Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Full name | Alan Christopher Smith | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Born | Hall Green, Birmingham, Warwickshire | 25 October 1936||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Batting | Right-handed | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bowling | Right-arm fast-medium | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
International information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
National side | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Test debut | 30 November 1962 v Australia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Last Test | 15 March 1963 v New Zealand | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Career statistics | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Source: Cricinfo, 17 November 2022 |
Alan Christopher Smith CBE (born 25 October 1936), [1] often known as A. C. Smith, is an English former Test cricketer, who appeared in six Tests matches for England. Primarily a wicket-keeper, Smith was also a capable right-handed middle-order batsman and right-arm seam bowler. Very unusually for a regular wicket-keeper, he was sometimes selected by Warwickshire as a frontline bowler.
He was in the last group of amateurs to play for England, before the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) abolished such a status. [1]
Educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham and Brasenose College, Oxford, Smith scored his maiden first-class century (106, opening the batting) for Oxford University against the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1958. [2] He won blues 1957–1960, and captained Oxford University 1959–1960. Against Hampshire in 1959, Smith captained Oxford, kept wicket and scored centuries in both innings (145 and 124). [3] Against the Free Foresters in 1960, Charles Fry's deputising as wicket-keeper allowed Smith to bowl himself; having never previously taken more than a single first-class wicket in an innings, he claimed figures of 5–32 and 4–45. [4]
With Jim Parks, Jr. incumbent as England's wicket-keeper, Smith's international opportunities were limited to one tour of Australia and New Zealand under the captaincy of Ted Dexter in 1962–63. Smith failed with the bat in his four Tests against Australia; his score of 69 not out from number 10 in the Second Test against New Zealand, [5] sharing a vital unbroken 163-run partnership with Colin Cowdrey to set up an innings victory, was his only batting contribution of note.
He succeeded M. J. K. Smith, to whom he was unrelated, as county captain of Warwickshire in 1965, retaining the post until his retirement at the end of the 1974 season. Against Essex in 1965 he achieved the very rare feat of taking a hat-trick as bowler in a first-class match in which he had been selected as a wicket-keeper. [6] As the West Indian wicket-keeper Deryck Murray played for Warwickshire from 1972 onwards, Smith was seldom required to keep, and was hence able to bowl increasingly regularly towards the end of his career; in 1972 he took 5–47 against Glamorgan [7] and 5–19 in a 40-over match against Northants. [8] On one occasion, Smith was a member of a Warwickshire team which boasted three international wicket-keepers, none of whom were keeping wicket: Deryck Murray was injured, Rohan Kanhai had given up keeping, and Smith had been selected for his bowling, leaving occasional wicket-keeper John Jameson behind the stumps. [9]
After retirement he became a leading figure in the game's organisation including spells as Secretary of Warwickshire County Cricket Club (1976–1986), as an England selector and Chief Executive of the Test and County Cricket Board (1986–1996). [1]
Michael Colin Cowdrey, Baron Cowdrey of Tonbridge, was an English cricketer who played for Kent County Cricket Club from 1950 to 1976, and in 114 Test matches for England from 1954 to 1975. He was born in Ootacamund, Madras Presidency, British India and died in Littlehampton, West Sussex.
Michael John Knight Smith, better known as M. J. K. Smith or Mike Smith, is an English double international, in cricket and in rugby union.
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Norman Walter Dransfield Yardley was an English cricketer who played for Cambridge University, Yorkshire County Cricket Club and England, as a right-handed batsman and occasional bowler. An amateur, he captained Yorkshire from 1948 to 1955 and England on fourteen occasions between 1947 and 1950, winning four Tests, losing seven and drawing three. Yardley was named Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1948, and in his obituary in Wisden Cricketers' Almanack he was described as Yorkshire's finest amateur since Stanley Jackson.
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Peter May captained the English cricket team in Australia in 1958–59, playing as England in the 1958–59 Ashes series against the Australians and as the MCC in their other matches on the tour. It was widely regarded as one of the strongest teams to depart English shores, comparable with the great teams of Johnny Douglas in 1911-12 and Percy Chapman in 1928-29. It had no obvious weaknesses, and yet it was beaten – and beaten badly. By the First Test the top batsmen had made runs, the Surrey trio of Loader, Laker and Lock had taken wickets, as had Lancashire's Brian Statham. South Australia, Victoria and an Australian XI had all been beaten – the last by the crushing margin of 345 runs – and all seemed rosy for Peter May's touring team. But in the Brisbane Test they lost by 8 wickets and the rest of the series failed to offer any hope of reversing their fortunes. The reasons for their failure were manifold; the captain was too defensive; injuries affected their best players; others were too young and inexperienced such as Arthur Milton, Raman Subba Row, Ted Dexter, Roy Swetman and John Mortimore, or at the end of their career; Godfrey Evans, Trevor Bailey, Jim Laker, Willie Watson and Frank Tyson. Their morale was further bruised when faced with bowlers of dubious legality and unsympathetic umpires. Peter May was criticised for seeing his fiancée Virginia Gilligan, who was travelling with her uncle the Test Match commentator Arthur Gilligan. The press blamed the poor performance on the team's heavy drinking, bad behaviour and lack of pride – a foretaste the treatment losing teams would receive in the 1980s. It was not a happy tour by any means and it would take 12 years to recover The Ashes. As E.W. Swanton noted
It was a tour which saw all sorts of perverse happenings – from an injury list that never stopped, to the dis-satisfaction with umpiring and bowlers' actions that so undermined morale. From various causes England gave below their best...
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