Chapter 1
EARLY SIGNS
As I dragged myself from the change rooms to the oval, I noticed two weathered, old eucalypts providing only speckled relief from the sun, and headed straight towards them. Here was the place to take some catches and dodge the hard training.
It was a pity that the coach did not think so.
My thoughts had drifted away when I felt a sickening thud in my left shin.
The pain was sharp. It had not been a glancing blow.
I looked up to realise that I in deep conversation had wandered directly behind the stumps, and into the path of a crisply struck straight drive, that had cannoned into my leg. The ball sat menacingly at my feet. It amazed me that it sat so still after impact.
Thinking back, I've had a bad run with cricket balls. It's such a great game but these rock-hard missiles have since broken my nose, my ribs, and my hand, concussed me twice, and bruised both of my eyes. When an errant hook led to a depressed fracture of the cheekbone it was time to retire.
When I'd finished jumping around, I reached tentatively for my shin. I was shocked to find a tender lump almost the size of the offending ball. The immediacy of the swelling was staggering and clearly not normal.
It was just four days before my sixteenth birthday in February 1976.
"Well fielded," I heard the coach yell from behind me.
He was a slightly built man with a neatly cropped moustache and a retreating hairline.
"Good one!" I muttered under my breath, not appreciating his
attempt at humour.
My leg was throbbing.
After looking at the injury, he was concerned. "You'd better have that seen to."
I didn't need convincing at that stage, so I grabbed my gear and hobbled home. It wasn't that far but I was thirsty and shaken.