A notorious feud, an ugly sectarian conflict
Greg Growden's Jack Fingleton: The Man Who Stood Up To Bradman is not merely a biography of Fingleton, gutsy Test batsman and peerless cricket writer
George Binoy
25-Feb-2013
Greg Growden's Jack Fingleton: The Man Who Stood Up To Bradman is not merely a biography of Fingleton, gutsy Test batsman and peerless cricket writer. It is an inside story of Australian cricket in the 1930s, which draws on new sources to explain how things really were inside the Australian dressing room then and, in particular, why Don Bradman alienated many of his teammates, writes Philip Derriman in the Sydney Morning Herald.
Growden approaches the issue from Fingleton's Catholic perspective, although it is worth noting that Growden himself is not a Catholic. One story he tells shows how rancorous an issue it was. During a match at the SCG, Bradman learned that Fingleton, who opened the batting, had had his bat sprinkled with holy water by a Catholic bishop. Fingleton was soon dismissed. As Bradman, the new batsman, passed Fingleton on his way to the middle, he said to him: "We'll see what a dry bat will do out there." Bradman scored a century.
George Binoy is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo