Bill O'Reilly (cricketer) - Off-field Career, Mentoring and Legacy

Off-field Career, Mentoring and Legacy

In 1933, O’Reilly married Mary Agnes "Molly" Herbert, after less than six months of courtship. Of Irish stock, Molly had been introduced to O'Reilly through one of his teaching colleagues at Kogarah, who married Molly’s elder sister the following year. The couple then moved to the southern Sydney suburb of Hurstville. The couple had two children, a girl followed by a boy.

O'Reilly continued to work as a schoolteacher after he broke into international cricket, but at the end of 1934, after missing more than six months of the year in England, he resigned from his government post, reasoning that his career could not progress if he was going to be overseas so often. However, he had not made any plans for his future employment. Soon after, O'Reilly received an offer to work as a sportsgoods salesman for the department store David Jones with sporting leave entitlements. The Premier of New South Wales, Bertram Stevens, tried to coax O'Reilly into staying in the government education system, offering him a post at Sydney Boys High School if he returned to STC to complete the Bachelor of Arts that he had abandoned a decade before.

In 1935, O'Reilly took up an appointment at Sydney Grammar School, one of the leading private schools in the state, having been offered 50% paid leave for his cricket commitments. There he taught English, history and business. In 1939 he took a job in the sports store of close friend, teammate and fellow Irish Catholic Stan McCabe, which was located on George Street, the city centre's main thoroughfare. O’Reilly was a financial partner in the business, but following the outbreak of World War II, the sales revenue began to suffer and O’Reilly left as the store would not be able to support two stakeholders.

O'Reilly then accepted a position as a manager of the Lion Tile Company at Auburn, in Sydney's western suburbs. He remained in the position until 1976. O’Reilly was responsible for the financial and accounting affairs of the firm, which expanded to employ more than 200 workers. He was held in high regard and granted full paid leave when he thrice went overseas for six months to cover tours of England as a journalist. Doc Evatt, a leading Australian Labor Party politician attempted to recruit O'Reilly into politics, but was unsuccessful.

During the late-1930s, O'Reilly mentored the then-teenaged Arthur Morris and Ray Lindwall at St. George. He converted Morris from a left arm unorthodox spinner into an opening batsman, and exhorted Lindwall to become a specialist express paceman. Both had long Test careers and captained their country and are regarded as all-time Australian greats in the fields that O'Reilly chose for them—both were chosen with O'Reilly in the ACB Team of the Century. The pair credited O'Reilly as being the main influence in their careers, and Lindwall made his Test debut in O'Reilly's last Test in 1946.

In 1956–57, McCabe and O'Reilly were given a testimonial match by the New South Wales Cricket Association. The match was between Harvey's XI and Lindwall's XI and acted as a trial for the non-Test tour of New Zealand. It raised 7,500 pounds, which was split between McCabe and O'Reilly and would have bought two average-sized homes in Sydney at the time.

On retirement as a player, O'Reilly became a cricket columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald, remaining in that position until his health declined in 1988. His first engagement was England’s tour of Australia in 1946–47, and during this season he began a partnership with the Daily Express of London, going on to cover several Ashes series for them. O’Reilly’s articles for The Sydney Morning Herald were reproduced in its sister publication, The Age of Melbourne. Later, his writing was syndicated to newspapers in India, South Africa and New Zealand. His style was described by Wisden as "muscular, very Australian... flavoured with wit and imagery ('You can smell the gum-leaves off him', he wrote of one country boy just starting with Queensland)." Jack McHarg said that "The clarity, wit and pungency of his writing, together with almost infallible judgment, never deserted him", even as his health began to restrict him. He was a highly respected and forthright pundit, who hated one-day cricket, describing it as "hit and giggle". He condemned the omission of Keith Miller in 1949–50 and said that to call it "a complete surprise would be a cowardly way of describing a botch". Reacting to the selection of the dour batting all rounder Ken Mackay, he wrote "words fail...to express adequately my contempt for this howler". In 1952 he had a falling-out with Lindwall after condemning his protégé for bowling five consecutive bouncers at Everton Weekes in a Test. In comparison with his illustrious contemporary on-field and on paper, "while Sir Donald walked the corridors of cricketing power O'Reilly was the rumbustious backbencher." In 1956, O’Reilly strongly criticised Australian captain Ian Johnson, a Melburnian, for his leadership during the 1956 Ashes tour. The Age took exception to this and asked their sister publication to rein in their pundit. O’Reilly refused to shy away from his opinions and was dropped by the Melbourne publication. In the 1980s, when Bob Simpson became the first coach of Australia, O’Reilly, himself self-taught, spoke out against the creation of such posts. He was a strong critic of the breakaway World Series Cricket, the commercialisation of the sport and the erosion of the social norms that were followed during his playing career.

Aside from his autobiography, O'Reilly wrote two books; Cricket Conquest: The Story of the 1948 Test Tour, published in 1949, and Cricket Task Force, published in 1951. They were accounts of the Invincibles tour of England in 1948 and England's Ashes tour to Australia in 1950–51.

Upon retiring from The Sydney Morning Herald, O'Reilly wrote in a column

As a writer on the game it has always been my one consuming resolve to tell my readers…exactly what my personal reactions were to the events of the day. Not once did I ever spend time racking my brain on what was the nice thing to say or the thoughts I should not let come through on paper. In my opinion that would have been cheating.

O’Reilly was honoured with several accolades late in his life. In 1980, he was awarded an Order of the British Empire for his services to cricket as a player and writer. In 1985, the oval in Wingello was renamed in his honour, and in 1988, a grandstand at the SCG was named the Bill O’Reilly Stand. In the same year, the oval in White Cliffs was renamed, and The Sydney Morning Herald renamed the medal they awarded to the best player in grade cricket in O’Reilly’s honour. During the celebrations for the Australian Bicentenary, O’Reilly was named among the 200 people, and only 21 living, who had contributed the most to the country since European settlement.

O'Reilly's later years were troubled with poor health, including the loss of a leg. In late 1988, he suffered a major heart attack and was hospitalised for two months. He died in hospital in Sutherland in 1992, aged 86. O'Reilly lamented the decline of spin during his twilight years, and in the 1980s he was often derided by younger people who felt that his advocacy of spin bowling—which they deemed to be obsolete—was misplaced. He died just months before Shane Warne revived the art of leg spin on the international stage.

In 1996, O'Reilly was posthumously inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame as one of the ten inaugural members. In 2000, O'Reilly was named in the Australian Cricket Board Team of the Century, and in 2009 he was named among the 55 inaugural inductees of the International Cricket Council's Hall of Fame, being formally inducted in January 2010.