16 Facts About Bob Appleyard

Robert Appleyard was a Yorkshire and England first-class cricketer.

Bob Appleyard was one of the best English bowlers of the 1950s, a decade which saw England develop its strongest bowling attack of the twentieth century.

Able to bowl fast-medium swingers or seamers and off-spinners with almost exactly the same action, Bob Appleyard's career was almost destroyed by injury and illness after his first full season in 1951.

Whilst in hospital, Bob Appleyard kept his fingers strong by squeezing a cricket ball under the bed covers.

Bob Appleyard had to learn to walk again and had the upper half of his left lung removed.

Bob Appleyard was able to bowl both as a paceman and as a spinner with no apparent changes of action, so that he could go through an innings with little rest and possess sting under all conditions of weather and wicket.

Bob Appleyard was chosen as a Wisden Cricketer of the Year but did not gain representative honours.

Bob Appleyard again bowled with skill on unusually erratic Australian wickets, most notably in the extreme heat at Adelaide in the Fourth Test, which clinched the Ashes.

In 1955, by then almost exclusively bowling spinners, Bob Appleyard was almost unplayable on the wet wickets early in the summer, but a knee injury wiped out almost all his cricket after the middle of June.

Bob Appleyard recovered his form well enough in 1956 to regain his Test place for the first match as Trent Bridge but did not bowl well enough to challenge Jim Laker for the rest of the summer.

Bob Appleyard's decline continued in 1958, and Yorkshire dropped him for good in early June, and he never did well enough for the second eleven for them to consider retaining him.

Bob Appleyard became a successful businessman after retirement from the game and founded a cricket school in Bradford.

Bob Appleyard raised over a million pounds for youth cricket, working with the Sir Leonard Hutton Foundation Scheme for young cricketers.

Cricket commentator Colin Bateman noted that Bob Appleyard won an out-of-court settlement from Maxwell, whom Bob Appleyard had threatened to sue.

Bob Appleyard served as President of Yorkshire into his eighties, from 2006 to 2008, and was an Honorary Life Member of the club.

Bob Appleyard died aged 90 at his home in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, on 17 March 2015.