Sydney Barnes' Melbourne Burst — Four Wickets for One Run, 1911

Barnes was 38, professional, prickly about money, and convinced he was the best bowler alive. Being asked to take the second new ball at Sydney had wounded him deeply.

Australia won the toss and batted. Bardsley and Kelleway, normally a careful pair, walked out to face Barnes and Foster on a hot Melbourne morning.

Smarting from being denied the new ball at Sydney, Barnes was finally allowed first use at Melbourne and answered with one of the great pieces of fast-medium bowling. Warren Bardsley went first, then Charlie Kelleway, then Clem Hill — bowled by a ball Hill said pitched outside leg and hit the off stump before he could lift his bat — then Warwick Armstrong. Five overs, four wickets, one run conceded. Australia recovered through a defiant 56 from Roy Minnett and an even more defiant 27 from the tail, and Monty Noble's first innings figures of seven for 17 actually outshone Barnes statistically. Australia won the match by 229 runs. But Barnes' spell was the moment around which the rest of the series turned: from then on Douglas opened with him, and the new-ball pair of Barnes and Foster never lost a Test.

“The ball pitched outside my leg-stump, safe to the push off my pads, I thought. Before I could pick up my bat, my off-stump was knocked silly.”

Barnes finished the innings with 5/44, the match with 9/103. Despite his effort, Noble's spinners won the match for Australia. England lost the Test but never lost another in the series.