Tom Wills

The updated edition of the definitive biography of the visionary sportsman who brought us Australian Rules football and was the greatest cricketer of his era.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY AWARD

This is the story of Tom Wills - flawed genius, sporting libertine, fearless leader and agitator, Australia's first great cricketer - the man most often credited with creating the game we now know as Australian Rules football.

Sent to the strict Rugby School in England at fourteen, Tom returned as a worldly young man whose cricket prowess quickly captured the hearts of the colony. But away from the adoring crowds, in the desolation of the Queensland outback, he experienced first-hand the devastating effects of racial tension when his father was murdered in the biggest massacre of Europeans by First Nations people. Yet, five years later, Tom coached the first Aboriginal cricket team.

Tom Wills lived hard and fast, challenging authority on and off the field....