Robert Lawrence Sugden Armitage (9 July 1955 – 9 December 2000) was a South African first-class

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. Armitage was born in

Grahamstown Makhanda, also known as Grahamstown, is a town of about 140,000 people in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is situated about northeast of Port Elizabeth and southwest of East London, Eastern Cape, East London. Makhanda is the lar ...

in July 1955 and later studied at

Rhodes University Rhodes University is a public university, public research university located in Makhanda, Eastern Cape, Makhanda (Grahamstown) in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is one of four universities in the province. Established in 1904, ...

. He made his debut in

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 ...

for Eastern Province against

Transvaal Transvaal is a historical geographic term associated with land north of (''i.e.'', beyond) the Vaal River in South Africa. A number of states and administrative divisions have carried the name Transvaal. * South African Republic (1856–1902; af, ...

at The Wanderers in the 1973-74

Currie Cup The Currie Cup is South Africa's premier domestic rugby union competition, played each winter and spring (June to October), featuring teams representing either entire provinces or substantial regions within provinces. Although it is the premier ...

. He made 109 appearances in first-class cricket until 1987–88

Castle Bowl The CSA 4-Day Domestic Series is the domestic First-class cricket, first class cricket competition of South Africa. The tournament is contested by teams from all nine provinces of South Africa. First contested as the Currie Cup from 1889–90, ...

, making ninety appearances for Eastern Province, nine appearances for Eastern Province B, six appearances for

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 r ...

, and four appearances for South African Universities. Playing as an

all-rounder An all-rounder is a cricketer who regularly performs well at both batting and bowling. Although all bowlers must bat and quite a handful of batsmen do bowl occasionally, most players are skilled in only one of the two disciplines and are consi ...

, he scored 3,923 runs in first-class cricket, 3,376 of which came for Eastern Province 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 24.11 and a high score of 171

not out In cricket, a batter is not out if they come out to bat in an innings and have not been dismissed by the end of an innings. The batter is also ''not out'' while their innings is still in progress. Occurrence At least one batter is not out at t ...

. Making four

centuries A century is a period of 100 years. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word ''century'' comes from the Latin ''centum'', meaning ''one hundred''. ''Century'' is sometimes abbreviated as c. A centennial or ...

and thirteen half centuries, his highest first-class score came against Northern Transvaal in the 1981–82 season. With his right-arm

off break Off spin is a type of finger spin bowling in cricket. A bowler who uses this technique is called an off spinner. Off spinners are right-handed spin bowlers who use their fingers to spin the ball. Their normal delivery is an off break, which spi ...

bowling, he took 205 wickets, 143 of which came for Eastern Province at a

bowling average In cricket, a player's bowling average is the number of runs they have conceded per wicket taken. The lower the bowling average is, the better the bowler is performing. It is one of a number of statistics used to compare bowlers, commonly use ...

of 35.84 and best figures of 7 for 97. He took seven five wicket hauls, with his best figures coming against Transvaal in the 1975–76 season. He made his debut in List A one-day cricket for Eastern Province against

Border Borders are usually defined as geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other subnational entities. Political borders c ...

in the 1974-75 Gillette Cup. He played List A cricket until November 1987, making 55 appearances. These included 51 matches for Eastern Province, in addition to one match for Northern Transvaal and three matches for

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, at a time when South Africa was suspended from

international cricket International cricket matches are played between teams representing their nations, normally organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The main forms are Test matches, One-Day matches and Twenty20 matches. Most games are played ...

as a result of

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

. He scored 969 runs at an average of 25.50 in his 55 List A matches, with a high score of 73. With the ball, he took 35 wickets at an average of 27.20, with best figures of 4 for 18. He was a South African cricketer of the year in 1982. In addition to playing first-class and List A cricket, he also played

minor counties cricket 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 ...

in England for

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...

in 1980, making eight appearances 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 ...

. He died in Grahamstown in December 2000, following a long struggle with

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Armitage, Robert 1955 births 2000 deaths People from Makhanda, Eastern Cape Rhodes University alumni South African cricketers Eastern Province cricketers South African Universities cricketers Northerns cricketers Cambridgeshire cricketers Deaths from cancer in South Africa Cricketers from the Eastern Cape