English cricket team in Australia and New Zealand in 1878–79 English cricket team in Australia and New Zealand in 1878–79 An English cricket team captained by Lord Harris toured Australia and New Zealand in 1878–79 in a private tour organised by the Melbourne Cricket Club. The team's match against Australia in January 1879 was retrospectively given Test match status, making it the third Test ever and the third between Australia and England, though it was not part of The Ashes which began in 1882. Harris' tour party arrived in Australia just two months after the touring Australians had returned from England. They were scheduled to play five tour matches, two
English cricket team in Australia in 1970–71 in the 1970s he would become a leading England runmaker. Basil d'Oliveira was the best of the strokemakers, making 369 runs (36.90) in the series with a century at Melbourne. He was a brilliant Cape-Coloured batsman who qualified for England by residence in his mid-thirties, an unflappable player with a low backlift and powerful arms whose gentle, smiling face concealed a very determined man. His match-winning 158 against Australia at the Oval in 1968 led to his selection for the 1968-69 tour of South Africa and a cricketing crisis. John Hampshire was a dashing Yorkshire batsman who is the only