Christopher Marples (born 3 August 1964 in

Chesterfield Chesterfield may refer to: Places Canada * Rural Municipality of Chesterfield No. 261, Saskatchewan * Chesterfield Inlet, Nunavut United Kingdom * Chesterfield, Derbyshire, a market town in England ** Chesterfield (UK Parliament constitue ...

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the nor ...

) is an English former

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

and

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...

er.

Football career

Marples'

Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...

goalkeeping career spanned 1984 to 1995, beginning and ending with his local club,

and also taking in spells with York City and Stockport County. He won a

Fourth Division Fourth or the fourth may refer to: * the ordinal form of the number 4 * ''Fourth'' (album), by Soft Machine, 1971 * Fourth (angle), an ancient astronomical subdivision * Fourth (music), a musical interval * ''The Fourth'' (1972 film), a Sovie ...

Championship medal in his first season with Chesterfield and was part of the club's 1994–95 squad that again won promotion from the fourth tier, this time via the playoffs. However, he broke his leg in two places during the course of the campaign. Though this injury ended his career at the top level, he continued to play non-league football for several years, including with Emley and Ilkeston Town who he went on to manage for the 2001–02 season before a run of poor results led to his dismissal. In 2005, he became assistant manager to Nicky Law at Buxton during a period which brought success for the club with the achievement of two consecutive promotions in the 2005–06 and 2006–07 seasons to reach the Northern Premier League Premier Division. He accompanied Law in a switch to Alfreton Town for the following season but resigned in April 2008 citing other commitments.

Cricket career

In cricket, Marples was a

wicket-keeper The wicket-keeper in the sport of cricket is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket or stumps being watchful of the batsman and ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises. Th ...

and right-handed batsman. Having represented the Derbyshire team in the Second XI Championship as early as 1982, Marples made his debut

County Championship The County Championship (referred to as the LV= Insurance County Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the domestic first-class cricket competition in England and Wales and is organised by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). It bec ...

appearance in July 1985 against

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...

. He finished the game with four catches and played all ten subsequent fixtures in the competition to the end of the season. In addition, Marples was part of Derbyshire's Asda Challenge Trophy winning side. He played fifteen further

First-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...

matches for the club in 1986, a season during which Derbyshire used three different players in the wicket-keeper role, with

Bernie Maher Bernard Joseph Michael Maher (born 11 February 1961) was an English professional cricketer and a fly-fishing international. He was born in Hillingdon in West London. As a cricketer, he was a right-handed batsman and a wicket-keeper who played ...

, who was recognised as a stronger batsman, eventually reclaiming the position. Marples was not offered a new contract thereafter. However, Marples stayed on to play several games with the Second XI in 1987, and returned to play one Second XI game in 1993, an almost actionless three-day match, against

Leicestershire Leicestershire ( ; postal abbreviation Leics.) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East Midlands, England. The county borders Nottinghamshire to the north, Lincolnshire to the north-east, Rutland to the east, Northamptonshire t ...

. Throughout the two seasons in which he was a first-team player, Marples was a tail-end batsman alongside Danish mainstay

Ole Mortensen Ole Henrik Mortensen (born 29 January 1958) is a Danish first-class cricketer, probably the best his country has produced. A fast-medium right-arm bowler, in a first-class career with Derbyshire that ran from 1983 to 1994 he took 434 wickets at ...

and was often unlucky to find himself out of action as a strike partner.

Honours

Individual *

PFA Team of the Year The Professional Footballers' Association Team of the Year (often called the PFA Team of the Year, or simply the Team of the Year) is an annual award given to a set of 55 footballers across the top four tiers of men's English football; the Premie ...

: 1989–90 Fourth Division

References

External links

*
Chris Marples
at Cricket Archive {{DEFAULTSORT:Marples, Chris 1964 births Living people Cricketers from Chesterfield, Derbyshire English footballers Men's association football goalkeepers Goole Town F.C. players Chesterfield F.C. players Stockport County F.C. players York City F.C. players Scunthorpe United F.C. players English Football League players Wakefield F.C. players Ilkeston Town F.C. (1945) players Ilkeston Town F.C. managers English cricketers Derbyshire cricketers Derbyshire Cricket Board cricketers English football managers Footballers from Chesterfield