Rodney Craig Ontong (born 9 September 1955) is a former

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 ...

er who played for

Glamorgan County Cricket Club Glamorgan County Cricket Club ( cy, Criced Morgannwg) is one of eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Glamorgan ( cy, Morgannwg). Founded in 1888, ...

in the UK, and for various South African teams. Ontong was born in

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Demo ...

, and originally came to the UK from South Africa to pursue a football career; he had trials with

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in the early 1970s. He did not impress enough to join their books, instead turning to cricket, after some success as a club cricketer in London. The South African earned a place on the MCC groundstaff and coach

Len Muncer Bernard Leonard Muncer (23 October 1913 – 18 January 1982) was a cricketer who played for Middlesex and Glamorgan. Muncer was a useful middle or later order right-handed batsman and a spin bowler who began by bowling occasional leg breaks ...

later recommended him to Glamorgan, Muncer's former county. Ontong made his Glamorgan debut against the touring Australian team at Swansea in 1975. From 1977 he was a regular in the Glamorgan side and would return to South Africa at the conclusion of each British summer to play more first-class cricket. Early in his career he was a right-arm fast-medium pace bowler but in 1983 he took up off-spin for the first time and it became his preferred craft. Around the same time Ontong moved from the middle and lower order to the number three position. Following

Mike Selvey Michael Walter William Selvey (born 25 April 1948), known as Mike Selvey, is an English former Test and county cricketer, and now a cricket writer and commentator. Selvey played in three Tests for England in 1976 and 1977. His county cricket co ...

's sudden retirement halfway into the 1984 season, Ontong became captain of Glamorgan and he finished the summer with a career best 74 wickets. He also achieved his highest first-class score that season, an innings of 204 not out against Middlesex at Swansea. He had arguably his best season in 1985 when he won the '

Cricket Society The Cricket Society is a charitable organisation founded in 1945 as the Society of Cricket Statisticians at Great Scotland Yard, London. It has grown steadily to be the largest body of its kind in the cricket world. The Cricket Society now has mor ...

Wetherall Award' for the 'Leading All-Rounder in English First-Class Cricket' after making 1121 runs at 48.73 and taking 64 wickets at 27.76. In a match against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge he took figures of 5/39 and 8/67 as well as scoring 130. He was just the second Glamorgan cricketer to achieve the feat of making a century and taking 10 wickets in a first-class match. As Ontong had met the qualifying requirements to represent

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 ...

in international cricket, he was said to have been close to being picked as the country's Test all-rounder and was also in consideration for a spot in their 1987 World Cup squad. Over the course of his career at Glamorgan he passed 1000 runs in a season on five occasions and was their 'Player of the Year' in both 1982 and 1985. While in Wales he met and married the daughter of former Glamorgan player Jim Pressdee. In August 1988, Ontong was badly injured in a car accident when he was travelling from Essex to Northamptonshire. The damage to his knee ended his career at Glamorgan although in the early 1990s he appeared in some matches for Northern Transvaal, a team he would go on to coach. He has also served as the Director of Coaching at Gauteng. Rodney Ontong is not related to South African Test cricketer

Justin Ontong Justin Lee Ontong (born 4 January 1980) is a former South African cricketer, who played domestic cricket for the Cape Cobras. He has played two Test matches, 26 One Day Internationals and twelve Twenty20 Internationals as an all-rounder. Cric ...

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* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ontong, Rodney 1955 births Living people South African cricketers Glamorgan cricketers Glamorgan cricket captains Border cricketers Gauteng cricketers Northerns cricketers Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers South African cricket coaches Middlesex County Cricket Club T. N. Pearce's XI cricketers