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| © Getty image |
Full name Bert Sutcliffe
Born November 17, 1923, Ponsonby, Auckland
Died April 20, 2001, Auckland (aged 77 years 154 days)
Major teams New Zealand, Auckland, Northern Districts, Otago
Batting style Left-hand bat
Bowling style Slow left-arm orthodox
Other Coach
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Bert Sutcliffe on the attack © Getty Images |
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Evans celebrates the dismissal of Sutcliffe,
for 32 © Photosport |
Bert Sutcliffe, MBE, who died of emphysema on April 20, 2001, aged 77, was the outstanding New Zealand batsman of the immediate post-war period, though many in England who watched that other New Zealand left-hander, Martin Donnelly, in The Parks for Oxford might pursue counter-claims. Perhaps, as R. C. Robertson- Glasgow noted, "Sutcliffe had a more powerful case in his strokes to leg" whereas "in defence, Donnelly always looked the surer". The splendour of their off-side strokes was, needless to say, a given, and their brilliant fielding never ceased to excite attention, with Sutcliffe in his element whether at short leg, in the slips or at cover. Both made manifest again in that austere era some of the more charming cricketing images of the inter-war years.
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| The Bert Sutcliffe Oval at Lincoln © New Zealand Cricket |
Tall and good-looking, fair-haired and enviably fit, batting in the classic manner, Bert Sutcliffe - his given name the homely choice of parents who had emigrated from Lancashire - might well have graced the pages of a novel featuring country-house cricket, not least in that he ever remained an affable man of steady temper. His blondness made him instantly recognisable, while, for the enthusiast, there was much that was identifiable in the shapely, clean-cut dispatch of his shot-making. When Walter Hadlee's New Zealanders visited England in 1949, determined to prosecute their case for an end to the insult of three-day Tests, it was in large degree thanks to Bert Sutcliffe that, with four sound draws, the slur was removed. He scored 2,627 runs in that pleasantly dry summer, including 423 at a marvellous 60.42 in the Tests; only Bradman, with 2,960 in 1930, had a higher aggregate on a tour of England. Patsy Hendren, observing Sutcliffe as he warmed up at Lord's in pre-tour nets, is reported to have said, "2,500 in a season if ever I saw 'em."
