More than a comprehensive history, this ground-breaking volume is a colourful, insightful and affectionate portrait of Australian cricket. A selection of Australia’s best writers share their thoughts on different aspects of the game and its place in our national culture; from bowling, captaincy and scoring, to alcohol, media and literature.

He was top of the world, with numbers bettered only by Don Bradman – then captain Steve Smith led his Australian team into a cheating scandal that stunned cricket. Media exploded and million-dollar contracts were torn up. Australia’s prime minister expressed the public anger and disappointment: ‘Our cricketers are role models, and cricket is synonymous with fair play.’ But there was more to the story than the actions of a few young men. A tangle of personality, politics and culture had led them to this point. Geoff Lemon witnessed that story from commentary boxes and press conferences, and was there in South Africa for its final act. This is a frank, fearless and often humorous account of the path from Ashes high to Cape Town low, from someone who watched it all unfold.

This book explores the dynamics of Anglo-Australian cricketing relations within the ‘British World’ in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It explores what these interactions can tell us about broader Anglo-Australian relations during this period and, in particular, the evolution of an Australian national identity. Sport was, and is, a key aspect of Australian culture. Jared van Duinen demonstrates how sport was used to rehearse an identity that would then emerge in broader cultural and political terms. Using cricket as a case study, this book contributes to the ongoing historiographical debate about the nature and evolution of an Australian national identity.

Australia’s development, from the most unpromising of beginnings as a British prison in 1788 to the prosperous liberal democracy of the present is as remarkable as is its success as a country of large-scale immigration. Since 1942 it has been a loyal ally of the United States and has demonstrated this loyalty by contributing troops to the war in Vietnam and by being part of the “coalition of the willing” in the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and in operations in Afghanistan. In recent years, it has also been more willing to promote peace and democracy in its Pacific and Asian neighbors. This fourth edition of Historical Dictionary of Australia covers its history through a chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 500 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Australia.

Shortlisted for the Cricket Writers Club 'Book of the Year' 2022 and the Sunday Times Sports Book Awards 'Cricket Book of the Year' 2023 In telling the story of cricket from the bottom up, Different Class demonstrates how the "quintessentially English" game has done more to divide, rather than unite, the English. In 1963, the West Indian Marxist C.L.R. James posed the deceptively benign question: "What do they know of cricket, who only cricket know?" A challenge to the public to re-consider cricket and its meaning by placing the game in its true social, political and economic context, James was, all too subtly, attempting to counter the game’s orthodox history that, he argued, had played a key role in the formation of national culture. As a consequence, he failed, and the history of cricket in England has retained the same stresses and lineaments as it did a century ago — until now. In examining recreational rather than professional (first-class) cricket, Different Class does not simply challenge the widely accepted orthodoxy of English cricket, it demonstrates how the values and belief systems at its heart were, under the guise of amateurism, intentionally developed in order to divide the English along class lines at every level of the game. If the creation of opposing class-based cricket cultures in the North and South of England grew out of this process, the institutional structures developed by those in charge of English cricket continue to discriminate. But, as much as the exclusion of Black and South Asian cricketers from the recreational mainstream is the most obvious example, it is social class that remains the greatest barrier to participation in what used to be the national game.

It's the 1986 tour of India, and Australian cricket is reeling from the loss of key players to retirement and rebel tours. Few give Australia a chance against a surging India, and even Allan Border doubts his ability to lead this team. What follows is one of the most titanic struggles in cricket history. Played in oppressive conditions, the first Test in Madras (now Chennai) swung like a pendulum. Tensions reached boiling point on and off the field. Dean Jones's 210 was one of the gutsiest Australian knocks ever, Greg Matthews bowled for most of the final day (in a jumper!) and Ray Bright took five wickets despite being seriously ill. The climactic and controversial final ball forced a tie for only the second time in Test history and set a course for Allan Border to remain as captain. In Border's Battlers, Michael Sexton details the momentous occasion when Australia drew a line in the dust of Madras, and drew inspiration from the fight. The team returned to Madras the next year to launch a winning World Cup campaign as rank outsiders and the seeds of a new golden age of Australian cricket were sown.

The long-awaited autobiography of one of Australia's finest sportsmen A key member of one of the greatest Australian teams in cricket history, and part of an exceptional bowling line-up that dominated opposition batsmen for a decade, Jason Gillespie gives his fascinating account of a life in cricket in Dizzy: the Jason Gillespie Story. the first player of Aboriginal descent to represent Australia at test level, Jason grew up obsessed with the game. Little did he realise his remarkable career would feature such dramatic highs and lows, including helping Australia claim the Ashes four times in succession; breaking his leg in a horrifying accidental collision in the field with Steve Waugh; taking on and getting the better of such legendary batsmen as Brian Lara and Sachin tendulkar; being dropped during the 2005 Ashes series; scoring a brilliant double century against Bangladesh, and ultimately carving his name in the record books as one of the top Australian wickettakers of all-time. In Dizzy: the Jason Gillespie Story, Jason takes us through the tours, tests and trials of playing for Australia during an unforgettable era of cricket in this country.