The Captains : THE STORY BEHIND AUSTRALIA’S SECOND MOST IMPORTANT JOB by Malcolm Knox ISBN 9781742735573, 1742735576 instant download

The Captains : THE STORY BEHIND AUSTRALIA’S SECOND MOST IMPORTANT JOB by Malcolm Knox ISBN 9781742735573, 1742735576 instant download

This book is not an attempt to reheat Robinson, which has in any case been done by Roland Perry, in his 2000 book Captain Australia. For the early captains, reliance on similar sources has produced similar profiles; with recent captains, an over-abundance of sources has, paradoxically, resulted in a similar narrowing effect.
Though it was peerless in composing pictures by the use of the telling anecdote, what On Top Down Under never did was knit the pen-portraits into a narrative of the game in Australia. Robinson depicted each captain in isolation, with the significant events of cricket history as their background.
There is also, in Robinson’s approach, an unavoidable chronological toing and froing. When Bill Lawry was sacked in 1971, the book left the cliffhanger behind, to tell the life story of Barry Jarman – Lawry’s replacement for one Test in 1968 – before returning to 1971 and Ian Chappell. The format forced the story to a jarring halt.
The object of this book is to put the story of Australian cricket first, and tell it through the prism of the captaincy: the office and the men who have occupied it. This approach tries to enjoin Sir Donald Bradman’s words that the captains, like all players, have been stewards of a greater history.