stylistic:tone, structural:reformatting
Cancellation of South Africa tour

Despite South Africa's apartheid regime excluding black players from participating in national sports, many countries including Australia retained sporting relations with the regime until the mid-1970s. In this vein, the South African national cricket team was meant to tour Australia over the 1971–72 Australian summer. Public polls from the time suggested that, despite a group of very active protestors, around 75% of Australians wanted the tour to go ahead—believing that Australia should not interfere with South Africa's domestic politics.

Bradman, as Chair of the Australian Cricket Board, was initially sympathetic to this majority position of allowing the planned tour to proceed. He expressed the view that white South African cricketers, many of whom had voiced their opposition to Apartheid and "had tried harder than our protestors to do something about it", should not be punished for the decisions of their national government. However, seeking to understand the situation better, Bradman travelled to South Africa in June 1971. While there, Bradman met with then South African Prime Minister John Vorster. Their exchange was documented as follows:

Sobers, a West Indian cricketer, was regarded as perhaps the greatest cricketing all-rounder of all time, and was reportedly admired by Bradman—who had helped get Sobers out to play in South Australia the previous decade.

When Bradman returned to Australia later in the year, and in the absence of any intervention by the Australian Government to prevent the tour, he argued to the other members of the Australian Cricket Board that they should cancel the tour. On behalf of the Board, Bradman made a one-line statement to the press: "We will not play them until they choose a team on a non-racial basis.".

At the time, many disapproved of Bradman's decision to cancel to the tour. Vorster unsurprisingly decried the decision, calling it one by "anarchists, communists and fellow travellers". Even Australian Prime Minister William McMahon expressed regret at the decision, saying it had been wanted by a "great many Australians". Meanwhile, some Australian newspapers lamented that "a small violent group of trouble-makers has won the day" and that "Bradman had 'conced defeat without a ball being bowled". The decision was, however, praised in other media, and was well received by anti-apartheid activists in South Africa. Those who appreciated Bradman's decision included a then-imprisoned Nelson Mandela. After Bradman's death, Mandela prasied him on public television—stating that "he was a hero, a true hero".

Although Bradman became unwell and died before the two could meet, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser gifted Mandela a signed bat from the cricketer, which read: "To Nelson Mandela—in recognition of a great, unfinished innings".