David Kenneth Taylor (born 17 December 1974) is an English

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er. He was born in

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. Taylor played for

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English citi ...

's Second XI in

1993 File:1993 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Oslo I Accord is signed in an attempt to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; The Russian White House is shelled during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis; Czechoslovakia is peace ...

at the age of 18, and the following year captained a National Association of Young Cricketers side against

Minor Counties The National Counties, known as the Minor Counties before 2020, are the cricketing counties of England and Wales that do not have first-class status. The game is administered by the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), which comes unde ...

. He had a further outing for

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

seconds in

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is O. J. Simpson murder case, acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the 1994, year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The ...

, but then dropped out of view for a while. In

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The '' Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently ...

he played for

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the north west of South East England. It is a mainly rural county, with its largest settlement being the city of Oxford. The county is a centre of research and development, primarily ...

in the MCC Trophy, and three years later still he at last made his

List A List A cricket is a classification of the limited-overs (one-day) form of the sport of cricket, with games lasting up to eight hours. List A cricket includes One Day International (ODI) matches and various domestic competitions in which the numbe ...

debut for the same county, against

Huntingdonshire Huntingdonshire (; abbreviated Hunts) is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire and a historic county of England. The district council is based in Huntingdon. Other towns include St Ives, Godmanchester, St Neots and Ramsey. The popul ...

in the

C&G Trophy The Friends Provident Trophy was a one-day cricket competition in the United Kingdom. It was one of the four tournaments in which the eighteen first-class counties competed each season. They were joined by teams from Scotland and Ireland. Lan ...

Vicarage Hill Vicarage Hill is a cricket ground located in East Challow, Oxfordshire. Situated on the site of a park which has been in existence since the 1890s, the ground is surrounded to the west by the road from which it gets its name, to the south by the ...

East Challow East Challow is a village and Civil parishes in England, civil parish about west of Wantage in the Vale of White Horse, England. Historically it was part of the ecclesiastical parish of Letcombe Regis, but since 1852 East and West Challow have ...

(the only List A game ever played on that ground). It was not a happy occasion for Taylor: he made only 1 and Oxfordshire lost by 77 runs. Taylor's next List A game, in the first round of the same competition in August 2002 (though because of the vagaries of the fixture list, this was in fact the start of the ''2003'' competition), saw him playing for

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...

, and making by far his highest score at this level: 140 in a huge total of 424/5 which set up a crushing 230-run triumph over

Suffolk Suffolk () is a ceremonial county of England in East Anglia. It borders Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south; the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich; other important towns include Lowes ...

at Dinton. He also played in Buckinghamshire's much closer (11-run) victory over

Shropshire Shropshire (; alternatively Salop; abbreviated in print only as Shrops; demonym Salopian ) is a landlocked historic county in the West Midlands region of England. It is bordered by Wales to the west and the English counties of Cheshire to th ...

in the second round in September. For the

2003 season 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societie ...

Taylor was signed by

Worcestershire Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a county in the West Midlands of England. The area that is now Worcestershire was absorbed into the unified Kingdom of England in 927, at which time it was constituted as a county (see His ...

with an eye to the first season of the

Twenty20 Cup The T20 Blast, currently named the Vitality Blast for sponsorship reasons, is a professional Twenty20 cricket competition for English and Welsh first-class counties. The competition was established by the England and Wales Cricket Board (E ...

. His first innings was exactly what the county had been hoping for: opening the batting he produced a whirlwind knock of 46 from 20 balls, making a major contribution towards Worcestershire's nail-biting one-wicket victory over

Northamptonshire Northamptonshire (; abbreviated Northants.) is a county in the East Midlands of England. In 2015, it had a population of 723,000. The county is administered by two unitary authorities: North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire. It is ...

. Unfortunately for him, single-figure scores in three further Twenty20 (and one

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team s ...

) match spelt the end for him at New Road. In 2004, after a few games for

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; in the 17th century sometimes spelt phonetically as Barkeshire; abbreviated Berks.) is a historic county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by Queen Elizabeth II as the Royal County of Berk ...

, Taylor was picked up by

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 ...

to play exclusively

one-day cricket Limited overs cricket, also known as one-day cricket or white ball cricket, is a version of the sport of cricket in which a match is generally completed in one day. There are a number of formats, including List A cricket (8-hour games), Twenty ...

for the rest of the season; Derbyshire's coach David Houghton had played with Taylor in

club cricket Club cricket is a mainly amateur, but still formal, form of the sport of cricket, usually involving teams playing in competitions at weekends or in the evening. There is a great deal of variation in game format although the Laws of Cricket are obs ...

and admired his hard hitting. However, he was not a success, with the only innings of real note being 29 against

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

in the

totesport League The NatWest Pro40 League was a one-day cricket league for first-class cricket counties in England and Wales. It was inaugurated in 1999, but was essentially the old Sunday League retitled to reflect large numbers of matches being played on days o ...

: here he added 69 with

Hassan Adnan Muhammad Hassan Adnan Syed ( ur, ), (born 15 May 1974, in Lahore) is a Pakistani former cricketer who has played for the cricket teams of Islamabad, Water and Power Development Authority, Gujranwala, Derbyshire and Lahore. One of the most adap ...

after Derbyshire had slumped to 48/3. This proved to be Taylor's final innings for the county, however, since he was sacked by Houghton, who said that he had expected "fireworks rather than

Polyfilla In the United States and various other countries, spackling paste or spackle is a putty used to fill holes, small cracks, and other minor surface defects in wood, drywall, and plaster. Typically, spackling is composed of gypsum plaster from ...

". Since then, Taylor has not played at the highest level of the domestic game, although he did appear in a minor match for Minor Counties against

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...

(MCC) and for

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

's second team against

MCC Young Cricketers MCC may refer to: Aviation * McClellan Airfield (IATA code MCC) in Sacramento, California * Multi-crew cooperation, allowance to fly in a multi-pilot aircraft Buildings * Castellania (Valletta), a former courthouse and prison in Valletta, Malta * ...

, both in

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...

. Following many years of successful club cricket, he set a world record in adult 50-over cricket by scoring 330 not out in just 160 balls for Totton & Eling cricket club on 5 May 2012. The number of sixes in the innings, 31, is also believed to be a world record.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Taylor, David 1974 births Living people Derbyshire cricketers Worcestershire cricketers Berkshire cricketers Buckinghamshire cricketers Oxfordshire cricketers English cricketers Dorset cricketers Cricketers from Oxford