Brian Close

Brian Close

CBE

Brian Close in 1950
Personal information
Full name	Dennis Brian Close
Born	(1931-02-24)24 February 1931 Rawdon, Yorkshire, England
Died	13 September 2015(2015-09-13) (aged 84) Baildon, Yorkshire, England
Batting	Left-handed
Bowling	Right-arm off break Right-arm medium
Role	All-rounder
International information
National side	England (1949–1976)
Domestic team information
Years	Team
1949–1970	Yorkshire
1950–1967	Marylebone Cricket Club
1971–1977	Somerset
Career statistics
Competition Test ODI FC LA Matches 22 3 786 164 Runs scored 887 49 34,994 3,458 Batting average 25.34 16.33 33.26 23.84 100s/50s 0/4 0/0 52/171 2/11 Top score 70 43 198 131 Balls bowled 1,212 18 69,971 2,258 Wickets 18 0 1,171 65 Bowling average 29.55 – 26.42 22.43 5 wickets in innings 0 – 43 0 10 wickets in match 0 – 3 0 Best bowling 4/35 – 8/41 4/9 Catches/stumpings 24/0 1/0 813/1 53
Source: ESPNcricinfo, 24 February 2020
Association football career Position(s) Forward[1] Youth career 1945–1949 Leeds United Senior career* Years Team Apps (Gls) 1949–1950 Leeds United 0 (0) 1950–1952 Arsenal 0 (0) 1952–1953 Bradford City 6 (2) International career England Youth *Club domestic league appearances and goals

Dennis Brian Close, CBE (24 February 1931 – 13 September 2015) was an English first-class cricketer. He was picked to play against New Zealand in July 1949, when he was 18 years old. Close went on to play 22 Test matches for England, captaining them seven times to six wins and one drawn test. Close also captained Yorkshire to four county championship titles – the main domestic trophy in English cricket. He later went on to captain Somerset, where he is widely credited with developing the county into a hard-playing team, and helping to mould Viv Richards and Ian Botham into the successful players they became.

Throughout his cricket career, which lasted from 1948 until the 1977 season, Close was one of the most charismatic and well-known cricketers. He scored almost 35,000 runs as a batsman, including 52 centuries with a highest innings score of 198. He also took 1,168 wickets as a bowler, over 800 catches as a fielder and one stumping, as a stand-in wicket-keeper. At just over six feet (1.83 m) tall he was a noticeable presence on the field, often fielding at the short leg position, close to the batsman. As cricketers did not use head or body protection in Close's day, he would often get hurt when a batsman struck a ball that hit him. Close was also noted, as a batsman, for standing up to intimidatory bowling, letting the ball hit his unprotected torso rather than flinching.

Close was known as a cricketing gambler; he was prepared to take risks and to court controversy throughout his career. He was serving a "confined to barracks" punishment during his military service when selected for his first international cricket tour to Australia in 1950, was sacked as England captain for timewasting, and later sacked by Yorkshire for his lukewarm attitude to one-day cricket. He was also accused of not giving enough support to younger Yorkshire cricketers. He attracted further criticism by touring apartheid-era South Africa and white-minority-controlled Rhodesia with private teams. As chairman of Yorkshire's cricket subcommittee he had many run-ins with the then Yorkshire captain, Geoffrey Boycott. However, he continued to serve Yorkshire cricket, and in his seventies was coaching and occasionally captaining the county's Colts XI. He was President of Yorkshire in 2008/9.^[2]