The evolution of the wicketkeeper

There was a time when the main responsibility of the wicketkeeper was to keep wicket, and occasionally contribute with the bat, but that was more than a couple of decades ago. The days of light hitting, defensive specialist glovemen such as Wasim Bari, Bob Taylor and Godfrey Evans are a thing of the past.

The graphic below (which can be enlarged by clicking on it) lists decade-wise averages of wicketkeepers since 1950, and it's clear that since 2000 the numbers have changed dramatically: from an average that used to hover in the mid-20s, it has shot up to more than 32 over the last decade.

Compared to the 1950s, the batting average of wicketkeepers has jumped up a whopping 63%. During the same period, the averages for openers went up by about 10.5% (33.42 to 36.90), for all top-order batsmen by about 18% (32.42 to 38.34) and for all tailenders by about 11% (14.05 to 15.63).

In each of those cases, the increase in averages is less than 20%, while for wicketkeepers the rise is more than 60% - that expresses the dramatic change in their role pretty vividly. In the 1950s, there were ten centuries for wicketkeepers in 505 innings - an average of one every 50.5 innings; since 2000, it has gone up to 107 in 2326 innings - that's one every 21.7 innings.



Over the last 20 years, 18 wicketkeepers have averaged 30+ and 8 of those have an average better than 40. Compared to the 20 years prior to that, Andy Flower was the only wicketkeeper with an average greater than 40, and only 4 others had an average above 30.

Great stuff as usual Dillinger !

This should be an ESPNcricinfo publication.

Get on it , Chairman !

Alan Knott was my fave  ;D

Funny you should mention Alan Knott, Ketch, as the research for this article really highlighted the greatness of both Alan Knott and Jeff Dujon. From 1950-1989, Dujon and Knott combined to score 10 centuries. All other wicketkeepers (106 of them) over this period combined for just 37 centuries between them. Knott amassed 30 fifties - his nearest rivals in this category were John Waite, Rod Marsh and Farokh Engineer - all with 16 fifties each.

As for Djuon, between 1982-1989 he averaged 35.64. For comparison, the composite average of all wicketkeepers in the 1980s was just 23.63, and he accounted for 5 of the 14 centuries. Dujon was so good, his average was 50 percent better than the decade-wide average for keepers.

I dont think Dujon started as a keeper

Like Kanhai did...

Do you know what age Dujon transitioned to being a keeper? I had a quick peak through Duj's first-class career logs, and it appears he made his first-class debut in 1975 for the Jamaica Under-19s vs the Leeward Islands - he batted third and was the keeper for that match.

cricketarchive.com/Archive/Scorecards/172/172342.html

If as a youth he wasn't a keeper then his transition was truly remarkable as he was one of the better glovemen in the game.

Edit: In digging a little further, it would appear that in 1975, Dujon's first year, Desmond Lewis was the wicketkeeper for Jamaica and Dujon did indeed play as a batsman only. Even between 1977-1979, it appears that Dujon only played a handful of matches as the first-choice wicketkeeper with Anthony Campbell taking the gloves for the majority of games over this period. Great stuff, Ketch.

www.espncricinfo.com/wisdenalmanack/content/story/154438.html

"The West Indies middle-order batting was very strong at the time, and I realised my best way of

breaking into a touring team was as a wicket-keeper who could bat," he says now.

"I couldn't make it if I wasn't keeping."

www.espncricinfo.com/westindies/content/player/52287.html

Rohan Kanhai 

Batting style Right-hand bat

Fielding position Wicketkeeper

One other wicketkeeper that also deserves special mention is Farokh Engineer. I believe he was one of Mapoui's favourites. During Engineer's Test career (1961-1975), Alan Knott was the only wicketkeeper to score more runs. Engineer had the second most fifties (16) over this period, and his average was fifth best among all keepers with a minimum of 1000 runs scored.

Engineer was also a very rare breed in that he was one of only four wicketkeepers to appear in 10+ Test matches as an opening batsman. The other three were the previously mentioned John Waite, Imtiaz Ahmed and Nayan Mongia.

IF I recall Jackie Henedricks or was it Worrel had to give Blood

when Nari Contractor was knocked out by Charlie Griffith.