Remembering Bevan Congdon

[fredfertang]

Remembering Bevan Congdon

In this feature Martin looks back on the career of the man who was at the helm when, in the eyes of Englishmen at least, the character of New Zealand cricket changed forever

 

[wpdavid]

Remembering Bevan Congdon

In this feature Martin looks back on the career of the man who was at the helm when, in the eyes of Englishmen at least, the character of New Zealand cricket changed forever

And a very good piece it is too - thank you for taking the time to write it.

I started watching test cricket in 1971, so Congdon's twin 170's in 1973 made a big impression on me. At the time, I had him in my World XI from the test cricket that I had seen plus the domestic one day matches that the BBC showed. From memory, the rest of my top 5 were Gavaskar, Barry Richards, Greg Chappell and Zaheer Abbas, so BC was in some pretty handy company. Matters became more complicated in the 2nd half of the 1973 summer when WI toured and I had to make room for Clive Lloyd, but Congdon was still secure at number 3. His age didn't bother me, as England had recently picked lots of players of a similar age, and a few who were about 5 years older.

As the article says, his eventual dismissal in the Trent Bridge was a huge surprise, probably down to exhaustion. Had he lasted into Day 5, NZ probably would have fancied their chances to reach 479, or whatever it was. That looks very odd writing it now, but we really didn't look like getting him out at all.

Interesting to read how unpopular he was with some of his team-mates. Even at 13 I knew he was a grumpy old bugger, but the chippiness of some of the Kiwis is a surprise. Makes you realise what a good job Howarth did a few years later to mould them into such a formidable side.

 

[Hurricane]

Excellent article. Cheers.

 

[Midwinter]

Nice work again

Thanks

 

[Lillian Thomson]

I also remember the last day at Trent Bridge. It definitely wasn't a school holiday where I was as I listened to it in the classroom intermittently on a small yellow radio which I still have to this day. I also remember the Congdon dismissal. I always had to watch the last session of play at my friends house as he was one of the few who had BBC2 (needed a separate aerial in the early days). On a rainy day in the 80's the BBC showed full highlights of the New Zealand run chase and I recorded it. This now means I'm going to have to dig out my VHS collection and find it.

 

[fredfertang]

Post it on youtube when you're done

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Post it on youtube when you're done

My VHS collection is about 300 randomly recorded non-indexed tapes, so I might be gone for some time.

 

[wpdavid]

Post it on youtube when you're done

Highlights are already on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0kobkQ-5O4

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Highlights are already on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0kobkQ-5O4

Thanks for pointing that out as it has saved me what could have been several hours of searching. For some reason it never occurred to me look to see if it was there already. I think I'll blame Fred who I assumed would have looked and not found it otherwise he wouldn't have made that suggestion.

On the tapes I've checked so far I did find one piece that I might put on youtube (if it's not already there). When the final Test of the 1985 Ashes Series finished early there was a wrap up discussion between Peter West, Richie Benaud and Ted Dexter which lasted for 27 minutes and included the final 5 wickets to fall and interviews with Gower and Border, plus a quick look forward to the West Indies tour. Amazing to think that during that Test Australia were so bad that they made Richard Ellison and Les Taylor look like Test bowlers.