Peter Bowler (cricketer)

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Peter Bowler (born July 30, 1963) was an English-born Australian cricketer. He was a right-handed batsman and a right-arm off-break bowler, who also occasionally played as a wicket-keeper.

The veteran off-spinner, who has three youth Test matches to his name, coming in a 1982 tour by Pakistan, made 82 on his Australian debut, also making a 76 on the tour. This high production level was to show itself further come 1986, when he made a century on his Leicestershire debut. Though he played in Australia during the following season, he came back to England in 1988, playing for Derbyshire, and, fourteen times in the ensuing seventeen seasons, top-scored in the season with an innings exceeding 100. In 1988, his first season with Derbyshire, he scored 1725 runs, a record which stood for three years until broken by Mohammad Azharuddin.

Bowler's top score in a league match came in 1990, as he made an innings of 210, having just a month previously made 241 against Hampshire in the NatWest Trophy. Even in 1992, when he possessed his highest season average, of nearly 66 runs, he failed to get a call-up by the England selectors, particularly at a time when Derbyshire's wickets were more suspect to being felled by clever seam bowlers.

However, come 1994, he had a very poor season, playing for Somerset, soon following this up with a 1997 and 1998 season where his problems were only exacerbated. He made something of a comeback in Derbyshire's second placing of 2001, before they were relegated the following season. He spent two years in Division Two before retiring from the game.

[edit] External links

• Peter Bowler at Cricket Archive