Bill Frindall
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William Howard Frindall MBE (March 3, 1939, Epsom, Surrey) is a British cricket scorer and statistician who is familiar to cricket followers from his appearances on the BBC's radio programme Test Match Special. He was nicknamed "the Bearded Wonder" (often shortened to 'Bearders') by Brian Johnston for his ability to research the most obscure cricketing facts in moments at the same time as keeping perfect scorecards.
Frindall was educated at Reigate Grammar School and studied architecture at the Kingston School of Art before serving in National Service for six and a half years in the RAF. Frindall took over the scoring for Test Match Special on 2nd June 1966, following the death of the previous scorer Arthur Wrigley in October 1965, who had been the BBC scorer from 1934 up to the year of his death.
Frindall is an enthusiastic cricketer himself and his fast bowling prowess has been on display at cricket grounds around the country (especially in Charity matches) for many years.
His major works include
- "Wisden Book of Test Cricket"
- "Playfair Cricket Annual", which he has edited since 1986.
- "Wisden Book of Cricket Records"
- "Guinness Book of Cricket - Facts and Feats"
- "Cricket records" section of "Wisden" for several years.
He is also known for producing scoring charts for many of his tours with England. He modified the linear scoring system developed by Australian scorer Bill Ferguson into a version that is known as the Frindall system.
Frindall was selected as the Statistician of the Year by the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians (ACS)[1] in 1996. In 1998, he was awarded the honorary Degree of Doctor of Technology by Staffordshire University for his contribution to statistics. He was appointed an MBE for services to cricket and broadcasting in the 2004 summer Honours list.
Frindall has often challenged authority. A few years ago ACS revised the first class status of many old matches, which lead to figures which are different from the conventional figures. Frindall refused to accept it with the result that the ACS figures (which appear in Cricinfo and on Cricket Archive) are different from those in Wisden. Jack Hobbs, for instance, has 199 hundreds in Cricinfo and 197 in Wisden. More recently, the ICC decided to give Test and ODI status to the matches played for the Tsunami benefit and the ICC Super Series between Australia and a Rest of the World team. Frindall, in common with many other statisticians, disputes this ruling, and Playfair and other publications to which he supplies statistics will not classify them as official Tests and ODIs.
In June 2006 his autobiography - 'Bearders - My Life in Cricket' - was published by Orion.
