John Martin (cricketer, born 1941)

John Martin

Personal information
Full name	John Donald Martin
Born	23 December 1941 Oxford, England
Batting style	Right-handed
Bowling style	Right-arm fast-medium
Role	Bowler
Domestic team information
Years	Team
1962–65	Oxford University
1964–65	Somerset
First-class debut	2 May 1962 Oxford University v Gloucestershire
Last First-class	13 July 1965 Somerset v Glamorgan
Career statistics
Competition First-class Matches 40 Runs scored 148 Batting average 3.89 100s/50s –/– Top score 14* Balls bowled 6317 Wickets 93 Bowling average 29.04 5 wickets in innings 4 10 wickets in match – Best bowling 7/26 Catches/stumpings 13/–
Source: CricketArchive, 17 February 2011

John Donald Martin (born 23 December 1941) is a retired English cricketer who played first-class cricket for Oxford University and Somerset.^[1] He also played Minor Counties cricket for Oxfordshire and Berkshire. He was born in Oxford.

Martin was a tail-end right-handed batsman and a right-arm fast-medium bowler. Educated at Magdalen College School in Oxford, he played Minor Counties cricket for Oxfordshire from 1959, and he took four Somerset wickets in the 1961 Minor Counties Championship challenge match, which was won by Somerset's second eleven.^[2] The following season, 1962, he joined Somerset, playing mostly second eleven cricket for the next four summers after the end of the university term, and appearing only twice in the county's first team.

The bulk of Martin's first-class cricket was played for Oxford University. He was a freshman undergraduate at St Edmund Hall in 1962 and opened the bowling in the first match of the season against Gloucestershire: Martin Young and Ron Nicholls put on 395 for the first wicket for Gloucestershire, still the highest first-class partnership for any wicket for the county, though Martin did have Young caught behind the wicket.^[3] Playing in just six matches because of examinations, Martin took only nine first-class wickets in what Wisden Cricketers' Almanack declared was a "depressing" season.^[4] Four of those came in the University match, where he won his blue.^[5] He was a lot more successful in 1963, taking 26 first-class wickets including his first five-wicket haul, a return of six for 70 in the match against MCC when his victims included four England Test batsmen.^[6] In the University match, however, he retired with influenza after bowling only five overs. In 1964, he missed the match with Cambridge entirely through injury, though earlier in the season, he had produced the best bowling figures of his first-class career by taking seven Derbyshire wickets for just 26 runs in a rain-ruined match.^[7]

In December 1964, Martin was a member of an MCC team that toured South America for a month: the team consisted of mainly former public school players and there were matches in Chile, Brazil and Argentina.^[8] In the 1965 season, Martin was captain of the Oxford University side and had his best-ever bowling season, taking 37 wickets for the university side at an average of 19.24.^[9] After almost leading his side to victory in the 1965 University match, though, Martin played only one further first-class match, his second for Somerset after one in the 1964 season. He continued to play second eleven cricket for Somerset until the end of the 1966 season and made one fleeting appearance six years later for Berkshire in the Minor Counties.

A negligible batsman, he reached double figures only five times in 40 matches (twice in one match) and his highest score was just 14.

References

1. "John Martin". www.cricketarchive.com. Retrieved 10 February 2011.
2. "Scorecard: Somerset Second XI v Oxfordshire". www.cricketarchive.com. 6 September 1961. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
3. "Scorecard: Oxford University v Gloucestershire". www.cricketarchive.com. 2 May 1962. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
4. "The Universities in 1962". Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (1963 ed.). Wisden. p. 705.
5. "Scorecard: Oxford University v Cambridge University". www.cricketarchive.com. 11 July 1962. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
6. "Scorecard: MCC v Oxford University". www.cricketarchive.com. 26 June 1963. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
7. "Scorecard: MCC v Oxford University". www.cricketarchive.com. 17 June 1964. Retrieved 16 February 2011.
8. "M.C.C. in South America, 1964–65". Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (1966 ed.). Wisden. p. 845.
9. "The Universities in 1965". Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (1966 ed.). Wisden. p. 658.