Robbie MacDonald
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Born | 14 February 1870 Clunes, Victoria, Australia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | 7 March 1946 (aged 76) Victoria, British Columbia, Canada | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Batting | Right-handed | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bowling | Right-arm leg-spin | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Domestic team information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1893-94 to 1903-04 | Queensland | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1899 to 1902 | Leicestershire | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Career statistics | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Source: Cricinfo, 27 July 2019 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Robert MacDonald (14 February 1870 – 7 March 1946) was an Australian cricketer who played first-class cricket for Queensland and Leicestershire from 1894 to 1903. He was born in Clunes, Victoria, Australia, and died in Victoria, British Columbia. He was a dentist.[1]
Life and career
Born in the goldfields town of Clunes in Victoria, MacDonald moved to Brisbane in 1881 with his mother and his stepfather, Justice A. B. Noel.[2] After attending Brisbane Boys Grammar School Robbie MacDonald studied dentistry at the University of Pennsylvania, where he excelled. He was the first Queenslander to graduate as a doctor of dental surgery with honours.[3]
In cricket, MacDonald had a reputation as an imperturbable defensive batsman. The English player and writer C. B. Fry said of him in 1901: "he pays extreme attention to not getting out, and has no regard for the time it takes to make his runs. He is an excellent antidote to the modern tendency to try for high hitting. He never hits a ball, but just pushes and blocks, pushes and blocks. His skill, however, in defence is most remarkable: and I doubt whether there has ever been a more perfect player in his own particular line."[4] In a match for Leicestershire against Sussex in 1902 he batted for three and three-quarter hours for 33, in what an English newspaper called "a wonderfully patient innings".[5] His highest score was 147 not out for Leicestershire against Derbyshire in 1901, when he added 142 for the fourth wicket with John King and then made an unbroken stand of 226 for the fifth wicket with Frederic Geeson. Leicestershire won by an innings.[6]
He served as secretary of the Queensland Cricket Association in 1894-95, and secretary of Leicestershire from 1922 to 1930. He also represented Australia on the Imperial Cricket Conference between the wars.[2]
References
- ^ "Sporting Notes". Worker: 14. 1 August 1908.
- ^ a b The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford, Melbourne, 1996, p. 321.
- ^ "Young Queenslander: Overtops a Lot of Yankees". The Telegraph: 5. 5 April 1892.
- ^ "Miscellaneous Sporting". Brisbane Courier: 8. 7 October 1901.
- ^ "Cricket and Other Notes". Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser: 2. 15 November 1902.
- ^ "Derbyshire v Leicestershire 1901". Cricinfo. Retrieved 27 July 2019.
External links
- Robbie MacDonald at ESPNcricinfo
- Robert MacDonald at CricketArchive