One of the earliest great spinners of the game Hugh Trumble was born on 12th May 1867. An Australian legend, Trumble was the first bowler to take two test hat-tricks. At the time of his retirement, he was also the highest wicket-taker in tests, the record which stood for another decade. His record of 141 wickets against England was broken later by Dennis Lillee. Interestingly Trumble played 31 tests against England to get those 141 wickets. His only other test match was against South Africa which he went wicketless.
Both of his hat-tricks came in his home-ground MCG and on both occasions it resulted in Australia winning the match by more than 200 runs. In 1902, Trumble took the wickets of Arthur Jones, John Gunn, and Sydney Barnes to take only the sixth hat-trick in the test cricket history. Trumble finished the match with a record of 3-38 and 4-49 in two innings.
Two years later again he repeated the feat in his last test match and this time his victims were Bernard Bosanquet, Plum Warner and Dick Lilley on consecutive balls. He finished with seven wickets for just 28 runs which were his second-best performance in the test.
His best performance in the test came in a losing cause. In the 1902 test in The Oval, Trumble gave Australia the early advantage by taking 8 for 65 but in the second innings. Despite four wickets from Trumble, England won by just one wicket as Gilbert Jessop blasted a 77-minute hundred on the last day to take them to victory from an unlikely situation.
Trumble was also a good enough batsman to score four test fifties with a highest score of 70 and was briefly considered as an all-rounder during the 1902-03 season.
One of the greatest bowlers, Trumble was six feet four inches tall and could use his height to get a significant bounce in those sticky wickets and was quite unplayable. He was also a very popular personality among his teammates and opponents and was part of the Victoria cricket till his last day.
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