60 Facts About David Gower

David Ivon Gower was born on 1 April 1957 and is an English cricket commentator and former cricketer who was captain of the England cricket team during the 1980s.

David Gower was one of the most capped and high-scoring players for England during this period, and only Jack Hobbs made more runs against Australia than Gower's 3,269.

David Gower was a part of the English squad which finished as runners-up at the 1979 Cricket World Cup.

David Gower was briefly reinstated for the 1989 Ashes series, before being replaced as captain by Graham Gooch.

The strained relationship between the pair contributed to David Gower retiring from international cricket in 1993.

The family returned to England after Tanganyika was granted independence, when David Gower was six years old, settling in Kent and later moving to Loughborough.

David Gower attended prep school at Marlborough House School in Hawkhurst from the age of 8 to that of 13, where he leaned towards cricket as his preferred sport.

David Gower made the school cricket First XI aged 14, and was later made captain.

David Gower played for the rugby First XV before being dropped from the team for "lack of effort".

David Gower finished school with eight O levels, three A levels and one S level in history.

David Gower sat the History exam for Oxford University and was offered an interview at St Edmund Hall, but missed a place.

Spurning a place at University College London, David Gower returned to school in an attempt to gain two more A levels but lost interest partway through the year.

David Gower is nicknamed "Lord David Gower" by his Sky Sports colleagues, in allusion to his aristocratic ancestry and public school education.

David Gower enjoyed one of the most prolific first-class cricket careers in English history, in both domestic and international competitions.

David Gower's career run total in test matches of 8,231 is the fifth-highest by an English player, behind only Alec Stewart with 8,463, Graham Gooch with 8,900, Sir Alastair Cook with 12,472 and Joe Root with 12,777.

David Gower played domestic cricket from 1975 until 1993, largely with Leicestershire until 1989, when he moved to Hampshire.

David Gower made his debut for Leicestershire on 30 July 1975, during that season's County Championship, against Lancashire at Stanley Park, Blackpool.

Lloyd made 90 in the second innings as Lancashire declared on 305, with David Gower taking one catch to dismiss Jack Simmons for 17.

The match, lasting only three days with 100 overs as a maximum limit imposed on both teams for each innings, ended in a draw, with Leicestershire reaching 90 without David Gower getting to bat again.

David Gower continued to make little impression during the rest of the 1975 season, playing in only two more matches and ending the season with 65 runs at 13.00.

David Gower enjoyed greater success in his debut List A season, playing in eight matches, scoring 175 runs at 25.00 with two fifties.

David Gower was retained for the 1976 season playing in a total of seven first-class matches.

David Gower enjoyed greater success, with 323 runs at 35.88 including a maiden century, 102*, and a second fifty.

David Gower amassed 745 runs at 23.28, with three other half-centuries.

David Gower returned to England in 1978 from an international tour with a career-best 200*, forming part of his 957 runs for the season at 41.60, with eight fifties to go with that one hundred.

David Gower typified a new, precocious breed of stroke-players, imperious and exciting, who added colour and glamour to an otherwise bedraggled English summer.

David Gower played 21 one-day matches, with 616 runs including another century.

David Gower followed up the winter international tour with a prolific performance during the 1981 season, which included the 1981 Ashes series.

David Gower narrowly failed to reach 1,000 runs in the 1984 season, ending with 999 at 35.67, and then scored 1,000 runs, including a then career-best of 215, at 54.70, in 1985.

David Gower scored one century in England and Australia in the next two seasons, before topping 1,000 runs for three consecutive series, in 1987,1988 and 1989, with a total of seven centuries including his career-best 228.

Batting at number four, he made a farewell century of 134 before he was stumped in the first innings, and with future captain Nasser Hussain and then captain Graham Gooch both making centuries as Essex fell short of Hampshire's 347 with their own innings of 268, David Gower came out to bat for the final time in Hampshire's second innings.

Gooch, at that time the England captain, having succeeded David Gower, came back onto the field for Essex to score his second century of the match.

David Gower was selected to play for the England Young Cricketers in 1976 against the West Indies equivalent team.

Opening the batting, David Gower made only 10 runs in the first innings as England were bowled out for 164; after the West Indies had made 201, he scored 49 in the second innings, stumped off a spin bowler.

David Gower made his debut in Test cricket in 1978 at Edgbaston, scoring a boundary via a pull shot off his first delivery, bowled by Pakistan's Liaqat Ali.

David Gower went on to make 58 in England's only innings, followed by 56 at Lord's and 39 at Headingley.

David Gower made scores of 46,71 and 46 in the rest of the series, the latter including his first Test six, earning him selection for the following Ashes Tests in Australia.

David Gower might have been more at home in the 1920s or 1930s, cracking a dashing hundred for MCC, the darling of the crowds, before speeding away in a Bugatti and cravat for a night on the town.

David Gower made his Ashes debut at the Gabba, Brisbane, on 1 December 1978.

David Gower made 44 and 48* in the first Test, before making his maiden Ashes hundred, 102 from 221 balls at Perth.

David Gower then faced four Test matches against India over the summer of 1979, beginning the series with a fast-paced 200* at Edgbaston, followed by an 82 at Lord's.

David Gower followed this with 18,34 and 60 at Brisbane and Adelaide before a compact 114 in the second innings of the Adelaide match revived his hundred count.

In 1985 after low scores at Leeds, David Gower enjoyed a "golden season" in the 1985 Ashes.

David Gower scored 86 and 22 at Lord's against Australia, and 166 at Trent Bridge.

Back in England against India, David Gower lost the captaincy after two Tests both of which were lost.

In 1987 David Gower declined to play in that year's Cricket World Cup for he did not wish to travel, having been on nine successive winter tours since his debut.

David Gower posed for press photographs with the plane the next day.

The last ball before lunch was bowled down the leg side to a leg trap, and all David Gower needed to do was block.

However, David Gower flicked idly at the delivery and was caught at leg-slip.

David Gower scored 73 and 31* in the following matches against Pakistan; however, on 9 August 1992 he was dismissed for one by Waqar Younis in what would be his last Test match, at The Oval.

The selection decision prompted a vote of no confidence in the selectors at the Marylebone Cricket Club, but it was to no avail as David Gower was not included.

David Gower was a right-arm off break spin bowler despite batting left-handed, who took one Test wicket at 20.00 out of the six overs he sent down on the rare occasions when he was called upon to bowl.

On one occasion, during Steve O'Shaughnessy's 35-minute century for Lancashire, David Gower conceded 102 for 0 from nine overs.

David Gower presented four series of the BBC2 cricket magazine show, Gower's Cricket Monthly, from 1995 to 1998, and, at the same time was one of the BBC's main cricket commentators.

David Gower spent time commentating on several cricket series in Australia in the 1990s.

David Gower was the main presenter of international cricket coverage for Sky Sports and a regular commentator for many years until 2019 when Sky decided not to renew his contract.

Matthew Engel of ESPNcricinfo wrote that David Gower's commentating career has been "so successful that his cricket seemed mere preparation".

David Gower was awarded the "Oldie of the Year" award in 1993 by The Oldie magazine.

David Gower is the author of a number of written works on cricket, including Gower: The Autobiography with The Independent journalist Martin Johnson in 1992, David Gower: With Time to Spare with Alan Lee in 1995 and Can't Bat, Can't Bowl, Can't Field with Johnson.

In 2009, David Gower was inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame.