‘Well played, son’: Father’s heartbreaking tribute to Ben Austin at the cricket ground they loved

Ben Austin knew this cricket field well. It’s where he would run out to see some of Australia’s greatest stars play, and where he came with his sports-mad dad, Jace, any chance he could. They would sit for hours in the old stands named for one of their favourites, “Warnie” – the late Shane Warne from their own neighbourhood of Ferntree Gully.

On Thursday, about 1000 mourners filled those stands again at Junction Oval in St Kilda to remember Ben, the cheeky teen from the Gully who lived and breathed the game.

The shock death of 17-year-old Ben last month, after he was struck in the neck with a ball during cricket practice, has left the sport reeling – an accident likened to the death of Australian star cricketer Phillip Hughes a decade ago.

Ben’s love for the game was infectious, and it swept up everyone who knew him. He was the one cheering his teammates on when they were down in the final moments of a game, he was the laughter, the cheeky grin, the smart-arse joke.

“He got that from me,” Jace said, smiling through tears as he remembered the warmth and kindness of his oldest son. “And he got that from his mum.”

Members of Ben’s two sport clubs – the Ferntree Gully cricket club and Waverley Park Hawks football club – joined his family for a funeral service on the green Thursday to lay signed jerseys on a small black and white coffin, piled high with cream roses and sporting medals. Alphaville’s Forever Young played as mourners filed into Junction, Cricket Victoria’s home in St Kilda, some teens in their sports and school uniforms.

Light rain began to fall while they shared stories of their Benny – the rising star rocketing through the ranks of southeastern junior cricket, the clever footy player, the dedicated young umpire.

When umbrellas went up, almost all were in the black and white of Ben’s favourite football team, Collingwood.

The club’s premiership cup even stood sentinel beside Ben’s cricket bat and footy, won in 2023 and on loan for the day as a special tribute by the AFL club.

Ben’s cricket coach Josh Henry called Ben a natural leader with a “a beautiful smile and a heart of gold, but a steely grit underneath”. He was going places, Josh said, admitting he often had to be reminded Ben was so young – by 2024, Ben had already risen to third in command in the club’s premiership team.

“Coaches aren’t meant to have favourites, but you were mine, Benny,” he said.

Since Ben’s untimely death, cricketing greats across Australia and around the world have honoured him by wearing black armbands at matches.

Jace now wears his son’s cricket cap almost everywhere he goes. As they embraced the grieving father on the field this morning, some of those closest to the family touched the cap.

Ben had made the newspaper the day he was born – his mother Tracey’s “miracle baby” after an accident left doctors sure she would never have children.

She went on to have three sons. “You’re the one who made me a mum,” her tribute for Ben read. “I was always so proud to say I was Ben’s mum.”

Further out east, on a field just like this one, there are still flowers at Ben’s home ground in Ferntree Gully. It was a typical afternoon practice in the nets when Ben was struck by the ball and rushed to hospital. While his death has reignited the same safety debate that began with the loss of Hughes, the Austin family say no one is to blame.

“You didn’t just run, you bounced,” Jace told his son at the funeral Thursday, speaking of his bright 17 years of life. Ben was always running, so resting won’t come easy, Jace said, but he knew his son’s spirit would live on in his community, in his two little brothers Zach and Cooper and in the game he loved so much.

That love, more than his runs on the board, is now Ben’s legacy. “Well played, son,” said Jace.

Tracey laid a final kiss on Ben’s coffin as his friends carried it into the hearse for one last lap of honour around the oval.

Fourteen and not out, Ben is still that boy running onto a cricket field. And, for his club and his family, he’ll be there at every game to come.

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