Greg Chappell World Series Cricket (1977-1979)
What position did Greg Chappell play during the World Series in 1977?
What position did Greg Chappell play during the World Series in 1977?
Chappell was happy for brother Ian to captain the WSC Australian team, which allowed him to concentrate on his batting. In the first season of WSC, he returned to type with 661 runs at an average of 60. The Australians struggled against the array of talented players assembled to represent the West Indian and World teams, and the emphasis on fast bowling destroyed the confidence of many batsmen, who took to wearing helmets for safety. Chappell eventually opted for a helmet with temple guards only - he never wore one with a grile. He never missed an opportunity to slip into a cap when facing medium pace or spin. In the final "Supertest" of the first season, Chappell captained the Australian team as his brother had suffered a broken finger. After four losses in five matches, the Australians turned matters around, thanks to a magnificent 246* by Greg Chappell, the highest innings played during the existence of WSC. However, the constant diet of fast bowling got to Chappell in the next season, and he managed to pass fifty in the Supertests just once. With a WSC tour of the West Indies looming, Chappell was diagnosed with Bell's Palsy and one side of his face was paralysed. Doctors and family advised him to miss the trip, but Chappell was determine to go and utilise a modified technique he had devised for facing the relentless fast bowling. After a slow start, Chappell hit the richest vein of form in his career. In quick succession, he peeled off 45 and 90 in Barbados, 7 and 150 in Trinidad, 113 in Guyana and finished his WSC career with 104 and 85 in Antigua, all scored against an attack of Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Colin Croft and Joel Garner on their home wickets. Unfortunately for Chappell, WSC matches are not included in official statistics as he scored five hundreds in 14 Supertests and a total of 1415 runs at 56.6 average. In all, he missed 24 Test matches during his exile from official cricket. CANNOTANSWER
Chappell captained the Australian team as his brother had suffered a broken finger.
Gregory Stephen Chappell  (born 7 August 1948) is a former cricketer who represented Australia at international level in both Tests and One-Day Internationals (ODI). The second of three brothers to play Test cricket, Chappell was the pre-eminent Australian batsman of his time who allied elegant stroke making to fierce concentration. An exceptional all round player who bowled medium pace and, at his retirement, held the world record for the most catches in Test cricket, Chappell's career straddled two eras as the game moved toward a greater level of professionalism after the WSC schism.

Since his retirement as a player in 1984, Chappell has pursued various business and media interests as well as maintaining connections to professional cricket; he has been a selector for national and Queensland teams, a member of the Australian Cricket Board, and a coach.

Family and early life 
Born in Unley, South Australia, Chappell was the second of three sons born in Adelaide to Arthur Martin and Jeanne Ellen (née Richardson), a Cornish Australian family. He was steeped in the game from a very early age: his father Martin was a noted grade cricketer in Adelaide who put a bat in his hands as soon as he could walk, while his maternal grandfather was the famous all-round sportsman Vic Richardson, who had captained Australia in Test cricket. Elder brother Ian and younger brother Trevor also played for Australia, and Greg closely followed in Ian's footsteps to the top. Given weekly lessons by coach Lynn Fuller, the brothers fought out fierce backyard cricket matches, with no holds barred. The fraternal relationship between Ian and Greg became legendary in Australian cricketing history for volatile verbal slanging matches, even during hard fought Test matches, which had their genesis in the family backyard.

Chappell attended St Leonards primary school, where he played his first competitive match at the age of eight; he also played a lot of baseball. Quite small for his age, Chappell developed a technique for dealing with the high bouncing ball by playing most of his shots to the leg side. Aged twelve, he hit his first centuries and was selected for the South Australian state schools team. He was then enrolled at Plympton high school for two years before following brother Ian and attending Prince Alfred College on a scholarship. Chappell recalled himself being an "economical" student whose mind often wandered to the cricket field during class. In the summer of 1964–65, Chappell suddenly grew ten centimetres in seven weeks and within twelve months had shot up to 189 cm. With this greater physical presence, Chappell was able to dominate schoolboy matches; in one of his matches for the school's First XI he scored a double ton and combined with classmate (and future Test teammate) Ashley Woodcock to put on more than 300 runs for the first wicket against Scotch College. Chappell's cricket coach at Prince Alfred, former first-class player Chester Bennett, described Chappell as "possibly the finest all-round schoolboy cricketer in my experience...he could go far in the game."

Cricket career

Early first-class career 
The Chappell brothers played grade cricket for Glenelg and they batted together for the first time in a semi final against Port Adelaide in early 1966. Later that year, Ian was chosen for the Test tour to South Africa, which opened up a place in the South Australian team. Greg seized the opportunity by scoring 101*, 102* and 88 for his club, then made his first-class debut against Victoria at Adelaide Oval, aged 18. Hampered by a throat infection, Chappell still managed 53 and 62* to earn an extended trial in the team. The remainder of the season brought another 386 runs in 14 innings, including a maiden century against Queensland.

With the return of the Test players the following summer, Chappell held his place in the South Australian side and was promoted to the number four position, following brother Ian at number three. The highlight of Chappell's season was a brilliant 154 against Western Australia, but his continuing preference for leg side shots was seen as a weakness if he wanted to make Test cricket. During a brief dressing room encounter with the great Don Bradman, then a state and national selector, Chappell was advised to change his grip on the bat in order to improve his off-side play. Without hesitation, Chappell made the recommended change and at season's end, wrote to the English county team Somerset, asking for a contract to play county cricket to further his development.

During two seasons with the county, Chappell scored 2493 first-class runs at a moderate average of 30. Hitherto, Chappell bowled leg spin, but after his growth spurt had found it difficult to land the ball on a consistent length. The green pitches in England encouraged him to experiment with seam-up medium pace, which produced immediate results: he finished with 71 wickets for Somerset, including 7 for 40 against Yorkshire at Leeds in 1969. In his first season, he was capped by Somerset after belting the Middlesex attack for three hours in making 148. Shortly after was hit a severe blow to the eye when hooking at a bouncer from England fast bowler John Snow in a match against Sussex. In between these stints in England, Chappell scored 707 runs (including two centuries) in the 1968–69 Australian season, which made him a favourite to break into the Australian squad for the tour of India and South Africa. His subsequent omission in favour of West Australian unknown Jock Irvine cause a sensation at the time.

Early test career (1970–1973) 
Entering the 1969–70 season, Chappell hit four hundreds to earn a place on an Australian A trip to New Zealand. Scoring 519 runs at 57.70, he was the dominant batsman of the tour and with the Test team failing in South Africa, he only needed a solid start to the next season to force his way in to play against England in the 1970–71 Ashes Series. After acting as twelfth man in the first Test, he was selected to bat at number seven for the second match, the first Test played at Perth's WACA ground. During an historic century on debut, he teamed with Ian Redpath to add 219 runs and haul Australia out of a difficult situation. Just days after the Test, he belted 102 in two hours against the English in a tour match. However, the dream start affected Chappell, who struggled for the rest of the series, apart from a score of 65 in the last Test. In the main, he was getting out by playing too many big shots early in his innings.

The inconsistent form continued the following season, when he was omitted from the Australian team for the series with a Rest of the World XI. Press criticism led to a rethink of his mental approach, and when reinstated a new Chappell emerged. He invented what became known as the Chappell "vee" where he played the ball exclusively in a narrow arc between mid off and mid on until he felt he had his eye in. This reorganisation brought him scores of 115* and 197* in the third and fourth unofficial Tests.

Chappell's new-found approach continued to yield results on the 1972 Ashes tour of England. Going into the second Test at Lord's Cricket Ground, Australia was down 1–0, after losing the first Test at Old Trafford by 89 runs. In a match that would be remembered for Bob Massie's remarkable 16-wicket haul, Chappell's masterful 131 in Australia's first innings was a key component in squaring the series. Coming in after Australia had lost its first two wickets with only seven runs on the board, Chappell combined with older brother Ian to steady the innings. The pair put on 75 runs for the third wicket, with Chappell happy to hold down one end while Ian took charge of the scoring. Chappell would not score his first boundary until three hours into his innings, but thereafter the runs flowed. He managed to bring up a well-deserved century just before the close of play on Day Two, and batted for a further hour-and-a-half the next day before he was bowled by Basil D'Oliveira. He had batted for over six hours and hit 14 boundaries. Chappell himself rated this his best innings, as did Richie Benaud, who wrote:

<blockquote>...I thought it close to the most flawless innings I had seen and I still believe that to be the case. It was beautifully elegant with wonderfully executed strokes, great technique and it exhibited a deep knowledge of what was needed to square the series</blockquote>

His game went from strength to strength. In the fifth Test at the Oval, he hit another ton, sharing a big partnership with Ian as they became the first brothers to score Test centuries in the same innings. Against Pakistan he made 116* and 62 at Melbourne and bagged 5 for 61 at Sydney. On the subsequent trip to the West Indies, he achieved the rare feat of scoring a thousand runs on a Caribbean tour, which included 106 in the Test at Bridgetown, Barbados.

In recognition of his outstanding 1972 Ashes tour, Chappell was named, along with fellow Australians Bob Massie, Dennis Lillee and Keith Stackpole, as one of the Wisden Cricketers of the Year in 1973.

With the Australian team now undergoing a dramatic renaissance, Chappell was the leading batsman, giving him a huge national profile. This brought a lucrative offer to move to Brisbane and captain the Queensland side, as a precursor to taking over the Australian captaincy when Ian decided to retire. He made the move in the winter of 1973.

 Move to Queensland (1973–1974) 
The interest in his arrival in Queensland was enormous as he was expected to lead the state to its first Sheffield Shield title. Although Chappell gathered more than a thousand runs in the shield matches alone, Queensland was thwarted in the last match of the season by a devastating spell from young New South Wales fast bowler Jeff Thomson. Learning of the bowler's dissatisfaction with his home state, Chappell persuaded Thomson to move to Queensland for the following season. Chappell then departed for Australia's first Test-playing tour of New Zealand. The Chappell brothers shattered records in the Wellington Test, as Ian and Greg scored centuries in both innings, the only such instance. Greg's effort of 380 runs in a Test match (247* and 133) remained a record until beaten by Graham Gooch in 1990.

Unfortunately for Chappell, his health was now blighted by recurring tonsillitis and he found it difficult to bat for long periods during the 1974–75 Ashes series. He was the backbone of Australia's sometimes inconsistent batting, scoring 608 runs at 55.3. At Sydney, where Australia won to reclaim the Ashes, Chappell dominated with 84 and 144, which he followed up with a century in a losing cause in the sixth Test at Melbourne. At Perth, he broke the world record for a fielder by snaring seven catches. Ironically, his grandfather Vic Richardson was one of several players who held the old record of six. Chappell reluctantly had his tonsils removed, but he quickly lost a lot of weight which affected his performance on the tour of England that followed. He played in the World Cup (for what proved to be the only time), then made only one good score (73* at Lords) in the four Ashes Tests that followed.

 Australian captain (1975–1977) 
Sufficiently recovered, Chappell totally dominated the season of 1975–76, amassing a record 1547 first-class runs at an average of 85.9, with five centuries. Appointed as Australian captain, Chappell began with a century in each innings to win the first Test against the West Indies in his adopted home town of Brisbane. This performance was unique in Test cricket at the time (later replicated by Virat Kohli of India in 2014). He led the team to an overwhelming 5–1 win and the title of unofficial world champions. His personal highlight was a classic 182* in the Sydney Test.

The peak of Australia's form proved to be brief. The team lost a number of players to early retirement, mainly because remuneration was so poor. Chappell was able to parlay his position into a reasonable income with his Queensland contract and personal endorsements, but he still needed to develop business interests in life insurance outside the game. His leadership abilities were tested in the summer of 1976–77 as a number of new players were blooded and Jeff Thomson was laid low by long-term injury. Australia received much criticism for defensive play during a drawn series with Pakistan, but Chappell's form was faultless, and he scored 121 and 67 in the only Test victory. The tour to New Zealand that followed was similar; it was clear Australia was in a rebuilding phase. During the Test at Auckland, a streaker appeared when Chappell was at the crease. Incensed by this new craze and the disruption that it caused, Chappell grabbed the man and hit his bare backside with the bat. When play resumed, the ensuing din from the incident caused Chappell to mis-hear his partner's call for a run, and he found himself run out. For once, the famous Chappell concentration had been broken. But the most significant occurrence of this match occurred off-field: Chappell was approached to sign with a proposed break away competition, later to be known as World Series Cricket (WSC).

Chappell formally signed a WSC contract the following month, during the Centenary Test, a one-off match against England commemorating one hundred years of Test cricket. He was offered the most lucrative WSC contract in line with his age and high profile as captain of Australia. Chappell led Australia to a dramatic victory. Some of his players felt that he struggled to cope with the pressure of captaincy during the tense England run chase on the final day, when Australia won a dramatic victory, due to by a marathon bowling spell from Dennis Lillee. But Lillee's absence for the forthcoming tour of England would hamper Chappell's campaign to retain the Ashes.

News of the WSC break away was leaked early in the tour, and Chappell quickly found himself besieged. Tour officials and administrators back home questioned his loyalty, journalists were constantly looking for comment, while non-WSC players in the squad accused him of bias in team selections. Leading an inexperienced team in often inclement weather sapped his confidence, while the English bowlers, knowing that he was the key wicket, constantly put him under pressure. After a brave 44 and 112 failed to save the second Test at Manchester, his form fell away and the team slipped to a 0–3 loss.

 Chappell, who was a tremendous player of pace bowling, is regarded as one of the greatest batsmen ever to play for Australia. Although adept in all aspects of batting, he was especially noted as a strong player on the on side (or leg side) of the wicket. The English writer and commentator John Arlott wrote of him in 1977:

 World Series Cricket (1977–1979) 
Chappell was happy for brother Ian to captain the WSC Australian team, which allowed him to concentrate on his batting. In the first season of WSC, he returned to type with 661 runs at an average of 60. The Australians struggled against the array of talented players assembled to represent the West Indian and World teams, and the emphasis on fast bowling destroyed the confidence of many batsmen, who took to wearing helmets for safety. Chappell eventually opted for a helmet with temple guards only – he never wore one with a grille.  He never missed an opportunity to slip into a cap when facing medium pace or spin.

In the final "Supertest" of the first season, Chappell captained the Australian team as his brother had suffered a broken finger. After four losses in five matches, the Australians turned matters around, thanks to a magnificent 246* by Greg Chappell, the highest innings played during the existence of WSC. However, the constant diet of fast bowling got to Chappell in the next season, and he managed to pass fifty in the Supertests just once. With a WSC tour of the West Indies looming, Chappell was diagnosed with Bell's Palsy and one side of his face was paralysed. Doctors and family advised him to miss the trip, but Chappell was determined to go and utilise a modified technique he had devised for facing the relentless fast bowling.

After a slow start, Chappell hit the richest vein of form in his career. In quick succession, he peeled off 45 and 90 in Barbados, 7 and 150 in Trinidad, 113 in Guyana and finished his WSC career with 104 and 85 in Antigua, all scored against an attack of Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Colin Croft and Joel Garner on their home wickets. Unfortunately for Chappell, WSC matches are not included in official statistics as he scored five hundreds in 14 Supertests and a total of 1415 runs at 56.6 average. In all, he missed 24 Test matches during his exile from official cricket.

 Post-WSC years (1979–1984) 
When WSC players rejoined official cricket for 1979–80, there was plenty of debate over the Australian captaincy. Chappell was the far from unanimous choice, but led the Test team in twin series, against England (won 3–0) and West Indies (lost 0–2), and the first triangular ODI series where Australia failed to reach the final. It was a mixed bag of results and the programming came in for some criticism. Chappell led by example in scoring 74 and 124 in the Brisbane Test against the West Indies in his comeback to Test cricket. His 98* guided Australia to victory over England at Sydney, then 114 and 40* extracted a similar result at Melbourne. While he averaged 44 with the bat and claimed seven wickets in the ODIs, a constant shuffling of positions ensured an uneven Australian performance.

Despite protesting the strenuous nature of the players' workload in this new era, Chappell found himself leading the team to Pakistan two weeks after the end of the Australian season. Pakistan narrowly won the first Test, then prepared featherbed wickets for the remaining two matches. At Faisalabad, Chappell made 235 and as a protest at the pitch, allowed all eleven Australians to have a bowl in Pakistan's innings – the first time this had happened in a Test since 1884. Australia lost the series 0–1. Later in the year, Australia played a second Centenary Test, this time to commemorate the first Test played in England, and the match (played at Lords) ended in a draw due to poor weather. One of only four players who played both matches, Chappell scored 47 and 59, but his best remembered contribution to the match was an attempted citizen's arrest (along with England captain Ian Botham) of an MCC member who attacked one of the umpires in a very ill-tempered scene.

The 1980–81 season brought another three-way competition, this time with New Zealand and India. In the Tests, Australia had a convincing win over the Kiwis, but was held to a drawn series against India. Chappell was in good form throughout the summer, but managed only two international centuries. The first came at Sydney in an ODI against New Zealand, when Chappell set a then record Australian score of 138*. Early in the new year, on the same ground, he played his first Test against India. Despite suffering a bad stomach upset, Chappell hit 204, an innings described by Wisden'' as "masterly". However, this season is best remembered for the triangular ODI series, specifically the third of the best of five finals series, played in Melbourne on 1 February 1981 (See #Underarm controversy, below).

Chappell experienced his only extended run of poor form during the 1981–82 Australian season, which featured Test and One Day matches against the West Indies and Pakistan.  His 201 in the second test of the season, against Pakistan, was his only score of note and he registered seven ducks in total in the international matches, including four consecutive ducks spread across two Test matches and two One Day matches.  Chappell's average in the Test matches was 30.6 (13.6 without the double century) and his average in the One Day matches was 17.7.

From 1981 onwards, Chappell did not make himself available for most overseas tours. Thus Kim Hughes was captain for the 1981 and 1982 tours of England and Pakistan respectively, before Chappell was returned the captaincy for the Australian summers of 1981–82 and 1982–83. Chappell retired as captain in 1983, playing his last test series (1983–84) under Hughes as captain.

Summary

Chappell was batsman of the ODI team concurrently with his Test captaincy, registering 21 wins and 25 losses from 49 matches; all but four of these matches were after the end of World Series Cricket, and Chappell never captained Australia in a Cricket World Cup tournament. His batting exploits in ODIs were not quite of the same magnitude as his Test match career, but he did hold the Australian record single-innings score (138 not against New Zealand in 1980) for more than ten years. His ODI captaincy career is most commonly remembered for the "underarm" incident in 1981 (see below).

Chappell played his last Test match in January 1984, making 182 in his final innings. Thus, Chappell became the first Test batsman in history to score centuries in both his first and last Test innings. Of all the Test batsmen who have retired since 1974 and scored more than 2,000 Test runs, Chappell's Test batting average of 53.86 is the third highest, behind Kumar Sangakkara (57.41) and Jacques Kallis (55.37). And if Chappell's batting average in Kerry Packer's "Supertests" (the hardest cricket Chappell says he ever played) were added to his test record, his overall average would be 54.30

Controversies

Underarm bowling incident

Chappell instigated the underarm bowling incident in the New Zealand–Australia One Day International on 1 February 1981. With the series tied at 1–1, Australia looked to have gained the upper hand by batting first and setting New Zealand a chase of 235 runs. Undisciplined bowling and fielding by the Australians, and a great innings from Kiwi opener Bruce Edgar narrowed the target to 15 with one over to play. Chappell's younger brother, Trevor, a batting all-rounder who specialised in bowling at the end of an innings, delivered the final over. From the first five balls, Trevor Chappell took two for 8, leaving the new batsman (Brian McKechnie) to score a six to tie the game.

At this point, Greg Chappell intervened, told his brother to deliver the ball along the ground (i.e. underarm) and he then informed the umpire to let the batsman know of the change of bowling style. Despite the protestations of wicketkeeper Rod Marsh, the ball was delivered and the batsman simply put his bat in front of the ball to stop. He then hurled his bat away. A large crowd of 50,000 – mostly Australian – loudly booed the Australian team from the field. The New Zealand Prime Minister Rob Muldoon said it was "the most disgusting incident I can recall in the history of cricket", the Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser said it was "contrary to the traditions of the game", and the Chappells' decision was universally condemned. Both brothers have expressed regret and embarrassment over the incident.

Ganguly spat

Chappell's first overseas tour as the coach of the Indian team was to Zimbabwe in September 2005. Sourav Ganguly, the Indian captain, scored a century in the first Test match and later alleged that the coach Chappell had asked him to step down as captain on the eve of the game. This was widely covered by the Indian media. Ganguly was later dropped from the Indian cricket team by the selectors on the grounds of poor form, but many in the media suggested his omission was influenced by the previous row with Chappell.

Book on Rahul Dravid

In his new book, Chappell gave rise to fresh controversy by claiming that Rahul Dravid as a captain didn't receive the kind of support he gave to other captains and his success was not enjoyed by some of his teammates.

Post-retirement

Selector

Australian selector 1984–88
Shortly after Chappell retired from cricket he was appointed selector for the Australian team and also became a member of the Australian Cricket Board. This was a time of rebuilding for the national side, with many players lost through retirement and the South African rebel tours. He resigned from both positions in mid-1988, before the Australian team revived but by which time many key players in that revival had been selected, including David Boon, Geoff Marsh, Merv Hughes and Steve Waugh.

Among the decisions made by the panel when Chappell was a selector included encouraging Kim Hughes to resign, not selecting Hughes on the 1985 Ashes, trying Wayne Phillips, Greg Dyer and Tim Zoehrer as wicketkeepers, and fast-tracking Craig McDermott and Ian Healy to the national side.

Australian selector 2010–11
Chappell was made a selector of the Australian national side on 29 October 2010, replacing Merv Hughes. The "Argus Review" led to Chappell, along with selector Andrew Hilditch and coach Tim Nielsen, being sacked in August 2011. It emerged at the time that Chappell was banned from the Australian dressing room at the request of the players.

Coach

South Australian coach
From the late 1990s Chappell coached South Australia for five seasons during which time the team failed to win a single trophy.

Pakistan consultant

In 2004, he fulfilled a consultancy role for Pakistan's National Cricket Academy

Indian coach

In May 2005, he was appointed coach of the Indian national cricket team for a two-year term until the World Cup 2007. He earned about US$175,000 as salary from the BCCI every year.

This role was the subject of much negative public and media commentary, particularly involving his working relationship with former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly, for his tinkering with the batting lineup and his coaching methods. Several senior Indian players whom Chappell coached have come out to criticize his methods, including Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, and Zaheer Khan His comments also did not go down well with the Indian public. Ultimately, his coaching and methods came into question as India crashed out of the 2007 Cricket World Cup in the first round, the first time since the 1992 Cricket World Cup. Chappell resigned after reports that none of the senior players, including Tendulkar, were happy with him and his coaching methods. His rift with India's captain Sourav Ganguly and poor performances of the team at the 2007 World Cup made Chappell a dark figure in the history of Indian Cricket.

Despite the popular perception that Chappell's tenure as coach was an unsuccessful one, he had a hand in laying the foundations of the team that went on to win the 2007 ICC World Twenty20 and 2011 Cricket World Cup. He handed debuts to Sreesanth, Munaf Patel and Suresh Raina, who were all part of India's squad in the successful 2011 World Cup campaign. R. P. Singh, who was India's top wicket taker with 12 scalps in their successful campaign for the inaugural T20 World Cup in 2007, and Robin Uthappa, another member of the winning squad, were also handed their debuts by Chappell. Sreesanth and Munaf were also part of the Indian squad for the 2007 World T20.

Other
Chappell has served as an academy coach for the Rajasthan Royals, and was hired as the All Stars Coach for the 2008 Twenty20 match against Australia. He also serves as the executive coach for a series of Cricket Summer Camps in the United States as part of Chappell Way.

Commentator

Chappell has worked as a cricket commentator for both Channel 9 and ABC radio.

Personal life
During the early part of his career, since being a cricketer was not yet a full-time profession, Chappell worked in a variety of jobs, including at a life assurance firm, an oil company, and as a promotions officer with Coca-Cola bottlers in Adelaide. He married Judith Elizabeth Donaldson, a schoolteacher from Bexley in New South Wales, in 1971. The couple had three children: older son Stephen was born in 1975, Belinda was born in 1977 just before Chappell's departure for the 1977 Ashes tour, and younger son Jonathan was born in 1980. From an early age, Jonathan chose to pursue baseball, which his father and uncle had also played during their childhood, and played Minor League Baseball from 2004 to 2005.

Chappell was a vegan.

Awards and recognition
Chappell was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire in the 1979 New Year Honours. He was made an Officer of the Order of Australia in the 2021 Australia Day Honours for "distinguished service to cricket as a leading player, captain, coach and administrator at the elite level, and to a range of charitable foundations".

Chappell was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 1986.

In 2002, he was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame.

See also
 List of international cricket centuries by Greg Chappell

Notes

References

External links

 
 Watch Greg Chappell hit a century on debut in 1970 (black & white footage)

1948 births
Officers of the Order of Australia
Australia One Day International cricketers
Australia Test cricket captains
Australia Test cricketers
Australian cricket coaches
Australian cricket commentators
Australian Cricket Hall of Fame inductees
Australian cricketers
Australian Members of the Order of the British Empire
Greg
Coaches of the Indian national cricket team
Cricketers at the 1975 Cricket World Cup
Cricketers from South Australia
Cricketers who made a century on Test debut
Living people
People educated at Prince Alfred College
Queensland cricket captains
Queensland cricketers
Somerset cricketers
South Australia cricketers
Sport Australia Hall of Fame inductees
Cricketers from Adelaide
Wisden Cricketers of the Year
Wisden Leading Cricketers in the World
World Series Cricket players
Trevor Martin Chappell (born 12 October 1952) is a former Australian cricketer, a member of the South Australian Chappell family which excelled at cricket. He played 3 tests and 20 One Day Internationals for Australia. He won the Sheffield Shield with New South Wales twice, and scored a century for Australia against India in the 1983 World Cup. His career was overshadowed, however, by an incident in 1981 in which he bowled an underarm delivery to New Zealand cricketer Brian McKechnie to stop the batsman from hitting a six.

After retiring from first class cricket in 1986, Chappell went on to become fielding coach for the Sri Lanka cricket team in 1996, and in 2001 became coach of the Bangladesh cricket team. He used to be the national coach of the Singapore cricket team.

Early life
Chappell was the youngest of the Chappell cricketing brothers, his two elder brothers being Ian and Greg, and the grandson of former Australian captain Vic Richardson. Chappell grew up playing cricket in the backyard with his brothers, and like them was coached by Lynn Foster and attended Prince Alfred College.

Greg Chappell later recalled, "I was going to be every bit the tyrant to Trevor that Ian had been to me. But TC was his own man. Trevor was quiet and unassuming, but if you pushed him too far, he'd explode. That's TC through and through: very passive most of the time, easy going, but push him too far and there's an explosion coming."

Chappell's childhood hero was Keith Miller. Throughout his early playing career he was a batsman, although his excellent fielding at cover also brought him attention. "I figured the cover region was the area where the ball went more often than not, so I thought it was a good spot to field", he later said. "It keeps you occupied and always in the game."

Over the summer of 1969/70 he toured the West Indies with the Australian Schoolboys XI, a team that also included Gary Gilmour, Gary Cosier and Ian Davis. During the tour he came down with chicken pox. He recovered to score 52 against St Kitts.

Chappell also played for South Australia in the Australian Schoolboys Cricket Council Championships in Sydney.

Early career

Early 1970s
Chappell debuted for South Australia in the 1972–73 season, replacing Ken Cunningham who had to drop out for business reasons. He later recalled:
When I first got picked for South Australia, Ian said, "You got to decide what sort of a player you want to be – whether you want to be an aggressive, attacking player, or more like a grafting sort of player." I had to think about that and that I'm not really a free hitter of the ball, so the choice I made was I was going to be more of a grafter.
His career began well, scoring 67 on debut. He made half-centuries in his next two games, but struggled thereafter and was eventually dropped from the South Australian side. Chappell:
When I first played for South Australia, I did all right. Then I got injured right at the start of the second season – I broke my nose and cheekbone in a fielding accident. I damaged my shoulder as well. I couldn't throw very well. Fielding has always been one of my main skills and I lost confidence in the fielding. I wasn't getting any runs, I wasn't bowling much in those days, and I wasn't fielding terribly well either. I ended up playing all of the first-class season and had a bad season. I still couldn't get runs in South Australia the following season but I'd go to England and get runs. I got dropped from the South Australian team.

1975: League cricket
In 1975 Chappell played for Walsden in the Central Lancashire Cricket League over the English summer. It was a highly successful season for Chappell, who found his medium pace bowling effective on English wickets. He ended up making 1,268 runs at an average of 52.8 and taking 106 wickets at an average of 14 – the first "double" of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets in the Central League since 1961.

1975–76: South Africa
Over the 1975–76 Australian summer Chappell toured South Africa as part of DH Robins XI, a special invitational side managed by Richie Benaud. Chappell's teammates included David Steele and Geoff Howarth. Chappell later said "I ... did all right" on the tour. Highlights included scoring 69 against Transvaal.

When he returned to South Australia at the end of the English season Chappell continued to play club cricket in Adelaide.

1976: England
He returned to England in 1976 and enjoyed another successful English summer in the Lancashire League, this time for East Lancashire.

1976–77: Western Australia
Chappell then received an offer to play for the Scarborough Cricket Club in Perth and moved to Western Australia. He had a run of strong games with scores of 48, 88, 43 and 76. This led to him playing four first class games for Western Australia in 1976–77, in which he scored two fifties at an average of 40.

1977: England
In 1977, he played for East Lancashire again in the Lancashire League.

World Series Cricket

1977–78
In the same year, Chappell signed to play for World Series Cricket along with his brothers. He had failed to make the first team for WA for the 1977–78 season when Dennis Lillee approached him. Chappell later recalled, "Lillee said to me, "Bad luck about not making it in the WA team. Don't worry, something better might come along." I had no idea what he meant. And a few days later [Austin] Robinson, Dennis' manager, rang and said, "Do you want to join World Series Cricket" and I said, "Yeah, where do I sign?""

Chappell played ten games for WSC Australia in the Country Cup in 1977–78, scoring 339 runs, more than any other Australian batsman, although his average was only 26.

A highlight was a 110 he scored against the West Indies in Albury. He also scored 56 off 300 minutes against a World XI in a Lismore game which resulted in him being booed by the crowd for slow scoring. "Trevor Chappell batted exceptionally well and he did not deserve the rubbishing the crowd gave him", said Australian captain Ross Edwards.

1978–79: World Series Cricket
Over the 1978–79 season Chappell mostly played for the WSC Cavaliers, a team of players of various nationalities who were not selected for the top three WSC teams, competing in the Cavaliers Cup.

"We had a whole mixture and nobody probably really wanted to be there", recalled Chappell. "They would rather be in the main games. We had some surprising results. We won a few games we probably weren't expected to."

Chappell enjoyed good form that season, which he partly attributed to the captaincy of Eddie Barlow. "Eddie once said to me early on in the series, 'You gotta stop trying to play like Ian or Greg and play like you. Just be Trevor.' That definitely helped me through World Series."

Chappell's highlights that season included 93 against the West Indies and 126, 96 and 72 against the World XI.

Chappell led the aggregates out of all players in the Country Tour, making 629 runs at an average of 33.1, including one century and four half centuries.

Australian XI selection and the West Indies
This form helped earn Chappell selection in the Australian XI one-day team for the International Cup that summer (he played in three games with a top score of 14) and also on the Australian XI in the West Indies in 1979.

In the West Indies Chappell was picked in the first four of the Supertests, but was unable to reprise his Australian form in the Caribbean, his highest score in the Test matches and One Day Internationals being 28. During the first Test he was struck in the face by a delivery from Andy Roberts and required stitches.

Post-WSC

1979–80: Move to New South Wales
When World Series Cricket ended in 1979, Chappell moved to Sydney and started playing for the club Gordon. He started off the season with 55 for a Rick McCosker XI against a Ross Edwards XI in a trial game. This ensured his selection in the New South Wales side for the first Sheffield Shield match that summer, meaning Chappell had now played for three states. He was preferred to non-WSC-aligned batsman John Dyson, which caused some controversy at the time.

Chappell was under pressure to justify his selection but responded with 150 against West Australia, helping New South Wales win. He later scored 144 against Tasmania 76 not out against Queensland and 80 against the touring English. Chappell started to bowl more, and his fielding by now was amongst the best in the country; he began to be discussed as an international prospect.

1980–81: One Day International Player
At the beginning of the 1980–81 summer, Chappell's bowling spell of 3–22 helped NSW defeat Queensland.

In November, Chappell was selected in the Australian one-day side against New Zealand. Australia lost the game. Chappell managed only 12 runs and took 0–21 with the ball. He did not bat or bowl in his second game.

Chappell was kept in the team to play India, taking 1–14 and scoring 14. His figures for his next game were 0–27 and 6, then 1–40, 2–42, 1–21, 14 and 14.

Chappell did not particularly impress with the bat that summer but his bowling and fielding were useful.

Chappell's early season Sheffield Shield form was poor but he recovered to score 111 against Queensland.

He was then selected to play in the Australian side for the third test against New Zealand, replacing Shaun Graf as 12th man. He had to make way for the next test when Graf returned from injury.

He was dropped from the one-day side to make way for Jim Higgs, but soon returned.

He managed to keep his place in the squad for the finals. In the second final Chappell took 2–21. He is most remembered for what happened in the third final.

Underarm incident

Chappell became infamous after bowling an underarm delivery when playing for Australia during a match against New Zealand in 1981.

The teams were contesting the third final of the Benson and Hedges World Series Cup. New Zealand needed to score six runs to tie the match. Not wanting to risk this, Greg Chappell, Australia's captain and Chappell's brother, asked Trevor Chappell how his underarm bowling was. When Trevor Chappell replied that he didn't know because he had never bowled underarm, Greg Chappell said, "well there is only one way to find out" and then Trevor Chappell rolled the ball along the ground to batsman Brian McKechnie.

Underarm bowling, allowed at the time by the rules of the series, but already outlawed at the time in England's domestic competition, is no longer permitted in games under the playing regulations directly controlled by the ICC. In terms of The Laws of Cricket (Law 24.1b), underarm bowling is permitted in other matches provided that the captains agree to it prior to the start of the match.

Although it was not universally illegal to bowl underarm at the time, it was widely accepted to be contrary to the spirit of the game. A visibly agitated McKechnie could do little but block the ball to avoid being dismissed, then throwing his bat away in disgust, and so Australia won the game. It was described as "the most disgusting incident I can recall in the history of cricket" by the then Prime Minister of New Zealand, Robert Muldoon.

Chappell played in the fourth final, taking 1–41.

Test Cricket

1981 Ashes
In February 1981, Ian Chappell listed his possible squad for the Ashes. He wrote "if another batsman is needed for any reason, then Trevor Chappell would be my selection because he can bat anywhere in the order and is the best cover field in Australia."

Trevor Chappell returned to Sheffield Shield making 71 against WA. This form, and his bowling and fielding, helped Chappell be selected on the squad to tour England for the 1981 Ashes.

Greg Chappell chose not to tour England in 1981, and there was much speculation over who would take his spot at number three in the batting line-up. During the early stages of the tour it was thought Martin Kent would take his place at number three, and Chappell only play one-dayers and tour games. However, Kent displayed poor form while Chappell was more consistent – 47 against Somerset and 91 against Gloucestershire.

As the tour went on, Chappell's form was not particularly good but Kent's was worse, and it was felt the other batsman, Dirk Wellham, was too inexperienced. Hence, Chappell was selected in the first Test.

"I'd never really expected to play Test cricket – three family members had already played, what were the chances of a fourth?" said Trevor Chappell. "Then I was involved in World Series Cricket, throw in the underarm and the odds were getting longer. So when it did happen, it was a great thrill."

Chappell's first innings saw him come in at number five with Graham Yallop at three. He made 17 runs over 122 minutes. In the second innings, he made 20 over 94 minutes, and hit the winning runs as Australia won by four wickets.

Chappell kept his place in the team for the second Test but failed twice, scoring 2 and 5. Despite this the selectors kept their faith, and Chappell was in the third Test side, promoted to number three.

This match passed into legend. Chappell scored 27 over 161 minutes, helping Australia to a first innings total of 401, notably taking part in a 94-run partnership with John Dyson. England were dismissed for 174, Kim Hughes enforced the follow-on, and at one stage England were 7–135 in response. Then Ian Botham began one of the most famous counter-attacks in Test cricket, scoring 149 not out and helping England reach 356. Chappell was never called upon to bowl. Australia had to score 130 to win. Chappell came to the wicket when Australia were 1–13 – he and Dyson took them to 56, with Chappell making 8 off 56 balls. He was then dismissed, which triggered a collapse; Australia lost the match by 18 runs.

The fighting quality of Chappell's innings had been noted, and it was not a foregone conclusion that he would be dropped. However, by this stage Martin Kent had rediscovered his form, and he was selected in the Australian eleven for the fourth Test, with Chappell made twelfth man.

Australia lost the fourth test and there was some media talk that Chappell might find his way back in the team for the fifth test in place of Graham Yallop, who had shown weakness against fast bowling. Chappell scored 46 in a tour game, but then it seemed the wicket for the fifth test would take spin, which Yallop excelled at playing, so he kept his spot and Chappell remained twelfth man.

Chappell then won a man-of-the-match award for hitting 63 in a one-day game against Leicestershire. However, Dirk Wellham was preferred to him in the sixth Test.

1981–82 summer
At the beginning of the 1981–82 summer, Chappell was still mentioned as a Test prospect. "Trevor Chappell cannot be left out of calculation", wrote one journalist. "He is resourceful, can bat early or late, bowls a penetrative medium pacer and fields brilliantly." However, Chappell never played Test cricket again. "Being on a tour that is not very successful probably damns your chances to get another go", he later reflected.

He did participate in a 219-run stand against Tasmania for NSW. He later took 4–35 against WA in a McDonald's Cup match, and in a crucial Sheffield Shield game against Victoria he took 4–12 and made 47 runs.

1982–83
Chappell began the following summer poorly when hit by a ball at training. He recovered, and went on to deliver a number of excellent performances for NSW, including 92 against South Australia, 61 against England, 89 against New Zealand in a one-day game and 132 against Queensland.

The highlight of Chappell's summer came during the Sheffield Shield final where his second innings effort of 4–45 was crucial in helping bowl New South Wales to victory. It was the state's first Shield in a long time.

He ended the season with 633 first class runs and 27 wickets.

1983 World Cup
Chappell's efforts over the summer resulted in a surprise selection for Australian's 1983 World Cup squad. He said at the time:
I thought I was in with a chance but I didn't want to build up my hopes. The way I worked it out, it was to be me or Ken MacLeay and I knew I had a few years experience on him, having played Tests and more Sheffield Shield. This is the biggest thrill apart from my 1981 Test selection in England and helping bring back the Sheffield Shield to NSW last year.
Ken Macleay ended up joining the squad anyway, when Jeff Thomson fell injured.

Chappell was made 12th man for Australia's early games.

He was selected for a game against India and promoted to opener – he responded by scoring 110. However, he found less success in later games and never played for Australia again after the tournament.

Chappell later recalled:
I preferred to open the batting or bat in the top order somewhere. But I probably wasn't good enough to bat at No. 3 or No. 4, which is why I was where I was – down at the bottom. It just depended if we had couple of good openers so I wasn't going to get a go there and at No. 3 or No. 4 or even at 5, 6, so 7 is where I got a go in the international side.

Later career

1983–84
A series of indifferent performances led to Chappell being dropped by New South Wales during the 1983–84 season. He was kept on in the one day team and scored 54 against the Australian Capital Territory.

1984–85
During the opening game of the 1984–85 season Chappell was again dropped from the NSW Shield team down to 12th man. However he was kept in the side for the McDonald's Cup. Injuries to players and national selection duties meant Chappell found himself back in the team. New South Wales ended up winning both the Sheffield Shield and the McDonald's Cup that season.

1985–86
During the 1985–86 summer, Chappell was suspended for two premiership matches in Sydney's grade competition for disputing an umpire's decision.

Later life
Chappell retired from first-class cricket in 1986; however, he continued to play grade cricket with the North Sydney cricket club, leading them to a premiership.
He went on to coach the Gordon Women's cricket club.

In 1987, he and Brian McKechnie reunited to play a double wicket game together in New Zealand.

He was a fielding coach for Sri Lanka from 1996–2000 and had a short stint as national coach for Bangladesh. "I’m lucky coaching came along because I couldn’t bear the thought of office work", he said later. He says coaching Bangladesh was a very rough job because of the language barrier.

In 2003, Chappell, along with his brothers, were honoured by the South Australian Cricket Association when a new stand in the Adelaide Oval was named the Chappell Stand after the cricketing brothers.

Chappell then became coach of the 1st XI cricket team at The King's School, Parramatta over the Australian summer. He also began coaching the Singapore National Cricket Team. In 2006, he also participated in a game to celebrate former teammate Robert Holland's 60th birthday, as well as Greg Matthews, David Gilbert, Rick McCosker and Greg Dyer at Toronto NSW.

From July to September 2009, he undertook a 50-day stint as coach of Singapore for its ICC World Cricket League Division 6 tournament, held in Singapore.

In 2013, he said about coaching in Singapore that "I have never had my best 11 together during a training session. It is very disjointed and players offer excuses not to train, some of which are probably not legitimate. The players are amateur, so there isn’t always the motivation to come to training. The work schedule is long and players can’t leave work early for cricket here. So, as coach it means having to do things over and over again because we can’t get guys together." "I wouldn’t mind being more involved with helping the New South Wales juniors", he said. "Unfortunately, the cricket associations seem to look at players from the 1970s and ‘80s as from a bygone era. I have tried a few times to get a more prominent gig in Australia but it never progressed anywhere."

Personal life
Chappell married Lorraine Gavin in Canberra in 1981; Graeme Watson was his best man.

"There is not a lot non-cricketing that I have done really", he said in a later interview. "I'm not married and don't have any kids, so that is a very short story. I was married, shortly after the underarm actually, in March 1981 and then divorced before the 1980s had finished."

References

External links

1952 births
Living people
Australian cricketers
Australia One Day International cricketers
Australia Test cricketers
Trevor
Cricketers at the 1983 Cricket World Cup
Cricketers from Adelaide
New South Wales cricketers
People educated at Prince Alfred College
South Australia cricketers
Western Australia cricketers
World Series Cricket players
D. H. Robins' XI cricketers South Australia is an Australian state, it has produced cricketers that have represented Australia in all forms of the game—Tests, One Day Internationals (ODIs) and Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is). George Giffen became the first South Australian to represent the national side when he played in the first Test of England's 1881–82 tour of Australia. Giffen went on to make 31 appearances for Australia, including 4 matches as captain in the 1894–95 Ashes series. 7 South Australians have held the captaincy of Australia, including the Chappell brothers, Ian and Greg. Greg Chappell has led the Australian Test side more than any other South Australian, with 48 appearances as captain. A third Chappell brother, Trevor, also represented Australia from 1980 to 1983.

With 7,110 runs, Greg Chappell is the highest scoring South Australian in Tests. Ian Chappell is the second highest with 5,345. Greg Chappell has also taken more ODI wickets than any other South Australian. The only South Australian to have scored more ODI runs than Greg Chappell is Darren Lehmann, who made 3,078 runs from 1996 to 2005.

Key

 Apps denotes the number of appearances the player has made.
 Runs denotes the number of runs scored by the player.
 Wkts denotes the number of wickets taken by the player.

Statistics correct as of: 2011 Cricket World Cup

See also
List of Australia Test cricketers
List of Australia ODI cricketers
List of Australia Twenty20 International cricketers

References

South Australia,international
Cricketers