COMMENTATORJim MaxwellSpecial Guest Interviewer

TEST MATCH LUNCHEONwith special guest

Ricky Ponting AO former Australian Cricket Captain

One of the most successful cricketers of all time. Recently retired from international cricket, Ricky continues to enjoy the game. Awarded the “Sheffield Shield Player of the Year” for the 2012/13 Australian summer, winter 2013 sees Ricky captaining Mumbai Indians and the Surrey County Cricket Club as well as playing in the inaugural season of the Caribbean Premier League.

Off the field, Ricky and his wife Rianna have raised in excess of $10 million since 2002 to help young Australians and their families beat cancer. In 2008 Ricky and Rianna established the Ponting Foundation to provide focus to their fundraising efforts.

Ricky’s philanthropic efforts and sporting achievements were recognised when Ricky was awarded an Order of Australia honour in 2012.

SPECIAL GUESTJohn RutherfordFirst WA Test Match Cricketer

51AGENDA thewest.com.auApril 6-7, 2013

But for a serious chipon his shoulder — ofhis favourite bat, thatis — John Rutherfordmay not have livedlong enough tobecome WA’s first Test

cricketer.Perched on the veranda of his

Lancelin home and proudlywearing the famous baggy greencap that he earned in 1956,Rutherford takes keen delight inrecalling the day his flashing bladesaved his life. The tale of legendaryEnglish fast bowler Frank“Typhoon” Tyson pawing at theWACA Ground’s outfield turf beforethundering in towards him in 1954still rolls vividly from his tongue.

“He whacked it down at off stumpat a million miles an hour and itleapt straight at my heart,”Rutherford recalled.

“I pulled the bat up and it hit theinside edge, knocking a big chunkoff. The ball flew up and I wantedsomeone to catch the thing becauseI was still alive and I’d had enough.

“Tyson was bloody quick, I cantell you. If it hadn’t hit the bat, Icould have finished my career thereand then . . . cactus.”

With a new Ashes series startingin July, Rutherford this week tookAgenda on a whirling overseas ridealongside legendary cricketerssuch as Sir Donald Bradman, KeithMiller, Neil Harvey, Ray Lindwalland Richie Benaud, that includedhis one and only Test appearance inBombay in 1956.

The former WA openingbatsman, who suffered alife-threatening bout of tonsillitiswhen he was just three and morerecently had his right kneereplaced, opened the inningsalongside past great Jim Burke inthe second Test.

He overcame a stomach illness tomake 30 runs and took his only Testwicket by bowling Indian star VijayManjrekar.

Rutherford, clad in his whitesand with crisp white socks pulledup tightly, happily re-enacts some ofhis favourite batting shots andfootwork on request in a beachfrontsetting with small garden lizardsscurrying around his woodenveranda.

The son of wheat, sheep and pigfarmers from the outskirts of BruceRock, he is the most famousproduct of the Bungullaping schoolwhich he said had only one teacher,the same one for the 27 years of itseducating existence.

His younger brother Malcolmstill lives on the farm where theircricket fanatic father Jock wouldonce bowl at them to help honetheir childhood batting skills.

Not that it helped much backthen.

In his first match, playing in ateam of schoolmates against aBruce Rock outfit in the smallWheatbelt town of Kumminin,Rutherford returned the modestscores of 0 and 2 in his two innings.

The game had cleverly invitedthose involved to “Come on out toKumminin”. But it was when hewent to high school in Northam

that his prowess in the game beganto flourish . . . as did romance.

“I got very friendly with a girl,she was the head girl of NorthamSenior High School,” he explainedof his now late wife, Bethanie.

“She wrote the best papers inFrench and German in WA. Shewon an exhibition to go touniversity (UWA) so I thought I’dbetter go down there and keep aneye on her or some bastard willgrab her.”

He and his wife, who was anaccomplished pianist, and theirthree children all earned UWAdegrees. One of them, daughterSharnee, is now the town doctor inLancelin.

Rutherford forced his way intoconsideration for the Australianteam with centuries in his only twoSheffield Shield innings for the1955-56 season, both against SouthAustralia. It earned him an invitein the Test team trial in Sydney,where he smashed around some ofthe nation’s best bowlers for 113runs.

He built a strong claim for hisinclusion by also denying Harvey acentury in dismissing him for 96

and catching out rival opener SidCarroll for 2. But few in the eastcoast-centric group had any ideawho he was and none, apart fromone man, offered him any sort ofwarmth in their welcome.

One official had told him therewere 40 better openers than him inVictoria alone and simply told himto “just eat the crumbs that fallfrom the master’s table”.

“Some people have asked mewhat it was like getting in theAustralian XI . . . it was just a joke,”he said.

“I went to Sydney and there wasno bastard to meet me. So I got mypads and bat and my gloves andwhat have you and got a taxi to theSydney Cricket Ground.

“There they were all practisingand there was this guy with a padwriting names down. He said,‘What’s your name?’ I said, ‘Myname’s John Rutherford’.

“He told me to have a greatmatch. The fella, his name was SirDonald George Bradman.”

It had been Bradman who helped

stoke Rutherford’s cricketingpassion as a child as he listened viashort-wave radio headphones to theAustralian game’s icon dishing outswashbuckling performancesagainst the world’s best bowlers ofthe time.

To have then become a cricketacquaintance had been bothhumbling and memorable.

“During the tour, he would oftencome out and hit catches to us forpractice,” he said.

“People have a go at Bradmansaying he was this or that, but it’sall bullshit. I remember him as anabsolute gentleman and a fatherfigure.”

Bradman had also been part ofthe 1956 Ashes touring party thattravelled by boat to England to play33 matches, 30 of them affected byrain. But the partying spirit on thethree-week sea trip alongside about1000 public travellers was anythingbut damp.

“Occasionally, some of the otherfellas would mooch off to one of thecabins,” he recalled. “It was a lot offun, but not as much for me.”

He explained further byrevisiting his anxious moment atthe end of the trip when his wifeunpacked his bags and found thepacket of condoms his teammateshad given him as a gesture tocelebrate his birthday, which fellduring the tour. “One was missing,”

he said with a glint in his eye. “Shesaid to me, ‘There’s one been takenout here, John, did you really useit?’ I told her that if I had, shewouldn’t have found it.”

The Ashes series was dominatedby English spinner Jim Laker, whotook a record 19 of the 20 Australianwickets in the fourth Test at OldTrafford. In a later tour match,Laker also dismissed Rutherford,who had been surprised at theraucous English cheers at hisdemise until he realised his hadbeen the only scalp in theAustralian touring party that thebowler had not claimed.

Rutherford tells rollicking yarnsof the playboy-like Miller from bothon and off the field, including anintimate date with a Sydney modeljust an hour before one of theEngland tour matches and hislong-speculated dalliance withPrincess Margaret.

It often seemed he knew justabout everyone in England as hegreeted trails of people in the streetand it was not only his cricketingbrilliance which smacked of raretalent.

“Miller was fantastic in regardsto classical music — what he didn’tknow about it wasn’t worthknowing,” Rutherford said.

“On the ship, the doctor wouldput one of his records on and youhad to say who was the orchestra,who conducted the orchestra andwhere it was played and what haveyou. Most of us got about two rightout of 10, Miller would get eight.”

Rutherford said Benaud had stillbeen learning his cricket craft onthat 1956 tour.

Now regarded widely as a doyenof the Australian game andsomething of a moral guardian, hesaid Benaud’s image was notalways so squeaky clean.

“The best example I can give youis when we were in India and wehad to go out to a special function,”he said.

“We all went except for Benaudand Harvey, who went to anightclub. It was like a catch thenext plane home thing to do, butthey got away with it. So whenBenaud became captain, he wasawake to all these things becausehe’d done them all himself.

“He was a lad, too.”

A real Ashes tour de force

(Frank) Tyson wasbloody quick, Ican tell you.

Batting stance: John Rutherfordplayed just one Test for Australia.

Beers all round: John Rutherford, front left, celebrates his testimonial with ayoung Richie Benaud, fourth from left, and teammates.

� Steve Butler

The Ashes arecoming and at 83not out, formerstar WA batsmanJohn Rutherfordwill be watching

Baggy green: John Rutherford was awarded his cap in 1956 when he playeda Test against India, returning from an Ashes tour of Britain. Picture: Nic Ellis

ROADS 2000 MONO on BLACK background

ROADS 2000 BLACK & WHITE on RED background

ROADS 2000 BLACK, WHITE & RED on BLACK background

Benefactors of luncheon: Wanneroo Cricket Club and the Wanneroo Junior Rugby Club

Table for 10 - $2250 Phone: 0419 197 658 Email: testmatchlunch@westnet.com.au

Thursday December 12th Hyatt Regency Perth

12:15 for 12:30 start

MENU: Entrée - Pan seared sea scallops, dehydrated pineapple crisp, butternut squash puree, sweet raisin vinaigretteMain - Rib beef medallion, cider jus, crushed sweet potato, feta cheese, pancetta wafer, zucchini. Cheese platters. Wines - Lost Lakes. Beer - Carlton Dry & Hahn Super Dry.

MASTER OF CEREMONIES Steve Butler The West Australian