Burgess scored three great test centuries

Press, 26 December 1979, Page 12

Burgess scored three great test centuries

By

R. T. BRITTENDEN

Only 46 New Zealand cricketers have enjoyed the single satisfaction of being in a winning test team during the 50 years New Zealand has been in the test arena, Mark Burgess, whose withdrawal from first-class cricket for the season was announced last week, was in no fewer than five winning teams.

Ahead of him are Bevan Congdon, who was in the side for seven of the country’s 10 test victories, and Graham Dowling, who was in six winning sides.

The absence of Burgess snaps a link with the start of New Zealand’s most productive and exciting period in test matches. From 1967-68 to 1977-78, seven of the test wins were obtained. Burgess was in the 1967-68 team which beat India. The others were Dowling, Bruce Murray, Keith Thomson, Congdon, Dick Motz, Gary Bartlett, Vic Pollard, Richard Collinge, Jack Alabaster and Ray Harford. None of them are in first-class- cricket now.

But it is more than a memory of a pleasant recent past which makes Burgess’s departure so disappointing. For he was never a passive player. Even when things were running badly for him, or for his side, he was always eager to counter-attack. Burgess was intensively competitive. Apart from being a useful bowler and an outstanding batsman, he was; in his youth, almost beyond compare as an out-fielder. Extremely fast to the ball, he had a superbly swift flat throw, as Alan Knott found to his cost one sunlit day in Kent. Burgess had a long chase

almost to the boundary for a ball hit to third man by Knott’s partner. Knott trotted his way back for the second run. But before he was home a magnificently fast flat throw simply demolished the stumps at the far end: one of the most satisfactory sights in a tour which brought New Zealand little satisfaction.

Burgess has a fine test record, but there were three innings which stand out, for differing reasons. He scored a century against England at Auckland in 1971 which counted far more than the runs in the book. New Zealand at that time was under the spell of the England left-arm bowler, Derek Underwood. When the teams went to Auckland, Underwood had just run through New Zealand in the first test, in which he took six for 12 in one innings and that took his tally in tests against New Zealand to 36 at the extraordinarily low cost of 8.8 runs each. Underwood was a phan-

tom on the field to haunt, anxious New Zealand batsmen. But Burgess that day batted magnificently to show that Underwood was a mere mortal. Burgess scored 104, and there is an indelible memory of his fierce forcing shots off the back foot which left Underwood’s cover fieldsmen helpless.

He played a cool and calculated innings of 119 not out against Pakistan at Dacca during the 1969 tour which will always be regarded as one of the great New Zealand performances. New Zealand was in a desperate situation, trying to save the match and

win a series for the first time.

It seemed a hopeless quest until Bob Cunis came in at number 10. He and Burgess stayed together for more than two hours, against splendid spin bowling, hungry fielding, and an almost perpetual roar from a huge home crowd. As Burgess sensed some security at the other end, his strokes began to flow; this was a memorable display. He also scored a wonderful century at Lord’s in 1973, when he played competently and attractively to reach about 70. He went on to his hundred in a fine flurry of magnificent attacking strokes which simply razed the England bowling. It may be that Burgess’s hopes of returning to top cricket next, season will not be fulfilled. If he has finished, he will have few regrets. He has been one of New Zealand’s best and most personable cricketers.