for several years before the outbreak of the Second World War.

Fingleton was unable to distinguish himself on the field while at school, but after joining Waverley, he quickly broke into the first XI of a grade team which included Test players Alan Kippax, Hanson Carter and Arthur Mailey.

First class career

Jack Fingleton's career performance graph.

In 1930-31, aged 22, Fingleton made his debut for New South Wales, and first came to prominence when he withstood a ferocious opening spell from Eddie Gilbert in Brisbane against Queensland. He went on to score a stubborn 93 and featured in a 195 run fourth wicket partnership with Stan McCabe. After a century in the following match, he was selected for the Test team for the 1931-32 home series against South Africa. It was less than twelve months and only five first-class matches after his Shield debut. He was twelfth man for three consecutive Tests before making his debut in the Fifth and final Test due to Bill Ponsford’s illness. In a low scoring match on a rain softened pitch, Fingleton was second top-scorer with 40 in the second innings. In the following summer came the "Bodyline" series, when England toured under Douglas Jardine. In one of the tour matches before the Tests, Fingleton scored a defiant 119* for New South Wales against the bumper barrage of Harold Larwood and Gubby Allen, ensuring his selection for the First Test. His earlier experience held him in good stead as he scored 26 and 40 as Australia were crushed by ten wickets in the first Test in Sydney. He then made a defiant four hour innings to score 83 in Australia’s only win of the series. He appeared as well equipped as any Australian to combat England’s strategy.

Warner and Woodfull incident

However, the Third Test at the Adelaide Oval was disastrous for Fingleton, who scored a pair as Australia were hammered by 338 runs. He was blamed for leaking the details of the dressing room exchange between captain Bill Woodfull and English manager Plum Warner, which almost caused the abandonment of the Test series. Warner had visited Woodfull after he was struck in the heart by Larwood’s short pitched bowling, to which Woodfull retorted “I do not want to see you Mr. Warner. There are two sides out there. One is playing cricket and the other is not.” Woodfull had publicly remained composed in the face of the body barrage. Fingleton was dropped for the remaining two Tests of the series. Fingleton always denied responsibility for the leak.

Despite a prolific 1933-34 Shield season, Fingleton was an overlooked for the Australian side selected to tour England in 1934. Wisden speculated that it may have been due to cricket diplomacy reasons following the incident in Adelaide.

Test recall

Fingleton and Brown walk out to open for Australia

Fingleton was recalled to the Test team for the tour of South Africa in 1935-36, where he partnered Bill Brown at the top of the innings. The tour was to be the most prolific phase of his career and included several large opening stands with Brown. Against Natal at Durban he made his highest first class score of 167. He finished the series with centuries in each of the last three Tests; 112 at Cape Town, 108 at Johannesburg and 118 in Durban. Each of these resulted in an innings victory for Australia. In the following 1936-37 season in Australia, against an English side captained by Allen, he became the first player to score centuries in fourth consecutive Tests, with 100 at Brisbane in the First Test. This was later equalled by Alan Melville, (whose four centuries were scored on either side of World War II) and surpassed by the West Indian, Everton Weekes in 1948-49.

In the second innings of the Third Test in Melbourne, Fingleton combined with Bradman for a sixth-wicket partnership of 346, Fingleton made 136, a record which still stands. It turned the Test and helped Australia to retain the Ashes. In 1938, Fingleton made his international farewell as Australia toured England, a series in which he found runs difficult to come by. He later attributed this to his inability to play the pull shot. His Test career ended disappointingly at The Oval in "Hutton's Match". In the course of England's marathon innings of 903/7 he sustained a leg injury which prevented him from batting in either Australian innings. With Bradman also unable to bat, Australia collapsed to the heaviest defeat in Test history, by an innings and 579 runs. In another Test, he responded to heckling by the crowd by sitting down on the pitch and refusing to resume before the gallery quietened.

Retirement

Fingleton at practice, in his NSW cap.

Fingleton retired from first class cricket after the 1939-40 Shield season. At the start of the war, he enlisted in the Australian Defence Force in the army before appointed as the press secretary for former Prime Minister of Australia Billy Hughes. From his appointment onwards, he lived and worked in Canberra. After the end of the war, Fingleton divided his time between Canberra, where until his retirement in 1978 he was political correspondent for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Radio Australia, and cricket journalism. He forge close relationships with several Prime Ministers. In particular, Sir Robert Menzies, Australia’s longest serving Prime Minister, provided him with a laudatory foreword in his book, ‘’Masters of Cricket’’. Fingleton's Test coverage resulted in a number of books that placed him at the forefront of Australian cricket writers. The books included Cricket Crisis (mainly an account of the 1932-33 Bodyline series), Brightly Fades the Don (the 1948 Invincibles tour), Brown & Company: The Tour in Australia (the English tour of Australia in 1950-51), The Ashes Crown the Year (the Australian tour of England in 1953), Masters of Cricket, Four Chukkas to Australia (the English tour of Australia in 1958-59), The Greatest Test of All (the Tied Test of 1960), Fingleton on Cricket and The Immortal Victor Trumper. His final book, the autobiographical Batting From Memory, was to have its Australian launch during the week in which he died of a heart attack. His cricket writing, regarded as one of the most stylish by and Australian often left a sour taste with observers with persistent anti-Bradman jibes.

In addition to his writing, Fingleton was a witty, perceptive and occasionally sardonic commentator for the BBC and at various times a contributor to The Times, The Sunday Times, The Observer, and various newspapers in Australia, South Africa and elsewhere. In 1976, he was awarded an OBE for services "to journalism and to cricket". He was the subject of three appearances in 1979 and 1980 on Parkinson’s TV interview show. Fingletons’s judgements were characterised by careful first-hand evidence and was known for sensing the emergence of a possible story. E W Swanton stated that “Fingleton remains surely, as cricket writer and broadcaster, the best his country has”.

Conflict with Bradman

Fingleton (c) with Bradman (r)

Throughout his career as player and journalist, Fingleton persistently came into personal conflict with Don Bradman, one of the captains under whom Bradman played, damaging the reputations of both. Bradman characteristically held his silence during Fingleton's lifetime. Bradman was known for his reserved personality, did not drink and often eschewed social activities with teammates, preferring to privately listen to music or read. Combined with his success, he gained a reputation for cockiness. In the 1930s, Australia had been divided along sectarian lines, with those of Irish descent such as Fingleton being Catholic and Anglo-Australians such as Bradman being predominantly Protestant, leading to speculation that the tension was fuelled by religion. After the 1936-37 Ashes series in Australia, four Catholics, leading bowler Bill O'Reilly, batsman Stan McCabe along with Leo O'Brien and Chuck Fleetwood-Smith were summoned by the Board of Control to respond to allegations that they were undermining Bradman. Fingleton was not invited, speculated to be due to his journalistic background, but Bradman later alleged that he was the ringleader. After that, Bradman’s relationship with O’Reilly and Fingleton never recovered. When Bradman was dismissed in his final Test innings in 1948 for a duck, Fingleton and O’Reilly were reported to be laughing hysterically in the pressbox. E W Swanton said that that “I thought they were going to have stroke.” Bradman later wrote after both had died: “With these fellows out of the way, the loyalty of my 1948 side was a big joy and made a big contribution to the outstanding success of that tour”.