Courtney Walsh
Encyclopedia
Courtney Andrew Walsh is a former international cricket
er (fast
bowler) who represented the West Indies
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
.
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
in Perth
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
at Hobart
. He first played for Gloucestershire
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
and Graeme Wood
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
after Richie Richardson
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Walsh is one of only four bowlers to have bowled over 5000 overs
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
: Muttiah Muralitharan
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
last man Saleem Jaffar
of Pakistan in a World Cup
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.
Courtney Andrew Walsh (born October 30, 1962) is a former international cricket
er (fast
bowler) who represented the West Indies
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
.
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
in Perth
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
at Hobart
. He first played for Gloucestershire
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
and Graeme Wood
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
after Richie Richardson
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Walsh is one of only four bowlers to have bowled over 5000 overs
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
: Muttiah Muralitharan
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
last man Saleem Jaffar
of Pakistan in a World Cup
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.
Courtney Andrew Walsh (born October 30, 1962) is a former international cricket
er (fast
bowler) who represented the West Indies
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
.
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
in Perth
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
at Hobart
. He first played for Gloucestershire
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
and Graeme Wood
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
after Richie Richardson
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Walsh is one of only four bowlers to have bowled over 5000 overs
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
: Muttiah Muralitharan
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
last man Saleem Jaffar
of Pakistan in a World Cup
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
er (fast
Fast bowling
Fast bowling, sometimes known as pace bowling, is one of the two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket. The other is spin bowling...
bowler) who represented the West Indies
West Indian cricket team
The West Indian cricket team, also known colloquially as the West Indies or the Windies, is a multi-national cricket team representing a sporting confederation of 15 mainly English-speaking Caribbean countries, British dependencies and non-British dependencies.From the mid 1970s to the early 1990s,...
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
Test cricket
Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev Ramlal Nikhanj , better known as Kapil Dev, is a former Indian cricketer. He captained the Indian cricket team which won the 1983 Cricket World Cup...
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
.
Walsh's career
Walsh's first claim to fame came in 1979 when he took 10 wickets in an inningsInnings
An inning, or innings, is a fixed-length segment of a game in any of a variety of sports – most notably cricket and baseball during which one team attempts to score while the other team attempts to prevent the first from scoring. In cricket, the term innings is both singular and plural and is...
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
Australian cricket team
The Australian cricket team is the national cricket team of Australia. It is the joint oldest team in Test cricket, having played in the first Test match in 1877...
in Perth
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan cricket team
The Sri Lankan cricket team is the national cricket team of Sri Lanka. The team first played international cricket in 1926–27, and were later awarded Test status in 1981, which made Sri Lanka the eighth Test cricket playing nation...
at Hobart
Hobart
Hobart is the state capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Founded in 1804 as a penal colony,Hobart is Australia's second oldest capital city after Sydney. In 2009, the city had a greater area population of approximately 212,019. A resident of Hobart is known as...
. He first played for Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Gloucestershire. Its limited overs team is called the Gloucestershire Gladiators....
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
Tony Dodemaide
Anthony Ian Christopher Dodemaide is a former Australian Test Cricketer. After a three year stint as Chief Executive of the Western Australian Cricket Association in Perth, he is the current Chief Executive of Cricket Victoria...
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
Mike Veletta
Michael Robert John Veletta is a former Australian and Western Australian cricketer.He played in 8 Tests and 20 One Day International matches between 1987 and 1990...
and Graeme Wood
Graeme Wood
Graeme Malcolm Wood is a former Australian cricketer who played in 59 Tests and 83 ODIs from 1978 to 1989. He scored nine Test centuries in his career and it was a West Australian record until 2001-02 when it was passed by Justin Langer....
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
Indian cricket team
The Indian cricket team is the national cricket team of India. Governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India , it is a full member of the International Cricket Council with Test and One Day International status....
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
after Richie Richardson
Richie Richardson
Richard Benjamin Richardson is a retired West Indies cricketer and a former captain of the West Indian cricket team.Richardson was born in Five Islands Village, Antigua. He began his career with the Leewards Islands in 1982 as an opener and after his second season he was called up by the West...
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
Malcolm Marshall
By 1984 Marshall was seen as one of the finest bowlers in the world, and he demoralised England that summer, especially at Headingley, where he ran through the order in the second innings to finish with 7-53, despite having broken his thumb whilst fielding in the first innings...
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
Joel Garner
Joel Garner , also known as "Big Joel" or "Big Bird", is a former West Indian cricketer, and a member of the highly regarded late 1970s and early '80s West Indies cricket teams....
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
South African cricket team
The South African national cricket team represent South Africa in international cricket. They are administrated by Cricket South Africa.South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council, also known as ICC, with Test and One Day International, or ODI, status...
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Over (cricket)
In the sport of cricket, an over is a set of six consecutive balls bowled in succession. An over is normally bowled by a single bowler. However, in the event of injury preventing a bowler from completing an over, it is completed by a teammate....
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
Spin bowling
Spin bowling is a technique used for bowling in the sport of cricket. Practitioners are known as spinners or spin bowlers.-Purpose:The main aim of spin bowling is to bowl the cricket ball with rapid rotation so that when it bounces on the pitch it will deviate, thus making it difficult for the...
: Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
Shane Warne
Shane Keith Warne is a former Australian international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. In 2000, he was selected by a panel of cricket experts as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet...
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble is a former Indian cricketer and captain of the Indian Test cricket team. He is a right-arm leg spin bowler and a right-hand batsman. He is currently the leading wicket-taker for India in both Test and One Day International matches...
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
Glenn McGrath
Glenn Donald McGrath AM , nicknamed "Pigeon", is a former Australian cricket player. He is one of the most highly regarded fast-medium pace bowlers in cricketing history, and a leading contributor to Australia's domination of world cricket from the mid-1990s to the early 21st century...
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
Run out
Run out is a method of dismissal in the sport of cricket. It is governed by Law 38 of the Laws of cricket.-The rules:A batsman is out Run out if at any time while the ball is in play no part of his bat or person is grounded behind the popping crease and his wicket is fairly put down by the opposing...
last man Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar is a retired Pakistani cricketer who played in 14 Tests and 39 One Day Internationals from 1986 to 1992. Jaffar was born in Karachi, Sindh...
of Pakistan in a World Cup
Cricket World Cup
The ICC Cricket World Cup is the premier international championship of men's One Day International cricket. The event is organised by the sport's governing body, the International Cricket Council , with preliminary qualification rounds leading up to a finals tournament which is held every four years...
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
Lashings World XI
The Lashings World XI is a famous cricket team, founded by David Folb. It was originally formed in 1984 as a scratch team, and grew from an unremarkable English local club cricket team into, as it bills itself, the "World’s greatest cricket club"....
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.
External links
- Cricinfo Player Profile : Courtney Walsh
- CricketArchive Player Profile : Courtney Walsh
- Jackie Hewitt's tribute to Courtney Walsh
- Behind The Walsh
Courtney Andrew Walsh (born October 30, 1962) is a former international cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
er (fast
Fast bowling
Fast bowling, sometimes known as pace bowling, is one of the two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket. The other is spin bowling...
bowler) who represented the West Indies
West Indian cricket team
The West Indian cricket team, also known colloquially as the West Indies or the Windies, is a multi-national cricket team representing a sporting confederation of 15 mainly English-speaking Caribbean countries, British dependencies and non-British dependencies.From the mid 1970s to the early 1990s,...
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
Test cricket
Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev Ramlal Nikhanj , better known as Kapil Dev, is a former Indian cricketer. He captained the Indian cricket team which won the 1983 Cricket World Cup...
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
.
Walsh's career
Walsh's first claim to fame came in 1979 when he took 10 wickets in an inningsInnings
An inning, or innings, is a fixed-length segment of a game in any of a variety of sports – most notably cricket and baseball during which one team attempts to score while the other team attempts to prevent the first from scoring. In cricket, the term innings is both singular and plural and is...
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
Australian cricket team
The Australian cricket team is the national cricket team of Australia. It is the joint oldest team in Test cricket, having played in the first Test match in 1877...
in Perth
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan cricket team
The Sri Lankan cricket team is the national cricket team of Sri Lanka. The team first played international cricket in 1926–27, and were later awarded Test status in 1981, which made Sri Lanka the eighth Test cricket playing nation...
at Hobart
Hobart
Hobart is the state capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Founded in 1804 as a penal colony,Hobart is Australia's second oldest capital city after Sydney. In 2009, the city had a greater area population of approximately 212,019. A resident of Hobart is known as...
. He first played for Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Gloucestershire. Its limited overs team is called the Gloucestershire Gladiators....
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
Tony Dodemaide
Anthony Ian Christopher Dodemaide is a former Australian Test Cricketer. After a three year stint as Chief Executive of the Western Australian Cricket Association in Perth, he is the current Chief Executive of Cricket Victoria...
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
Mike Veletta
Michael Robert John Veletta is a former Australian and Western Australian cricketer.He played in 8 Tests and 20 One Day International matches between 1987 and 1990...
and Graeme Wood
Graeme Wood
Graeme Malcolm Wood is a former Australian cricketer who played in 59 Tests and 83 ODIs from 1978 to 1989. He scored nine Test centuries in his career and it was a West Australian record until 2001-02 when it was passed by Justin Langer....
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
Indian cricket team
The Indian cricket team is the national cricket team of India. Governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India , it is a full member of the International Cricket Council with Test and One Day International status....
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
after Richie Richardson
Richie Richardson
Richard Benjamin Richardson is a retired West Indies cricketer and a former captain of the West Indian cricket team.Richardson was born in Five Islands Village, Antigua. He began his career with the Leewards Islands in 1982 as an opener and after his second season he was called up by the West...
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
Malcolm Marshall
By 1984 Marshall was seen as one of the finest bowlers in the world, and he demoralised England that summer, especially at Headingley, where he ran through the order in the second innings to finish with 7-53, despite having broken his thumb whilst fielding in the first innings...
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
Joel Garner
Joel Garner , also known as "Big Joel" or "Big Bird", is a former West Indian cricketer, and a member of the highly regarded late 1970s and early '80s West Indies cricket teams....
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
South African cricket team
The South African national cricket team represent South Africa in international cricket. They are administrated by Cricket South Africa.South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council, also known as ICC, with Test and One Day International, or ODI, status...
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Over (cricket)
In the sport of cricket, an over is a set of six consecutive balls bowled in succession. An over is normally bowled by a single bowler. However, in the event of injury preventing a bowler from completing an over, it is completed by a teammate....
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
Spin bowling
Spin bowling is a technique used for bowling in the sport of cricket. Practitioners are known as spinners or spin bowlers.-Purpose:The main aim of spin bowling is to bowl the cricket ball with rapid rotation so that when it bounces on the pitch it will deviate, thus making it difficult for the...
: Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
Shane Warne
Shane Keith Warne is a former Australian international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. In 2000, he was selected by a panel of cricket experts as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet...
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble is a former Indian cricketer and captain of the Indian Test cricket team. He is a right-arm leg spin bowler and a right-hand batsman. He is currently the leading wicket-taker for India in both Test and One Day International matches...
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
Glenn McGrath
Glenn Donald McGrath AM , nicknamed "Pigeon", is a former Australian cricket player. He is one of the most highly regarded fast-medium pace bowlers in cricketing history, and a leading contributor to Australia's domination of world cricket from the mid-1990s to the early 21st century...
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
Run out
Run out is a method of dismissal in the sport of cricket. It is governed by Law 38 of the Laws of cricket.-The rules:A batsman is out Run out if at any time while the ball is in play no part of his bat or person is grounded behind the popping crease and his wicket is fairly put down by the opposing...
last man Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar is a retired Pakistani cricketer who played in 14 Tests and 39 One Day Internationals from 1986 to 1992. Jaffar was born in Karachi, Sindh...
of Pakistan in a World Cup
Cricket World Cup
The ICC Cricket World Cup is the premier international championship of men's One Day International cricket. The event is organised by the sport's governing body, the International Cricket Council , with preliminary qualification rounds leading up to a finals tournament which is held every four years...
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
Lashings World XI
The Lashings World XI is a famous cricket team, founded by David Folb. It was originally formed in 1984 as a scratch team, and grew from an unremarkable English local club cricket team into, as it bills itself, the "World’s greatest cricket club"....
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.
External links
- Cricinfo Player Profile : Courtney Walsh
- CricketArchive Player Profile : Courtney Walsh
- Jackie Hewitt's tribute to Courtney Walsh
- Behind The Walsh
Courtney Andrew Walsh (born October 30, 1962) is a former international cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
er (fast
Fast bowling
Fast bowling, sometimes known as pace bowling, is one of the two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket. The other is spin bowling...
bowler) who represented the West Indies
West Indian cricket team
The West Indian cricket team, also known colloquially as the West Indies or the Windies, is a multi-national cricket team representing a sporting confederation of 15 mainly English-speaking Caribbean countries, British dependencies and non-British dependencies.From the mid 1970s to the early 1990s,...
from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test match
Test cricket
Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...
es. He is best known for a remarkable opening bowling partnership along with fellow West Indian Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
for several years and holding the record of most Test wickets from 2000, after he broke the record of Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev Ramlal Nikhanj , better known as Kapil Dev, is a former Indian cricketer. He captained the Indian cricket team which won the 1983 Cricket World Cup...
. This record was later broken in 2004 by Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
.
Walsh's career
Walsh's first claim to fame came in 1979 when he took 10 wickets in an inningsInnings
An inning, or innings, is a fixed-length segment of a game in any of a variety of sports – most notably cricket and baseball during which one team attempts to score while the other team attempts to prevent the first from scoring. In cricket, the term innings is both singular and plural and is...
in school cricket and three years later made his first-class cricket
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...
debut.
Walsh made his Test debut against Australia
Australian cricket team
The Australian cricket team is the national cricket team of Australia. It is the joint oldest team in Test cricket, having played in the first Test match in 1877...
in Perth
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
in 1984, taking 2 wickets for 43 runs. Later that season, he also made his One Day International debut against Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan cricket team
The Sri Lankan cricket team is the national cricket team of Sri Lanka. The team first played international cricket in 1926–27, and were later awarded Test status in 1981, which made Sri Lanka the eighth Test cricket playing nation...
at Hobart
Hobart
Hobart is the state capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Founded in 1804 as a penal colony,Hobart is Australia's second oldest capital city after Sydney. In 2009, the city had a greater area population of approximately 212,019. A resident of Hobart is known as...
. He first played for Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Gloucestershire. Its limited overs team is called the Gloucestershire Gladiators....
in 1984 and was a mainstay of the side until 1998.
In 1987, Walsh was named as one of the Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...
Cricketers of the Year. In 1988–89 at Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
he took a 'complicated' hat trick, dismissing Australia's Tony Dodemaide
Tony Dodemaide
Anthony Ian Christopher Dodemaide is a former Australian Test Cricketer. After a three year stint as Chief Executive of the Western Australian Cricket Association in Perth, he is the current Chief Executive of Cricket Victoria...
with the last ball of the first innings and Mike Veletta
Mike Veletta
Michael Robert John Veletta is a former Australian and Western Australian cricketer.He played in 8 Tests and 20 One Day International matches between 1987 and 1990...
and Graeme Wood
Graeme Wood
Graeme Malcolm Wood is a former Australian cricketer who played in 59 Tests and 83 ODIs from 1978 to 1989. He scored nine Test centuries in his career and it was a West Australian record until 2001-02 when it was passed by Justin Langer....
with his first two deliveries in the second. During that winter he also took 10 wickets in a Test match for the first time against India
Indian cricket team
The Indian cricket team is the national cricket team of India. Governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India , it is a full member of the International Cricket Council with Test and One Day International status....
in Kingston.
In 1994, he was appointed captain of the West Indies for the tours of India and New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
after Richie Richardson
Richie Richardson
Richard Benjamin Richardson is a retired West Indies cricketer and a former captain of the West Indian cricket team.Richardson was born in Five Islands Village, Antigua. He began his career with the Leewards Islands in 1982 as an opener and after his second season he was called up by the West...
was ordered to rest because of "acute fatigue syndrome". In 1995, he took 62 Test wickets at an average of 21.75 runs per wicket, a performance which he bettered in 2000 when he took 66 Test wickets at an average of 18.69, including 34 wickets in the Test series against England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
at an average of 12.82 runs per wicket. Coming close to the record for a West Indian bowler of 35 wickets in a Test series (set by Malcolm Marshall
Malcolm Marshall
By 1984 Marshall was seen as one of the finest bowlers in the world, and he demoralised England that summer, especially at Headingley, where he ran through the order in the second innings to finish with 7-53, despite having broken his thumb whilst fielding in the first innings...
in 1988). In the 1990s, his partnership with Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Ambrose
Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose is a former West Indian cricketer. His skill was as a right-arm fast bowler, especially in partnership with Courtney Walsh...
was one of the most feared bowling attacks in world cricket.
During the first part of his career, Walsh served as the "stock" bowler in an attack featuring Marshall, Joel Garner
Joel Garner
Joel Garner , also known as "Big Joel" or "Big Bird", is a former West Indian cricketer, and a member of the highly regarded late 1970s and early '80s West Indies cricket teams....
and later Ambrose, but after the retirement of Marshall and Garner took the role as opening bowler. His action lacked the elegance of those bowlers, but its economy and his natural athleticism ensured he was accurate and durable, even over very long spells and he used his height (about 198 cm, or six-foot-six) to extract occasionally vicious bounce. Even as he lost pace in the later stage of his career he continued to take wickets at an undiminished rate; teams tended to defend against him and Ambrose and attack the weaker third and fourth bowlers.
Walsh played his last ODI against New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
in 2000 and his last Test match against South Africa
South African cricket team
The South African national cricket team represent South Africa in international cricket. They are administrated by Cricket South Africa.South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council, also known as ICC, with Test and One Day International, or ODI, status...
in his homeland, Jamaica, in 2001.
Over (cricket)
In the sport of cricket, an over is a set of six consecutive balls bowled in succession. An over is normally bowled by a single bowler. However, in the event of injury preventing a bowler from completing an over, it is completed by a teammate....
in Test cricket, the other three being spinners
Spin bowling
Spin bowling is a technique used for bowling in the sport of cricket. Practitioners are known as spinners or spin bowlers.-Purpose:The main aim of spin bowling is to bowl the cricket ball with rapid rotation so that when it bounces on the pitch it will deviate, thus making it difficult for the...
: Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah Muralitharan , often referred to as Murali, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who was rated the greatest Test match bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2002...
of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne
Shane Warne
Shane Keith Warne is a former Australian international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. In 2000, he was selected by a panel of cricket experts as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet...
of Australia, and Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble
Anil Kumble is a former Indian cricketer and captain of the Indian Test cricket team. He is a right-arm leg spin bowler and a right-hand batsman. He is currently the leading wicket-taker for India in both Test and One Day International matches...
of India. These four, in addition to Glenn McGrath
Glenn McGrath
Glenn Donald McGrath AM , nicknamed "Pigeon", is a former Australian cricket player. He is one of the most highly regarded fast-medium pace bowlers in cricketing history, and a leading contributor to Australia's domination of world cricket from the mid-1990s to the early 21st century...
are also the only bowlers to have taken 500 or more Test wickets. Among the five, Walsh is the only one who has not taken 8 or more wickets in an innings. In ODIs, Walsh was not as successful although he will be remembered for his best performance, 5 wickets for just 1 run against Sri Lanka in 1986. In first-class cricket, he took 5 wickets in an innings more than 100 times and 10 wickets in a match 20 times.
Walsh's feats with the bat are rather less flattering, as indicated by an average of seven in both Test cricket and ODIs. He also holds the record for the most Test ducks (43), but also for the most "not outs" - 61 times. His highest score, coincidentally, was 30 in both forms of the game. By the end of his career, he had such a reputation for poor batting that the crowd would cheer every ball he faced. Whether this was in appreciation of his batting or an attempt to wind up the bowling side is open to interpretation. That said, Walsh is a much loved and respected cricketer and the West Indies have arguably yet to find a fast bowler with anything approaching his talents.
Walsh is also famous for his sportsmanlike gesture of not mankading
Run out
Run out is a method of dismissal in the sport of cricket. It is governed by Law 38 of the Laws of cricket.-The rules:A batsman is out Run out if at any time while the ball is in play no part of his bat or person is grounded behind the popping crease and his wicket is fairly put down by the opposing...
last man Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar
Saleem Jaffar is a retired Pakistani cricketer who played in 14 Tests and 39 One Day Internationals from 1986 to 1992. Jaffar was born in Karachi, Sindh...
of Pakistan in a World Cup
Cricket World Cup
The ICC Cricket World Cup is the premier international championship of men's One Day International cricket. The event is organised by the sport's governing body, the International Cricket Council , with preliminary qualification rounds leading up to a finals tournament which is held every four years...
match in 1987, which cost the West Indies the match and a place in the semi-finals.
He is currently a regular feature of the Lashings World XI
Lashings World XI
The Lashings World XI is a famous cricket team, founded by David Folb. It was originally formed in 1984 as a scratch team, and grew from an unremarkable English local club cricket team into, as it bills itself, the "World’s greatest cricket club"....
alongside other cricket legends including Sachin Tendulkar and fellow West Indian Richie Richardson.
Courtney Walsh Also owns a restaurant in Jamaica called Cuddyz.