January 23, 2017
Kingaroy cricketing hero Matthew Hayden will be formally inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame as part of the Allan Border Medal awards ceremony in Sydney on Monday night.
Australian Cricket Hall of Fame chairman Peter King made the announcement on Sunday.
Hayden told reporters he felt very privileged to have been associated with all formats of the game – from Test Cricket to Big Bash.
However, he could not have foreseen any of his career.
“I fell in love with the game listening to a transistor radio on the back of a tractor in a shed of my Dad’s property. Because I couldn’t see the game, I had to listen to the game,” he said.
“And in some ways that was a good thing … I really thank mentors like David (Boon) who sat around over a couple of stubbies at the end of a day and talked about the game whilst we were actually playing together.
“I’m thinking of the ’93 Ashes tour. Everyone had to be patient with me because I hadn’t really seen a lot of the game so in a lot of ways in my head it was about my game.
“In some ways that was a pro but it was also a con. The pro side was that I was very free when I came to the game. I had no expectations. I took every day as it came.
“I never believed that I was ever going to get selected on another tour and I remember often having conversations with my wife Kelly saying “Look it doesn’t happen, then you’ll work, I’ll work and we’ll be happy”. So I definitely don’t have any regrets, that’s for sure.”
Joining Hayden in the Hall of Fame will be fellow batting superstar David Boon and the late Betty Wilson, who played 11 tests for Australia during the war years and in the 1950s.
Mr King said the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame, which is located at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, began in 1996; 46 cricketers have so far been inducted.
The latest selections were made by former Test captains Bill Laurie and Mark Taylor, former Test batsman and ex-Melbourne Cricket Club president Paul Sheahan, Australian Cricketers Association CEO Alistair Nicholson, Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland and media representatives Ben Horne and Gideon Haigh.
Mr King said Boon and Hayden were among a select group of cricketers to play more than 100 tests for Australia.
Boon scored more than 13,000 runs during his career, including 21 centuries at Test level as is now a match referee with the ICC.
Mr King described Hayden as an “intimidating” opening batsman and slips fieldsman and “undoubtedly one of the best players this country has produced”.
Hayden is fifth on the list of all-time list of Australian run-scorers, notching up 40 international centuries and almost 15,000 runs in Test / ODI cricket in a career that spanned 15 years.
The late Betty Wilson played 11 Tests, making 90 on a debut and was the first Australian woman to make a century against England.
Mr King said she would have played significantly more cricket but for the war.
In 1958 in Melbourne she became the first cricketer, male or female, to score 100 runs and take 10 wickets in a Test, including a hat-trick.
