SYDNEY: A ‘baggy green’ Test cap worn by Australian great Don Bradman sold for $250,000 at auction on Tuesday as collectors vied to own a rare piece of cricket history.
The tattered garment – nearly 80 years old – was sun-faded, showed signs of “insect damage” and had a torn top.
Bradman wore the cap during India’s tour of Australia in 1947-48, their last Test series on home soil, auction house Bonhams said.
In a 10-minute auction, a flurry of bidding pushed the price from a starting point of $160,000 to a winning bid of $250,000 (AU$390,000).
The total cost was $310,000 once the “buyer’s premium” fee was added.
Bonhams said it was “the only known baggy green” worn by Bradman during the series, in which he scored 715 runs in six innings at an average of 178.75, with three centuries and two hundreds.
Australian cricketers are given dark green wool caps before their Test debut, and are held in high regard by cricketers and fans alike, often batting more the better.
A different ‘loose green’ worn by Bradman during his Test debut in 1928 fetched $290,000 when he went under the hammer in 2020.
This was significantly less than the $650,000 he paid for Shane Warne’s loose green plant when he put it up for sale to help victims of the Australian bushfires earlier that year.
Bradman retired with the highest ever Test batting average of 99.94 and was described by the Wisden Cricket Board as the greatest “who ever graced the gentleman’s game”.
He died in 2001 at the age of 92.