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| © PA Photos |
Born October 17, 1917, Ngaruawahia, Waikato
Died October 22, 1999, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (aged 82 years 5 days)
Major teams New Zealand, Canterbury, Middlesex, Oxford University, Warwickshire, Wellington
Batting style Left-hand bat
Bowling style Slow left-arm orthodox
Profile
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| © Getty image |
Martin Paterson Donnelly, who died on October 22, 1999, aged 82, left an indelible impression on cricket despite the brevity of his career. As a New Zealander at Oxford, he entranced cricket-followers in the immediate post-war years in a manner surpassed only by Compton. He proved that reality matched appearance with a magnificent double-century against England in the Lord's Test of 1949. C. B. Fry said he was as good a left-hander as any he had seen, including Clem Hill and Frank Woolley. Then Donnelly retired and became a businessman in Sydney.
For New Zealanders, his career was even more tantalising, since he played only 13 of his 131 first-class games in the country. None the less, he did enough in his seven Tests to raise the country's cricketing profile, and establish himself among the country's best-remembered sporting heroes. when he was elevated to the New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame in 1990, the citation read: They said he had everything as a Test batsman: style and grace; confidence and determination; success and modesty. The words they said encapsulate the sense of loss that surrounded Donnelly, despite his long life. His cricket was a victim of the war, the lowly cricketing status of his country at the time, and the game's financial circumstances.
