Richard Paul de Groen (born 5 August 1962) is a former New Zealand international cricketer. He played five

Test matches 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) ...

and 12

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

s for

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

in 1993 and 1994.Richard de Groen

CricInfo 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 d ...

. Retrieved 2019-12-14. He is now a

Commonwealth Games The Commonwealth Games, often referred to as the Friendly Games or simply the Comm Games, are a quadrennial international multi-sport event among athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations. The event was first held in 1930, and, with the exce ...

official.

Life and career

De Groen was born at

Ōtorohanga Ōtorohanga is a north King Country town in the Waikato region in the North Island of New Zealand. It is located south of Hamilton and north of Te Kūiti, on the Waipā River. It is a service town for the surrounding dairy-farming district. ...

Waikato Waikato () is a Regions of New Zealand, local government region of the upper North Island of New Zealand. It covers the Waikato District, Waipa District, Matamata-Piako District, South Waikato District and Hamilton, New Zealand, Hamilton City ...

and educated at

Mount Albert Grammar School Mount Albert Grammar School, commonly known as MAGS, is a co-educational state secondary school in Mount Albert in Auckland, New Zealand. It teaches students in year levels 9 to 13. , Mount Albert Grammar School is the second largest school in ...

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

. He studied accountancy at the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

and worked as a manager with

Price Waterhouse PricewaterhouseCoopers is an international professional services brand of firms, operating as partnerships under the PwC brand. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is considered one of the Big Four accounting ...

from 1986 to 1997. He played domestic cricket for

and

Northern Districts The Northern Districts men's cricket team are one of six New Zealand first-class cricket teams that make up New Zealand Cricket. They are based in the northern half of the North Island of New Zealand (excluding Auckland). They compete in the ...

between the 1987–88 and 1995–96 seasons.Richard de Groen
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2019-12-14. In the match against

Otago Otago (, ; mi, Ōtākou ) is a region of New Zealand located in the southern half of the South Island administered by the Otago Regional Council. It has an area of approximately , making it the country's second largest local government reg ...

in the 1992–93

Shell Trophy New Zealand has had a domestic first-class cricket championship since the 1906–07 season. Since the 2009–10 season it has been known by its original name of the Plunket Shield. History The Plunket Shield competition was instigated in Octob ...

he took 7 for 50 and 6 for 49. He was the leading bowler in the competition that season with 46 wickets at an average of 16.84; the next most successful was his Northern Districts teammate

Matthew Hart Matthew Norman Hart (born 16 May 1972) is a former New Zealand cricketer. Hart, a left-arm orthodox spinner, played in 14 Tests between 1994 and 1996, claiming 29 wickets including one five-wicket haul against South Africa. He also appeared i ...

with 34 at 17.23. Northern Districts won the competition. ''

Wisden ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'' described de Groen as "a medium-fast right-armer of admirable control and stamina". He toured Australia with the Test team in 1993–94, playing in two of the three Tests after being called up during the tour to replace the injured Willie Watson. He then played two Tests at home against Pakistan in 1993–94, and a final Test on the tour to South Africa in 1994–95. He took his best Test figures in the First Test against Pakistan: 3 for 40 and 2 for 48. De Groen was Games Team Manager with the

New Zealand Olympic Committee The New Zealand Olympic Committee (before 1994, The ''New Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association'') is both the National Olympic Committee and the Commonwealth Games Association in New Zealand responsible for selecting athletes to re ...

from 1998 to 2007, controlling all aspects of team preparations for three Commonwealth Games (1998, 2002 and 2006) and three Olympic Games (2000, 2002 and 2004). Since 2008 he has been the development director with the

Commonwealth Games Federation The Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF), currently known as Commonwealth Sport, is the international organisation responsible for the direction and control of the Commonwealth Games and Commonwealth Youth Games, and is governing body of the ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:deGroen, Richard 1962 births Living people People educated at Mount Albert Grammar School University of Auckland alumni Auckland cricketers New Zealand One Day International cricketers New Zealand Test cricketers New Zealand cricketers Northern Districts cricketers People from Ōtorohanga North Island cricketers New Zealand sports executives and administrators Cricketers from Waikato