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(Part five.) History by accident.
Tuesday 5 January 1971 is one of cricket’s historic days, with the first-ever One-Day International being played.
Copyright: The Melbourne Age.
As with the first-ever Test match, which bowled off on 15 March 1877, the ODI was staged at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and matched hosts Australia against England. The ‘Aussies’ emerged as winners, just as they did in that first Test.
And as we reach 46 days to go to the 50th anniversary of the West Indies’ World Cup triumph at Lord’s, there’s another similarity. Noone really seemed to know at the time that the fixture would take on such significance—eventually leading to the first Men’s World Cup four-and-a-half years later and the avalanche of what became known as white ball cricket in the ensuing decades.
In fact, the match, billed as an “International Knock Out Match MCC vs Australia” only became a reality after rain washed out the scheduled third Test of the 1970/71 Ashes series.
Australian Cricket Board officials were already worried about the attractiveness of the series, given that the first two matches were boring draws, and saw the hastily-arranged fixture as a way to recoup losses from the abandoned Test.
Copyright: Lords.
While domestic limited-over cricket had truly taken off in England in the 1960s, Australia’s home version of the format had only been introduced the previous season.
Nevertheless, the Melbourne audience, deprived of their traditional annual diet of Test cricket, turned out in numbers with over 45,000 attending—more than twice the number anticipated by the authorities, given the last-minute nature of the arrangement.
Played as 40 eight-ball overs-per-side (Australia, Pakistan and South Africa used eight-ball overs up to the late 1970s), England totalled 190 all out off 39.4 overs. Opener John Edrich was the top scorer with 82 and off-spinner Ashely Mallett was the best of the bowlers with three for 34.
Australia reached the target for the loss of five wickets with five overs to spare, thanks primarily to 60 from Ian Chappell—considered one of the best batsmen in the world at the time—and 41 from Doug Walters.
England captain Ray Illingworth led the effort with the ball, taking three for 50.
There were no drinks or music, but the fixture appeared to have a fete match mood at the time, only taking on historic significance later.
As Mallet said subsequently: “They called it the first one-day international which rather surprised me years later. That game we thought was a bit of a joke.”
At that time, it wasn’t referred to as an ODI while England touring teams then were known as “MCC”, the Marylebone Cricket Club, as Lord’s ruled the administration of the game there until the Test and County Cricket Board took over in the 1970s.
There was no rush after that game to pack the schedule with ODIs and it would be almost three years before the West Indies had their first taste of the format, which is what we focus on next.
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Fazeer Mohammed is a journalist/broadcaster with almost 40 years’ experience across a range of media.
His interest in cricket, and particularly its history, started at home via his father’s small collection of autobiographies and magazines, offering perspectives and context which have informed his commentary and analysis on contemporary issues in the game.
