Walter Arnold Hadlee CBE (4 June 1915 – 29 September 2006)[1] was a New Zealand cricketer and Test match captain.

As an administrator, he guided New Zealand cricket in the mid-1970s during years of increasing professionalism, the Kerry Packer threat and the sporting boycott of South Africa.

He read cricket history avidly, kept scorebooks of all the big games at Lancaster Park, and practised assiduously.

Though he initially appeared awkward, at Christchurch Boys' High School, he also played hockey and rugby, and developed into a punishing batsman, particularly strong on the drive.

He scored 198 for Otago against the touring Australian team in 1945–46, and was appointed captain of New Zealand for the first Test in peacetime, against Australia that year.

Although he made 1,225 runs in 1937, including an innings of 93 in the Test at Old Trafford which ended after he trod on his stumps, it was his captaincy of the 1949 New Zealand team to England that proved to be the pinnacle of his playing career.

The 1949 team is still cited as one of the finest New Zealand has sent abroad and there were some illustrious names in the side, including Bert Sutcliffe, Martin Donnelly, John Reid, Jack Cowie, Tom Burtt, Harry Cave, Merv Wallace, Verdun Scott, Geoff Rabone and Frank Mooney.

As leading English writer John Woodcock noted: "Hadlee was a courageous and enterprising batsman, a popular and successful captain who played his cricket in the sporting manner usually associated with his country".

When asked to vote, for the 2000 edition of Wisden, for his choice of the five cricketers of the 20th century, he included his son Richard, confessing it was "embarrassing ...

He had considered Dennis Lillee for his selection, but found Richard's test match performance put him marginally ahead.

He died, aged 91, at the Princess Margaret Hospital in Christchurch, reportedly from a stroke, some six weeks after hip replacement surgery.