Across the five Tests of the 1894-95 Ashes, George Giffen — Australia's captain, opening bowler and number-three batsman — scored 475 runs at 52.78 and took 34 wickets at 24.12. The combined haul is still, 130 years later, the best all-round performance in any Test series in cricket history. Australia lost the rubber 2-3, but Giffen's series average has never been matched.
Giffen had been part of Australia's first Test sides in the 1880s but had never captained a full series. The 1894-95 Ashes was his moment: he was 35, fully matured as an off-spinner who could open with medium pace, and a calm if undemonstrative leader. Australia held the Ashes from the previous home series.
Giffen won the toss in three of the five Tests, two of which Australia lost. He bowled himself extensively — averaging 60 overs a Test — and batted top three in every innings.
Giffen, then 35 and Adelaide-born, was Australia's first true cricketing all-rounder. He had captained South Australia for a decade and was the first man to score 10,000 first-class runs and take 500 first-class wickets in Australian cricket. The 1894-95 Ashes was the only series in which he led his country across a full schedule.
His output across the five Tests reads: bat 161, 41, 32*, 25, 78, 71, 82, 0, 24, 7, 51 — five fifties, one hundred. Bowling: 4/75 and 4/164 at Sydney; 6/155 and 2/72 at Melbourne; 3/65 and 5/76 at Adelaide; 1/47 and 0/40 at Sydney; 4/130 and 4/164 at Melbourne. His 161 in the First Test at Sydney was, with Syd Gregory's 201, the platform for Australia's record 586 — a total only beaten by themselves.
The Giffen all-round series mark of 475 + 34 has never been seriously challenged. The next best is Aubrey Faulkner (1910-11, 732 runs and 16 wickets) and, by another measure, Ian Botham at Headingley 1981 (399 runs and 34 wickets in six Tests). Giffen's average across the series, when calculated by the standard runs-per-wicket method, comes out at 28.66 — better than Bradman's series average against bowlers across his career.
First Test Sydney: 161 + 4/75 + 4/164; Australia lose by 10.
Second Test Melbourne: 32* + 43 + 6/155 + 2/72; Australia lose by 94.
Third Test Adelaide: 58 + 24 + 3/65 + 5/76; Australia win by 382.
Fourth Test Sydney: 0 + 24 + 1/47; Australia win by an innings.
Fifth Test Melbourne: 57 + 51 + 4/130 + 4/164; Australia lose by 6 wickets.
Series totals: 475 runs at 52.78, 34 wickets at 24.12.
Still the best all-round individual performance in any Test series.
Dec 1894
Sydney: 161 + 8 wickets; Australia lose by 10.
Dec 1894
Melbourne: 75 runs + 8 wickets; Australia lose.
Jan 1895
Adelaide: 82 runs + 8 wickets; Australia win.
Feb 1895
Sydney: Australia win by an innings.
Mar 1895
Melbourne decider; Australia lose; series 2-3.
“Giffen was Australia.”
Giffen captained South Australia for many more years but did not lead Australia again. He played his last Test in 1896 in England. His brother Walter also played Test cricket. George never married and lived in modest circumstances in Adelaide, working as a postal clerk; the South Australian Cricket Association eventually granted him a small pension.
The most complete individual Test series ever played: 475 runs at 52, 34 wickets at 24, captain of a nation that nearly won. No one has matched the combined load.
Giffen's 475/34 mark is the most-cited all-round series record in cricket. The Bradman Foundation has called it 'the high water mark of all-round Test cricket.' Aubrey Faulkner's 1910-11 series, Bobby Simpson's 1977-78, Imran Khan's 1982-83 and Ian Botham's 1981 have come close on one axis or the other, but none has matched Giffen on both.
Yorkshire v Essex
1932-06-16
On 15-16 June 1932 Herbert Sutcliffe (313) and Percy Holmes (224*) put on 555 for the first wicket against Essex at Leyton, breaking the world first-class record for any wicket and adding a layer of folklore — including a scoreboard that read 554 for several minutes and a hastily reversed declaration — that has clung to the partnership ever since.
Australia v England
1933-02-14
With the fate of the Bodyline series in the balance and England 216 for 6 chasing 340, Eddie Paynter checked himself out of a Brisbane hospital where he was being treated for acute tonsillitis, taxied to the Gabba in pyjamas and a dressing gown, and batted for nearly four hours to score 83. England drew level on first innings, won the Test by six wickets and the series 4-1.
Australia
1934-09-25
Days after the 1934 Oval Test, Bradman fell seriously ill with appendicitis that progressed to peritonitis. With antibiotics not yet available, he was given little chance of survival; his wife Jessie left Adelaide on a sea voyage to England prepared for the worst. He recovered after weeks of intensive nursing in a London nursing home and returned to first-class cricket the following Australian summer.