No fast bowler suffered as many bizarre injuries as Alan Igglesden. He had to pull out of one match after poking himself in the eye with his thumb, and another when demonstrating his delivery stride. The wicket-keeper thought he’d had a heart attack. When he trod on a boundary rope at Canterbury he had to be transported back to the dressing-room on an old milk float, past quizzical supporters.
He was injured again on the eve of playing for England against Australia in 1993, this time through playing five-a-side football, and had to miss another match. Fortunately he was fit enough to run to the team hotel when he and Phil Tufnell were chased out of a bar in Antigua on England’s 1993-94 tour to West Indies after a rum punch too many. Even then Tufnell, the cigarette-smoking spinner, hardly renowned for his athleticism, beat him back.
Injuries prevented Igglesden from playing in more than three Test matches, and he was unfortunate also in that three other bowlers of not dissimilar pace and ability — Neil Foster, Angus Fraser and Darren Gough — were uppermost in the England selectors’ thoughts. Nonetheless, when fully fit he could come up with waspish spells and swing the ball away from a right-handed batsman. Being 6ft 6in, he had the advantage of making it lift as well.
He had an old-fashioned curved run-up that derived from bowling at his brother, Kevin, when growing up in the garden of the family home in Westerham, Kent. Behind the open gate was an angled service road used for delivery drop-offs by the Co-operative store. In an era when there was less traffic, he could start off in the main street and work up sufficient pace by the time he was treading on grass, suffering less discomfort than when he played professional cricket.
Alan Paul Igglesden, always known as “Iggy”, was the son of Trevor Igglesden, who in his eighties still works as an electrician, and Gillian (née Relf). He was educated at Churchill Secondary School in Westerham, growing up two miles from Chartwell, Churchill’s former home. His cricketing ability was spotted at Sevenoaks indoor school by Colin Page, the irascible manager of Kent, who predicted when Igglesden was 16 that he would play for England. Not that it stopped Page saying to him, “You’ll never make it unless you get your arm up higher”.
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Igglesden progressed through Holmesdale Cricket Club and Kent’s Club and Ground XI, making his first-class debut in 1986. He was unfortunate also in that, although Kent managed to finish runners-up in the county championship in 1988, their trophy-laden days had come to an end. In the winters he coached and played at Avendale, the multiracial club in Cape Town run by Bob Woolmer, the former England all-rounder, and played in first-class matches for Western Province.
He was given little encouragement when chosen for England in 1989. As if playing a rampant Australia side was not enough, Igglesden was described by Micky Stewart, England’s manager and coach, as “the 17th best seamer in the country”. His brother thought this did not have a disconcerting effect. “Alan knew a number of other players had been tried and was excited to make his debut, just keen to get playing.”
Stewart was trying to make a point about the injuries England had suffered but it was hardly a ringing endorsement. Still, Igglesden took the wickets at the Oval of Geoff Marsh, Mark Taylor and Steve Waugh, three fine batsmen. He went on the England A tour to Kenya and Zimbabwe in 1990 but was not fit enough to play in any of the Tests against Australia in 1993. On the tour to the Caribbean that winter, he took three wickets in two Tests, fortunately missing the match in which Brian Lara made his world record score of 375, and was not chosen again. He also played in four one-day internationals.
Keith Fletcher, who succeeded Stewart as England coach, regarded Igglesden as the kind of bowler who, had he kept fit, would have played ten to 15 times for his country. “Alan swung the ball at a good pace, 83-84mph. He would have got on with anyone and could have shared a room on tour with any cricketer. When we went to Victoria Falls we passed some small gift-shops and spotted this 8ft-tall giraffe — the ugliest thing you’d ever seen. I said to Bob Bennett, our tour manager, ‘I hope no one buys that’. And who should do so? Iggy. It had to have its own seat on the bus and somehow he got it home.”
Igglesden continued to play for Kent until he was released at the age of 34 in 1998. In all first-class and List A (one-day) cricket he took 693 wickets. Christopher Cowdrey, who was his Kent captain, said: “Iggy was just the nicest guy, almost too nice to be an aggressive fast bowler. That can be said about some people and not meant. In 1988 we would have won the championship had he been fit. When he got it right, he hit a length and bowled a good out-swinger.”
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A year after Igglesden retired, when representing Berkshire in minor counties cricket, he had an epileptic fit and it was discovered that he had a brain tumour the size of a junior cricket ball. He was still able to take up a coaching role at Sutton Valence School in Kent, where he met his wife, Liz Farley, who was an English teacher. When they moved to live near Keighley, West Yorkshire, where she taught at Woodhouse Grove School, he took another coaching position. His tumour, which could not be removed, erupted again in 2009 and required life-saving surgery and chemotherapy. He and Liz had a daughter, Beth, and he became a full-time parent while Liz worked.
Notwithstanding two strokes Igglesden, whose other sporting interests were golf and supporting Crystal Palace, raised more than £300,000 for the Brain Tumour Charity, being well supported on golf days by former team-mates.
Despite all the difficulties he suffered throughout his career and in later life, he always professed that he was a happy man. He would pass on advice to fellow fast bowlers who were making their debuts against Australia. “When the umpire says play, stop for a moment, have a look around, take it all in. You only bowl your first ball in an Ashes Test once.”
Alan Igglesden, cricketer, was born on October 8, 1964. He died of complications from a brain tumour on November 1, 2021, aged 57
