A nation salutes a hero

More than 1,000 mourners filled Melbourne's St Paul's cathedral today to farewell Keith Miller, Australia's greatest allrounder.

Miller, who died on October 11 aged 84, played 55 Tests for Australia. He was also a wartime pilot who flew many Mosquito missions over Germany, a VFL footballer, a media personality and a raconteur. The mourners were led by Miller's second wife Marie and his four sons Bill, Peter, Denis and Bob, his seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Richie Benaud, the former Australia Test captain who played alongside Miller, said everything written and said about Miller since his death was true. "His name will live for as long as cricket exists," Benaud said.

Another former Australian captain Ian Chappell told of being taken to the Adelaide Oval by his father in the early 1950s to be given one simple instruction: "Watch Miller." "That's all my father told me, and that was all that I did," Chappell told the congregation.

While Benaud declared all the Miller stories true, John Bradman contradicted a few. Bradman, the son of Sir Donald, said any suggestion that Miller and his father had an uncomfortable relationship was false. "My father told me that he never had a more loyal supporter than Keith Miller," Bradman said. "People speak of contrasts, but the similarities go deeper."

Among those who paid tribute at the state funeral were the governor of Victoria John Landy, Miller's team-mates from the 1948 Invincibles, Neil Harvey, Sam Loxton and Bill Brown, and the Test players Lindsay Kline, Ian Meckiff, Ian Craig, and Paul Sheahan. Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting also attended.

The funeral was followed by a wreath laying at the foot of Miller's statue at the MCG where a wake was to be held in a room named in his honour.