Rex Sellers of Australia played his only test in the country of his birth, India. Playing against India at Calcutta in the 3rd test of the 1964/65 series, he did not make a single run in the only innings he batted and was clean bowled by RF Surti for a duck. He could not pickup a wicket either, in the 5 overs he bowled conceding 17 runs. His only contribution in this test for Australia was a catch he held to dismiss RF Surti of the bowling of Bob Simpson.
Farooq Hamid of Pakistan, considered as one of the fastest and wildest bowler with not much control with his temperament made his debut at Melbourne in the only test played against Australia during the 1964/65 series. He took just one wicket that of another fellow debutante, Ian Chappell in Australia’s 1st innings, getting him caught by his skipper Hanif Mohammed. While bowling 19 overs in the 1st innings and another 4 in the 2nd, he conceded 82 & 25 runs. He did not make any impact with the bat either, making just 0 & 3 coming at the last in Pakistan’s innings.
Glen Gordon Hall of South Africa became the next OTW when he played against England at Cape Town in the 3rd test of the 1964/65 Series. Glen Hall, though made a by taking 9 wickets for 122 runs in the first innings he bowled in first class cricket, did not live up to the promise and clean bowled Peter Parfitt to claim his only test wicket to record a final bowling analysis of 31-7-94-1. He was clean bowled for a duck by Ken Barrington, who in contrast to Hall has registered his career best innings analysis of an unbelievable 3.1-1-4-3. Hall committed suicide on June 26th, 1987 at an age of 49 years.
In the 3rd test of the 1964/65 series between New Zealand and Pakistan, played at Christchurch, two cricketers Pakistan’s Mufasir-ul-Haq and New Zealand’s Peter Truscott made their single test appearances. Mufasir made 8* in the only innings he batted and took 2/50 and 1/34 while opening the bowling in both the innings. Truscott made 3 & 26 while opening the batting for New Zealand and did not get a chance to bowl.
In the 5th and final test match between England and South Africa, played at Port Elizabeth, which started on the same day, on 12th February, as the one in which Truscott and Mufasir made their debut, two other players, MJ Macaulay of South Africa and Ken Palmer of England made their test debut and never played in tests again. Macaulay made 21 & 12 and had bowling figures of 1/63 and 1/10. Ken Palmer, who later became an umpire of very high repute and officiated in 22 Tests and 23 ODIs, made 10 while coming to bat no.11 position. He also bowled in both the innings returning with figures of 1/113 and 0/76. None of them could get a chance to hold a catch.
Peter Allan of Australia, who became the first bowler to take all 10 wickets in an innings of any first class match at Melbourne by taking 10 for 61 for Queensland against Victoria, got a chance to represent Australia in tests in the same season in the 1st Ashes Test. Making his test debut along with Doug Walters, one of the greatest cricketers that Australia has ever produced, Allan took 2/58 and 0/25 and did not get a chance to bat as Australia declared their innings closed at 443/6 decl, which included a brilliant century from fellow debutant Doug Walters. Walters though brought into the side primarily as a batsman, had better bowling figures (1/25 & 1/22) than Allan. Walters went on to play 74 tests, whereas Allan with his single test appearance got into the record books as another OTW.
Ramesh Saxena, who announced his arrival in first class cricket with a splendid century on his Ranji Trophy debut, could not take it to the next level and became an OTW with his lone test appearance at Leeds in the 1st test of the 1967 series against England. Saxena opened the batting in the 1st innings and made just 9 runs and was demoted in batting order in the 2nd innings when India followed on. Coming into bat at 362/5 Saxena could not avail the opportunity and was clean bowled by John Snow for 16. Saxena also bowled 2 wicketless overs for 11 runs and was dropped from the test squad for the next test and never played in tests again. The only solace he might have had at that time was, even Geoffrey Boycott after making 246* in this test match was dropped from the 2nd test for his slow scoring.
In the same English season Pakistan’s Ghulam Abbas made his only test appearance in the 3rd test played at The Oval. He made 12 & 0 and did not get a chance to play in tests again.
Fourth test of the Australia Vs India series, played at Sydney has witnessed Les Joslin of Australia making 7 & 2 in his lone test appearance. Ajit Pai of India while making his test debut along with Chetan Chauhan and Ashok Mankad in the 1st test of the 1969/70 series against New Zealand at Bombay’s Brabourne Stadium bowled well and returned with figures of 2/29 and 0/2. Though Pai did well on his test debut, he was surprisingly dropped from the next test match and was never considered for a test position again.
Graeme Chevalier of South Africa has to blame his country’s apartheid policy more than anything else for becoming a member of OTW club. He made his test debut at relatively an older age of 33 years against Australia in the 1st test of the 1969/70 series at Cape Town and bowled well to return with respectable bowling figures of 2 for 32 & 3 for 68. He clean bowled the last batsman Alan Connolly in the 2nd innings to enable South Africa record a 170 run victory. He also caught Ian Chappell of Peter Pollock’s bowling in Australia’s 1st innings. In spite of his excellent debut, he was dropped from the side in favor much younger John Traicos and did not get a chance to play in that series again. It was the last test series that South Africa played before they were banned from playing test cricket for more than two decades.
Making his debut along with Kerry O’Keeffe, JRF ‘ Ross’ Duncan made his lone test appearance in the 5th test of the 1970-71 Ashes at Melbourne. He made 3 runs in the only innings he batted and failed to take a wicket in the only innings he bowled. Though he later appeared in unofficial tests between Australia Vs Rest of the World Series in 1971-72 season, he never played Test Cricket again. In the final test of the same series Australia’s Ken Eastwood made his only appearance in test cricket by opening the batting for Australia and getting out cheaply both times (5 & 0). He took the wicket of Keith Fletcher in England’s 1st innings getting him caught by his opening partner Keith Stackpole for 20.
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