Almanac Cricket: Keith Miller’s drop kick at the ‘G’

 

 

KEITH MILLER’S DROP KICK AT THE ‘G’

 

For years people did not believe me when I said, and then wrote, “I saw Keith Miller catch a cricket ball over the boundary and drop kick the ball back to the centre during a first-class game”.

 

 

For those pundits who scoffed at the time, I was reading an excerpt from The Cricketer’s Companion by Alan Ross, last night when I came across an article on Keith Miller written by the wonderful Ray Robinson.  In part it said:

 

Onlookers are amused by his mimicry of the umpire signalling a wide against him, … his drop-kicking the ball to the wicketkeeper after a running catch … .

 

Robinson, over the journey saw far more cricket than I ever had.  What a marvellous wordsmith he was.

 

If you ever get the chance to read The Cricketers Companion  and read ‘X-Ray’s’ story do so.  Brilliant.

 

The occasion I saw Miller perform this extraordinary feat was at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday 15^th January 1954 during the Lindsay Hassett Testimonial game.  In those days some of  the top line players received testimonials and Hassett had just retired from the game.

 

The game was between Arthur Morris’s XI and Hassett’s XI and contained the best twenty two players in the land.

 

Ian Craig, the 18 year-old tyro, took to Ian Johnson’s bowling and hit the off-spinner for four successive sixes to reach a wonderful century to show his class as a cricketer. On the fourth six Miller, who was on the boundary, went back and took a fine overhead mark.  Showing his football skills he then drop-kicked the ball back to the bowler.

 

It was estimated that the kick went between 50 and 60 yards.  It has lived with me to this day. I was fourteen at the time and the whole day is vivid in my memory.

 

For the statistician Morris’s XI made 562 and 369 while Hassett’s team replied with 415 and 425.  Hassett made 126 in the first innings, Miller and Craig also scored tons.  Most batsmen made runs.

 

In total 1801 runs were scored in 18 hours and 24 minutes, 189 boundaries were hit and 20 sixes.

 

A.L.Hassett would have done very well financially from the game with an average of  ten to eleven thousand attending each day.

 

Nb. Keith Ross Miller played 50 games and kicked 42 goals for St Kilda. He represented Victoria in 1946 playing at full back.  He was renowned for his magnificent drop kicking. Miller, ‘Gigs’ and I were all born in the Sunshine Hospital.

 

More stories from Citrus Bob Utber can be read Here.

 

 

 

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