- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Australia will today commemorate the one century that eluded Don Bradman. Cricket’s greatest player, and an icon of Australian history, will be celebrated on the day he would have turned 100.
More on Bradman
The Don is incomparable, says Ponting
Bradman left his mark on popular culture
Bradman still defined by The Average
Bradman just as prolific with the pen
Sir Donald, who was born on August 27, 1908 and died in 2001, gave Australia a sporting hero when it needed one.
Over 20 years he established a Test career that has never been rivalled, 60 years since his final Test.
His life and remarkable career will be commemorated at functions in most capital cities, and at events in the southern NSW towns of Cootamundra, where he was born, and Bowral, where he grew up.
The major event will be a Cricket Australia dinner in Sydney, where 400 guests will listen to an address given by current captain Ricky Ponting.
About 400 guests are also expected to attend a lunch at the MCG, where Bradman scored nine of his 29 Test hundreds.
Other lunches are scheduled to be held in Sydney and Perth.
In Cootamundra, Bradman’s grandson Tom will open the town’s Captains Walk, a collection of sculptures of the men who have captained Australia.
A black-tie dinner will also be held in the town on Friday night.
Bowral will mark The Don’s birth centenary by unveiling a plaque at the school he attended, before students assemble on the oval outside the Bradman Museum to sing `Happy Birthday’.
The Australian cricket team will acknowledge the occasion in Darwin, where it is preparing for the coming one-day series against Bangladesh.
Members of Bradman’s family, mainly based in Adelaide, plan to attend the functions in Melbourne and Sydney.
Adelaide recognised the centenary by opening the Bradman Collection of memorabilia at Adelaide Oval last week.
In honour of Bradman’s Test average of 99.94, the Australian Cricket Society held its dinner on August 4, a fraction short of a perfect century.
Sir Donald died aged 92. His ashes and those of his wife Jessie, who died in 1997, were scattered in Bowral, where the couple met.
The cricketing career of Sir Donald Bradman
Born: August 27, 1908 in Cootamundra, NSW
First-class career span: 1927-28 to 1948-49
Test career span: 1928-29 to 1948
Knighted: March 15, 1949
Died: February 25, 2001 in Adelaide, SA (aged 92)
Cricket career: Played for NSW, Australia, SA (right-hand batsman, legbreak bowler)Test career:
52 matches, 80 innings, 10 not outs, 6,996 runs, average 99.94, HS 334, 29 centuries, 13 half-centuries, 32 catches, 2 wickets, BB 1-8, bowling average 36First-class career:
234 matches, 338 innings, 43 not outs, 28,067 runs, average 95.14, HS 452*, 117 centuries, 69 half-centuries, 131 catches, 1 stumping, 36 wickets, BB 3-35, bowling average 37.97
Build your own fantasy cricket team and put it to the test with Draftstars daily fantasy competitions. Pick your match, pick your team and watch the points roll in to take out cash prizes on each match. What are you really gambling with? Set a deposit limit.