The Ashes Legends: Stan McCabe - An Australian hero

The Ashes urn

The next morning, as wickets tumbled around him, Stan launched a blistering attack on the English bowlers, particularly on fast bowler Ken Farnes and rival captain Wally Hammond. At 194/6, with all specialist batsmen back in the hut and wicket-keeper Ben Barnett for company, McCabe took the English attack head-on as he unleashed powerful drives and his signature hook shots. Farnes was smashed for 18 in one over – McCabe slamming three boundaries before hooking the bowler for six, forcing Hammond to pull his pacer out of the attack.

Having reached his century, the stocky McCabe accelerated hard, scoring his last 132 runs in 95 minutes (including 44 runs off a three-over spell from leg spinner Doug Wright). He finally fell for a well-made 232 in 235 minutes, with 34 boundaries and a six, an innings that saved the game for Australia.

That innings at Trent Bridge prompted Bradman to instruct his players to witness every ball, as they would never see anything like it again. Upon McCabe’s return to the dressing room, the Don stated: “If I could play an innings like that, I’d be a proud man, Stan“.

English captains Arthur Gilligan and Bob Wyatt regarded Stan’s innings as the best that they had ever witnessed. The inimitable Neville Cardus praised it as one of the greatest innings in Test history. Cardus likened McCabe as being in the same mould as former Australian great Victor Trumper, noting that McCabe “has inherited Trumper’s sword and cloak“.

Sadly for Australia, McCabe’s journey at the Test level ended with that tour – hampered as he was by chronic foot injuries and the onset of the second World War. All three of his greatest knocks – he hammered 189 at Johannesburg on the SA tour in 1935-36 – never resulted in an Australian victory.

Compatriot Clarrie Grimmett rated him as being technically superior to Bradman, while McCabe’s fellow New South Welshman Bill Brown regarded him as the finest stroke-player ever. For cricket lovers around the world, McCabe was someone who could demolish any attack on his day – perhaps a precursor to the arrival of future international stars such as Adam Gilchrist and Ricky Ponting.

He may not have achieved the kind of greatness and adulation accorded to the Don, but his two special scores in the Ashes remain testament to the skill of a man who was urbane, sociable, unpretentious and straightforward. He remains one of the select few Australians to have never been dropped from the Test team in his entire career, and was one of the first among his squad to take the attack to the bowlers during the Bodyline series.

In the annals of Ashes and Test cricket history, Stanley Joseph McCabe will remain etched in glittering letters until the end of time.For me, he is truly the epitome of grit and grace.