3rd July at Castle Avenue, Dublin
With Hunter injured and O'Riordan on holidays the new captain was IJ Anderson. B Donaghy cried off both teams and was replaced in each by BA O'Brien. A new cap was RHC Waters, the former Oxford University and Sussex player who was now in his second year as a professional with Clontarf CC.
This was a young and inexperienced Australian side. The average age was 25. They came to Ireland direct from Sheffield where Yorkshire had given them their first defeat - by an innings. They had, nevertheless, won the first Test and drawn the second. Only three were left of the 1961 tourists to Ireland. They were Lawry (now captain), Jarman and Mackenzie. Of the Irish players only Duffy and Colhoun had played seven years ago. The Australian team included six of those who had played in the second Test and only Mallett and Inverarity had not played in a Test at all.
The day was cold and cloudy but rain did not fall. The crowd was good. Ireland were put in to bat at 11:30 am (the Australians had arrived in Dublin Airport at 10 am) and were not all out until 3:30 pm. Pigot and McCall opened to Hawke and Freeman, both of whom moved the ball a good deal. After 15 minutes Freeman bowled Pigot on a full toss and, in the same over, McCall was caught at the wicket. 5-2. Connolly replaced Freeman after five overs. Waters fished at his second ball and was caught at second slip. O'Brien and Anderson added 17. Hawke came off after nine fruitless overs and was replaced by off spinner Mallett. Then, at 27, Connolly had O'Brien taken at the wicket. Freeman came back for Connolly and bowled Monteith who was playing badly. 33-5.
Cowper (off spin) and Chappell (leg spin) were given a bowl and 22 were added in 35 minutes before lunch by Anderson and Duffy. Connolly came back and bowled Anderson off the last ball before lunch. 55-6-26. Anderson batted 82 minutes and had looked in good form. Duffy and Colhoun after lunch added 28 in 45 minutes off Hawke, Connolly, Cowper and Chappell. Colhoun was dropped at second slip by Sheahan off Hawke at 62 but he did very well to stay with Duffy and display more strokes than usual. At 82 Duffy hit Chappell to Joslin at mid-wicket and was given out but Joslin indicated "no catch". One run later Duffy got a lifter from Hawke and was caught at gully for 23. Freeman now finished off the innings. He bowled Goodwin at 89, Colhoun at 98 and Torrens at 106. Freeman, in 12.5 overs, had taken 6-15.
Cowper and Joslin, both left-handers, opened for Australia. The bowlers were Goodwin and Leng. 16 were scored in 20 minutes when Joslin flicked Leng and Goodwin took a good catch at leg slip. Sheahan and Cowper battled quietly to tea at 4:30 pm. Soon after tea Torrens came on for Goodwin. Cowper hit his second ball for four and was bowled decisively by the third. Cowper had batted just under an hour for 30. 56-2-30. 10 minutes later Inverarity cocked the first ball of an over from Monteith to forward short leg. 65-3-0. Chappell hit his first ball for six, stopped the next, advanced to the next and mis-hit it to mid-on. 71-4-6. Freeman arrived at 5-22 pm and delighted the crowd. He had earlier in the tour made a century in 88 minutes against Northamptonshire. In 37 minutes today Freeman and Sheahan added 57 and, incidentally, won the match. Duffy eventually got a bowl and bowled Sheahan in his second over.
This tall, promising forward player had scored 45 in 92 minutes. Freeman now launched an attack on Anderson and Duffy. Fours and sixes flowed and several balls were lost. Eventually Duffy had him caught in his fifth over for 75. He batted in all for 56 minutes and scored his runs out of 104. He had hit four sixes and seven fours - all of them clean hits. Lawry was LBW to Goodwin at the same score, 175. Taber and Mallett brought the match to an end at 190-7. The bowling was very steady until Freeman struck out and the fielding was good
4th July at Ormeau, Belfast
For the second match it was a lovely day at Ormeau but the wicket was wet from a terrible storm on the previous day. Eventually, in the evening, Gleeson, the Australian spinner, enjoyed the drying wicket. Mackenzie came into the team and captained Australia for the first time. Redpath, Walters, Gleeson and Renneberg replaced Chappelll, Sheahan, Hawke and Lawry. Mackenzie replaced Connolly. The crowd of Belfast was better than in Dublin and again Freeman entertained them with 70 scored in 62 minutes. Mackenzie won the toss and batted. This time Redpath went in with Cowper but in Torrens's second over Goodwin took a fine right-handed catch at leg slip to dismiss the left-hander. Inverarity and Redpath added 25 in 29 minutes before Inverarity cocked a ball from Goodwin to Pigot at forward short leg. Now came Waters. In 25 minutes he scored 13 quietly. Meanwhile Leng had had three overs at Torrens's end. Then Monteith came on. The first ball of his second over Waters lunged forward and sent a catch to Torrens, the only slip. 66-3. Before lunch Joslin was caught off Goodwin. At lunch, after 90 minutes, the Australians were 83-4, Redpath 40, Freeman 0.
Redpath went to his 50 with a snicked 4 to Monteith's left at slip off Goodwin. He had batted for 100 minutes. Freeman was now going strong. 51 were added for the fifth wicket of which he made 34. At 134 Redpath was caught at mid-off by Waters off Goodwin. He scored 57 out of 134 in two hours. With Mackenzie in Freeman arrived at 50 in 45 minutes. Duffy was given his first ball at 150 but it was the reliable Goodwin who got Mackenzie. O'Brien caught a skier running from mid-on to mid-wicket. 156-6-2. Freeman was now batting very well. He had pulled and driven Monteith for sixes and now he hit Duffy for three successive fours. They were his last scoring strokes. He hit Goodwin on the up to mid-wicket and McCall took a good catch. 174-7-70. Freeman batted 62 minutes and faced 60 balls. Taber and Mallett were now in. Torrens came back for Duffy. Off his first ball Mallett give a chance to O'Brien at slip and in the same over Pigot dropped Taber at mid-on, going for the catch one-handed. At 3:25 pm, after bowling 24 successive overs, Goodwin came off. He had taken 5-68 in a great spell. Leng replaced him at 193 Taber, hitting at Torrens, was caught by Goodwin at square leg off the bottom of the bat. 193-8-12. At 198 Mallett was lucky when he skied Leng towards long-on and O'Brien and McCall got in each other's way. Mallet and Gleeson added 20, mostly off Leng. Then Leng bowled Mallett and, next over, Torrens had Gleeson caught at the wicket. 230 in came in 187 minutes. Despite the innings ending at 3:46 pm tea was not taken.
Mackenzie's first ball had McCall caught at leg slip and Renneberg bowled Waters at seven. Pigot, who was playing well, was joined by O'Brien and the score at the tea interval was 21-2. After tea Freeman took over from Mackenzie. The last ball of his first over was a full toss which Pigot drove back and Freeman caught an easy catch at the second attempt. Pigot had scored 17 out of 23. He batted well and his dismissal was most disappointing. After bowling four overs Freeman gave way to Gleeson. Anderson reached at his third ball and was caught at slip. 30-4-2. O'Brien and Monteith brought the score to 41. Then O'Brien mistimed a pull off a bad ball from Gleeson and was caught at short square leg. Two runs later and Monteith did exactly the same to Mallett. 43-6.
He and Colhoun now added 13, all scored by Duffy! Then Colhoun returned a gentle full toss to Gleeson. Next over Gleeson had Duffy caught at slip. 65-8. With Goodwin and Torrens in Redpath and Inverarity were given a bowl. Goodwin swung the bat and hit four fours. Eventually Gleeson came back and bowled both Torrens and Leng. Gleeson had taken 6-24 in 9.1 overs. With his unusual grip and mixture of breaks he is a difficult bowler to read and play.