Author: Bill Ricquier

  • English county cricket's debt to overseas talent

    16 February 2014
    English county cricket owes a huge debt to its overseas players. Particularly since the qualification rules were liberalised in 1968,…
  • A roll-call of names, and England's gathering gloom

    24 January 2014
    David Gower, Ian Botham, Allan Lamb, Paul Downton, Brian Lara, Ridley Jacobs, Alastair Cook, Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell. What…
  • Johnson's fire, and England's Melbourne misery

    12 January 2014
    Image: Mitchell Johnson bowling a bouncer to Graeme Swann at the WACA during the 2013-14 Ashes in Australia. By Dan…
  • Peter O'Toole, and cricket on the screen

    27 December 2013
    Image: By ABC TV (ebay) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Peter O’Toole died on 14 December. At his best he…
  • The rabbit-holes hidden in the almanack

    15 November 2013
    The other day I was leafing, as one does, through the pages of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for 2012 when I…
  • Salim Durani, and cricket's forgotten charmers

    10 November 2013
    Image: Salim Durani, by Vasim Maner/ Impact Index One of the most intriguing aspects of the next fifty-over World Cup,…
  • A county season's end, more poignant than most

    24 October 2013
    The end of the 2013 English county season had an even more poignantly fin de siècle feel than usual for…
  • A debut gone wrong, and sympathy for the bowler

    6 September 2013
    It was impossible not to feel sorry for Simon Kerrigan, the Lancashire slow left arm bowler, as he made his…
  • Murali departs, and the game feels emptier

    23 August 2013
    Muralitharan receiving a guard of honour after passing Walsh's record, Harare 2004. Image by Ajithjay licensed under the Creative Commons…
  • The tail-enders who briefly become heroes

    10 August 2013
    Two events in the last few weeks, the heroics of Ashton Agar at the first Ashes Test at Trent Bridge,…