Sir Don Bradman’s iconic Baggy Green Australia cap has been sold at auction in Sydney.
The legendary cricketer wore the cap between 1947 and 1948 and the historic piece was sold by auction house Bonhams on Tuesday for $479,700, $89,700 above its initial valuation of $390,000.
Bradman, who played 52 Tests for Australia and returned 6,996 runs, wore the cap during Australia’s Test series against India, during which the Australian batsman averaged a staggering 178.75 in six Test innings.
That also included four centuries, while Bradman also scored his 100th ton, which was described by the legendary Australian batsman as his “magical milestone”.
It was also the last series Bradman played at home.
The cap had been gifted to Pankaj Gupta, the coach of the Indian cricket team after the end of the series, which Australia won 4-0.
He had passed the cap to his Bengali wicketkeeper, Probir Kumar Sen, who married Gupta’s niece, Reena, in 1948. Subsequently, Sen also represented India at Test level, making his debut on New Year’s Day in Melbourne, taking four sacks.
Bradman’s cap is understood to have been hand-embroidered and features a tag on the inside that has the cricketer’s name handwritten in blue ink.
Despite that, today’s sale fell short of the fee paid for Shane Warne’s Baggy Green in 2020, which sold for $1,007,500.
That auction set a historic price for any cricket memorabilia and the legendary spinner put the cover up for sale to raise funds for bushfire relief after it was purchased by Commonwealth Bank chief executive Matt Comyn.
It later went on a national tour of Australia, visiting schools and cricket clubs, before going on display at the Bradman Museum in Bowral, New South Wales.
More to follow…