John Lever

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page.

John Lever England (Eng)
Batting style	Right-hand bat
Bowling type	Left-arm fast-medium
	Tests	ODIs
Matches	21	22
Runs scored	306	56
Batting average	11.76	8.00
100s/50s	-/1	-/-
Top score	53	27*
Balls bowled	4433	1152
Wickets	73	24
Bowling average	26.72	29.70
5 wickets in innings	3	-
10 wickets in match	1	N/A
Best bowling	7/46	4/29
Catches/stumpings	11/-	6/-
As of 1 January 2006 Source: Cricinfo.com

John Kenneth Lever (born February 24, 1949, Stepney, London) is an English former cricketer who played in 21 Tests and 22 ODIs from 1976 to 1986.

Lever was a left arm fast medium bowler who predominantly swung the ball into the right handed batsmen predominantly, to try to outwit them.

He is sometimes remembered for the 'vaseline incident'. It was one of the first publicised 'doctoring' (using unfair means to enhance the swing or seam abilities) of the cricket ball by a bowler, when Lever reportedly rubbed vaseline onto one side of the ball so it would swing better. The claim was later rejected and Lever was cleared of any wrongdoing. In this Test Lever recorded the best Test bowling figures for an English debutant (7-46), a record that stood until Dominic Cork beat it by 4 runs on his debut vs west indies

A more publicised version of doctoring was to rock the world controversially after 1992 when Pakistani fast bowlers similarly tried to get 'something more' from the cricket ball. They made English batsman eat 'humble pie' with stupendous swinging (deviation) of the cricket ball. They also supplemented it with their ingenious technique of 'reverse swing' and some like Waqar Younis and Wasim Akram seemed virtually unplayable at times. Recently, reverse swing has been used by all Test playing nations in a legitimate way to induce batsmen into false strokes. Umpires to that end have been careful to keep out unfair doctoring of the ball and the controversy has now subsided.

Lever gave 22 years of service to Essex CCC in one of the most successful periods in the clubs history. Later awarded an MBE for his services to cricket. He was also involved in the "Rebel" tour to South Africa during the apartheid era, where he formed strong links in the country and later spent many winters there playing for the provincial side of Natal.

More recently John Lever has taken up teaching physical education at Bancroft's School.