W. G. Grace's cricket career (1879 to 1882) with a best analysis of 7–30. His bowling average was 18.00; he had 5 wickets in an innings 3 times. Grace's most significant Test was England v Australia in 1882 at The Oval. Thanks to Spofforth who took 14 wickets in the match, Australia won by 7 runs and the legend of The Ashes was born immediately afterwards. Grace scored only 4 and 32 but he has been held responsible for "firing up" Spofforth. This came about through a typical piece of gamesmanship by Grace when he effected an unsporting, albeit legal, run out of Sammy Jones. Grace made 22
Australian cricket team in England in 1882 on a greenish wicket that gave more assistance that it first seemed. England began their run chase with openers Dick Barlow and WG Grace, but 'The Doctor' was unable to reproduce his usual heroics, clean bowled by the express pace of Fred Spofforth for 4. A steady succession of wickets followed with only George Ulyett (26 off 59 balls) and Maurice Read (19 off 54 balls) providing any real resistance as Spofforth's pure pace provided too much firepower for the England line-up to deal with. He collected 7 for 46 off 36.3 overs including an astonishing 18 maidens. Four of