This year’s Boxing Day Test between Australia and Pakistan will honour the 150th anniversary of the 1866 match between the MCC and an Aboriginal XI.
An array of activities will take place to recognise the historical significance of the match in 1866, and celebrate the legacy left by that landmark Aboriginal cricket team.A piece of commemorative artwork will be integrated into all celebrations associated with the 1866 match and the 1868 Aboriginal team that toured England. Walkabout Wickets was designed by Aboriginal artist Fiona Clarke, a descendent of the Kirrae Whurrong Clan in the Western District in Victoria. She is also a descendent of players from both the 1866 and 1868 Aboriginal teams.
Another commemorative activity will be the inaugural Mullagh-Wills Oration, the first to be delivered with a focus on the connection between historical events and the present, between cricket and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
MCC will host the oration, together with Cricket Australia and Victoria University, in the Jim Stynes Grill at the MCG on December 13. The oration will be co-delivered by 2009 Australian of the Year and advocate for Indigenous rights, Professor Mick Dodson AM, and Dr Greg De Moore, author of Tom Wills and A National Game.
The oration is named in honour of Tom Wills, the former MCC secretary who captain-coached the Aboriginal XI in 1866, and Johnny Mullagh, the side’s star all-rounder who later went on to captain the Aboriginal XI which toured England in 1868 – the first cricket team from Australia to tour internationally.
A very limited number of free tickets is available to MCC members who would like to attend this event. Please email membership@mcc.org.au to request a ticket, which will be issued on a first-in, first-served basis.
The event, which commences at 6.30pm, is being filmed and live streamed free of charge by Cricket Australia at cricketaustralia.com.au/150. Please visit this same web page after December 13 if you wish to view a recording of the oration.
Members and guests attending the Boxing Day Test will see a commemorative pre-match anthem ceremony and a customary Welcome to Country prior to the first ball.
The MCC Museum will also unveil a special display that reflects the historic MCC v Aboriginal XI Boxing Day match, featuring a ball presented to the MCC’s WH Handfield “for his excellent bowling in the match”.
More than just a cricket match
An MCC Library exhibition explores in detail the MCC v Aboriginal XI match on December 26 and 27, 1866. Members are welcome to visit when next at the club and take in scorecards, photographs and other material relating to the historic match.As Alf Batchelder recounts in his excellent club history Pavilions in the Park, a crowd of around 10,000 people watched on as the Aboriginal XI – captain-coached by Tom Wills (see team photo) - batted first and was dismissed for 39, with MCC honorary secretary WH Handfield taking seven wickets for five runs.
MCC replied with an even 100, captain Richard Wardill making 45 of them and Johnny Cuzens taking 6/24, with deliveries that rose ‘well to the bails, with lots of spin and twist and every now and then shooting most dangerously.’
The Aborigines responded with 87. Wills was left undefeated on 25 and Johnny Mullagh produced an innings of 33 that was so highly regarded by the MCC members that they presented him with a new bat.
MCC scored the required 27 runs for victory with the loss of one wicket, “...after which a scratch match was played between a team of black and white native-born Australians and an All Comers Eleven. On December 29, with the MCG ‘as full as on any day of the cricket match’, an athletics meeting was conducted on the field, providing another showcase for the Aborigines’ skills.