Hugh Trumble took 7 for 28 in his last Test innings, including a hat-trick of Bosanquet, Plum Warner and Dick Lilley, as Australia beat England by 218 runs at the MCG in March 1904. The hat-trick was Trumble's second in Tests (the first being against England at the same ground in 1902); he was the first man to take two Test hat-tricks. Australia won the dead rubber but lost the series 3-2.
Trumble had been Australia's premier bowler since the early 1890s. A tall (6 ft 5 in) off-spinner with a high action, he relied on flight, length and the late drift the matting wickets at home and the wet wickets in England both gave him. His first hat-trick had come at Melbourne in January 1902 against the same opposition (Bobby Abel, John Gunn, Archie MacLaren).
By March 1904 he was 36 and had already announced retirement. His banking career and family obligations had taken precedence; only the urging of Joe Darling and Monty Noble persuaded him to play the home Ashes.
Australia had lost the first Test (Foster's 287), the second (Bosanquet), and the fourth (Bosanquet 6/51). The fifth Test at Melbourne was a dead rubber for the series but a live one for Trumble's farewell.
Hugh Trumble's Test career had been extraordinary — 141 wickets at 21.78 across 32 matches between 1890 and 1904 — and he had announced his retirement before the 1903-04 series began. He came out of his planned retirement at the urging of teammates and the Australian board to play the home Ashes.
The series was lost (England won 3-2 thanks to Foster, Bosanquet and Hirst) but Trumble's last Test, the fifth at Melbourne in March 1904, was his finest. England, batting first, made 247. Australia replied with 247. England in the second innings collapsed to 101 all out, with Trumble taking 7 for 28 in 21 overs. The middle of his spell included a hat-trick: Bernard Bosanquet caught at slip, Plum Warner caught behind, and Dick Lilley bowled. It was Trumble's second Test hat-trick (he had taken one against England at the same ground in January 1902).
Australia knocked off the 102 required for a 218-run win. The match concluded Trumble's Test career and confirmed his place as the leading wicket-taker in Test history at the time of his retirement — a record he held until Sydney Barnes passed it in 1913. Trumble retired to his banking career with the National Bank of Australasia, became long-serving secretary of the Melbourne Cricket Club, and died in 1938.
England 247 in first innings (Trumble 5/34).
Australia 247 in reply.
England's second innings: 101 all out.
Trumble: 21-7-28-7.
Hat-trick: Bosanquet (caught slip), Warner (caught behind), Lilley (bowled).
Australia knock off 102 to win by 218 runs.
Trumble retires from Test cricket — 141 wickets at 21.78 in 32 Tests.
Wisden hails his farewell as cricket's greatest.
1890
Trumble's Test debut — first of 32 Tests.
Jan 1902
First Test hat-trick — v England at Melbourne.
1903
Trumble announces planned retirement.
Late 1903
Persuaded to play the home Ashes by Darling and Noble.
March 1904
5th Test, Melbourne — Trumble 7/28 with hat-trick.
End of match
Trumble retires; 141 Test wickets at 21.78 — world record.
1913
Barnes passes Trumble's wicket-taking record.
14 Aug 1938
Trumble dies in Melbourne, aged 70.
“The most dramatic and memorable farewell performance ever by a bowler.”
Trumble's record of 141 Test wickets stood as the world record until Sydney Barnes passed it in 1913. He continued to live in Melbourne, working at the National Bank and (from 1911) as secretary of the MCC, the powerful Melbourne Cricket Club. He died in 1938 aged 70.
The hat-trick is one of only four pairs of Test hat-tricks taken by the same bowler (with TJ Matthews, Jimmy Matthews having two in the same Test in 1912). In 1904 Trumble was the first to do it in any form.
A farewell of cinematic perfection. The hat-trick on his home ground in his last Test, the seven-wicket haul, the win — Wisden called it 'the most dramatic and memorable farewell performance ever by a bowler', a verdict not seriously challenged in the 120 years since.
Trumble is one of only a handful of bowlers to retire from Test cricket as the leading wicket-taker — only Charlie Turner before him and Sydney Barnes (in 1914) match the description in cricket's first 50 years. His off-spin technique, with high action and flight, remained the model for spin bowling until the war.
The MCG records his hat-trick on the honours board; the Hugh Trumble Stand was named for him in 1936.
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.