Keith Carmody
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| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Full name | Douglas Keith Carmody | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Batting | Right-hand | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bowling | Right-arm medium pace | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Role | Middle-order batsman | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Domestic team information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1940–1947 | New South Wales | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1947–1956 | Western Australia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Career statistics | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Source: [1], 10 April 2008 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Douglas Keith Carmody (16 February 1919 — 21 October 1977) was an Australian first class cricketer who played during the 1940s and 1950s. He was Western Australia's captain when they won their first ever Sheffield Shield and is credited as being the inventor of the 'umbrella field'.
Born in Mosman, Carmody started his career with New South Wales. He made his Sheffield Shield debut against Queensland in 1939/40, his only game before the competition was suspended because of the war. During World War II, Carmody joined the Royal Australian Air Force but continued playing cricket with the Australian Services team, touring England and India in 1945. Carmody was at one stage imprisoned at Stalag Luft III, having been shot down off the coast of Holland. He was eventually freed by the Russian army.
When the war ended he returned to Shield cricket for the 1946/47 season. The following summer he crossed to Western Australia who had just joined the competition and Carmody was appointed as their inaugural captain. Carmody made his highest first class score of 198 against South Australia in Perth during the season. They went on to win the competition in their first attempt and Carmody remained in charge until Ken Meuleman took over in 1956-57. Every time a captain packs a full hand of slips it adds a tribute to the cricket brains of Douglas Keith Carmody, who died on October 21 in Yaralla Repatriation Hospital, Sydney, aged 58.
Origination of the umbrella field made Carmody one of the great innovators in cricket, and his strategy contributed to major structural changes in modern cricket rearding field placemets. In an umbrella field, the batsman is surrounded in the slip, leg sip and close-in-positions with 6 or 7 fielders besides the wicket-kepper. The umbrella field was as much an innovation as the body-line bowling tactics invented by Douglas Jardine, former captain of the English cricket team.
A disciple of Stan McCabe in Mosman club, Sydney, Carmody made his debut at 20 for NSW in 1939, the last season before the War suspended Sheffield Shield cricket. A blue-eyed strokemaker of middle height, he still holds the record for most runs, 1606, in the under-21 Poidevin-Gray competition.
Joining the RAAF, served in 455 Squadron, flying Beaufighters from Langham, Norfolk. Cricket-starved crowds were thronging to Services matches played to keep up morale. RAAF's captain for a match at Lord's was Ken Ridings, brother of Phil Ridings, now chairman of Australia's selectors. In a Sunderland hunting U-boats Ken was shot down in the Atlantic.
Flt-Lt Carmody led RAAF in F/O Keith Miller and Bob Cristofani's first appearance at Lord's. Shot down off Holland in 1944 Carmody was picked up by a U-boat after two days on a rubber dinghy. Imprisoned at Stalagluft 3, he made several escape attempts before the Russian Army freed him in 1945. He reappeared in the last three of five Victory Tests by Lindsay Hassett's Services XI against England.
Edged balls getting by orthodox slip placings prompted Keith to develop an arc of eight from gully to leg gully. It became known as the Carmody field. In unofficial four-day Tests against India on the Services' way home his sequence as opening batsman was 113, 40, 14, 0 and 92. Captain-coach in Western Australia's first Sheffield Shield season, his direction of his new field helped the State win the trophy on percentages. Miller adopted it for NSW and it became a feature of Hassett's attack in England in 1953.