Clem Hill's Reminiscences

bowling, picked up the ball, pulled out a stump and appealed for a run out. McLeod was given out. He was at the Randwick end and had to walk in front of his wicket to go the pavilion. If he had been at the other end he would, on leaving for the dressing room, have gone behind the wicket and therefore would not have been out. And now I come to the arrival of Noble in Test cricket. He had been playing for two years in interstate matches, and was now included in the Australian Eleven in place of Jack Lyons. I can see him now – a long, thin, gawky young fellow. He was very serious, and took failure to heart very much. He and Trumper had played against the Englishmen in 1894 in a colts team. In this first Test of his, Richardson pitched a ball just outside his off stump, and yet it scattered the wicket with Noble’s bat perched in the air, presumably with the idea of allowing the ball to pass. He did the same thing against Jones on the Adelaide Oval. He was quite dispirited, and went straight to one of the old players and remarked, ‘I suppose after such a silly display they will never pick me for Australia again.’ At that time few knew Noble as a bowler. During the first innings Syd Gregory went along to Trott and suggested Alf be given a try. ‘He is a young fellow who can make the ball swerve a bit’, Gregory said. Noble was thrown the ball, and although he took only one wicket he impressed us. In the second innings Ranji was going well, and the Australians seemed to be in a pocket. Start of great Test career Noble was brought on, and he got Ranji with a beauty in his second over, and from that time onwards he became a tower of strength to Australia as a bowler. I well remember that delivery of his which proved fatal to the English champion, as many times in later years I had to keep it off my wicket. It was a ball of good length which looked to a right-hander as if it would pitch on the leg stump. At the last moment it would swerve to pitch on the off stump, and would then turn back, hitting the middle or the leg stump. ‘Mary Ann’, as he became known afterwards, captured six wickets in that second innings of England for 49 runs off 17 overs. Truly a very auspicious opening to his very fine career in Test cricket. He became a particularly hard bowler to play if he got any assistance from the wind. Like many other great players, he was nervous while watching the play when his side was in difficulties and others were trying to save the game. Sometimes he would not be able to sit in the grandstand, but would wait in the dressing room, and have the scores brought to him. When he went in to bat, however, there was no sign of anxiety, but grim determination. Noble was a good captain, and always popular with his team. He had a great amount of control over everyone, and the members of the side always looked to him with confidence. He had a remarkable faculty for placing the field so that, no matter who the batsman was, he found the particular strokes well blocked, and runs hard to obtain. Stoddart’s Tour of Australia 36