When England needed Four Keepers

It is not commonplace for teams to use more than one wicketkeeper during the course of a match. In first class cricket for Western Australia, Tim Zoehrer used to start keeping to the quicks, before relinquishing the gloves to Mike Valetta so that Zoehrer could bowl his more than useful leg-spin. Likewise, a number of wicketkeepers have had to retire hurt whilst fielding, often suffering nasty blows to the mouth and nose while keeping to the spinners. However, in 1986 England had cause to use four different keepers during the same test.

The nominated keeper for England in the First Test against New Zealand at Lords in 1986 was Bruce French. Unfortunately, he was struck on the head by Kiwi maestro Richard Hadlee and forced to retired hurt without scoring. By the time of the commencement of the New Zealand innings, French was still not well enough to take his place behind the stumps. Accordingly, his team-mate Bill Athey took up the gloves. This was not the ideal solution, and with the sporting agreement of New Zealand captain Jeremy Coney, Bob Taylor was drafted onto the field to keep. It is worth pointing out that Taylor was not only 45 years old and had been retired from first class cricket for a number of years, but also that he had also been sitting happily in a hospitality tent watching the events unfold. Nonetheless, Taylor did an admirable job for the remainder of the day.

The next morning, again with the agreement of Coney, Bobby Parks took over from Taylor. This was a more logical replacement, as Parks was the current Hampshire keeper of the time. Parks was the wicketkeeper until French was able to return, ironically for only one ball of the New Zealand first innings. French had recovered enough to keep throughout the abbreviated New Zealand second innings of only fifteen overs, but he showed no significant effects of the blow from Hadlee. Ironically, none of the four keepers were involved in any dismissals and the match ended in a tame draw.

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