Fingleton made his debut in the Fifth and final Test in similar circumstances to his break at the start of the season; Bill Ponsford fell ill and Bradman twisted an ankle. As Bradman later took a hard-running catch as a substitute fielder on the same day, some suspected that he had feigned injury to avoid playing on a rain-affected wicket hostile to batting—he had appeared uncomfortable against aggressive bowling in the previous Test. In a low-scoring match, Fingleton's first action on the field was to let a ball go between his legs as South Africa batted first. Opening with captain Bill Woodfull in the absence of Ponsford, Fingleton saw his skipper removed from the first ball of the innings. He was allowed to ease into his first innings when the first ball he faced, from Neville Quinn, was a deliberate full toss to give him an opportunity to score his initial runs easily. The pair became friends from this point onwards. Fingleton was second top-scorer with 40 as Australia made 153 recorded an innings victory. The match lasted less than one day's playing time as the hosts fell for only 36 and 45. The cricketer-journalist Richard Whitington later wrote that "for courage and skill...51 was worth quadruple that number". "The Sydney Mail" predicted that Fingleton's display on the rain-affected wicket, the likes of which were common, proved that he would "someday be a great success" there. Fingleton ended the season with 386 runs at 42.88 with one century and a fifty in six matches.