The society is delighted to welcome back David Graveney who is making a record fourth appearance with us, having spoken to C.C.S. in 1983/84 (our second speaker, following the late Peter West, in our inaugural year), 1992/93 and 2003/04.
David was born on 2nd January 1953 at Westbury-on-Trym, Bristol. He has an excellent cricket pedigree being the son of Ken Graveney and nephew of our very own Tom Graveney. Ken was a prolific right-arm fast bowler with Gloucestershire between 1947 and 1964 who captained his county in 1963 and 1964. Tom captained both Gloucestershire and Worcestershire and played 79 times for England (once as captain).
David’s first-class and list A career spanned 1972 to 1994. He played for Gloucestershire from 1972 to 1990, Somerset in 1991 and Durham from 1992 to 1994. He played 457 first-class matches and 382 list A games. He captained Gloucestershire (like his father and uncle before him) from 1982 to 1988 and Durham in 1992 and 1993 (appointed by Geoff Cook as their first captain at first-class level).
He had a successful career as a useful right-hand batsman and orthodox left-arm spinner. He made over 7,000 first-class runs, averaging just under 20, with 2 centuries and 16 fifties with a top score of 119. He took almost 1,000 first-class wickets, including 40 five wickets in an innings and 7 ten wickets in a match analyses, with 8/85 being his best haul. He was a frugal bowler with an economy rate of 2.57 runs per over. He also had 287 list A scalps with a best of 5/11 and an economy rate of 4.11 runs per over.
He is a qualified chartered accountant and is a former Chief Executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association. He managed the rebel tour to South Africa in 1989/90 and became Chairman of the selectors in 1997, taking over from Ray Illingworth. During his 11 years’ tenure England won 8 successive Tests in 2004, regained the Ashes in 2005 and also won overseas in South Africa, West Indies, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Under him there was a greater continuity of selection. On 31st December 2005 he was awarded the OBE for his services to cricket.
On 18th January 2008, following the Schofield Report, he was removed from the Chairman’s position (the new role of full-time National Selector was awarded to Geoff Miller) and given the position of National Performance Manager to be responsible for monitoring the progress of the most promising players in county cricket. Graveney said that “while I am naturally disappointed no longer to be involved with the England team, I feel that I can play an important part in ensuring that we maintain a consistent flow of world-class talent from the county academies into our international teams at all levels”.
With his wide-ranging and high level cricketing experiences we can, once again, look forward to a wonderful evening with David Graveney.