Dennis Keith Lillee, (born 18 July 1949) is a retired Australian cricketer rated as the "outstanding fast bowler of his generation". Lillee formed a new ball partnership with Jeff Thomson, which is recognised as one of the greatest bowling pairs of all time.
In the early part of his career Lillee was an extremely fast bowler, but a number of stress fractures in his back almost ended his career. Taking on a strict fitness regime, he fought his way back to full fitness, eventually returning to international cricket. By the time of his retirement from international cricket in 1984 he had become the world record holder for most Test wickets with 355, and had firmly established himself as one of the most recognisable and renowned Australian sportsmen of all time. He was a part of the Australian squad which finished as runners-up at the 1975 Cricket World Cup.
In a fan poll conducted by the CA in 2017, he was named in the country's best Ashes XI of the previous 40 years. On 17 December 2009, Lillee was inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
He is the subject of the song "Water Lillee" on Lord Kitchener's 1976 album Home for Carnival.
Aged 20, Lillee made his first-class debut for Western Australia in 1969–70 and impressed with his raw pace. Lillee took 32 wickets in his debut season to be WA's leading wicket-taker.
At the end of the season, he toured New Zealand with an Australian second team and took 18 wickets at 16.44 average.
The following season, Lillee made his Test debut in the Sixth Test at Adelaide in the 1970–71 Ashes series, taking 5/84 from 28.3 eight-ball overs. His first Test wicket was John Edrich, caught by Keith Stackpole for 130, but it was not until the Seventh Test at Sydney that John Hampshire became the first batsman to be "caught Marsh, bowled Lillee". The following season, during the series against the Rest of the World XI, which had been arranged in place of the cancelled series against South Africa, Lillee announced himself during the first innings of the second unofficial "Test" match at his home ground in Perth, destroying a powerful batting lineup that included Garry Sobers, Clive Lloyd, Rohan Kanhai and Sunil Gavaskar to finish with 8/29 in only 7 overs, which would remain his career-best bowling figures in an innings. Sobers would later comment that as far as particular spells went, Lillee's bowling that day was the fastest he had ever faced. Lillee then backed up with 4/63 in the second innings to end with match figures of 12/92 as Australia won by an innings.
Lillee followed this performance with a successful Ashes tour of England in 1972, when he "asserted himself as a great bowler". In a series that ended 2–2, he was the outstanding bowler on either team, taking 31 wickets at an average of 17.67. This earned him selection as one of Wisden's five Cricketers of the Year for 1973.
John Snow believes that Lillee saw reduced effectiveness after being overbowled by Western Australia and Australia in 1971–73.
During a Test against Pakistan in the 1972–73 season, Lillee felt sharp pain in his back for the first time, but continued to play. On the tour of the West Indies that followed, Lillee broke down completely and was diagnosed with stress fracture in his lower vertebrae. Forced out of cricket, he spent six weeks during the winter of 1973 wearing a plaster cast that encased his entire torso. After the removal of the cast, he played club cricket for Perth as a specialist batsman. He returned to the bowling crease towards the end of the season, guiding Perth Cricket Club to the final at the WACA Ground.
There was speculation that his bowling career was nearly over. Lillee persevered, undergoing an intensive physiotherapy routine, formulated by sports scientist Frank Pyke, and remodelling his bowling action. In 1974–75, he returned to Test cricket for the Ashes series and was paired with New South Wales fast bowler Jeff Thomson to form one of the most effective opening bowling combinations in Test cricket. The pair was a major factor in Australia's emphatic 4–1 victory. In 1975, the University of Western Australia timed Lillee's bowling at 154.8 km/h.
The impact of the Lillee/Thomson bowling attack was summarised during the 1974–75 Ashes series, when Sydney newspaper The Sunday Telegraph ran a photo of Lillee and Thomson with a cartoon caption underneath that read:
Ashes to Ashes, dust to dust, if Thomson don't get ya, Lillee must.
Lillee toured England again in 1975. During the inaugural World Cup he captured eight wickets in five matches, including 5/34 against Pakistan at Leeds, which was the first five wicket haul in ODIs. His aggressive bowling was not always suited to the run-containing style required in the one-day game. In the subsequent four-Test series against England, Lillee claimed 21 wickets as his team finished winners by 1–0. With the bat, he made 73 not out at Lord's to rescue Australia from a difficult situation.
Another 27 wickets (at 26.37 average) followed in the summer of 1975–76 against the West Indies. At this time, Lillee was one of the most marketable personalities in Australia, but he was frustrated by the small amounts that he earned from the game. Outspoken in his opinions, he came into conflict with the game's administrators. Lillee suggested that a made-for-television exhibition series could be played each season with profits given to the players. John Cornell, his manager, took this idea to Kerry Packer, who later fashioned it into World Series Cricket (WSC).
An injury to Thomson early in 1976–77 forced Lillee to take on a greater workload during the six Tests of the season. He responded with 47 wickets including match figures of 10/135 against Pakistan at the MCG and 11/123 at Auckland against New Zealand. In the Centenary Test, his 11/165 was the
decisive performance in Australia's victory. However, the extra exertion created "hot spots" in his back and not wanting to reaggravate his previous condition, he made himself unavailable for the 1977 tour of England.
Remaining in Australia to do television commentary on the tour, Lillee was isolated from the furore in England surrounding the plans for the breakaway professional competition, WSC. He was announced as one of the WSC players in May 1977. The Lillee image and personality were key components in WSC's innovative marketing of their games. However, he struggled on-field during the first season of WSC and in the winter of 1978 made further adjustments to his action. He also spent time working with ex–World professional sprint champion Austin Robertson Sr., improving his running technique and fitness. In nine "Supertests" (four in Australia and five in the West Indies) during 1978–79, Lillee captured 46 wickets at 22.5 average, with a best of 7/23 against the West Indies XI at the SCG.