Jack Saunders, the left-arm spin bowler from Victoria, took 123 first-class wickets at 16.95 on the 1902 tour of England — bowling alongside Hugh Trumble in the side that won the Ashes 2-1. Saunders bowled the last ball of Fred Tate's Test at Old Trafford and was Australia's leading wicket-taker on the tour after Trumble.
Saunders began his career with the Victorian Sheffield Shield side in 1899. He was a left-arm slow-medium bowler relying on flight, drift and turn, with a slightly questionable arm action that was a recurrent topic of newspaper comment but never formally called.
He earned his living outside cricket and was rarely available for full domestic seasons.
Joe Darling's 1902 tour of England was one of the strongest Australian touring sides ever assembled. Trumper, Hill, Noble, Trumble, Armstrong and Saunders were all in form. The tour produced two Ashes wins (Sheffield and Old Trafford) and the famous draw at Old Trafford in which Saunders' fourth ball settled the result.
John Victor Saunders, born in Melbourne in 1876, was Australia's premier left-arm spinner of the early 1900s. He played 14 Tests between 1902 and 1908 and took 79 wickets at 22.73. His action was unorthodox — he bowled with what some umpires considered a bent arm — and his career was clouded by occasional no-ball calls for throwing. But his results, especially in 1902, were beyond dispute.
On the 1902 tour of England, Saunders was Joe Darling's first-choice spinner alongside the off-spinner Hugh Trumble. He took 123 first-class wickets at 16.95, with five-or-more in an innings 10 times. In the Ashes Tests he took 18 wickets, including the wicket of Fred Tate to win the fourth Test at Old Trafford by three runs. (Tate played one ball, missed a swipe at the second, edged the third for four, and was bowled by Saunders' fourth.)
Saunders was no less effective abroad. In the 1902-03 South Africa Tests immediately after the English tour, he took 7 for 34 in the Johannesburg Test, bowling unchanged through South Africa's innings of 83. He toured England again in 1905 (124 wickets at 18.30) but his Test career fizzled afterwards. Domestic earnings limited the time he could spend on cricket; he played his last Test in 1908. He died in 1927, aged 51.
1902 tour of England: 123 first-class wickets at 16.95.
Old Trafford Ashes Test: bowls Fred Tate to win by 3 runs.
5 wickets in an innings 10 times on tour.
1902-03 v South Africa, Johannesburg: 7/34 unchanged spell.
1905 tour of England: 124 wickets at 18.30.
1908: last Test (v England at Sydney).
Career Test record: 79 wickets at 22.73 in 14 matches.
21 Mar 1876
Saunders born in Melbourne.
1899
Sheffield Shield debut for Victoria.
1902
Test debut and tour of England — 123 first-class wickets.
26 July 1902
Bowls Fred Tate to win Old Trafford by 3 runs.
Oct 1902
7/34 v South Africa at Johannesburg.
1905
Second tour of England — 124 first-class wickets.
1908
Last Test, v England at Sydney.
21 Dec 1927
Dies in Toorak, Melbourne, aged 51.
“Saunders bowled with marked success throughout the season.”
Saunders did not tour England again after 1905. He continued in Sheffield Shield cricket sporadically until 1909-10. The questionable arm action was never tested formally, but the suspicion may have limited his selection in later years.
His 1908 Test was Australia's fifth Ashes Test of that series at Sydney; he took two wickets and was not picked again. He died of cancer in 1927, aged 51.
A bowler whose career deserved more recognition than it received. The 1902 tour of England, where he played alongside Trumble in the strongest Australian bowling combination of the era, was his defining season; his 123 wickets at under 17 each were the foundation of Australia's series win.
Saunders is one of those Edwardian Australian cricketers whose Test record looks modest but whose contribution was structural — he was Australia's left-arm spinner of choice for the better part of a decade, paired with Trumble in 1902 in arguably the strongest Test attack ever assembled to that date.
The Old Trafford 1902 ball that bowled Tate is preserved in the MCG museum; Saunders' name is on the honours board for the Johannesburg innings of 1902-03.
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.