David Brown (cricketer born 1942)

David Brown

Personal information
Batting style	Right-hand bat
Bowling style	Right-arm fast-medium
International information
National side	English
Career statistics
Competition	Tests	First-class
Matches	26	390
Runs scored	342	4110
Batting average	11.79	12.26
100s/50s	-/-	-/6
Top score	44*	79
Balls bowled	5098	63339
Wickets	79	1165
Bowling average	28.31	24.85
5 wickets in innings	2	46
10 wickets in match	-	5
Best bowling	5/42	8/60
Catches/stumpings	7/-	157/-
Source: [1],

David John Brown (born 30 January 1942, Walsall, Staffordshire)^[1] is a former English cricketer who played in twenty six Tests from 1965 to 1969. Cricket writer Colin Batemen described Brown as a "rangy, popular paceman...[with] gutsy determinaton and uncomplaining effort".^[1]

Life and career

Educated at Queen Mary's Grammar School, Brown made his Warwickshire debut in 1961. A dependable seam bowler in the English tradition, Brown used his full 6' 4" to extract bounce from any wicket, an attribute which enabled him to be as effective on hard wickets on tour as he was on green pitches at home. He overcame injury to take 1,165 first-class wickets and play regularly for England in the late 1960s, taking 79 wickets with a best return of 5 for 42.

His most famous bowling was in the Third Test at Sydney in the 1965-66 Ashes series, where he took 5/63, forced Australia to follow on and England won their biggest victory down under for fifty years. This was despite being "laid low with bursitis, or a sort of house-maid's knee of the elbow"^[2] and he only took 11 wickets (37.18) in the drawn series.

In the first half of 1969, Brown took fourteen wickets at 20 apiece as England easily accounted for the West Indies. An injury to Brown's opening bowling partner, John Snow, meant that Alan Ward was called up for the first Test against England's next opponents, New Zealand. When selection was made for the second test, and with Snow fit again, it was Brown that made way not Ward, and Brown did not play international cricket again.^[1]

His leadership skills were rewarded with the vice-captaincy on the MCC tour of Pakistan in 1966/7, and the captaincy of Warwickshire from 1975 to 1977. In 1982, he returned to the fray at the age of 40, long after he had retired to farm and breed racehorses, in answer to an injury crisis, and thus played in 390 first-class matches in all. It was in this latter capacity, that Brown became the first substitute to ever take a wicket in county cricket. After his colleague, Gladstone Small, had been called up for Test duties on the morning of the second day of Warwickshire's County Championship game against Lancashire, at Southport, revised playing conditions allowed Brown to act as a full substitute.^[3]

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Bateman, Colin (1993). If The Cap Fits. Tony Williams Publications. p. 34. ISBN 1-869833-21-X. 
2. ^ p137, E.W. Swanton, Swanton in Australia, with MCC 1946-75, Fontana, 1977
3. ^ Frindall, Bill (2009). Ask Bearders. BBC Books. p. 196. ISBN 978-1-84607-880-4. 

External links

• Sunday Times article 26 July, 2009

Persondata
Name	Brown, David
Alternative names	Brown, David John
Short description	English Test and County cricketer
Date of birth	30 January 1942
Place of birth	Walsall, Staffordshire, Enlgand
Date of death
Place of death