Pat Murphy lives in Worcestershire and is a sports writer, journalist and broadcaster. He has reported on cricket and football for many years and can often be heard on BBC Radio 5 Live. He plays village cricket, in his own words, “to a stunningly mediocre standard!”.
Pat has covered 12 England tours and has written over 40 books, collaborating with several famous cricketers such as Wasim Akram, Allan Donald, Graham Gooch, Imran Khan, Viv Richards and Bob Willis. Murphy also wrote ‘The Centurions’ which profiles all the 25 cricketers, including Tom Graveney, who have scored 100 first-class centuries. Due to the reduced first-class programme Pat is confident that he will never need to produce a further update to this wonderful reference work.
Pat has also written well-received biographies of Ian Botham and Brian Clough.
Pat last came to us in November 2017 and spoke about cricket broadcasting past, present and future and gave a very illuminating and entertaining talk. This time, he will be speaking about his latest book, ‘The Greatest Season: Warwickshire in the Summer of 1994’ which was published by Stephen Chalke’s Fairfield Books earlier this year. The book celebrates, 25 years on, the greatest county season ever when Warwickshire won three of the four trophies and were runners-up in the fourth. Coach Bob Woolmer and captain Dermot Reeve developed new ideas and Brian Lara broke batting records. Murphy covered their triumphs for the BBC and, with the aid of extensive interviews with team members, opponents and club officials, he creates the remarkable story. Nick Owen, of BBC Midlands Today, called the book “a compelling read … I couldn’t put the book down”. Richard Hobson, of “The Cricketer”, called the book as being “… no bland hagiography … The book is rich in anecdotes while the detail is outstanding”.
I’m sure that Pat will be very entertaining and it will be a trip down memory lane to 1994 when Brian Lara exploded into county cricket and Warwickshire had a truly remarkable season.