Lives in Cricket No 16 - Joe Hardstaff

This had the disastrous consequence that it was duly sent to Perth, Scotland rather than Perth, Western Australia. Joe was a very worried man until it turned up at Southampton just before the boat sailed, after prodigious efforts by the team’s baggage man, Bill Ferguson. Joe left for London on Friday, 30 August and joined the rest of the team for a farewell dinner at Lord’s. Bedser, Edrich, Compton, Evans and Wright had all been playing for their counties that day, the two Kent players having come from Canterbury. The Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, was present and amongst other things reminded them that it was a goodwill visit. The fourteen professionals were to be paid £550 for the tour with a possible maximum bonus of £263 made up of £125 10s 0d for merit and £137 10s 0d for discipline. Joe eventually received £65 10s 0d for merit and, in common with all the others, the full amount for discipline. 50 The following day the team departed from Waterloo on the boat train to Southampton where they boarded the RMS Stirling Castle . The players found that among their fellow passengers were 300 war brides heading for a ‘new life’ in Australia. As the ship was still a Government Transport the voyage was made as quickly as possible, and as a result the ship reached Fremantle in 24 days. Apart from a stop at Port Said the usual calls at Gibraltar, Toulon, Naples, Aden and Colombo were all omitted. After leaving the Suez Canal no land was seen for a fortnight. The early arrival in Australia meant more time for practice and also led to two extra fixtures being arranged. Joe played in the second match, against Western Australia Colts at Fremantle, making 10 and, according to E.W.Swanton, ‘sparred continuously outside the off-stump and looked anything but convincing.’ He then followed this with 52 against Western Australia at Perth. Again he did not impress Swanton who thought that he was ‘only a shadow of his best’. Joe was not to know it, but he would make only one other first-class appearance – against Victoria at Melbourne on 31 October, 1, 2 and 4 November – until he played against a Combined XI, in Tasmania, on 10 January. As usual there were seven first-class matches before the First Test Post-War Years, 1946-1948 91 50 Only Bedser and Wright received the full merit payment.