The Ashes Legends: Stan McCabe - An Australian hero

Stanley McCabe is regarded as one of the greatest stroke-players in the history of the game

Cricket’s oldest rivalry has seen some really outstanding performances over the years. I’ve always been awestruck at the way the contest between bat and ball was always even – neither could completely dominate the other. Be it Don Bradman‘s record 974 runs in the 1930 series or Ian Botham’s heroics in 1981, England and Australia must be duly credited for unearthing the most valuable cricketing talents to have ever graced the game.

When the Ashes come to mind, everyone thinks of the usual suspects: Bradman, Douglas Jardine, Harold Larwood and a host of other names. Of course, Bodyline actually helped to put the entire series on the map in terms of Test popularity.

However, there is one player who stamped his authority on the Ashes with a brilliant exhibition of batting and exceptional courage in the face of real danger; one who produced two of the most memorable innings ever seen in Test cricket and yet is never spoken of in the same breath as some of his more famous colleagues.

His name? McCabe- Stanley Joseph McCabe, described by Wisden as one of Australia’s greatest and most enterprising batsmen to have played the game. He found success as a batsman, but was also a handy medium-pacer and often opened the bowling for his side due to a lack of fast bowlers in the team.

Stan made his mark in the first Test of the infamous 1932-33 Ashes series – now immortalized as Bodyline. The short, stocky 22-year-old right-hander came in when his side was reeling at 82/3 with captain Bill Woodfull and both openers back in the pavilion. In the absence of the indisposed Bradman, the balding McCabe took charge almost immediately. The English captain Douglas Jardine employed a 7-2 field, with five close catchers and two men patrolling the boundary in the deep, all on the leg side. Yet, McCabe hooked the first ball he faced from Larwood for a boundary, shocking the opposition players.

From then on, Stan attacked with alacrity, ferociously cutting and compulsively hooking short-pitched deliveries in front of his face, totally unfazed by the body blows his other teammates received from Larwood, Bill Voce and Bill Bowes. Such was the nature of his assault that Jardine was forced to abandon the Bodyline approach and resort to spin in order to curtail the batsman’s scoring.

A partisan Australian crowd, already incensed at Jardine’s tactics, responded with wild cheering at McCabe’s counter-offensive. With Vic Richardson, McCabe added 129 runs for the fifth wicket, reaching 127 not out at stumps. He scored 60 of the 70 runs that Australia added in the second day to finish with a glorious unbeaten 187 from 233 balls in under four hours.

Although, Australia eventually crashed to a heavy 10-wicket defeat and McCabe struggled to make a similar impact during the rest of the series, his century at Sydney received a thunderous standing ovation from the 46,000-strong crowd as well as drawing praise from Larwood himself.

His second knock of note was in the 1938 Ashes tour of England, the last of his short career. In the first Test at Trent Bridge, after England had compiled a mammoth 658/8, Australia’s batsmen struggled, with skipper Bradman dismissed early. McCabe walked in at the fall of his captain, and as always, took charge of the proceedings. He started off slowly, reaching 19 in 35 minutes at the close of play.

The Ashes urn

The next morning, as wickets tumbled around him, Stan launched a blistering attack on the English bowlers, particularly on fast bowler Ken Farnes and rival captain Wally Hammond. At 194/6, with all specialist batsmen back in the hut and wicket-keeper Ben Barnett for company, McCabe took the English attack head-on as he unleashed powerful drives and his signature hook shots. Farnes was smashed for 18 in one over – McCabe slamming three boundaries before hooking the bowler for six, forcing Hammond to pull his pacer out of the attack.

Having reached his century, the stocky McCabe accelerated hard, scoring his last 132 runs in 95 minutes (including 44 runs off a three-over spell from leg spinner Doug Wright). He finally fell for a well-made 232 in 235 minutes, with 34 boundaries and a six, an innings that saved the game for Australia.

That innings at Trent Bridge prompted Bradman to instruct his players to witness every ball, as they would never see anything like it again. Upon McCabe’s return to the dressing room, the Don stated: “If I could play an innings like that, I’d be a proud man, Stan“.

English captains Arthur Gilligan and Bob Wyatt regarded Stan’s innings as the best that they had ever witnessed. The inimitable Neville Cardus praised it as one of the greatest innings in Test history. Cardus likened McCabe as being in the same mould as former Australian great Victor Trumper, noting that McCabe “has inherited Trumper’s sword and cloak“.

Sadly for Australia, McCabe’s journey at the Test level ended with that tour – hampered as he was by chronic foot injuries and the onset of the second World War. All three of his greatest knocks – he hammered 189 at Johannesburg on the SA tour in 1935-36 – never resulted in an Australian victory.

Compatriot Clarrie Grimmett rated him as being technically superior to Bradman, while McCabe’s fellow New South Welshman Bill Brown regarded him as the finest stroke-player ever. For cricket lovers around the world, McCabe was someone who could demolish any attack on his day – perhaps a precursor to the arrival of future international stars such as Adam Gilchrist and Ricky Ponting.

He may not have achieved the kind of greatness and adulation accorded to the Don, but his two special scores in the Ashes remain testament to the skill of a man who was urbane, sociable, unpretentious and straightforward. He remains one of the select few Australians to have never been dropped from the Test team in his entire career, and was one of the first among his squad to take the attack to the bowlers during the Bodyline series.

In the annals of Ashes and Test cricket history, Stanley Joseph McCabe will remain etched in glittering letters until the end of time.For me, he is truly the epitome of grit and grace.