Sir Donald Bradman, 92, Cricket Legend, Dies - The New York Times The New York Times Sports |Sir Donald Bradman, 92, Cricket Legend, Dies Search Sir Donald Bradman, 92, Cricket Legend, Dies By JOHN SHAW Continue reading the main story Sir Donald Bradman, rated the greatest player in the history of cricket, died Sunday at age 92, sending his native Australia and the sport's followers around the world into mourning. He had not played for 50 years, but his fame endured among millions of fans who have seen him only in flickering film clips from black-and-white newsreels. Among them is the former South African President Nelson Mandela, whose first question to an Australian visitor on his release from 27 years of imprisonment in 1990 was, ''Is Sir Donald Bradman still alive?'' In a career from 1928 to 1948, playing against British Commonwealth national teams, Bradman's winning scores, and rare failures, interrupted news broadcasts in Australia, made banner headlines, delayed business and government meetings and set spectators and experts searching for words of praise worthy of his skills.

So it was for his death, especially in other cricket strongholds like India, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and the Caribbean. The Australian Parliament suspended debate yesterday to hear eulogies. Arrangements for state memorial ceremonies began, and flags were lowered in hamlets and suburbs across the Australian continent. Call-in radio programs were flooded with anecdotes from admirers, including high school students who received some of the thousands of autographs Bradman mailed each year to well-wishers. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Australia idolized Bradman as a hero. In the 1930's, with the country in deep economic depression and still grieving for 60,000 killed in World War I, Bradman's achievements were a cause for national pride. On Monday, Prime Minister John Howard, a cricket lover who visited Sir Donald a few days before he died of pneumonia in Adelaide, South Australia, said: ''He had a great impact on Australian life, especially during the desperate years of the Depression.

His prowess on the cricket field lifted the hopes and spirits of the people, who at times felt they had little else.'' Bradman, who at 5 feet 7 inches was a wiry man with powerful forearms and a dancer's light, swift footwork, was self-taught. He was a batting champion in high school at 12 and on the national team at 20, subsequently recording scores and averages in 52 international games not previously achieved in almost a century of world cricket or in the half-century since his last innings, in London in 1948. King George VI knighted him in 1949 for services to cricket. Mathematical analysis of Bradman's achievements against other major sports stars support his singularity: he dominated his sport by margins greater than those achieved by other champions. Among world cricketers, Bradman had a career average of 99.94 runs per innings, a level 30 runs higher than that of his nearest rival even today. Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to.

Sign Up Privacy Policy In a recent book, ''The Best of the Best,'' Charles Davis, a Melbourne sports statistician, rated stars from different sports by measuring champions who were so far ahead of their rivals that they were in a class of their own, then comparing these margins. By Mr. Davis's calculations, Bradman led the order of career-long achievement with a 4.4 rating, followed by soccer's Pelé (3.7), baseball's Ty Cobb (3.6), golf's Jack Nicklaus (3.5), basketball's Michael Jordan (3.4) and football's Joe Montana (3.1). Mr. Davis calculated that for Cobb to have matched Bradman in dominance, he would have required a career batting average of .392. Cobb's career average was .366. He says that to achieve the superiority level of Bradman, Nicklaus would have needed 25 major golf titles (he won 18), and Jordan would have needed to average 43 points a game (he averaged 32). Advertisement Continue reading the main story Donald George Bradman was born Aug.

27, 1908, in Cootamundra, 250 miles southwest of Sydney, and grew up at Bowral, another rural settlement. In 1989 he allowed a small museum to be established there alongside the cricket field to record his career. An intensely private man who declined all endorsement offers and worked as a stockbroker in retirement, Sir Donald approved the exhibition, now a tourist favorite, in order to raise money for disabled children and junior cricket teams. He married Jessie Menzies, a childhood sweetheart, in 1932. She died in 1997. Their children, John and Shirley, survive him, as do three grandchildren. Bradman's prowess was obvious even to Americans. In 1932, when Bradman was in his prime, John Kieran wrote in The New York Times: ''Babe Ruth once knocked 60 home runs in a season. What's that to Daring Don Bradman, the ring-tailed wallaby of the cricket crease!

He scored 452 runs (not out) in an afternoon.'' The article continued, ''He simply keeps hitting and running until some sensible person in the stands suggests a spot of tea.'' Cricket great Don Bradman’s green blazer scores ton at auction | Sport | The Guardian Cricket great Don Bradman’s green blazer scores ton at auction Green jacket worn by former cricketer during his first Test series as Australian captain sells for $100,000 The first blazer Don Bradman wore as captain reached $100,000 at auction, well above the $70,000 estimate. Photograph: Tracey Nearmy/AAP Australian Associated Press Monday 7 September 2015 03.14 EDT Last modified on Wednesday 26 October 2016 19.07 EDT Close This article is 1 year old Its owner hit many centuries for Australia and now Don Bradman’s blazer has scored its own ton.

The green jacket worn by Bradman during his first Test series as Australian captain, against England in 1936-37, has sold at auction in Melbourne for a hammer price of $100,000, well above the $70,000 estimate. When the buyer’s premium and GST is added, the anonymous collector paid $132,000. 20 great Ashes moments No16: Don Bradman's 334 at Headingley, 1930 | John Ashdown Read more The woollen blazer, with gold piping and a coat of arms on the breast, is embroidered “D.G. Bradman”. “This is the first [Bradman] blazer we’ve had up for auction, which is possibly why it sold so well,” auctioneer Max Williamson said after Monday’s auction. “It went beyond our expectations ... we’re still shaking.” There were two active bidders, one by phone. Bidding opened at $50,000. It was sold to the bidder in the room. Williamson said he could understand the blazer’s appeal because it was tailored for Bradman and revealed his diminutive stature.

“You don’t get that from a bat or a cap but the blazer, everyone who looks at it says ‘boy I’ve got a son who is 14 and is bigger than that’,” he said. “It is shocking to realise how small he was.” Bradman, who was 170cm tall, had the blazer made for him by Sydney department store Farmers. He donated it in 1974 to be sold as part of a charity auction. Shattering the Bradman myth | The New Daily • ‘Scabrous attack’ on Bradman A more fitting testimony to The Don’s greatness, however, was the way Michael Clarke’s Australian team clean-swept the Poms in the recent Ashes Test series. It was cricket the Bradman way: clinical, ruthless, and detached with a touch of the school bully about it. Simply, there is not much about Bradman that was great, or deserving of the adulation heaped upon him. Bradman would not have stooped so low as to threaten to break a tail-ender’s arm. He was too shrewd for that. But he loved nothing more than intimidating and dominating the opposition.

Like Clarke, he loved to make runs and frighten opposition batsmen with a bit of ‘chin-music’. Clarke has Johnson, but Bradman had Lindwall and Miller whom, with great relish, he unleashed on the Poms after the War. As England’s 1948 captain Norman Yardley suggested, Bradman was not the nicest opponent. He was unrelentingly tough and not above gamesmanship or letting loose a bumper barrage from his quicks. But he was the greatest batsman of all time. His Test average of 99.94 far exceeds all others. It is one of the most recognisable numbers in Australian history. The national broadcaster, the ABC, even used it for its post office box. Don Bradman at the crease, NSW, 1932. Photo courtesy of State Library of New South Wales. When you dig for greatness in The Don, you keep coming back to that number. Simply, there is not much about Bradman that was great, or deserving of the adulation heaped upon him. Myth would have it that Bradman was a lonely but gifted kid, good with numbers and better with the bat.

Other than his mum and future wife, Jessie, his only childhood mates seem to have been the stump, the golf ball and the tank stand. In reality, Bradman was more comfortable with adults who indulged him. He chose to have few childhood mates of his own age. Whether or not Bradman was in the autism spectrum is open for debate. He certainly lacked empathy and had a near obsessional ability to concentrate intensely for long periods on repetitious tasks. He learned early that his uncommon batting ability could advance his job prospects. By his mid-teens he was managing Percy Westbook’s Bowral real estate office. By 19 he was a shareholder in a Sydney property development company. In the interim he had scored headline-grabbing mountains of runs for Bowral, Sydney club St George and New South Wales. Myth has it that Bradman left the real estate game because the Sydney property venture went broke. The fact is he threw it in for cricket. The venture was still going when Bradman was piling on the runs against the Poms in 1930. A feature of the Bradman personality seen early was an intense acquisitiveness.

Cricket enabled him to climb the social ladder and accumulate more money than by selling industrial sites for housing on Sydney’s outskirts. From the 1930 tour he obtained over ₤1600 from endorsements, publishing contracts, and a hefty gift from a wealthy Australian admirer. On returning to Australia, he left the team in Perth and set off on a promotional romp for his sporting goods employer, Mick Simmons, and General Motors. Again, he was showered with money and gifts, including a new Chevrolet Roadstar car. He was never one of the boys. Instead, he had an obsessional self-regard which made him unpopular with many of his teammates. Cricket was a means to an end, and he used it to secure employment, which caused problems with Australian cricket’s governing body, the Board of Control. Ahead of his time In many respects Bradman was more a sportsman of our age than his. He realised there was more money in journalism and radio commentary than cricket. But the Board had strict controls on players writing for papers during tours, which Bradman breached during the 1930 series.

When fined by the Board, Bradman threatened to take his services to the lucrative Lancashire League, and he threatened to withdraw from the 1932-33 Bodyline series. The matter was only resolved when Associated Newspapers released Bradman from his contract to write a column for the Sydney Sun. He used this ploy often. It got him a job as a clerk with the Adelaide stockbroker and Board of Control member, Harry Hodgetts. According to myth, Bradman joined Hodgetts to learn the stockbroking game. In reality, Bradman’s job was cricket. Most of his wage was not paid by Hodgetts, but by the South Australian Cricket Association. Myth also has it that Bradman was the greatest destroyer of bowling the game has ever seen. In reality, he was its most ruthless destroyer of ordinary bowling. Bradman was a part-time stockbroker’s clerk and full-time professional cricketer. In a world that still celebrated sport for the love it, Bradman was a ‘shamateur’. Myth also has it that Bradman was the greatest destroyer of bowling the game has ever seen.

In reality, he was its most ruthless destroyer of ordinary bowling and may have struggled against the great West Indian attacks of the 1980s. When the going got tough, Bradman often got out. It could be argued that his contemporaries, the Englishmen Jack Hobbs and Herbert Sutcliffe were better all-wicket batsmen, and Bradman had little liking for the fast leg theory of Harold Larwood. On a sticky Oval wicket Larwood had struck Bradman in the ribs in 1930. He took a month to recover physically and was determined not to get hit again. During the Bodyline series, Larwood and Jardine considered Bradman scared of the quick stuff. So too did some Queensland journalists and players who’d seen him bat against the Aboriginal fast bowler, Eddie Gilbert. Bradman campaigned against Gilbert and Bodyline. He branded Gilbert and Larwood ‘chuckers’ and Bodyline a blight on the game. He may not have leaked to the press details of the famous Warner-Woodfull exchange during the Bodyline series, though he had good reason for doing so.

But he did inform Australian Board members of his views and even wrote a letter to Lord’s; and once again threatened to take his bat to the Lancashire League. Cashing in Bodyline may have halved his average, but it cleared the way for Bradman to cash in on his batting ability. By the mid-1930s bodyline was barred and Larwood had been forced from the Test arena. Against far more docile attacks than Cook’s Englishmen faced, Bradman plundered runs. By 1936 he was Australian captain, selector and considering a move into in cricket administration. He applied unsuccessfully for the plum job of Melbourne Cricket Club secretary in 1939, but was pipped by Vernon Ransford. Not all considered Bradman ideal for the job. As noted by the NSWCA vice-president, Bert Evatt, Bradman lacked the “social charm” and was “intensely suspicious”. He campaigned to keep white South Africa in the international game against the groundswell movement in favour of a boycott over apartheid. When the war came, Bradman enlisted but was quickly pensioned out with a bad back. Myth has it that Bradman was almost an invalid, but he used his war years wisely.

He campaigned for war bonds and followed in Hodgetts’ footsteps, securing seats on the Adelaide Stock Exchange and the Australian Board of Control. But Hodgetts was a flawed mentor. For years he had been drawing illegally from his clients’ scrips to stay afloat. In mid-1945 his business collapsed and Bradman was unemployed and out-of-pocket. Within days, however, he opened his own business from Hodgetts’ premises. For Adelaide’s close-knit establishment, many of whom had lost money in the crash, Bradman was seen to be cashing in on Hodgetts’ demise and their misfortune. Confronted with their hostility, and the prospect of protracted legal proceedings as Hodgetts’ former clients sought recompense in the courts, Bradman returned to cricket. The Don playing Sheffield Shield cricket in 1937. Photo courtesy of State Library of NSW Myth has it that he selflessly gave of his time to almost single-handedly resurrect the game here and in England. Bradman was too self-regarding for that. He returned to the crease to resurrect his reputation after the Hodgetts’ affair.

He was now captain, selector and Board member, and batting with his old ruthlessness against depleted English and Indian attacks. But he was determined to leave his mark as captain. In 1948 he drove his Australian team to be the first to go through an English tour undefeated. He retired at the end of the ‘48 tour and was knighted in 1949. With his last Test innings in mind, one of Adelaide’s matrons was heard after the event to utter cattishly: ‘Arise Sir Donald Duck.’ Howard made knowledge of The Don a pre-requisite for citizenship and passed legislation to stop the commercial exploitation of Bradman’s name. He also published his memoir Farewell to Cricket, a retort to those critics who acknowledged his batting genius but considered him self-obsessional and fearful of fast bowing. Old English foes – Wally Hammond, Bill Edrich and Norman Yardley – joined the chorus, writing critically of Bradman’s win-at-all-costs attitude. A conservative administrator In the ’50s, Bradman’s attention turned to the game’s administration. He was best in dealing with changes to the rules, and less adept at confronting the challenges posed by decolonisation.

Cricket was the most colonial of games and Bradman sought to maintain its white, Anglo-Australian hegemony. He campaigned to keep white South Africa in the international game against the groundswell movement in favour of a boycott over apartheid. As he explained in the 1990s, one of his great regrets was buckling under to Australian government policy which supported a boycott. Bradman didn’t see the Packer revolution coming. As Board chairman in the early seventies, he was against paying players their full market value. He was also slow to recognise the commercial value of television and the one-day game. Packer did, and when the Board refused to grant him exclusive rights in 1976, he bought the game’s best players. When the Board and Packer’s PBL brokered a peace settlement in 1979, Bradman left the Board. He liked to give orders, not take them, and now PBL was in charge. Business of retirement In retirement he cashed in on renewed public interest in Bodyline after the 1984 television dramatisation of the 1932-33 series, and he dabbled in the memorabilia market.

His determined interest in re-telling his side of the story continued as a spate of biographers hung on his every word in penning their definitive Bradmans, further fuelling the myth. The traits that his teammates criticised as personality disorders were swept under the table. But with the country’s popular history now being built on nationalistic self-aggrandisement in war and sport, the cult of Bradman’s humble origins and as beleaguered but all-conquering hero fitted in well. Each year sees a new and usually favourable book on some aspect of the great man’s exploits. A museum was built in his honour in Bowral, while the conservative Prime Minister, John Howard, declared The Don “the greatest living Australian”. Howard made knowledge of The Don a pre-requisite for citizenship and passed legislation to stop the commercial exploitation of Bradman’s name. A sex-shop on Adelaide’s Sir Donald Bradman Drive had planned to trade under the banner ‘Erotica on Bradman’ but was stopped by the Bradman Foundation and family. Howard left public life in 2007 along with the Bradman citizenship question The Bradman Museum is now the international Cricket Hall of Fame.

When it comes to the greats of the game, Tendulkar now out-ranks The Don, according to Hall of Fame patrons. But the myth grinds on. Each year sees a new and usually favourable book on some aspect of the great man’s exploits. There’s still Shepherd Street and the stump, the golf ball and the tank stand, and the larger-than-life image of a man made great by his batting average for country tourism promoters. The myths are better than the reality for some. But for others, perhaps it is time to acknowledge that Don Bradman was an extremely peculiar Australian. David Dunstan and Tom Heenan lecture in sports studies at Monash University. Don Bradman cricket 14 on PS3 | Official PlayStation®Store US 40 Ratings Description - Intuitive controls that allow for line and length deliveries without pitch markers and realistic shot control when batting. - Take a 16 year old aspiring cricketer through the ranks to international glory in Career mode. - Fully customise you play experience, setup tours, competitions, create players, teams and even umpires in the Cricket Academy. - Access thousands of Community created players and teams, ready for download and use in the game.

- Hone your skills to perfection in the Practise nets before taking to the field. - Dynamic time of day, weather and pitch wear that will keep you on edge, as no two matches play the same. -Continue your match whenever you want with the unique Online Save System. - The most realistic physics ever seen in a Cricket game including thin edges, bat pad catches, intimidating bouncers and much more. 1-2 players Don Bradman reddit More DON Bradman's farewell bow from Test cricket was incongruously abrupt. Still wanting for the most famous four he never hit, he was quickly lost in the shadows of The Oval pavilion. Now he has too rapidly disappeared from the public eye and mind again. As a cricketer, the Don at least faded brightly. As an immortal, there has been some sort of eclipse. It is just on 10 years since he died, a blip beside the 70 of living legendhood that preceded them. But he is gone already from the country's vernacular. The term “Bradmanesque” is rarely heard, and it is an age since the last “next Bradman” was anointed. Peter FitzSimons never did write a book on him.

It is as if he has slipped the country's mind. This is Don Bradman, no less, one of two Australians selected in International Who's Who's top 100 shapers of the 20th century (the other was Rupert Murdoch) and one of only three athletes on that list, alongside Muhammad Ali and Pele. This is a man hailed by one not-so-long-ago prime minister, John Howard, as the “greatest living Australian”. Already, he has become like one of the many statues of him: larger than life, but fixed in the past. This ossification was observable even on the day Bradman died. In Bowral, that day was like any other. The one Australian flag in the main street, above a real estate agent's office, still flew at full mast. Howard cried, but few others did. SHARE The greatest: Don Bradman. Photo: Getty Images In one way, this indifference towards the man was understandable. It was more than 50 years since Bradman had last played, more than 10 since he'd retired from public life. He was an old man, already a decade dead to public consciousness. It left him at an historical remove.

He did not have the doubtful advantage of, say, James Dean, to “live fast, die young and leave a good-looking corpse”. He was not still vivid in people's hearts and minds unlike, for instance, Beatles guitarist George Harrison, who also died that year. He was the Don, but it is problematic how much we ever knew him. Bradman was a man of his time, but it was another time. He was a Protestant, mason, Anglophile, monarchist and knight. He loved classical music, was an adept pianist and became a champion at squash. He had a weakness for rice pudding. Yet he was also atypical. For most of his playing days he was a teetotaller, and a non-smoker. In a highly social sport he was almost a hermit. Bill O'Reilly first met him in their early teens, played with and against him, jousted with him, studied him, wrote about him, but said near the end of his own life that he hardly knew him. Advertisement R.C. Robertson-Glasgow wrote a fond and famous tribute to Bradman at the beginning of that valedictory 1948 tour.

But in it, was this: “Stripped to the truth, he was a solitary man with a solitary aim.” Humorous stories abound in cricket but “there are no funny stories about the Don. No one ever laughed about Bradman. He was no laughing matter.” It is impossible to say now whether Bradman was solitary by nature or whether the public crush on him started to weigh before he could deal with it, forcing him to withdraw into a protective shell from which he never fully re-emerged. He was an unworldly 21 — much younger than, for instance, Usman Khawaja — when he hit 334 at Leeds in 1930 and fame first began to burden him. “His natural reticence and Puritan instincts irritated his own team and the English public after his record Test innings,” wrote Richard Holt in a Wisden essay. “Twenty years later, he was still wondering if he was expected to parade through the streets of Leeds. It took time for him to realise that he needed, and lacked, the common touch.” Bradman's refusal to act a part became the cross he bore all his life. It put a distance between him and the team from a young age.

It exacerbated a bitter sectarian divide between him and a Catholic coterie led by O'Reilly and Jack Fingleton, at a time when religion still mattered deeply in Australia. It put him at arm's length from his public. It led Wisden to muse at the time of his death: “Whether, for all his triumphs, the Australian champion often pushed beyond contentment into genuine happiness is a moot point.” Bradman's isolation did not endear him any less to people. It made for a simple image, easily idealised. He knocked up astronomical scores and led Australia to stirring victories, boosting the nation's morale, and that was enough. Media was neither as plentiful nor snoopish. Most of what is known about him beyond his cricket exploits emerged much later, in the memoirs of others, muted by passing years. O'Reilly never publicly dissed Bradman, explaining himself pithily: “You don't piss on statues.” Bradman was a hero of a time that needed one more than most. World War I had left a glowering bruise. Depression hit the country hard.

Australia had had no war of independence, nor a civil war, and so although replete with folk heroes, it lacked towering figures around which to rally. England's Lord Williams of Elvel, one of Bradman's myriad biographers, noted: “He was almost, as it were, an amalgam of, say, Joan of Arc and George Washington and Lenin at the same time.” Bradman's medium was not war or revolution, but cricket. Then, cricket was a game that was its own pedestal. “Cricket was modified and embraced by the muscular Christianity of the Victorian era, and imbued with a genuine ethical content, and this makes it vulnerable to a gloss of religiosity,” Wisden noted. “Half-consciously, mistily, the Bradman myth adopted some of this sheen.” Bradman himself thought cricket the most ennobling pursuit of all. Infamously, that most un-cricket-like ethic, Bodyline, was designed and enacted specifically against him. Only in that torrid summer of 1932-33 did cricket seem like war, and Bradman a likely martyr. Elsetimes, Bradman was the nonpareil player of the nonpareil game.

It made him almost popishly infallible. Here was the conundrum. Generally Australia's heroes are working class, with a bit of renegade about them: Breaker Morant, Albert Jacka, Mary MacKillop, even Phar Lap; they have rubbed up against the grain of life a little, known its texture, felt the splinters. To the extent that Bradman ever rebelled, it was on his own account rather than his team's — when considering an offer to play professionally at Accrington, for instance, or fighting for his right to have his own newspaper column. Bradman was never anti-authoritarian, and later in life became the apotheosis of authority. While still playing he applied for the job of secretary of the Melbourne Cricket Club, and was rejected. Instead he went to Adelaide to run a successful stockbroking business. After retiring as a player, he gave the game unbroken service until 1981, as a selector, a committeeman on the South Australian and national boards, and as chairman, twice, of the Australian board. For all but the first three of their 65 years of marriage, he and Jessie lived in the same suburban Adelaide house.

He resisted importuning for him to run for Parliament. He would never have intervened in public political discourse the way, for instance, Ian Chappell did when he demanded a fairer go for asylum seekers. He became a classic figure of authority, truly known to few, conservative, a man of manners, but a stickler for formality. The late Age cricket writer Peter McFarline once phoned and left a message for Bradman, who was out. Duly, Bradman returned the call, but only to rebuke McFarline for addressing his wife as “Jessie” rather than “Lady Bradman”, and then to bid him a brusque “good day”. He disliked being wrong, and rarely believed he was. Historian David Frith, reflecting on a 30-year friendship, wrote: “He was content only when he had had the last word in a debate. I suppose it was some sort of substitute for 20 competitive years of habitually carving up bowlers of all descriptions.” As a cricket administrator Bradman was, well, miserly. He was, wrote Christian Ryan, “a money-alert player but a penny-pinching administrator — the young visionary who stood up for his economic worth becoming an old reactionary”.

Thus he helped trigger World Series Cricket. Post-playing Bradman was not a god, who is unknowable, but a headmaster, of whom little is known personally. He was mysterious but not yet mystical; that dimension was to come. Such criticism as was brooked in his lifetime centred on whether, in keeping so much to himself, he gave enough back. He doubtless felt fully occupied by the task of being Don Bradman. As Peter FitzSimons noted, Bradman's profile was “low enough that we Australians are able to visit upon him pretty much any kind of personality traits we like — to best suit whatever we think the most admirable.” So a curing process began. Gideon Haigh put it like this: “In the 1990s, a sort of cultural elision turned Bradman from great batsman into great man.” This meant retro-fitting him to that peculiarly Australian highest ideal: the good bloke. At the forefront of this makeover was prime minister Howard. Holding Bradman up as an example, Howard claimed Australians could make “any dream come true”, and “not just in cricket but in life”. In America, anyone could become president; in Australia, anyone could be Bradman.

The repositioning of Bradman in Australia's consciousness coincided with two other shifts in Australian society, rubbing momentously up against each other like tectonic plates. One was the revival of patriotism. Back in the iconoclastic 1960s and '70s war heroes were marginalised, even ridiculed, and Anzac Day marches dwindled in size and significance. Old sports stars were swept up in the same nihilism. To a point, Australia disowned its history. Then a new generation had reclaimed it all, and with the zeal of converts. Anzac Day grew bigger than ever and Gallipoli became a place of pilgrimage. The Bradman legend was ripe for such re-engagement. Howard even managed to have a question about Bradman incorporated in the citizenship test. Here, though, was a clue to the other profound reordering of Australia: its demographics. In Bradman's heyday, and long after it, the bulk of the population was Australian-born and English-speaking. Now more than 40 per cent are migrants or children of migrants, from all over, and the diversity is growing. Where sectarian tension exists, it is not between Catholic and Protestant, but between Christian and Muslim.

Much as forces on the political right have tried to suffocate it, modern Australia is a vibrantly heterogeneous, multicultural country. Not least among the newly embraced nations is the oldest: Aboriginal Australia. Cricket has struggled to broaden its base at the same pace. Only one male cricketer of indigenous descent has played Test cricket, one Italian-Australian and no Greek-Australians. Usman Khawaja is only the second Asian. For once it can be said that this narrowness is not for want of trying by Cricket Australia. But cricket is a particular taste. Even lovers must own that is an eccentric game, loveable as a favourite uncle is loveable. It is this avuncular image that Cricket Australia is trying — clumsily — to redress. Bradman saw the game as a paragon of purity. But that scarcely rings true any more. Corruption's tarnish is inescapable. Media, massed as it never was in Bradman's time, glamorises, but also lays bare. The Australian team of modern times ruled the game but without ever ruling hearts as it once did; indeed, affection for the national team diminished as its sovereignty lengthened.

Cricket somehow is less important in the national psyche than it was in Bradman's day. Across the world, Test cricket — Bradman's cricket — is dying, and with it the Bradman legend. The unmaking began the day Bradman died. The nation — its PM excepted — did not so much grieve as pay its respects, as if to a departed head of state. Wisden's obituary was lavish, but began with the most faintly damning of praise, calling Bradman “the most effective” batsman in cricket history. Ever so subtly, Wisden was marking Bradman down for style. Before the year was out The Australian newspaper had published two less than laudatory articles about “the Don we never knew”. Soon a book questioned, for instance, the propriety of the circumstances in which Bradman came to inherit his stockbroking business from his former employer. Opportunists moved to exploit Bradman's name commercially — one appropriated it for a brand of biscuits — forcing family and trustees to move to thwart them, a tacky business. The Bradman family, foundation and retail interests bickered over a trove of letters. More quickly than could be imagined, time did its damnedest.

Howard's favourite sportsman was Bradman, but Kevin Rudd's is Garry Sobers and Julia Gillard's is probably a footballer. Immigrants now are taught about Bradman but not tested on him. Once, to have questioned Bradman as the unrivalled greatest would have been blasphemy. Now, some in India acclaim Sachin Tendulkar as greater. Bradman was a hero for crises, wedged between wars and surmounting Depression. This is a less oppressed age, but perhaps because of it, shallower. Arthur Mailey said of Bradman that he would never confuse popularity with success. Now, popularity is success; there is no other index. Bradman did not court it. By staying out of the limelight, he also kept away from the searchlight. By doing nothing conspicuous, he did no bad, nor more good than the plentiful good his playing exploits wrought on the nation's psyche. In its time, that was enough. Bradman didn't change, but Australia did, quickly, and in a quantum way. Bradman's feats are immutable but the angle of the prism through which we see them is different. Not for the first time, immortality is proving to be a fleeting affair.

So it is that in death, Don Bradman unexpectedly has his dearest wish: he rests in peace. Advertisement Is Sachin Tendulkar or Sir Don Bradman a better batsman? - Quora Quora Written Feb 16, 2015 I guess this should suffice : After Sachin’s Perth hundred(114) in 1992, the famous London Times correspondent John Woodcock, in his ’70s, was moved enough to say: “Gentlemen, he is the best batsman I have seen in my life. And unlike most of you, I have seen Bradman bat.” Written Feb 23, 2013 I am not jumping to any final conclusion, but for all facts and figures I know, it is Bradman, and I am saying this as a huge Sachin fan. I am ready to change my mind if someone can give me more facts in favor of Sachin. Sachin for me is Greatest ODI cricketer along with Viv Richards. Greatest ODI batsman slightly ahead of Viv Richards 2nd greatest test batsman after Bradman. 2nd greatest batsman. Comfortably ahead of Viv Richards.

Bradman for me is Greatest batsman ever, comfortably ahead of Sachin. Reasons are Sachin has faced better bowling attack. Sachin 1, Bradman 0 Bradman played on uncovered pitches. Sachin 1, Bradman 1 Technology has helped bowlers more, they can find out batsmen fault and weakness by watching his videos and many other things, beside that 3rd umpire decisions have helped bowlers, before that benefit of doubt were given to batsman. Sachin 2, Bradman 1 Sachin has better bats and protection in comparison to bats and protection used in Bradman era. Sachin 2, Bradman 2. Sachin played in more pressure in a nation where almost everyone is crazy about him Sachin 3, Bradman 2 Bradman played with more responsibilities he was Captain and also selector of Austalian and South Australian team. Sachin 3 Bradman 3 Sachin played in more surfaces and faced variety of attack. Sachin 4 Bradman 3 Bradman has support of Cricketers. There are some Cricketers who believe Sachin is greatest but they are few.

Wisden top 100 cricketers of all time Sachin 4 Bradman 5(+2) Bradman was almost twice great from any other batsman of his generation, avg avg of batsmen in all decades has always remain close to 30, but Bradman played with an avg of 99.99, when second best is in 60s. Sachin 4 Bradman 6 So finally for me it is Bradman. Written Jul 30, 2015 Technique - Although Bradman likened Tendulkar's technique to his own, they were clearly very different in certain ways. Tendulkar much more attractive stroke maker who didn't employ cross-batted strokes with a 'rotary action', which seemed to be a Bradman trademark. Similarities - footwork - both very quick and able to adjust strokes at the last moment. Timing & Balance - Both equally brilliant. Situation & Aggression - Bradman seems to have tried to dominate in every ball of every innings, thereby taking the situation out of the equation. Tendulkar more reactive to circumstance. Era - This is where any comparison becomes purely hypothetical.

Detractors of the Don try to minimise his achievements by pointing out that he didn't have to face this or that bowler under such a variety of conditions and formats, is there any reason to believe that he wouldn't have been able to deal with them just as effectively?For example, it's hard to imagine that Bradman wouldn't have been a brilliant one day player. Would Sachin have enjoyed playing on a plethora of uncovered and poorly prepared pitches in a less sophisticated era? Again, like Bradman, no reason to believe that he wouldn't have been able to adapt successfully. Have to disagree about the weight of expectation differential you have postulated. The pressure on Tendulkar was indeed huge but what about the expectation level on a batsman as prolific as Bradman? No batsman in history could ever have had more expected of him in terms of successful run-getting every time he went out to bat than Bradman. Statistics - Speak for themselves. Tendulkar's are remarkable and reflect his greatness, but Bradman was the ultimate run machine. Key Contributions - Bradman was a great ambassador for the game, even if not always so popular a figure in the Australian dressing room.

He set the all-time statistical benchmark for every batsman who has followed him. His run scoring consistency is what sets him apart from everyone else. 'Bradmanesque' is a term which is sometimes accorded to other batsmen when they have a prolific spell of run scoring. With Bradman the spell lasted throughout his career. Tendulkar has also been a wonderful ambassador for cricket. His batsmanship was a thing of beauty, classical yet modern. Like Bradman, he carried the weight of an entire nation's expectations on his shoulders throughout his career and did so with grace and humility. Two wonderful players. No losers here. Written Sep 29, 2015 Well, do a quick search on the best batting averages all time (preferably ESPN CricInfo). No surprises, Don Bradman tops the list. Now, just scroll down. Perhpas, you will start finding unknown names. But most in the top ten have one thing in common: the period when they played, mostly overlapping around the 1920s and 1930s. Now, one more quick search: 'best bowling strike rates'. For better stats, you may wish to consider bowlers with above 40 matches.

In any case, no one in the 1920s. This should give an idea that batsmen ruled the Don's phase of cricket. Or, in other words, that era did not have bowlers like Steyn, Akram, Waqar, Murali or Warne. So clearly, Tendulkar has played in a more competitive era and faced tougher oppositions. I have not seen Bradman play, but yes have read a lot of times that he himself accepted they have similar styles. Another thing, which I suppose is missed is the number of games played by Bradman and Sachin. Speaking of averages, 200 test matches with an average of over 50 is way better than just 50 odd matches at 100. Yes, I make this statement! Reason being: its about staying consistent for years together, with less practice times or inter match improvement times. A batsmen 'always' goes through phases of good and bad form (ask Virat Kohli, Kevin Petersen regarding this if you can :P), but Bradman did not play a great number of matches to actually generalize. In statistical terms, you need more sample points, to get closer to correct results.

No doubt that both of them have credible points in their favour, but still, (call is personal bias or coloured thinking with some attempt at reasoned explanation) 'Sachin was undoubtedly better!' Australian Sports Australian Sports In Australia sports is an integrated part of the lives of the people. The Australians have interest in a wide range of sports and it has made its presence felt in all the major arenas of world sports. Team sports and water sports are the main areas where the Australian sportsmen have excelled over the years. The people of this country have invented a game called Australian Rules football or the AFL which is very popular in this nation. Mostly all kinds of sports are played in Australia like, basketball, baseball, tennis, cricket, rugby, hockey, golf, netball and tennis. The national teams of Australia participate in the world level competitions and there are also frequent leagues within the country. The main reason behind such sports enthusiasm among the Australian people is the perfect and varied climates in the country. Apart from the cricket, hockey and football, surfing in Australia has become very popular over the years. The perfect waves in the beaches attract hundreds of surfers from around the world each year.

The names of some of the major sports league in Australia is given in he list below: National Rugby League National Wheelchair Basketball League National Basketball League The most unique sport which Australia boasts of is the Australia rules football which has its existence in this country since the nineteenth century. This sport has a rising popularity and more and more people are taking part in it. The Australia Football had originated in the state of Victoria in the mid of the nineteenth century and currently around 59% people of Australia takes interest in it. The other sports which can be associated with the history and heritage of Australia is cricket. Australia over the years had some gallant cricket players like Don Bradman, Mark Taylor and Allan Border. In the recent years the Australian cricket team has become almost invincible and had won three consecutive world cups. The Australian Rugby is the other most significant sport of the country. It has immense popularity in certain states like New South Wales and Queensland. Australia is represented by the national rugby league team at the international levels. Among the eleven tournaments which were held since 1954 Australian players had managed to win eight of them. There are number of nicknames which are given to the national teams of various sports in Australia.

Like for example the basketball men�s team were called the �boomers� and the basketball women�s team called the �opals�. The players of the Test side rugby league are known as the �Kangaroos� and the wheelchair rugby players are named � Wheelabies� the swimmers of Australia who participate in the international events like Commonwealth games and the Olympics are called the �dolphins�. Media has a very significant role to play in Australian sports. There are numerous sports channels like Fox sports and Setanta Sports who have augmented the popularity of sports and has almost made it a religion here. The Australian Sports Commission is the department of the government which has dedicated itself to the sports of this country. Related Links Don Bradman the world beater | The Independent Cricket Don Bradman the world beater Sir Donald Bradman, the greatest cricketer the sport has seen, was born 100 years ago today.

Angus Fraser salutes a man whose standards no other player has come close to matching Tuesday 26 August 2008 23:00 BST Click to follow Don Bradman the world beater 1/2 2/2 GETTY IMAGES The aim of many old golfers is to complete a round in fewer shots than their age. Most batsmen pass their career average in their forties, at a time when they are going through some sort of crisis. Sir Donald Bradman, arguably the greatest sportsman that has ever lived, never had much of a chance of overtaking his remarkable Test batting average of 99.94. Bradman passed away at the age of 92 on 25 February 2001 but today every Australian should raise a XXXX to celebrate the centenary of The Don's birth. Even now, more than 60 years after he was bowled for nought by an Eric Hollies googly in his final Test innings, a dismissal that prevented him averaging more than 100 in Test cricket, it is hard to appreciate how phenomenal a batsman Bradman was. Bradman's figures are quite simply astonishing.

His Test average is the statistic everyone remembers but he also had a first-class batting average of 95.14, scored a hundred for every three innings he played and passed 200 on 14 occasions in 52 Tests. Brian Lara is the next highest with 11, and he played in 131 Tests. His 117 first-class hundreds took on average 128 minutes to reach. It is therefore little surprise that Wisden, cricket's bible, hailed Bradman as "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games." Statisticians have analysed his career and compared it to other prominent sportsmen like Pele, Jack Nicklaus and Michael Jordan. The statisticians determined that none of the athletes named above dominated their sport to the same extent as Bradman. Indeed, Jordan, the legendary basketball player, would have needed to average 43 points per game to match Bradman, rather than the 30.1 he ended with. Bradman played his final first-class innings at the Sydney Cricket Ground in February 1949 but he remained at the fore of the game, acting as a selector, administrator and writer.

Indeed, when Nelson Mandela was released after 27 years in prison, one of the first questions he asked was: "Is Sir Donald Bradman still alive?" He never really enjoyed the limelight and became reclusive in his later years. Those years were spent in Adelaide, where he occasionally attended Test matches. It was at the 1994-95 Adelaide Test that I met him for the only time, bumping in to him next to the committee room as I was going for lunch. When he introduced himself to me I couldn't get over how small he was. He was tiny, but there was an aura about him that very few people have. On his visits to the Adelaide Oval Bradman occasionally frequented the Australian dressing room. On one such visit in the late '80s Australia were being beaten up rather badly by the West Indies. Malcolm Marshall, Curtley Ambrose, Courtney Walsh and Patrick Patterson were running riot and at the end of day's play Bradman sat down in the dressing to have a cold beer with the team. Dean Jones, the Australian middle-order batsman, asked Bradman how he would have fared against this great West Indies attack.

Bradman indicated that he would probably have averaged 60 or 70 against them. The admission took Jones and his Australian team-mates by surprise. Sixty or seventy, that wasn't a lot for The Don? But before anybody had the chance to speak Bradman said: "But I am 80 years old now." Bradman was born in Cootamundra, a small agricultural town 240 miles south west of Sydney. At the age of two his family moved to Bowral. It was here where his love for cricket blossomed. Bradman was one of five children but he had a lonely childhood, spending hours at home on his own entertaining himself by hitting a golf ball against the curved brick base of a water tank with a stump. The game is part of Australian folklore and unbeknown to him at the time, it was these hours that allowed him to develop the brain, eye and muscle coordination required to score thousands of runs. He scored his first hundred at the age of 12, before leaving school at 14 to work as a clerk at a local real estate agent.

Runs continued to flow from his bat and at the age of 18 he was invited by New South Wales to attend practice sessions in Sydney. Bradman was an outstanding tennis player too and his boss, peeved about the amount of time the two sports kept him away from work, presented him with an ultimatum. He chose cricket. Bradman joined the St George club in Sydney, making the 170-mile return trip from Bowral each weekend, and it wasn't long before he made his first-class debut for NSW. Predictably he celebrated the occasion with a score of 118 against South Australia. After nine matches he was picked for Australia, making his debut against England at Brisbane in the 1928-29 Ashes, where he scored 18 and 1. Amazingly, Bradman was dropped after his debut. But he returned in the third Test where, in Australia's second innings, he became the youngest player to make a Test hundred. It was on Australia's 1930 tour of England that Bradman's true brilliance was witnessed. In England he scored 2,960 runs at an average of 98.66.

In the Ashes he struck 131, 254 and 334 in consecutive Tests, with 309 of the 334 runs he scored at Headingley being gathered on the first day of the match. In the final Test at The Oval he struck 232 to help Australia win the Ashes. The result was greeted with joy in Australia, a country hit hard by the Great Depression. Though brilliant, Bradman's technique could not be described as classical or aesthetically pleasing. Much of his early cricket in Bowral was played on matted concrete pitches, surfaces that offered bounce to bowlers. The nature of the pitches and Bradman's stature – he was only 5ft 7in – meant that he had plenty of practice playing off the back foot. The hook, pull and cut shots brought him thousands of runs. Bradman had very little coaching, which is undoubtedly why he had an unorthodox grip. His hands were some distance apart on the handle, with his left hand turned over so far that it was almost at the back of it, resulting in the face of his bat being closed – facing the leg side – when he took guard.

Commenting on his grip, Bradman said: "My grip was different and it assisted me for on-side shots, though it handicapped me playing between mid-off and point. I experimented with it but decided not to change. Throughout a long career my grip caused many arguments, but I think it is sufficient to prove that any young player should be allowed to develop his own natural style providing he is not revealing any obvious error. A player is not necessarily wrong because he is different." What set Bradman apart were quick eyes, fast feet, fast hands, enviable powers of concentration, determination and an unquenchable appetite for runs. He was remarkably still at the crease when the bowler released the ball, not wanting to give the opponent any indication of what he was about to do. Good batsmen trust their judgement. They possess the ability to pick the line and length of the ball almost as soon as it leaves the bowler's hand. Quick feet allowed Bradman to get in position and fast hands allowed him to give the ball an almighty whack. He made full use of the crease, completing some shots with his feet behind the line of the stumps.

He was fearless coming down the pitch too, with his fast feet and hands allowing him to get to the pitch of the ball. Though slight Bradman hit the ball extremely hard, and essentially along the ground. Legend has it that on one occasion the South African captain appealed against the light in the interests of safety to his fielders. Once in he was ruthless, destroying attacks with a devastating array of strokes. In the 1930's most batsmen ambled between the wickets but Bradman sprinted, so strong was his desire to score runs. He was fit too, rarely seen to be breaking sweat. Sandy Bell, the former South African fast bowler, described bowling at him as: "heartbreaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which reminds one of a sphinx ... he never seemed to perspire." Bradman's 934 runs at an average of 139 in the 1930 Ashes made him an understandable target for England and in 1931, as a prelude to the 1932-33 series, Douglas Jardine was made England captain.

Jardine, amongst others, noted that Bradman had looked uncomfortable during his 232 at The Oval when Harold Larwood bowled short at him on a pitch enlivened by rain. On such detail "leg theory", as Jardine called it, was devised and England set off for Australia with a fast bowling attack spearheaded by Larwood and Bill Voce. In Australia the tactic, which revolved around England's fast bowlers bowling short and at the body of the Australian batsmen with several fielders positioned behind square leg, quickly became known as "Bodyline". It caused uproar. In the third Test at Adelaide Bill Woodfall and Bert Oldfield were injured as a direct result of the tactic. When Pelham Warner, the England manager, enquired about their well-being Woodfall uttered the now famous words: "There are two teams out there on the Oval. One is playing cricket, the other is not." England regained the Ashes as a consequence of the tactics, with Bradman averaging just 56, but it produced the darkest chapter in the history of Anglo-Australian cricket. The strategy was quickly banned, allowing Bradman to resume scoring runs at a prodigious rate.

Untouchable with a bat in his hand, Bradman had a more difficult time elsewhere. The pressures that came with being The Don had a detrimental effect on his health. He suffered from fibrositis, a muscular ailment, from an early age and illness nearly cost him his life on Australia's 1934 tour of England, when peritonitis set in following an operation to rid him of acute appendicitis. He was not universally popular with his team-mates either. Bradman was a loner and he spent a lot of time on tour writing, having often sold the rights to a book. His genius did not help, with colleagues becoming jealousof the attention he attracted. The fact that he had threatened to pull out of a tour unless the Australian Board allowed him to fulfil a contract with a newspaper would not have helped. He eventually relented but the damage had been done. Team-mates thought the focus on individual achievements in a team game to be unhealthy and it permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries, many of whom thought he was aloof.

When he returned to the Australian team after illness he was made captain, a move that did not go down very well with the Irish Catholic members of the side, who performed what almost amounted to a mutiny. Bradman's days as a Test cricketer ended on a far happier note in 1948, captaining Australia's "Invincibles", a team that went through an entire tour of England unbeaten. Bradman was 40 and he was at last showing human fallibility with the bat but the pre-war divisiveness had disappeared and Bradman wrote glowingly about his immortal team. "History may decide whether it was the greatest team ever, I can't," he said. "For me, I'm satisfied to say it was a really great team, whose strength lay in its all-round ability, versatility and brilliance allied to bulldog courage. You can often get some of these things; to get the lot is a rarity." Bradman could have been writing about himself when describing "The Invincibles". In most sports, as the Olympics have highlighted, records will be broken but it is safe to say that nobody will pass those set by Donald Bradman, the boy from Bowral.

Bradman's best: The Don's three most memorable innings 254 v England, Lord's, 1930 Australia lost the first Test of the 1930 Ashes in Nottingham by 93 runs and in the second Test at Lord's the tourists were in trouble after England scored 425 in their first innings. Donald Bradman then entered the scene, scoring 254 in his maiden Test innings at the home of cricket. When Bradman was finally out Australia were 160 runs ahead of England and on course for victory. Commenting on the innings, Bradman said: "Practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go. Any artist must surely aim at perfection, and that is why I think Lord's 1930 is my first choice [as my finest innings]." 334 v England, Headingley, 1930 Not satisfied with his innings at Lord's, Bradman then went on to Leeds where he scored 334, then the highest score in Test cricket. On the first day of the Test Bradman struck 309 unbeaten runs, accumulating more than 100 in each session.

He said: "In a long career there are many outstanding memories but I suppose the opening day of the third Test at Leeds must rank as the greatest in my cricketing life. To do so against Australia's oldest and strongest rival was satisfying." 173* v England, Headingley, 1948 With the Ashes already won, Australia's "Invincibles" were set the unlikely target of 404 on the final day of the fourth Test. No Test side team had ever come close to achieving such a goal on the final day of a Test. But Australia romped home with 15 minutes to spare after Bradman, 173 not out, and Arthur Morris, 182, put on 301 in 217 glorious minutes of batting. The worn state of the pitch made the feat even more memorable. Jim Laker, the England off-spinner, was turning the ball considerably and Bradman was batting in bowlers footholes that were two to three inches deep. It was his last Test century.

More about: Don Bradman | australia.gov.au Australia.gov.au Helping you find government information and services Search form Portrait of Don Bradman, 1930-39, gelatin silver. Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia: nla.pic-an23251485. Sir Donald Bradman is an Australian sporting legend. No other sportsperson in Australian history has captured the respect and admiration of the sporting public the way 'The Don', the cricketer from Bowral in the State of New South Wales (NSW), has done. During his 21 years of first-class cricket, Bradman achieved everything that was possible in the sport - he captained his South Australian Sheffield Shield team; was a State selector; Test selector; and captain of the Australian Team for almost a decade, including of the 1948 Australian Test team known as The Invincibles. Bradman averaged a century - 100 runs - once in every three innings he played. His batting averages are revered. In his first international tour (1930) Bradman made 2960 runs (with a batting average of 98.66), including 10 centuries.

In his final tour 18 years later, he made 2428 runs with an 89.92 batting average, including 11 centuries. When he retired in 1948, Bradman's legacy to the cricketing world was a remarkable Test batting average of 99.94. The tributes to Bradman kept coming after he retired. In 1949 he became the only Australian cricketer to be knighted. And in 1988 the Australian Confederation of Sport voted him greatest male athlete of the past 200 years. In 1960 Bradman became the first former Test player to be elected chairman of the Australian Board of Control. He continued to serve cricket as a selector and a member of the Board, including as chairman, for two terms. On 16 June 1979 he was invested as a Companion of the Order of Australia.

According to Bradman's official web site, this famous cricketer also holds other awards, including: Sportsman of the Century; Captain of the Greatest Team of the Century (1948 Australian cricket team); Wisden Cricketer of the Century; Captain of the Australian Cricket Team of the Century; nominated in the top ten world sports figures of the century by the World Confederation of Sport; and elected in the top 100 world figures of the twentieth century - one of only two Australians to be included. Don Bradman leading his team onto the field at the start of Bradman Testimonial match, Melbourne, December 1948, negative: b&w. Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia: nla.pic-an23751614. Donald George Bradman was born on 27 August 1908 in the NSW country town of Cootamundra, moving to Bowral in the Southern Highlands of NSW two and a half years later with his family. He attended Bowral Public School and spent many hours during his childhood playing backyard cricket with a golf ball and a cricket stump.

As a teenager Bradman played cricket for his school and county, coming to the attention of state and national selectors. In 1928 Bradman made his Test cricket debut for Australia, which was the beginning of his celebrated and record-breaking career. In a Sheffield Shield match at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1930, Bradman, at 21 years of age, broke the world's batting record for the highest score in first-class cricket by smashing the previous record of 437 runs held by Bill Ponsford. Bradman scored 452 runs not out in just 415 minutes. At the same time he also made 1000 runs for the season. This remarkable performance launched Bradman's international career with his inclusion in the team to tour England. Fans saw him smash many more records. For example, in the Third Test at Leeds Bradman broke the world Test batting record with 334 runs, scoring 309 runs in a day; and in the Fifth Test he scored 232 runs to have a series Test aggregate of 974 runs at a batting average of 139.14.

When he returned to Australia - still only 21 years old - Bradman was already an Australian legend. Writing in the Bradman Albums he said: In a long career there are many outstanding memories but I suppose the opening day of the Third Test at Leeds must rank as the greatest in my cricketing life. To break the world's record Test score was exciting. More than anything else, however, was the knowledge that I had scored the runs at such a fast rate and therefore provided entertainment for the spectators. Sam Hood (1872 - 1953), Wedding of Don Bradman (and Jessie Menzies), 1932. Image courtesy of the State Library of New South Wales: DG ON4/7305. On 30 April 1932 Bradman married his childhood sweetheart Jessie Menzies, and he later described their union as the greatest partnership of his life. Bradman was elected to the Australian Board of Control in August 1945, during a five-year hiatus from playing cricket due to severe muscular spasms.

After not expecting to play again, he accepted the Australian captaincy in 1946 for the test series against England, in an effort to help a post-war recovery. During the 1947-48 Test series against India Bradman scored 172 runs, his 100th first class century, and led Australia to a 4-0 win with a batting average of 178.75. During the tour Bradman announced that the forthcoming tour to England would be his last. In March 1948, Bradman captained the Australian Test team who became known as The Invincibles - the greatest Australian side in history. During the team's eight-month tour of England, which was Bradman's finale, the team won every match. In early December 1948, more than 94,000 people flooded to the Melbourne Cricket Ground to watch Bradman in his testimonial game. Sir Donald Bradman died on 25 February 2001 at the age of 92. He is widely recognised as the world's best ever batsman and a truly great Australian. Useful links

Question: With which sport is Don Bradman associated?
Answer: Cricket