New Zealand celebrated the party thanks to Glen Turner's magic innings

by A.C. de Silva

The New Zealand cricketers were enjoying their celebration party - big brawny sustained fellows who could have doubled for the All Blacks without any troubled at all.

But in that crowd giants, there was somewhat of a intruder, slight and pale and with the face of a choirboy, in marked contrast to the rest in every way.

That small made person was GLENN TURNER for whom the party had been thrown to honour his feat of scoring 1,000 runs by the end of May, 1973... one that placed him among the cricketing immortals.

Here was something out of the ordinary. For this relatively unathletic young man, with his quiet and gentle ways, had become the finest player of the new ball in the world, a heartbreaker and archenemy of fast bowlers everywhere.

He had carried his bat through a Test innings at Lord's, beaten Australia almost singlehanded, scored more runs than any other man during an English summer and set a new Worcestershire record of ten centuries in a season.

He says it was his pleasure and it came from occupying the crease hour after hour, grinding the bowlers down. He says that he was confident that he could overcome any bowler in the game, and he would fall only by his own mistakes.

He says he hated getting out and he did his best batting for long spells.

Two Jobs

In fact, since those days, Turner says he had undergone a big change, become a gifted stroke player and quite frequently a bit of a dasher. But it was still as the relentless run-machine that he will be remembered.

His hometown of Dunedin with its Scottish-type climate, was not a breeding ground for great batsmen. And New Zealand in the sixties was still very much the minnow of the international game.

So Turner, who had paraded rich talents at an early age, decided to take the gamble and play his cricket in England.

To earn the fare, he worked as an insurance clerk by day and as a baker by night, and still produced the strokes to catch the eye of Warwickshire's Billy Ibadulla who was coaching in Dunedin.

Ibadulla recommended him to his English county. But warwickshire had already taken up its full quota of overseas players and so he went to nearby worcestershire.

And after taking one long look at the new recruit, Tom Graveney commented: "It looks as though we've found ourselves another Boycott".

Like the Yorkshireman, Turner had to learn to ride the barracking during those early days when his play landed to be on the strokeless side. But this has always reflected on interesting aspect of his character. He thrives on hostility.

This was handsomely underlined at Christchurch in March, 1974, when he was the target of verbal aggression from the touring Australians. At times, it became so fierce that the umpires had to step in.

World record

But Turner batted serenely through the storm, nonallantly avoided the bouncers and paved the way for an historic five-wicket victory with scores of 101 and 110 not out.

In a previous series against the West Indies, he had taken up an almost permanent occupancy of the crease, and as the lone star in his country's batting line-up this role was inevitable.

During the Prudential World Cup, he averaged 297 in the three innings in the preliminary matches, but was unable to lead his side past the semi-final against the West Indies.

Under the Worcester banner, he was able to play a much more fluent game in 1973, he hit 333 boundaries, more than anyone else in England....and that included such adventures as Gorden Greenidge, Bany Richards, Clive Lloyd and Mike Procter.

At Swansea in 1977, he scored 141 out of Worcester's total of 169, thus setting a world record by supplying 83.43 per cent of a first-class side's runs.

He hit one six and 18 fours in that innings and his teammates managed just 14 scoring shots. He dismisses the beat with a shrug.

Freak situation

"It was just a freak situation" he says, "because the wicket wasn't behaving badly. It's impossible to explain how he should have got so many runs.

That ice-cool temperament served him well in his other two record-breaking performances.

In 1970, he had been run out on 99 against Lancashire when one more run would have given him the 10th century he needed. With only one match remaining that season, it seemed as though his chance had gone.

But he proceeded to score 133 against Warwickshire, calmly and without even the flicker of a mistake.

Cut Bedi to ropes to clinch victory

In 1973, he came to the last day of May still requiring 23 runs to achieve that magical 1,000. However as he resumed on his overnight score of 70, rain was threatening to fall and the Northamptonshire bowlers were moving the ball through the air and off the wicket.

In those difficult conditions, he refused to hurry, although the sky was growing darker by the minute.

Then after an agonising hour, he cut Bishen Bedi to the ropes and the target had been achieved. Soon afterwards the rain came tumbling down.

He had become the first cricketer to score 1,000 runs before the end of May since Don Bradman had done so 35 years earlier.

"I had always wanted to do something which would be remembered" confessed the quiet man from Dunedin."