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Sydney, 1926, this is the story of a man |
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Just a kid in from the sticks, just a kid with a plan |
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St George took a gamble, played him in first grade |
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Pretty soon that young man showed them how to flash the blade |
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And at the age of nineteen he was playing for the State |
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From Adelaide to Brisbane, the runs did not abate |
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He hit 'em hard, he hit 'em straight |
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He was more than just a batsman |
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He was something like a tide |
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He was more than just one man |
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He could take on any side |
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They always came for Bradman 'cause fortune used to hide in the palm of his hand |
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A team came out from England |
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Wally Hammond wore his felt hat like a chief |
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All through the summer of '28, '29 they gave the greencaps no relief |
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Some reputations came to grief |
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They say the darkest hour is right before the dawn |
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And in the hour of greatest slaughter the great avenger is being born |
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But who then could have seen the shape of things to come |
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In Bradman's first test he went for eighteen and for one |
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They dropped him like a gun |
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Now big Maurice Tate was the trickiest of them all |
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And a man with a wisecracking habit |
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But there's one crack that won't stop ringing in his ears |
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"Hey Whitey, that's my rabbit" |
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Bradman never forgot it |
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He was more than just a batsman |
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He was something like a tide |
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He was more than just one man |
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He could take on any side |
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They always came for Bradman 'cause fortune used to hide in the palm of his hand |
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England, 1930 ... and the seed burst into flower |
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All of Jackson's grace failed him, it was Bradman was the power |
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He murdered them in Yorkshire, he danced for them in Kent |
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He laughed at them in Leicestershire, Leeds was an event |
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Three hundred runs he took and rewrote all the books |
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That really knocked those gents |
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The critics could not comprehend this nonchalant phenomenon |
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"Why this man is a machine," they said. "Even his friends say he isn't human" |
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Even friends have to cut something. |
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He was more than just a batsman |
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He was something like a tide |
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He was more than just one man |
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He was half the side |
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Fathers used to take their sons 'cause fortune used to hide in the palm of his hand, in the palms of his hands. |
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Summer, 1932 ... and Captain Douglas had a plan |
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When Larwood bowled to Bradman it was more than man to man |
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And staid Adelaide nearly boiled over as rage ruled over sense |
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When Bert Oldfield hit the ground they nearly jumped the fence |
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Now Bill Woodfill was as fine a man as ever went to wicket |
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And the bruises on his body that day showed that he could stick it |
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But to this day he's still quoted and only he could wear it |
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"There's two sides out there today and only one of them's playing cricket." |
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He was longer than a memory, and bigger than a town |
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He feet they used to sparkle and he always kept them on the ground |
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Fathers took their sons who never lost the sound of the roar of the grandstand. |
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Now shadows they grow longer and there's so much more yet to be told |
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But we're not getting any younger, so let the part tell the whole |
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Now the players all wear colours, the circus is in town |
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I can no longer go down there, down to that sacred ground |
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He was more than just a batsman |
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He was something like a tide |
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He was more than just one man |
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He was half the bloody any side |
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Fathers took their sons 'cause fortune used to hide in the palm of his hand |
