Player Profiles
Alister McMillan
Al after a 5-wicket haul against Centaurs
Full Name: Alister James McMillan
Nickname: Australian redheads have thousands of nicknames. My most common soubriquets are Al and Surly Bloodnut.
Born: Lismore, New South Wales, Australia, where Adam Gilchrist learned to play.
Batting Style: Patient
Bowling Style: Straight-breaks
Location: Coogee, Sydney
Occupation: Journalist
Interests (outside cricket): Literature, journalism, travel and finding a way to live on the same continent as my wife
Previous Cricketing Experience:
I debuted as leg-spinner for Portland Cricket Club’s third grade XI as a 14-year-old. All I remember of the day is that I entered a pub for the first time. That might go some way to explaining why I forgot how bowl leg-spin the following season. As everything that came out of my hand was a wrong’un, I switched to off-spin. About a decade later, during a stint with the Miranda Magpies — playing under skipper Tez Pontikos — I forgot how to spin the ball altogether. My stats improved drastically.
Reason(s) for joining Lamma CC: Alex Price invited me to an LCC net session. He failed to turn up.
Best and/or worst cricketing memories: Bowling a yellow ball on a ridiculously humid day at the KCC net and watching it swing for the first time.
Replacing 1993 Ashes squad member Wayne “Cracker” Holdsworth in the representative line-up for Sydney’s Newbridge Road Indoor Cricket Centre (it was an under-20s side and he was too old).
Having a loud LBW appeal turned by Umpire Griffo after my first ball of a Mission Rd dig. It was so close I should have walked, but The Griff held his ground. However, he was stoned. The disgust his decision provoked from the opposition brought on the classic symptoms of paranoia in The Griff. Two balls later, another LBW appeal. This time I tried to make the umpire’s job easier by rubbing the part of my body the ball had struck — my shoulder. The Griff fired me without hesitation.
Spending three hours with a Lamma XI as we worked through what went wrong in another inexplicable loss on a baking-hot day at Po Kong Village Road. The discussion of tactics and technique was forensic, but no one mentioned that before the game and during the breaks the sustenance of choice was spliff and gin.
Favourite current international player: Justin Langer
Al with England fast-bowling legend Fred Trueman
