Thomas Albert McFarlane (9 July 1890 – 20 April 1967) was a New Zealand

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er. He played

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...

for

Otago Otago (, ; mi, Ōtākou ) is a region of New Zealand located in the southern half of the South Island administered by the Otago Regional Council. It has an area of approximately , making it the country's second largest local government reg ...

between the 1909–10 and 1919–20 seasons and for the

New Zealand national cricket team The New Zealand national cricket team represents New Zealand in men's international cricket. Named the Black Caps, they played their first Test in 1930 against England in Christchurch, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. From 1930 ...

before it was awarded Test match status. McFarlane was born at

Dunedin Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...

in 1890 and worked in a foundry.McCarron A (2010) ''New Zealand Cricketers 1863/64–2010'', p. 85. Cardiff: The Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians.
Available online
at the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians. Retrieved 5 June 2023.) A middle-order batsman and useful bowler, McFarlane made scores of 60 and 10 runs and took three wickets for 85 in Otago's innings loss to

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

in the Plunket Shield in 1909–10. Still aged only 19, he was selected in the first of the two matches New Zealand played against

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

later that season, but had no success.McFarlane, Thomas Albert, Obituaries in 1967, ''

Wisden Cricketers' Almanack ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'', 1968.
Available online
at

CricInfo ESPN cricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a d ...

. Retrieved 13 November 2023.) In March 1912, playing senior club cricket in Dunedin for Albion, he scored 211 in about 105 minutes out of the team's final total of 285; his innings included eight

sixes Sixes, home to approximately 14,540, is an unincorporated community in western Cherokee County, Georgia, United States, located about three miles west of Holly Springs and near the eastern shore of current-day Lake Allatoona. The community is l ...

. In 1914 ''

The Otago Daily Times The ''Otago Daily Times'' (ODT) is a newspaper published by Allied Press Ltd in Dunedin, New Zealand. The ''ODT'' is one of the country's four main daily newspapers, serving the southern South Island with a circulation of around 26,000 and a co ...

'' cricket columnist "Long Slip" said McFarlane had "all, or nearly all, the essentials of a great batsman" but was let down by his "lack of restraint". in his 13 first-class matches he scored a total of 442 runs and took 20 wickets.Thomas McFarlane
CricketArchive. Retrieved 13 November 2023. He served with the New Zealand forces in the

Otago Infantry Regiment The Otago Infantry Regiment (Otago Regiment) was a military unit that served within the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) in World War I during the Gallipoli Campaign (1915) and on the Western Front (1916–1919). This Regiment and the ...

during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, including at

Gallipoli The Gallipoli peninsula (; tr, Gelibolu Yarımadası; grc, Χερσόνησος της Καλλίπολης, ) is located in the southern part of East Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles ...

.Thomas McFarlane
Online Cenotaph,

Auckland Museum The Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira (or simply the Auckland Museum) is one of New Zealand's most important museums and war memorials. Its collections concentrate on New Zealand history (and especially the history of the Auckla ...

. Retrieved 13 November 2023. In the 1920s excessive drinking led to his imprisonment. McFarlane died at

Palmerston North Palmerston North (; mi, Te Papa-i-Oea, known colloquially as Palmy) is a city in the North Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Manawatū-Whanganui region. Located in the eastern Manawatu Plains, the city is near the north bank of the ...

in 1967 at the age of 76. Obituaries were published in the ''New Zealand Cricket Almanack'' in 1967 and in ''

'' in 1968.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:McFarlane, Thomas Albert 1890 births 1967 deaths New Zealand cricketers Pre-1930 New Zealand representative cricketers Otago cricketers Cricketers from Dunedin New Zealand military personnel of World War I