By Spiro Zavos
April 29th 2009 @ 1:48am
Related coverage
The glorious but sad story of Keith Miller
ABC1 has run a special two-part Australian Story documentary on the life of Keith Ross Miller, a cricketing superstar whose glamour and charisma endeared him to people all over the world, but whose life after cricket was a series of tragic misadventures.
The first episode concentrated on his cricket career, which was stellar enough for Michael Parkinson to suggest that Miller was one of the greatest players in the history of the game.
Miller bowled and batted, recalled the starry-eyed Parkinson, a self-confessed hero-worshipper, in the swashbuckling, volcanic, elegant and reckless manner that ordinary cricketers dreamed of emulating but never could, even once in their careers.
The second episode was a grim account of Keith Miller, the playboy, who chased after young women and neglected his family so that several of his boys turned to drugs and were alienated from him.
In his later years his health collapsed.
Two hip replacements made him an invalid dependent on a wheel-chair to get around. Finally, with his looks ravaged and needing constant attention, he left his seriously-ill wife Peggy, to whom he had been married for 60 years, to live with and subsequently marry his Melbourne mistress.
It was clear from their reaction to questions and to the comments they made on various aspects of his life that loyal and loving friends, like Ian Chappell and Michael Parkinson, were deeply upset by aspects of Miller’s self-indulgent lifestyle.
Chappell had the courage to pay a tribute to Peggy Miller at Keith’s funeral when it was clear to him that she was being scripted out of her husband’s life by his second wife.
At the end of the program, Parkinson had to move away from the camera to brush away tears when he tried to talk about this last, awful (for his first wife and his sons) turn in Keith Miller’s life. He finished, however, in avowing that despite everything, he still loved his hero and friend, and would always treasure his memory.
The documentary was introduced by Shane Keith Warne, a latter-day Keith Miller in some respects.
I couldn’t help thinking that Miller was lucky in a sense that he did not live as Warne has in the era of celebrity journalism and promotion. Miller’s high life would have been the stuff of the tabloids, instead of his incisive cricket articles for The Daily Express and The Australian, which were often written despite the fact that he had not actually bothered attending the match that particular day.
Having said this, Miller was a far more likeable, sophisticated, well-educated and well-mannered rogue than Warne.
Miller was a charming man. This is a description that can never be applied to Warne.
Miller’s back story, too, the profound effect his war service in bombers in the Second World War had on his attitude to life, provides a convincing rationale for his determination to live his life as if there was not going to be a tomorrow.
Like tens of thousands of people around the world of a certain age, I grew up with Keith Miller as my sporting hero. Unlike most of these people, I had the supreme pleasure of playing cricket against him and meeting up with him in his later years.
The cricket match was a one-dayer at the Basin Reserve in Wellington in 1961 when a Wellington XI played against the Governor-General’s XI.
The New Zealand Governor-General of the day was Lord Cobham, who as Charles Lyttleton, had played some country cricket in the 1930s. Lord Cobham and Miller were friends and the great cricketer was pulled out of retirement to play one last game.
There is an account of how I faced up to Miller’s opening overs in the cricket anthology, ‘The Longest Game: Best Cricket Writing from Alexander to Zavos’, which edited by Alex Buzo and Jamie Grant (William Heinemann Australia, 1990), and ‘The Pupil Meets the Master’ by Ronald Cardwell (The Cricket Publishing Company, Cherrybrook, 2008).
We batted first and made about 260 or so runs.
In the dressing room before we went out to field we were lectured by our captain Bob Vance about how we had to ensure that Keith Miller got plenty of time to entertain the 4,000 spectators who had packed the ground to see him play.
“Bowlers, just keep the ball away from his stumps when he comes in,” Vance implored. “If he snicks it or hits a catch into the out-field, just drop the ball, but not too obviously. Don’t appeal if you trap him LBW. And don’t try to run him out.”
When Keith Miller came to the crease, walking with that characteristic swagger, looking up at the sky from time to time and occasionally throwing his head back to keep his hair out of his eyes, I felt a certain pang of fear about whether he could deliver what the crowd had come to see.
He had been out of cricket for some years. What if he’d lost his batting genius?
For the next hour or so he belted our bowling all over the field, sometimes over the boundary.
We had an off-spinner, Alan Preston, who had a long and bouncy run-in like Bruce Yardley, and like Yardley bowled quickish dart-ball off-spinners.
I don’t think Preston landed a ball.
As soon as the ball left his hand, Miller was after it coming metres down the pitch to belt it to the boundary.
I had never seen batting like this. It was as if we’d been transported back to the golden age of the game when Victor Trumper was in his prime. We, the players, and the crowd, were enchanted and delighted.
But not our captain, who was intent now on forcing a victory for our side. I went up to him after one particularly savage onslaught and innocently asked: “Can we get him out now?”
“Get the bastard out any way you can,” Vance snapped back me. “Run him out, appeal him out. Let’s just get rid of him. He’s had his fun. It’s time to put a stop to him!”
At Government House that night, the teams enjoyed cocktails and small talk.
Miller was charming, attentive to the women and friendly and manly with the men. There were no airs and graces, just good conversation.
His hero status was entrenched by his civility and charm.
Many years later, the Sydney Morning Herald Sports section ran a series of essays by journalists on the paper about their heroes. I wrote about Keith Miller and the day I played against him.
The next morning, around 9.30, my phone at the Herald rang.
I picked up the receiver. A cultivated, resonant voice asked for “Mr Zavos.”
“It’s Keith Miller,” the resonant voice said. “I’m just calling to say thank you for that lovely article in today’s Herald.”
We chatted for about 40 minutes, probably longer.
He remembered the game well and said that he had enjoyed himself immensely. He was pleased to hear that he’d delighted those of us who so admired him.
When Michael Parkinson said at the end of the Australian Story program that despite everything Keith Miller would always be his hero, I said to myself, “Amen to that.”
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Both the sydney clubs seem to be pitching for the more committed...
Gladstone said | April 29th 2009 @ 6:40am | Report comment
A fine post, Spiro – warm, elegiac, and on the good side of sentimental. One tries constantly to separate the artist from the person, but too many sportspeople and entertainers ultimately let us down.
As to the cricket side of KM, Wally Hammond famously said to Bradman, “Give us Miller, and we’ll beat you.” And Cyril Washbrook famously moaned, “We struggle to survive an over from Lindwall, then we have to survive Miller coming the other way.”
BTW, Miller and Lindwall once batted together at a charity thing at Waverly Oval featuring soft bowling and big hitting. Miller hit them over the fence, but Ray Lindwall, one of the biggest hitting bowlers ever, belted them into Bondi Road.
Incidentally, your combo of swashbuckling, volcanic, elegant and reckless qualifies you for enrty in the Lytton Strachey contest.
Gladstone said | April 29th 2009 @ 6:43am | Report comment
Spiro – re that Lytton Strachey contest, I’ve been trying to win it for years.
Albert Ross said | April 29th 2009 @ 9:26am | Report comment
Ye see yon birkie, ca’d a lord,
Wha struts, an’ stares, an’ a’ that;
Tho’ hundreds worship at his word,
He’s but a coof for a’ that:
For a’ that, an’ a’ that,
Southernwaratah said | April 29th 2009 @ 9:49am | Report comment
Great Article Spiro, I too watched both episodes of the tribute and loved the insight into his life, I’d only every heard whispers from commentators and my grandfather as to his brilliance with the bat and ball so I watched with interest to learn of his life both on the field and off. My flat mate, (Madame. M) walked into the room to see the last 10 mins of the story which was of his last few years. Divorce (Betrayal?), fall out with his sons and death. As the vision of his funeral hit the screen and the newspaper front page proclaiming him as a legend, Madame M asked why he would be proclaimed a legend when he had been a cheating unfaithful husband. I tried to defend him for his input as a war hero, cricketing legend and the fact that he had been recognised with a MBE and AM.
Spiro you raise the point that Keith was not too dissimilar to S.K.Warne but lived in an era where the media didn’t loath his antics but loved them given his stature in society. So it is that his actions were deemed acceptable because of the company he kept or the gentlemen he was or the royalty he had as friends? I’m confused with this one and not to sure how to explain it to Madame M.
For me Keith Miller will be forever a legend given his cricketing ability which I’m in awe of.
Albert Ross said | April 29th 2009 @ 10:21am | Report comment
Thackeray defined a “gentleman” thus:
What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to be honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, to be wise, and, possessing all these qualities, to exercise them in the most graceful outward manner? Ought a gentleman to be a loyal son, a true husband, an honest father? Ought his life to be decent, his bills to be paid, his taste to be high and elegant, his aims in life lofty and noble?
By that standard Miller was not a gentleman in most respects. The Irish have a apposite word for it however: “chancer”
Jamie said | April 29th 2009 @ 10:50am | Report comment
Spiro, What an awesome article. I even got tingles. Top stuff.
KM was well before my time but i enjoyed reading this tribute. Thanks
Hatchet said | April 29th 2009 @ 2:20pm | Report comment
Spiro,
I watched enthralled. Miller was a true giant of the game. He had a darker side and who is to say if his experiences in the war did not accentuate this dark side or create this dark side.
I was impressed by the raw honesty of Ian Chappell. He always seems to be an honest and forthright person who is not always displayed as such by the media. Parky, he will always be Parky. I miss his sporting column that was so enjoyable before he succumbed to mamon and TV. S K Warne not educated? Is that a result of circumstance? Not as charming as K W Miller? Perhaps Keith’s legendary charm might not have been in such abundance had he been subjected to the media scrutiny that Warne is. Shane Warne has been quite ‘charming’ in helping kids and other aspiring cricketers, is his lack of charm with you an outcome of you being a member of the fourth estate? I thought that you had a cheap shot at Warne. It was quite gratuitous and added nothing to an otherwise quite readable article.
Judith Hutchison said | April 29th 2009 @ 2:37pm | Report comment
Hi,
Like many others Keith Miller had a special place in our life in that he and my father where best mates from Melbourne High days and it was of considerable delight to see the program and to read your article, Spiro.
Keith regularly visited our farm in the Riverina and played tenis – where our chook house now stands!
My father died in 1960 at the age of 39 years and it was of considerable surprise to see his photo with Keith and a young boy at Melbourne High being used not only in the Herald Sun, Roland Perry’s book – ‘Millers Luck’ and in both of the TV series. For us it raises many questions, why that photo. My fathers love of Keith was infectious and Keith’s loyalty to the family was incredible.
Keith even while in the nursing home, would contact my aunt(dad’s sister) every couple of months right up until he died.
Its of considerable regret that I did not make the effort to meet up with him in his latter year, however despite the sad ending to this mans life, he had many many wonderful atributes and loyalty was one – altho like others I struggle with what he did to Peg. Thanks
Untimelyzapped said | April 29th 2009 @ 3:05pm | Report comment
What is this forum coming to? There’s a quote from Burns and Thackeray, and also a mention of Lytton Strachey. It’s starting to sound more like Transition or the Paris Review than a sports blog. Please, all you intellectuals, we’re just simple rugby folk who have to take off our shoes to count to eleven. We much prefer Banjo to Burns, our favourite movie is Rocky, our favourite painting is that one of the crying clown done on velvet, and we’ll take a double cheesburger over rognons de veau au sauce madere any day of the week. And we hate polysyllables, obscure symbology, and any mention of Jean-Paul Sartre who was a much better flanker than Jean-Pierre Rives anyway.
Greg Russell said | April 29th 2009 @ 4:14pm | Report comment
Spiro, as an Australian domiciled in NZ, I especially must thank you for this article, as I will not get a chance to see the shows on Miller.
Just one thing though. I don’t like to take issue with you, but I suspect that enquiries amongst a younger generation would reveal that you are incorrect in writing that “Miller was a far more likeable … rogue than Warne. Miller was a charming man. This is a description that can never be applied to Warne.”
However repulsive Warne’s antics may look to older people (I wonder how Keith Miller would have looked to you if you were many years older than him?), my understanding is that Warne has always been exceptionally popular with his fellow players. It’s true that by late in his career people like Ponting and Gilchrist became fed up with the constant scandal around him, but that doesn’t change that he was always one of the most popular players in dressing rooms.
Peter Roebuck once pointed out the oddity of Jonty Rhodes calling Shane Warne a good friend, and that one had to take notice of this. In New Zealand it is widely known that Stephen Fleming is a good friend of Warne’s. These are cricketers of genuine substance who would not tolerate a fraud. Similarly Ian Chappell, with whom Warne has a close relationship.
When the Australian cricketers were close to going on strike in 1996-7, Shane Warne went to the ACB (as it was then known) and said that he would take a paycut if this would help to fund better payments for rank and file first-class cricketers in Australia. His colleagues never forgot this, and the fact that he had it in him to make an offer like this shows why he was popular.
It was also evident throughout Warne’s career that he was a cricketer’s cricketer, i.e., he always played for his team, not for himself. Again, this engenders popularity and respect.
Through the IPL Warne has become mates even with Graeme Smith, subsequent to which the South African captain has become a far more endearing figure to cricket fans around the world. I don’t think this is a coincidence.
Ziggy said | August 11th 2009 @ 7:19am | Report comment
Much appreciated comments on Warne. I can’t disclose my sources, but everything you have pointed out re Warne is true.
Much respected by all cricketers around the world as a player and a man.
Bob McGregor said | April 29th 2009 @ 9:02pm | Report comment
Great article Spiro – beautifully written.
Saw most of the Australian story and was surprised by what happened to his wife and children and how he neglected them. Sad really as another one of my heroes was found to have feet of clay in the family domain.
He abrogated his parental responsibility and I felt for the 4 sons who deserved better from one with such a background. Lord knows how this limited his children’s potential in life. Yet they took the punches and were there for him until the end. Perhaps wife Peggy and the 4 sons are the real heroes.
Has taught me to savour the sporting moments and not let them colour the life outside sport as human frailties are everywhere.
Jaffa said | April 29th 2009 @ 10:57pm | Report comment
Spiro – a wonderful reflective affectionate piece about my favourite cricketer ever.
I am inclined, though, to take a more generous view of Shane Warne and his status in world cricket. It seems to me that he never gave anything less than his considerable best while actually playing,and that he was and is liked and respected by his peers-always a good indication of a player’s standing in the game. His problems all occurred off the field, and usually in the bedroom. He is not the first prominent Australian sportsman to have this deficiency of character, but modern telecommunications technology and his own complete lack of discretion have brought him undone. Miller’s reputation would never have stood similar scrutiny.
His performance as a husband may have been patchy, but Warnie is a far better father to his children the Miller ever was, more’s the pity.
I never met Miller, but I have a friend who assisted at his hip replacements, which were done at Hornsby Hospital. He received an autographed copy of the great man’s autobiography as a gesture of appreciation. My friend naturally treasures both the gift, and the memory of his brief acquaintance with Australia’s greatest ever cricketer.
Jaffa said | April 29th 2009 @ 10:59pm | Report comment
correction : par 3 should say: …….a far better father to his children THAN Miller ever was………
Megan said | April 30th 2009 @ 8:50am | Report comment
I don’t think the boys blamed their father for their drug problem, so I don’t think you ought to either, although having three in the family was a bit much. His wartime experiences were definitely life and behaviour defining, but perhaps became a little habit forming themselves. fancy playing against the great man, what an experience.
Albert Ross said | April 30th 2009 @ 1:12pm | Report comment
>> I don’t think the boys blamed their father for their drug problem,
They didn’t- to their great credit. However t least one suggested that their father had been less than honest in his dealings with them.
I just don’t see how he can be described as a great man. Brave in the face of the enemy – yes. Wonderful cricketer – certainly. Great man – hmmmm…
Phil said | April 30th 2009 @ 7:39pm | Report comment
From hjis wiki page
“The media stridently criticised Miller’s omission,[325] as did former players such as Stan McCabe and Alan Kippax.[326] During the off season, he worked as a journalist and played baseball,[327] but declined a trial with a Major League Baseball club, the Boston Red Sox.[328] ”
It would have been way cooler if he saw the light and played for the Red Sox – sticking it to the selectors for dropping him from the South Africa tour once and for all
westy said | April 30th 2009 @ 11:18pm | Report comment
One thing you forget is his years of service as a fighter pilot in WW2 and then back to civilian life. Always remember his classic response to did he ever feel pressure in a cricket game ? Pressure is having ” a Messerschmidt up your arse 3000 feet in the air”. Miller was not just some hero of sport but of war. I think only those who have exposure to those pressures can truly understand.
Turning up to in the morning SCG in his tux from a good night out to open the bowling with only a low score to defend. The team asked for fieldind positions he said ” just spread out ” they did and he did the rest.
Those wartime years took some toll …he could not quite bring himself to bowl full pace against the brave Edrich…….I remember his comment ‘ they play the game bravely some of them could do with a good meal’ it was in this context he infamously threw the ball back to Bradman and said ” Bowl yourself”
He chased life too hard after the war and to understand his strengths and weaknesses the war took its toll on him. He was always a little different around his wartime comrades .
Dave said | August 12th 2009 @ 7:47pm | Report comment
Funny he should say that about pressure in a game because Ashley mallett reckons that Miller used to thow up before he batted
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=-HnJQ16XracC&pg=PA61&lpg=PA61&dq=mallett+keith+miller&source=bl&ots=g-6mOHyApW&sig=Z2BnE4YZHspyAbpUjzEPTdmWsuw&hl=en&ei=qI-CSvyMKtOJkQXC8YzPCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=mallett%20keith%20miller&f=false
Midfielder said | April 30th 2009 @ 11:36pm | Report comment
Westy
My Dad a returned serviceman and he loved his cricket .. rated Miller as the best player he ever saw .. but more when he was on the field he had an air about him that my Dad says no other sportsman in his lifetime brought…
Ian Noble said | May 1st 2009 @ 12:35am | Report comment
Spiro
I can just recall seeing Keith Miller playing on a black and white TV screen when I was very young. What a fabulous bowling action.
However my uncle who has been a member of the MCC since 1952 is always recalling the great days of Miller, Bedser and Compton. In particular it appears Miller had a great friendship with Compton and they would get up to all kinds of mischief. Stories of them partying together, gambling and drinking all night and yet arriving at Lords in their dinner jackets ready to play a blinder seem to be commonplace. How much credence one puts on these stories I don’t know, but I am sure they have been embellished over time.
In today’s world he would not have got away with it, although both Warne and Flintoff would probably be close. You probably are not aware of the Freddilo incident in the Windies, where Freddie a little worse for wear after a “quiet celebration” tried to set sail in the early morning from a beach on one of the pedalos only to be rescued by the local coastguard. Front page headlines in the UK, ECB not happy etc., Freddie is off the booze at the moment. How would Miller and Compton coped today, of course I don’t know, but as personalities and great cricketers they would be up there in the earnings and would set the world alight in the shorter forms of the game.
Westy my uncle always reminds me of the Messerschmitt story as the present day batter goes out padded and helmeted to face the onslaught. “In my day” of uncovered pitches having to face Trueman, Tyson etc. surprising nobody was killed!!
I hope we have the chance to see this TV programme in England as a Michael Parkinson presentation always brings a light touch to the subject with humour and reverence at the same time.
Bruce Walkley said | May 1st 2009 @ 4:36pm | Report comment
I was lucky enough to see Miller play for an Australian XI against a touring team at the NTCA Ground in Launceston in the late 1950s. He hit – no, stroked; it was so delightfully elegant – a six over the poplar trees at midwicket and smashed the windscreen of a car in the carpark outside. I think the best descriptions of him came from John Arlott, who wrote how he took his bat out of the way of the first ball he faced and went back to the pavilion, where he might find a challenge, during the Australians’ walloping of 721 in a day against Essex in 1948, and Neville Cardus, in an article reprinted in his compendium Cardus in the Covers. Cardus wrote: “I could have sworn that he was a ‘Sydney-sider’, born near Randwick’s racecourse. As a fact, he first saw the light of day in Melbourne, and so I suppose we must call him a Victorian. But he came in good time to live in Sydney, where Bondi beach, Dee Why, Elizabeth Street and – of course – Randwick, acclimatised him, expelled all decorum and released any inhibitions acquired while dwelling in the elegant ciity of the Yarra.” Cardus also recalled Miller visiting his flat in Kings Cross and insisting on hearing classical piano concertos on the gramophone. Truly a one-off, they broke the mould.
Rowdy said | May 1st 2009 @ 11:22pm | Report comment
An absolute hero of mine. I’d have Nugget, Compton and Sobers as the first names on my all-time XI as players able to play at the highest level without ever taking themselves, or the game, too seriously.
Dave said | May 2nd 2009 @ 12:52pm | Report comment
I hope this article is not saying that miller was better person than Warne because he liked opera and Warne likes ham and pineapple pizzas.
JohnB said | May 21st 2009 @ 3:54pm | Report comment
Westy, there’s a great version of that story about Miller turning up to play still in his dinner jacket (I think he would have worn a dinner jacket, not a tuxedo) in a Gideon Haigh book, Australian Cricket Anecdotes (I think). As Gideon tells it, he played in his white dress shirt, not having enough time to change that. After saying “spread out”, he (as always) said something like “right, who here bowls? Pat (Crawford), you bowl a bit, you have a go”. After that over “who wants a bowl now? Davo? How about you? No hang on a bit, I might roll my arm over”. And takes 5 for next to nothing. Haven’t read the story for a while so the exact details are probably wrong, but that’s the flavour of it. Nice story (regardless of how accurate it may be) and captures my impression of Miller from reading about him. Mind you, ask Andrew Symonds how that sort of carry on goes over nowadays.
On Miller/Warne and their relative levels of charm etc, I have been told that Warne when playing Shield cricket was always very courteous with the staff at the grounds, for example making a point of going and saying thank you to the dining room staff. As a result he was extremely well liked by those “little” people. As I say, that’s second hand and thus may be inaccurate. If true thought, I do think you get bonus points for getting at least some of your out of the public eye behaviour right.
Ziggy said | August 11th 2009 @ 7:23am | Report comment
As a boy growing up on the veldt in South Africa I had two sporting heros and one of them was Keith Miller. An extraordinary man of immense talents. He could have been anything he wished to be.
‘His life was gentle, and the elements
So mixed in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, ‘This was a man!’