Philip John Newport (born 11 October 1962 in
High Wycombe
High Wycombe, often referred to as Wycombe ( ), is a market town in Buckinghamshire, England. Lying in the valley of the River Wye, Buckinghamshire, River Wye surrounded by the Chiltern Hills, it is west-northwest of Charing Cross in London, ...
)
is a former English
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 officia ...
er, who played primarily as a
seam and
swing bowler. Newport was a stalwart of
Worcestershire County Cricket Club
Worcestershire County Cricket Club is one of eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Worcestershire. Its Vitality Blast T20 team has been rebrande ...
for most of the 1980s and 1990s, and played a key part in the county's triumphs in the late 1980s. Newport played in three
Tests for
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
between 1988 and 1991.
Life and career
After playing a number of times for Worcestershire's Second XI in 1982, Newport made his
first-class debut against the touring
Pakistanis at
New Road in July of that year. However, he had an unpromising beginning to his career at this level, failing to take a wicket and seeing his eleven overs costing 64 runs as the tourists scored 467 for 4 declared on their way to an innings victory. He returned to the Second XI for a while, but was then called up for the local derby with
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-Av ...
at
Edgbaston
Edgbaston () is an affluent suburban area of central Birmingham, England, historically in Warwickshire, and curved around the southwest of the city centre.
In the 19th century, the area was under the control of the Gough-Calthorpe family a ...
. In this game he took the wicket of
Dennis Amiss
Dennis Leslie Amiss (born 7 April 1943) is a former English cricketer and cricket administrator. He played for both Warwickshire and England. A right-handed batsman, Amiss was a stroke maker particularly through extra cover and midwicket – his ...
; picking up another in the second innings.
Slowly Newport forced himself into contention for a regular spot in the county side, and in 1986 he made the breakthrough, winning his
county cap
In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the ea ...
and taking five wickets in an innings on five occasions, on his way to a total haul of 85 victims. He also scored his maiden first-class fifty in this season, the first of 22 he was to make in his career. Although he never managed to convert one of these into a century, his top score being 98 against the
New Zealanders
New Zealanders ( mi, Tāngata Aotearoa), colloquially known as Kiwis (), are people associated with New Zealand, sharing a common history, culture, and language (New Zealand English). People of various ethnicities and national origins are citiz ...
at Worcester in 1990.
Newport had a mediocre 1987 season in England, his first-class batting average of over 41 that year being artificially inflated by twelve not-outs in twenty five innings. He had a happier time in
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 ...
, taking 34 wickets at 16.70, including his career-best one-day analysis of 5–22. That winter he went to play for
Boland in South African domestic cricket, and was reasonably successful, averaging 25 with the bat and 19 with the ball.
This set him up for the 1988 English season, and he put in some eye-catching performances. These included ten wickets in the match against
Somerset
( en, All The People of Somerset)
, locator_map =
, coordinates =
, region = South West England
, established_date = Ancient
, established_by =
, preceded_by =
, origin =
, lord_lieutenant_office =Lord Lieutenant of Somerset
, lord_ ...
(a match often remembered for
Graeme Hick
Graeme Ashley Hick (born 23 May 1966) is a Zimbabwean-born former England cricketer who played 65 Test matches and 120 One Day Internationals for England. He was born in Rhodesia, and as a young man played international cricket for Zimbabwe. H ...
's 405 not out), which helped Worcestershire to an innings victory; a further nine against
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly.
The non-metropolitan county of Lancash ...
in early June; and in the next match, his career-best bowling figures of 8–52 in a rain-affected match against
Middlesex
Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a historic county in southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the ceremonial county of Greater London, with small sections in neighbour ...
. He also took nine wickets against a powerful
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...
team containing
Graham Gooch
Graham Alan Gooch, (born 23 July 1953) is a former English first-class cricketer who captained Essex and England. He was one of the most successful international batsmen of his generation, and through a career spanning from 1973 until 2000, h ...
and
Allan Border
Allan Robert Border (born 27 July 1955) is an Australian cricket commentator and former international cricketer. A batsman, Border was for many years the captain of the Australian team. His playing nickname was "A.B.". He played 156 Test ma ...
, picking up Border's wicket in both innings.
This fine run of form brought Newport a place in the
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
team for the final
Test match Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to:
* Test cricket
* Test match (indoor cricket)
* Test match (rugby union)
* Test match (rugby league)
* Test match (association football)
...
of the summer, against
Sri Lanka in August. He acquitted himself well, taking 7–164 in the match, to help propel England to a comfortable seven-wicket victory, but was not selected for the (later cancelled) winter tour of India. He could console himself, however, with 93 first-class wickets, the best haul of his career, and – more significantly – Worcestershire's first
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 ...
title since 1974.
1989 started promisingly for Newport, with eleven wickets in Worcestershire's low-scoring win over the
Australians
Australians, colloquially known as Aussies, are the citizens, nationals and individuals associated with the country of Australia. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or ethno-cultural. For most Australians, several (or all) ...
(a rare defeat for the Australians that summer), and he was named in the team for the First Test. His second taste of cricket at this level, however, was a chastening experience, as
Steve Waugh
Stephen Rodger Waugh (born 2 June 1965) is an Australian former international cricketer and twin brother of cricketer Mark Waugh. A right-handed batsman, he was also a medium-pace bowler. As Australian captain from 1997 to 2004, he led Austral ...
– on his first tour of England and on his way to 177 not out – took a liking to Newport's seamers, and the Worcestershire bowler ended the first innings with figures of 2–153. He had no chance to make amends, being allowed only five overs in Australia's second innings, and was dropped for the Second Test of England's painful
Ashes summer. Again, the domestic game was his salvation as Worcestershire retained their Championship.
Newport's England career ran to only one more match. He was called up for the 1990/91
Perth
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...
Test while with the
A team in Sri Lanka as a replacement for the injured
Angus Fraser
Angus Robert Charles Fraser (born 8 August 1965) is an English cricket administrator.
He served as the managing director of Middlesex Cricket between 2009 and 2021, before assuming a new role heading the club's academy
He is also a former E ...
.
He made 40 not out in a lost cause, coming to the crease with England 118 for 6, but did not impress with the ball, taking only one wicket and bowling six
no-ball
In cricket, a no-ball is a type of illegal delivery to a batter (the other type being a wide). It is also a type of extra, being the run awarded to the batting team as a consequence of the illegal delivery. For most cricket games, especially ...
s in his fourteen overs. He never played for England again, after a career lasting just three Tests and without a
One Day International to his name.
In 1991, Newport helped Worcestershire to the
Benson and Hedges Cup
The Benson & Hedges Cup was a one-day cricket competition for first-class counties in England and Wales that was held from 1972 to 2002, one of cricket's longest sponsorship deals.
It was the third major one-day competition established in Engla ...
, and the
Refuge Assurance Cup, defeating
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly.
The non-metropolitan county of Lancash ...
in both finals.
He spent another winter in South Africa, this time with
Northern Transvaal
Northern may refer to the following:
Geography
* North, a point in direction
* Northern Europe, the northern part or region of Europe
* Northern Highland, a region of Wisconsin, United States
* Northern Province, Sri Lanka
* Northern Range, a ...
, in 1992/93, but apart from that the remainder of Newport's career was spent in familiar surroundings with Worcestershire. He reached 50 wickets in every season from 1991 to 1995, and in 1994 he won the
NatWest 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. La ...
with the county, taking 4-38 in the final against
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-Av ...
.
But after that he gradually faded from first-team contention, although he did manage one last hurrah in 1997, when he took 7–37 in a drawn game against
Leicestershire. Newport retired after the 1999 season, bowing out rather quietly with a
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 ...
game in which he did not bat or take a wicket, with only a single catch.
He subsequently became a Geography teacher and Head of Boys Cricket at
Royal Grammar School Worcester
The Royal Grammar School Worcester (also known as RGS Worcester or RGSW) is an eleven-eighteen mixed, independent day school and sixth form in Worcester, Worcestershire, England. Founded before 1291, it is one of the oldest British independent d ...
.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Newport, Phil
1962 births
Living people
Boland cricketers
England Test cricketers
English cricketers
Northerns cricketers
Worcestershire cricketers
People educated at the Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe
Buckinghamshire cricketers
Teachers at Royal Grammar School Worcester