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West Indian
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West Indies
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WI
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Malcolm Marshall
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cricket_no_picpng
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Right hand bat
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Right arm Fast
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81
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1,810
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1885
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0/10
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92
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overs
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2,9304
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376
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2094
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22
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4
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7-22
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25/0
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136
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955
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1492
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0/2
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66
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1,1955
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157
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2696
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0
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4-18
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15/0
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10 August
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2005
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( of 20.94 is the best of anyone who has taken 200 or more wickets.
Remarkably, he achieved his bowling success despite being, by the standards of other fast bowlers, a short man - he stood at 5'11", while most of the great quicks have been well above 6'0" and many great West Indian fast bowlers, such as
Joel Garner ,
Curtly Ambrose ,
Courtney Walsh and
Colin Croft , were 6'6" or above.
Marshall was also a very dangerous lower-order batsman, usually batting at around number eight. Blessed with a good eye, and naturally aggressive against any form of bowling, Marshall had ten Test fifties and a number of first-class centuries to his credit. He was only fractionally short of genuine
All-rounder status and probably never did full justice to his considerable natural batting talent.
Born in
Bridgetown ,
Barbados , Marshall was partly taught cricket by his grandfather, who helped to bring him up after his father was killed in a road accident. His first representative match was a 40-over affair for West Indies Young Cricketers against their English equivalents at
Pointe-à-Pierre ,
Trinidad And Tobago in August
1976 . He made nought and his eight overs disappeared for 53 runs: a most inaccurate guide to what would follow a few years later.
Marshall's first senior appearance was a Geddes Grant/Harrison Line Trophy (
List A ) match for
Barbados on
13 February 1978 ; again he made a duck and did not take a wicket. Four days later, he made his
First-class debut against
Jamaica , and this time the fact that he yet again failed to score was almost irrelevant as he claimed 6-77 in the Jamaican first
Innings . On the back of this single first-class appearance he was selected to tour
India in
1978 /
79 , many first-choice West Indian stars being unavailable having committed themselves to playing
World Series Cricket .
Despite doing little of note in the three Tests he played on that tour, he did take 37 wickets in all first-class games, and
Hampshire saw enough in him to take him on as their overseas player for
1979 . He was in
West Indies '
World Cup squad, but did not play a match in the tournament. Hampshire were not doing well at the time, but nevertheless he took 47 first-class wickets, as well as picking up 5-13 against
Glamorgan in the
John Player League .
Marshall really came to prominence in
1980 , when in the third Test at
Old Trafford he accounted for
Mike Gatting ,
Brian Rose and
Peter Willey in short order to spark an
England collapse, although the match was eventually drawn. After
1980 /
81 he was out of the Test side for two years, but a season of stunning brilliance in
1982 when he took 134 wickets at under 16 apiece, including a career-best 8-71 against
Worcestershire , saw him recalled and thereafter he remained a fixture until the end of his international career.
In seven successive Test series from
1982 /
83 to
1985 /
86 he took 21 or more wickets each time, in the last five of them averaging under 20. His most productive series in this period was the
1983 /
84 rubber against
India , when he claimed 33 wickets as well as
Averaging 34 with the bat and making his highest Test score of 92 at
Kanpur . A few months later he took five in an innings twice at home against
Australia .
By
1984 Marshall was indisputably 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. He also came out to bat at number 11 in West Indies' first innings despite his injury, allowing his team to gain a further psychological advantage as
Larry Gomes completed an unbeaten century (incredibly, Marshall batted one-handed that day). In that series, too, he also ended
Andy Lloyd 's Test career after just half an hour after hitting him on the head.
In
1984 /
85 he had another outstanding series at home against
New Zealand , although there were those who believed that the barrage of bouncers he sent down was intimidatory beyond what was acceptable, and that Marshall should have been admonished by the
Umpires . Nevertheless his repertoire consisted of much more than just the bouncer; Marshall mastered virtually every delivery in cricket, swinging the ball in both directions. He also used an in-swinging yorker as well as developing an effective leg-cutter, and with the exception (perhaps surprisingly) of the
1986 /
87 New Zealanders , against whom he could only manage nine wickets at 32.11, no side seemed to have an answer to him.
1988 saw his career-best Test performance of 7-22 at Old Trafford, but as it came against one of the poorest England sides in living memory perhaps neither this nor his extraordinary series total of 35 wickets at 12.65 could be considered his best in anything more than strict statistical terms. He was coming towards the end of his international career, moreover, and though he took 11 wickets in the match against
India at
Port Of Spain the following winter, he played his last Test at
The Oval in
1991 . His final Test wicket - his 376th - was that of
Graham Gooch .
Marshall's final appearances for West Indies came in at
Christchurch . This was the only time Marshall played for West Indies against South Africa in his career, though played provincial cricket for
Natal in both
1992 /
93 and
1993 /
94 . Whilst playing at Natal his experience was invaluable and his guidance was an influential spark in the early career of
Shaun Pollock . Today Shaun Pollock attributes much of his success to his mentor, Marshall. In 1992 he was delighted when Hampshire won the
Benson And Hedges Cup , Marshall making 29 not out and taking three wickets in the game.
He played for Hampshire again in
1993 , taking 28 wickets at a shade over 30 runs apiece, but that was to be the end of his time in county cricket, and in
1994 his only game in England was against the South Africans for the
Scarborough President's XI during the
Festival . He played five matches for
Scotland in the
1995 Benson And Hedges Cup without much success, and his last senior games were for Natal in
1995 /
96 . In his very last senior appearance, against
Western Province in a
Limited-overs game at
Cape Town , the first of his two victims was his former international team-mate
Desmond Haynes .
In
1996 Marshall became coach both of Hampshire and West Indies, although the latter's steadily declining standard during this period led to a considerable amount of criticism coming his way. All this was forgotten in
1999 , however, as during the World Cup the shocking news broke that he had
Colon Cancer . He immediately left his coaching job to begin treatment, but this was ultimately unsuccessful and he returned to his home town, where he died on
4 November aged just 41.
The cricketing world was shocked by Marshall's death, and a Malcolm Marshall Memorial Trophy was inaugurated, to be awarded to the leading wicket-taker in each England v West Indies Test series. Another trophy with the same name was set up to be the prize in an annual game between Barbados and
Trinidad And Tobago .
