Allan Corry shows off the ball he used to take 10 wickets in an innings at Bendigo Country Cricket Week in 1953.
Tongala cricketer, the late Allan Corry, shot to local sporting fame and into the history books with an extraordinary bowling feat at the annual Bendigo Country Cricket Week carnival in 1953.
Hold tight - we’re checking permissions before loading more content
Allan was representing the Kyabram District Cricket Association that year when he turned on a lethal bowling stint which has stood the test of time.
On that historic day Allan took all 10 Gladstone Cricket Association wickets in the first innings.
His bag of 10 wickets for 15 runs included a hat-trick.
Allan wasn’t satisfied with his first-innings heroics with the ball, taking the first four wickets to fall in Gladstone’s second innings before being banished from the attack by Kyabram captain Frank Howley.
‘‘I had taken 4-10 in Gladstone’s second innings when Frank told me to have a spell because he wanted me to be fresh for the next day,’’ Allan recalled years later of his fabulous feat in taking 14-25 for the day.
Due to his first innings demolition Gladstone was dismissed for 39 and Kyabram won the game outright.
Corry finished that series at Bendigo — four games and the final — with 33 wickets at a cost of 157 runs at the incredible average of 4.7 per wicket.
He also captured three hat-tricks in that series with his 10-wicket haul in one innings never being equalled in the history of the series.
Despite Allan’s super performance that day and week Kyabram lost the final to Gisborne.
One of Tongala Cricket Club’s all-time greats, Allan played his last game for Tongala in the 1973-74 final against Tatura in which he took another hat-trick — the 24th of his career.
He also captained KDCA teams at both Bendigo and Melbourne Country Weeks in a 30-year career with the Tongala Cricket Club in which he also scored five centuries.
One of the great stories told about Allan was when he was invited by Victorian cricket authorities in the late 1940s to show his wares in a practice session with Australian Test captain Ian Johnson and Test player Doug Ring at the South Melbourne ground during a Melbourne Country Week series.
Johnson had the pads on and Ring threw the ball to Allan and said ‘‘let’s see what you can do, son’’.
Allan clean bowled Johnson with his first two deliveries and would have had him caught in slips with his third ball.
Loxton then faced up to the country bumpkin and looked back to see his stumps scattered on the ground with Allan’s first delivery.
The dairy farmer’s deadly bowling is said to have embarrassed the Australian players so much he never got another invitation to try his luck in the big time!
– Numurkah Cricket Club’s current captain Tim Arnel is another bowler who also has the honour of taking all 10 wickets in an innings.
In 2019 Tim finished with 10-25 off 11.4 overs in the second innings against Euroa to engineer an outright win for his team in Cricket Shepparton’s Haisman Shield competition.
It is believed to be only the second time in the history of the Cricket Shepparton Haisman Shield competition a bowler has taken all 10 wickets in an innings.
Katandra Cricket Club’s Rod McLeod is believed to be the first and only other bowler in this competition to take 10 wickets an innings — a feat he achieved against Karramomus in the 1993-94 season.
Allan Corry (second from left front) in the Kyabram side which represented the Kyabram and District Cricket Association at Bendigo Country Week in 1953 when he took 14/25 including all ten wickets in the first innings. Back row: H Sefton, J Salmon, J Stone, J Ogden, F Salmon, J Whitbourne, R Pell, R Griffiths. Front: C Collins, A Corry, F Howley, B Rowston, F Sanguinetti.
The day Allan Corry got the lot.
NEXT UP IN GUS UNDERWOOD’S FREAKISH SPORTING FEATS: JAMES ‘WHITTY’ WHITBOURNE (CRICKET)
At one stage at the peak of his career 100 years ago James Thomas Arthur ‘Whitty’ Whitbourne was described as ‘‘the best known player in Victorian country cricket“.
One report even stated he was ‘‘boasting a record that would never be challenged“.
In Whitty’s 10 years of fantastic feats with Kyabram Cricket Club he took 100 wickets or more in a Kyabram District Cricket Association season on five occasions.
– Read Gus Underwood’s take on Whitty’s ‘Freakish Sporting Feat’ in next Friday’s News.
