The Australians who kickstarted Test cricket after the war: W. Watts (scorer), D. Tallon, K. R. Miller, W. J. O'Reilly, E. R. H. Toshack, B. Dooland, R. A. Hamence, E. C. Yeomans (manager); seated – I. W. Johnson, C. L. McCool, A. L. Hassett, W. A. Brown (captain), S. G. Barnes, K. D. Meuleman, R. R. Lindwall

 CRICKET IS a sport which at times borders on the perverse. It is perhaps appropriate, then, that the match which saw the resumption of Tests at the conclusion of the Second World War was something of an unheralded oddity, and a very brief one at that.

Scheduled as a four-day contest, the historic encounter between Australia and New Zealand at Wellington in late March 1946 was all over a few minutes after lunch on the second day. The pundits at Edgbaston last July didn't have so much to complain about after all.

It was one of the lowest-scoring and, in terms of playing time, one of the shortest Test matches ever. Just as unusually, those 150 or so overs constituted all the Test cricket between the two Antipodean neighbours unitl 1973. Even this match at Basin Reserve, Wellington was not made official for another two years.

Not that the 13 members of the Australian team who set out from Sydney to Auckland, eight months after the cessation of hostilities, had any doubt about that. Their understanding was always that the itinerary included one Test. Seven of them, in fact, would make their Test debut in this match, along with six of the New Zealand side.

The whole concern was thrown together fairly hastily, which, considering the timing, was understandable. Several members of Bill Brown's side had not been demobbed. Keith Miller made the trip across the Tasman Sea still in his RAAF uniform. It was probably crumpled when he arrived. The flight in a New Zealand Air Force Consolidated Catalina 50 years ago lasted 10½ hours.

Catalinas were flying-boats, not transport planes. They were never designed to accommodate 13 cricketers plus aircrew. Some players sat in the glass blisters on the fuselage. Ernie Toshack took up residence in the galley, where he cooked steaks, at the time still in very short supply and much sought-after. In a cold, cramped and uncomfortable space, Australia's first post-war tourists shared around a bottle of rum to pass the time and keep away the chill. Lindsay Hassett is credited for the successful smuggling act.

 Bill Brown had been made captain ahead of Hassett, who had led the Australian Services team earlier in England and India with some distinction. Bill O'Reilly was vice-captain. Bradman was unavailable, his physical capability to withstand the rigours of Test cricket at the age of 37 still very much an issue. Some experienced team members believed the overlooking of Hassett meant the way was being left open for Bradman's return. Arthur Morris was unavailable too. He was not able to get back from service in New Guinea. He missed out on what Ian Johnson described as one long party.

For O'Reilly this would be a final, quick, distinctly primitive cricket hurrah. His ageing limbs were complaining loudly. `I took no further part in Test cricket after Wellington. A busted left knee saw to that,' he later wrote.

The blazers worn by Brown's party displayed the initials ABC rather than the traditional national coat of arms. Sid Barnes offered the most bawdy suggestion of what those initials might have stood for. Others included `Australian Broadcasting Commission' and `Australian Bottle Company'.

 Barnes, too, was one of the most critical players of the tour payment of only £1 per day. O'Reilly was not particularly impressed either, but it was Barnes who would lose most friends in the game's higher echelons with his militancy. First-and-only-time tourist Ken Meuleman originally shared the disbelief of his more experienced team-mates. He later altered his opinion.

`When it was explained that our role was to help New Zealand cricket re-establish itself after the war I sympathised with the Board's motives. Certainly it proved to be a successful move. The entire tour had paid for itself following the attendance on the opening day's play in the first match on the itinerary. This was most gratifying to all the players,' Meuleman has said.

 Barnes still took every opportunity to get in a dig at the authorities. He wrote in his 1953 autobiography It Isn't Cricket of a team fishing trip near Auckland where the team manager, E. C. `Sonny' Yeomans, was the only member of the party not having success. He insisted on moving on, but when he pulled up his line there was a large fish on the end of it. Barnes wrote that Don Tallon estimated the fish had been dead for at least 15 minutes. Supposedly it had drowned waiting for Yeomans to pull it up.

 Ian Johnson's version of those events is slightly more sympathetic to the manager. He suggests Yeomans fell asleep and that either O'Reilly or Hassett put the fish on the end of his line as a joke.

In contrast to the Test, the tour matches provided plenty of runs, including a fair sprinkling of centuries by the tourists and an innings of 198 by Walter Hadlee for Otago. He withstood a pummelling in the ribcage from Lindwall which gained the admiration of the developing speedster.

When Bill Brown went out to toss with Hadlee at the start of the Test he found a pitch still very wet from rain. He was reluctant to start on time. Hadlee wanted to get the game under way though. `I'm not sure what he was thinking,' Brown has said of his counterpart, `but I think he wanted to nullify the pace of Ray Lindwall, at least. He won the toss and I thought Here we go, but he said they would bat.'

 Hadlee opened against Lindwall and left-arm medium-pacer Toshack. He made 6, which was to be the third-highest score behind Merv Wallace and stubborn opener Verdun Scott. From 37 for 2 the New Zealanders lost an astonishing eight wickets for five runs, including five wickets with the score on 37. O'Reilly claimed 5 for 14 and Toshack 4 for 12.

 Australia got away to a poor start, too, when Jack Cowie bowled Meuleman for a duck. `It was just too good for me,' Meuleman has lamented about his only Test innings. It was a disappointment, but it qualified him for a special club of Test batsmen without a run to their credit. He was 12th man in Brisbane against Wally Hammond's side the following summer. Meuleman also made thousands of runs for Western Australia when he moved from Victoria in the 1950s. He is considered unlucky to have had just one Test innings.

 Brown and Barnes then each compiled half-centuries, adding 109 for the second wicket. Cowie, in conditions still favourable to bowlers, made the remaining batsmen struggle though, taking 6 for 40. Brown declared early on the second day at 199 for 8.

The big second-day crowd, many spectators also still in military uniform, then witnessed the second horrendous collapse by the home side. Wallace and Eric Tindill made 14 and 13 respectively before New Zealand's lack of depth (they too had players like Bert Sutcliffe unavailable because of military duty) was again cruelly exposed. This time seven wickets fell for 17 runs.

 Brown had trouble giving all his bowlers a turn. Miller finally got on for his first spell in a Test at the recommendation of Hassett. He promptly took a couple of wickets. The locals were seemingly mesmerised by the status if not the ability of their opponents. A few years ago Merv Wallace said (WCM Dec'91) that one of his team-mates was bowled by O'Reilly and then played a shot: `Completely mesmerised by who it was, not by the ball itself.' He didn't name the unfortunate fellow, but as he suggested it happened in both innings, it is likely to be Glasgow-born Charles Rowe. He made a `pair', bowled both times by O'Reilly. Rowe never played another Test and so is a member of the same club as Meuleman.

Approaching the lunch-break, New Zealand were nine wickets down with the Test quickly heading for a finish. O'Reilly was obviously struggling with his injured knee. Brown asked him if he wanted to continue, suggesting what they both realised, that perhaps the greatest bowler of all time was saying farewell to Test cricket. He stayed on and eventually finished with match figures of 8 for 33. Those few magical over – and convincing Ray Lindwall that he should substitute beer for lemonade as his favoured post-match beverage – were the Tiger's last contributions as a player to Australian cricket. He threw his boots out of the dressing-room window.

The Test ended in the first over after lunch and the players then agreed to entertain the large crowd with an exhibition match.

Although a financial success, the Test itself was a disaster for New Zealand. Arthur Mailey, covering the game, said he missed one innings by the home side while he was looking for his hat under his seat. For the next 28 years the Kiwis were not considered by the Australian cricket authorities to be viable opponents against a full-strength Test team.

As for the tourists who had done so much to revitalise cricket in New Zealand, they expected something superior to a Catalina and a 10-hour flight for their return journey. And they did get something different. An old Douglas Dakota (DC3), which also took over 10 hours to get back to Sydney.

Their troubles were not over when they had left New Zealand either. After little more than an hour's flying time they had engine trouble and had to return to the airport. Ian Johnson recalls that Lindsay Hassett was sleeping off a heavy night during the flight. He was lying on the auxiliary petrol tank installed inside the fuselage of the plane. When they landed back in New Zealand, Hassett awoke with a start, believing he was in Australia and had slept through the entire trip.

If nothing else the flying conditions and pay-scale on that strange tour 50 years ago fostered team spirit and a bit of male bonding among the Aussies. That, and their unquestionable talent, stood them in good stead as they formed the nucleus of the side which conquered the then known cricket world over the next six years.

© Wisden CricInfo Ltd