A SWANS GREAT
Peter Bedford won the 1970 Brownlow Medal. He played 178 games for the old South Melbourne (now Sydney Swans), won their Best and Fairest five times and was captain for four seasons.
He was also a brilliant cricketer who represented Victoria and managed to combine the two major sports, something that cannot be done in these times. One of more than a hundred Parade College students to play VFL/AFL football Peter loved cricket more than football and would have loved to have represented Australia in the summer game. A quiet, unassuming person Peter is a legend of the Swans and of the school (Parade) to which he says he owes much.
The sports centre at the Bundoora College bears his name in tribute. Peter is pictured with his extended family in front of the centre.
Longtime Kilmore resident Lance Phillips, himself a proud Old Paradian is a great admirer of Peter Bedford.
CRICKET NEEDS HIM
The coming summer is one of the most critical in the long history of the Australian game. India will be here for five tests. They defeated us in their past two series in this country and it looks as if George Bailey and his co-selectors will trot out pretty much the same ageing players to confront the strong Indian side. Cricket interest has been strong. Often huge across the near century and a half of the first-class game in Australia, but it has waned over the past few years, particularly since the ‘sandpaper affair’ in South Africa in 2017. The sport is bleeding clubs and players across regional Australia and thousands of youngsters have turned to other sports. Where once there were cricket nets or a pitch on virtually every school ground, today they are a rarity. Young kids and teens need youthful heroes to ignite their interest and a ‘Dad’s Army’ test side does not inspire them. Brave selectors would insist on an emerging talent like Jake Fraser McGurk (pictured) into the current XI. Good judges such as Ricky Ponting and Ian Chappell are in his corner and say he is as good as David Warner at the same age. It’s crucial that the once conservative England now blood exciting young talent while Australia has become the ‘no risk’ country. This approach is stifling intent and damaging future prospects. The facts are there in front of us. Victoria has not produced a decent test bat since the late, great Dean Jones. NSW hasn’t produced one for a decade and a half since Warner and Smith first appeared on the scene. In both states, middle aged (30’s) ordinary performers seem to be preferred.
Half a century ago, when this nation’s population was half of today’s, these Aussies were watched by 300,000 people in an Ashes clash at the MCG.
DEVASTATING BLOW
In recent years the placing of white ball internationals behind a paywall (subscription tv) has cost the game dearly in vital areas especially in growing interest in the game at youth levels. Administrators, captain and coach of Australia and selectors need to urgently consider the games standing in a crowded summer sports marketplace an take decisive action to ensure the future is guaranteed. The legends of Australian cricket – from Charlie Bannerman in 1877 via Trumper, Ponsford, Woodfull, McCabe, O’Reilly, Bradman, Harvey, Miller, the Chappell’s, Lillee, Ponting, Warne and so many other deserve no less.
VARIA
The runs have kept coming for Broadford cricketer Gareth Sharp in his northern summer with a Hampshire League club. His dad Greg, a very good cricketer and footballer in his time, is happy his son is doing well. A friend and team-mate of Gareth in the UK is a grandson of the late Lancashire and England player Jack Ikin. The profile of the latter describes him as a fine man with Hollywood good looks. A LH bat and RH spinner, Jack Ikin made 18,000 wins and took 339 wickets for the Red Rose County, Lancashire. Like so many of his time, World War II took six years of his prime. He played 18 tests for England, touring Australia in 1946–47 and playing against Bradman’s Invincibles in 1948. During his career he hit 27 hundreds and 108 fifties. Jack was born and died in the same Staffordshire Village.
CROWD PULLERS
Taylor Swift can sure draw the crowds and so too can Pope Francis, head of the worlds Catholics. His recent whirlwind trip to Southeast Asia saw massive crowds lining the streets and attending mass in Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Singapore. In Dili (East Timor), more than three quarters of a million flocked to the open-air mass. Even in Muslim Indonesia the crowds were enormous, and it was good to see heads of the Muslim faith greet the Pope so warmly. There were no protests. He’d probably have to come to Melbourne for the rent-a-crowd mobs to turn out.
