Victor Trumper

Personal information

Full name

Victor Thomas Trumper

Born

2 November 1877
Darlinghurst, New South Wales, Australia

Died

28 June 1915 (aged 37)
Darlinghurst, New South Wales, Australia

Batting style

Right-handed

Bowling style

Right arm medium

International information

National side

Australia

Test debut (cap 79)

1 June 1899 v England

Last Test

1 March 1912 v England

Domestic team information

Years

Team

1894–1914

New South Wales

Career statistics

Competition	Test	First-class
Matches	48	255
Runs scored	3,163	16,939
Batting average	39.04	44.57
100s/50s	8/13	42/87
Top score	214 not out	300 not out
Balls bowled	546	3,822
Wickets	8	64
Bowling average	39.62	31.37
5 wickets in innings	0	2
10 wickets in match	–	0
Best bowling	3/60	5/19
Catches/stumpings	31/–	173/–

Source: Cricinfo, 30 September 2009

Victor Thomas Trumper (2 November 1877 – 28 June 1915) was an Australian cricketer known as the most stylish and versatile batsman of the Golden Age of cricket, capable of playing match-winning innings on wet wickets his contemporaries found unplayable. Archie MacLaren said of him, "Compared to Victor I was a cab-horse to a Derby winner". Trumper was also a key figure in the foundation of rugby league in Australia.^[1]

Life and career

Trumper was probably born in Sydney;^[2] no definite record of his birth exists. Trumper's parents are believed to be Charles Thomas Trumper and his wife Louise Alice "Louie", née Coghlan.^[2]^[3]

Trumper was educated at Crown Street Superior Public School^[2] and showed early ability as a batsman. When only 17 years old Trumper made 67 runs for a team of promising juniors against Andrew Stoddart's touring English team at Sydney Cricket Ground. In 1894-5 he played for New South Wales against South Australia but made only 11 and 0 runs in his two innings.^[2] At his next attempt he also failed with the bat and was left out of representative cricket for two years. M. A. Noble, always a good judge, was confident about young Vic's ability, but it was only after some controversy that Trumper was made a last minute selection for the 1899 Australian team to England. He soon showed his ability, scoring 135 not out against England at Lord's Cricket Ground and 300 not out against Sussex. After the Lord's innings in June 1899, the great English batsman W. G. Grace approached the Australian dressing room and presented Trumper with his own bat, declaring, "From the present champion to the future champion." That bat now belongs to the Australian Museum collection in Canberra.

Trumper's most remarkable Test season was played in England in 1902. It was one of the wettest summers on record, yet Trumper in 53 innings scored 2,570 runs, and without a single not out had an average of 48.49. Harry Altham wrote: "From start to finish of the season, on every sort of wicket, against every sort of bowling, Trumper entranced the eye, inspired his side, demoralized his enemies, and made run-getting appear the easiest thing in the world."^[4]

C. B. Fry added, "He had no style, and yet he was all style. He had no fixed canonical method of play, he defied all orthodox rules, yet every stroke he played satisfied the ultimate criterion of style -- the minimum of effort, the maximum of effect."

"No one," wrote Plum Warner, "ever played so naturally. Batting seemed just part of himself, and he was as modest as he was magnificent."

Trumper was modest, retiring and generous. A teetotaller and non-smoker, his general conduct was an example to his fellow players, and he was a great favourite with the public both in England and Australia. Monty Noble had no hesitation in calling him the world's greatest batsman, a genius without compare.

In 1902, in arguably his greatest innings, he became the first player to achieve the very rare feat of making a century on the first morning of a Test match, scoring 103 before lunch against England at Old Trafford.

In August 1904, Trumper, with Hanson Carter, opened a sports store in Market Street, Sydney. Although he is best known for his prowess as a cricketer, Trumper was also a competent rugby player and can lay claim to being the prime mover in the development of rugby league in Australia. He hosted meetings at his store during 1907 as discontent amongst players with the game's administration grew louder. On 8 August 1907 at Bateman's Crystal Hotel, George Street, Sydney independent politician Henry Hoyle chaired a meeting of fifty, comprising several leading rugby players and officials. The New South Wales Rugby Football League, the body that would go on to conduct the major national rugby league premiership of Australia, was founded and Trumper was elected its first treasurer.^[5]

Trumper's health during this period declined to the point where he missed the 1908-09 season due to illness.^[2]

At the begninning of the 1909 NSWRFL season the League, which was almost broke, had met and kicked out its founders, Trumper, Hoyle and J J Giltinan.^[6]

In 1912 Trumper opened "Victor Trumper and Dodge Ltd.", a sports and mercery store in George Street, Sydney.^[2]

Some notable highlight's of Trumper's career include scoring 292 against Tasmania, including a century before lunch (1908); scoring 100 in 58 minutes against Victoria (1906); 201 against South Australia (1913).^[2] His innings of 293 for an Australian XI against Canterbury (1914), scored in a little over three hours, was made in partnership with Arthur Sims (184 not out), and their stand of 433 still remains the record for the eighth wicket in first-class cricket, and Trumper's innings remains the highest score by a number nine batsman.^[7] His last 68 first-class innings, in 1910-14, gave him an average of 60. His ability as a batsman, however, cannot be valued by averages or the number of runs scored. His mastership was shown on bad wickets, for when other batsmen were struggling merely to keep their wickets intact, he was still able to time the ball and execute strokes all round the wicket.

In February 1913 a match was played for his benefit between New South Wales and the rest of Australia which, with subscriptions, yielded nearly £3000.

Trumper's health declined rapidly in 1914 and he died as a result of Bright's disease in Darlinghurst, Sydney on 28 June 1915, aged 37. Trumper was buried in Waverley Cemetery after the largest funeral procession ever seen in Sydney (with 20,000 mourners lining the route) and was survived by his wife Sarah, his son Victor and daughter Nancy.

Trumper's son, Victor Trumper, Jr (1913–1981), played seven first-class games for New South Wales in 1940-41, he was also the uncle of Admiral Sir Victor Smith (1913–1998), the first Australian to be promoted to the rank of Admiral.

Victor Thomas' maternal ancestry was of the Coughlin family which also included NSW's first female statistician and Australia's Northern Territory's Chief Minister Clare Martin. The family was originally from County Offaly, Ireland until the Cromwell invasion then left County Cork in the 1850s just after the Potato Famine.

Recognition

Trumper was named a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1903.

He was awarded Life Membership of the New South Wales Rugby League in 1914.

In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Trumper was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century.^[8] This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were Sydney Barnes, Don Bradman, W G Grace, Jack Hobbs and Tom Richardson.

In 1981 he was honoured on a postage stamp issued by Australia Post depicting a cartoon image by Tony Rafty .

In 1996 he was made one of the ten inaugural inductees into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame, the others being Fred Spofforth, John Blackham, Clarrie Grimmett, Bill Ponsford, Sir Donald Bradman, Bill O'Reilly, Keith Miller, Ray Lindwall, and Dennis Lillee.^[9]

The Sydney Cricket Ground Trust announced on 12 June 2008 that the new grandstand on the old hill at the SCG was to be named in Trumper's honour.

On 2 November 2008 the SCG Trust hosted the first 'Victor Trumper Day', a sporting and cultural retrospective organised by Sydney school teacher David Strange to honour the life of Trumper on the 131st anniversary of his birth. Former internationals and celebrities including Greg Matthews, Stuart MacGill, Greg Page, Mick Molloy and Tim Farriss wore slatted pads, sausage gloves and 1907 skull caps to recreate the Golden Age of cricket and raise money for charity in Trumper's name.

On 30 September 2009, Victor Trumper was one of five new members announced as part of the growing class of the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.^[10] On 4 January 2010, he was formally inducted into the Hall of Fame.^[11]

Trumper Park Oval in Paddington, New South Wales is also named in his honour, as is the Trumper Pavilion at Chatswood Oval.

Victor Trumper's career performance graph.

Notes

↑ nswrl.com.au. "History". New South Wales Rugby League. NSWRL. Retrieved 9 October 2011.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Bede Nairn, 'Trumper, Victor Thomas (1877 - 1915)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 12, MUP, 1990, pp 269-272. retrieved 13 January 2010
↑ Ancestry.com.au Stanford Family Tree by Thomas H Stanford
↑ Quoted in The Cricket Captains of England, Alan Gibson, 1989, The Pavilion Library, ISBN 1-85145-390-3, p76.
↑ Headon, David (2001). The best ever Australian sports writing: a 200 year collection. Australia: Black Inc. p. 316. ISBN 1-86395-266-7.
↑ Heads, Ian. "Controversy" (PDF). League of Legends. National Museum of Australia. Retrieved 9 October 2011.
↑ "Record Partnerships for Each Wicket at Cricket Archive, retrieved July, 2015".
↑ Six Giants of the Wisden Century Neville Cardus, Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, 1963. Retrieved on 8 November 2008.
↑ "Australian Cricket Hall of Fame Inductees". Melbourne Cricket Ground. Archived from the original on 11 January 2009. Retrieved 2009-02-23.
↑ "Sutcliffe, Grimmett, Trumper, Wasim and Waugh new inductees into Cricket Hall of Fame". TheSportsCampus. 30 September 2009. Retrieved 19 January 2016.
↑ "Lindwall, Miller, O'Reilly, Trumper and Waugh - Australian legends inducted into ICC Cricket Hall of Fame". TheSportsCampus.com. 4 January 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2016.

References

Haigh, Gideon (7 November 2009). "The man who was the Golden Age". CricInfo. Retrieved 2009-11-07.
FitzSimons, Peter (2006). Great Australian Sports Champions. Harper Collins Publishers. ISBN 0-7322-8517-8.
Serle, Percival (1949). "Trumper, Victor Thomas". Dictionary of Australian Biography. Sydney: Angus and Robertson.

External links

Six Giants of the Wisden Century

Six Giants	Barnes Bradman Grace Hobbs Richardson Trumper

Australian first-class cricket season leading run-scorers (1850–51 to 1899–1900)

1850–51: Hamilton 1851–52: Hamilton 1852–53: – 1853–54: Cavenagh 1854–55: – 1855–56: Driver/McKone 1856–57: Gilbert 1857–58: Wills 1858–59: Lewis 1859–60: Wills 1860–61: Bryant 1861–62: Caffyn 1862–63: D'Arcy 1863–64: Lockyer 1864–65: – 1865–66: N. Gregory 1866–67: Cosstick 1867–68: Wardill 1868–69: Phillips 1869–70: Gordon 1870–71: Loughnan 1871–72: Thomson 1872–73: Arthur 1873–74: – 1874–75: C. Bannerman 1875–76: D. Gregory 1876–77: C. Bannerman 1877–78: Thomson 1878–79: Ulyett 1879–80: A. Bannerman 1880–81: Horan 1881–82: Murdoch 1882–83: A. Bannerman 1883–84: Murdoch 1884–85: Barnes 1885–86: McIlwraith 1886–87: Shrewsbury 1887–88: Moses 1888–89: Trott 1889–90: Lyons 1890–91: Giffen 1891–92: Lyons 1892–93: Giffen 1893–94: Giffen 1894–95: Ward 1895–96: Donnan 1896–97: Lyons 1897–98: Hill 1898–99: Trumper 1899–1900: Trumper

Leading run-scorers: 1850–51 to 1899–00 1900–01 to 1949–50 1950–51 to 1999–00 2000–01 onwards Leading wicket-takers: 1850–51 to 1899–00 1900–01 to 1949–50 1950–51 to 1999–00 2000–01 onwards

Australian first-class cricket season leading run-scorers (1900–01 to 1949–50)

1900–01: Hill 1901–02: Hill 1902–03: Duff 1903–04: Trumper 1904–05: Armstrong 1905–06: Mackay 1906–07: Hopkins 1907–08: Hardstaff 1908–09: Ransford 1909–10: Kortlang 1910–11: Faulkner 1911–12: Rhodes 1912–13: Trumper 1913–14: Macartney 1914–15: Ryder 1915–16: – 1916–17: – 1917–18: no games played 1918–19: Armstrong 1919–20: Park 1920–21: Hendren 1921–22: O'Keeffe 1922–23: Chapman 1923–24: Ponsford 1924–25: Sutcliffe 1925–26: Richardson 1926–27: Ponsford 1927–28: Ponsford 1928–29: Bradman 1929–30: Bradman 1930–31: Bradman 1931–32: Bradman 1932–33: Sutcliffe 1933–34: Bradman 1934–35: Fingleton 1935–36: Bradman 1936–37: Bradman 1937–38: Bradman 1938–39: Brown 1939–40: Bradman 1940–41: S. Barnes 1941–42: Raymer 1942–43: – 1943–44: – 1944–45: – 1945–46: S. Barnes 1946–47: Compton 1947–48: Bradman 1948–49: Morris

Leading run-scorers: 1850–51 to 1899–00 1900–01 to 1949–50 1950–51 to 1999–00 2000–01 onwards Leading wicket-takers: 1850–51 to 1899–00 1900–01 to 1949–50 1950–51 to 1999–00 2000–01 onwards

Authority control	WorldCat Identities VIAF: 13683329 LCCN: n83062610 ISNI: 0000 0000 2620 8396

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