Michael Youll (born 26 April 1939) is a former 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, a left-handed

batsman In cricket, batting is the act or skill of hitting the ball with a bat to score runs and prevent the loss of one's wicket. Any player who is currently batting is, since September 2021, officially referred to as a batter (historically, the ...

who bowled

left-arm unorthodox spin Left-arm unorthodox spin, also known as slow left-arm wrist-spin, is a type of spin bowling in the sport of cricket. Left-arm unorthodox spin bowlers use wrist spin to spin the ball, and make it deviate, or 'turn' from left to right after pitchin ...

. He was born in

Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is ...

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land on ...

. Youll made his first-class debut for

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon an ...

against

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

in 1956. He made three further appearances for Warwickshire, the last of them against

Combined Services The Combined Services cricket team represents the British Armed Forces. The team played at first-class level in England for more than forty years in the mid-twentieth century. Their first first-class match was against Gentlemen of England at Lo ...

in 1957. In his four first-class matches, he took 14 wickets at an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

of 21.57, with a single

five wicket haul In cricket, a five-wicket haul (also known as a "five–for" or "fifer") occurs when a bowler takes five or more wickets in a single innings. This is regarded by critics as a notable achievement, equivalent to a century from a batsman. Taking ...

in his debut match in 1956: 5 for 99 in the first innings. In 1957, at the age of 18, he was the leading wicket-taker in the

Minor Counties Championship The NCCA 3 Day Championship (previously the Minor Counties Cricket Championship) is a season-long competition in England and Wales that is contested by the members of the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), the so-called national cou ...

, with 62 wickets at an average of 16.41. Despite this success, he completely lost his bowling form in 1958 and afterwards played purely as a batsman. He did his

National Service National service is the system of voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. The l ...

in the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

during his time at Warwickshire, and had fewer opportunities thereafter, leaving the county at the end of the 1961 season. Youll joined

in 1962, making his debut in that season's Minor Counties Championship against the Yorkshire Second XI. He played

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 ...

cricket for Northumberland from 1962 to 1981, including over 100 Minor Counties Championship appearances. He 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 Northumberland against

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-west, Leicestershire ...

in the

1971 Gillette Cup The 1971 Gillette Cup was the ninth Gillette Cup, an English limited overs county cricket tournament. It was held between 15 May and 4 September 1971. The tournament was won by Lancashire County Cricket Club who defeated Kent County Cricket Club ...

. He made two further List A appearances, both in the

1977 Gillette Cup The 1977 Gillette Cup was the fifteenth Gillette Cup, an English limited overs county cricket tournament. It was held between 29 June and 3 September 1977. The tournament was won by Middlesex County Cricket Club who defeated Glamorgan County ...

. In 1978, when he captained Northumberland, he was the highest scorer in the Minor Counties Championship, with 889 runs at an average of 42.33. His son Oliver also played Minor Counties and List A cricket for Northumberland.

References

External links

Michael Youll
at

ESPNcricinfo ESPN cricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a ...

Michael Youll
at CricketArchive {{DEFAULTSORT:Youll, Michael 1939 births Living people Cricketers from Newcastle upon Tyne English cricketers Warwickshire cricketers Northumberland cricketers 20th-century Royal Air Force personnel