A rarely worn baggy green cap of cricket legend Sir Donald Bradman during the 1947, 48 Test series against India has fetched a record price of AU$460, 000 (approximately US$320, 000) at an auction in Queensland, Australia. The cap, which is full of cricket history and has great symbolic meaning, generated a lot of interest before being sold to a private bidder at the Gold Coast auction held and organised by Lloyds Auctions.
This cap was originally from the first Test series of India as an independent nation, which was also the last season for Bradman at home before his retirement. After the match, Bradman gave the cap himself to Indian cricketer Sriranga Wasudev Sohoni, and the piece stayed in his family for over 75 years without being publicly displayed until it was put up for sale.
A Piece of Cricketing Legacy
The cap has the players’ names, “D. G. Bradman” and “S. W. Sohoni”, along with the year “1947, 48” embroidered below the Australian emblem. This is just one of 11 Bradman, worn baggy green caps known from the time when Test players were given a brand new cap for each series, unlike nowadays where the tradition is a single cap for the whole career.
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Bradmans batting records are simply out of this world: he amassed 6, 996 Test runs with the staggering average of 99. 94 a record that no other player in the history of cricket can claim. As a consequence of his legendary status, anything related to the great man has become a collectors dream.
Lee Hames, the Chief Operating Officer at Lloyds Auctions, stated that the caps significant value at auction was due to it being kept within the same family for a long time and the cap itself being in an outstanding state of preservation. The item was kept out of the public eye until the sale, and it is said that the family members were allowed only for a very short time to see it on rare occasions over the decades.
Record-Setting Sale and Future Display
Record, Setting Sale and Future DisplayThe price for which the cap was sold is a new milestone for Bradman memorabilia. However, a different Bradman cap from his 1928 debut went for AU$450, 000, and Australian spinner Shane Warnes baggy green was sold for more than AU$1 million in 2020 for charity, this one piece is considered as one of the most valuable items related to the greatest cricket hitter ever.
