Mark Davies (born Anthony Mark Davies, 4 October 1980) is an English 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 of three or more days scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officially adju ...

er who played for

Durham County Cricket Club Durham County Cricket Club (rebranded as Durham Cricket in February 2019) is one of eighteen first-class cricket, first-class county cricket, county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the Historic c ...

and, briefly,

Kent County Cricket Club Kent County Cricket Club is one of the eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Kent. A club representing the county was first founded in 1842 but Ken ...

. He bowled right-arm medium-pace and batted in the

tail The tail is the elongated section at the rear end of a bilaterian animal's body; in general, the term refers to a distinct, flexible appendage extending backwards from the midline of the torso. In vertebrate animals that evolution, evolved to los ...

. In December 2009, he was called up from the England Lions into the full England squad, to cover for injuries to other bowlers during the

tour of South Africa The Tour of South Africa was a stage cycling race in South Africa that was only held once, in 2011. It was part of UCI Africa Tour The UCI Continental Circuits are a series of road bicycle racing competitions which were introduced in 2005 by ...

. Davies suffered many injuries during his career. In September 2014, he was forced to retire from all forms of cricket after failing to recover from a shoulder injury picked up in a pre-season fixture.

County career

Born in

Stockton-on-Tees Stockton-on-Tees is a market town in County Durham, England, with a population of 84,815 at the 2021 UK census. It gives its name to and is the largest settlement in the wider Borough of Stockton-on-Tees. It is part of Teesside and the Tees Val ...

, County Durham, England, Davies made his

List A List A cricket is a classification of the Limited overs cricket, 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 competit ...

debut in 1998, and his first-class debut in 2002. He has represented England under-19s. His career has been blighted by injury, "especially in 2004 and 2005 when he was taking wickets for fun (50 at 18.76 and 47 at 15.55 respectively)." He rarely played in 2006, as recurring back problems left him in a "body brace" for three months, but made a comeback in 2007, including a one-month spell on loan to

Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated ''Notts.'') is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. The county is bordered by South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. Th ...

, playing one first-class game. In the 2008 season, he played regularly for Durham in the early season and, returning to the side after two months on the sidelines in August 2008 after

Steve Harmison Stephen James Harmison, (born 23 October 1978) is an English former first-class cricketer, who played all formats of the game. Primarily a fast bowler, he represented England in 63 Tests, 58 ODIs, and 2 T20s. He also played county cricket ...

was called up for England, Davies took career-best figures of 8–24 versus

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

, at

Basingstoke Basingstoke ( ) is a town in Hampshire, situated in south-central England across a valley at the source of the River Loddon on the western edge of the North Downs. It is the largest settlement in Hampshire without city status in the United King ...

as Hampshire were dismissed for just 96. He took 3–51 in the second innings, 11–75 in all, but could not prevent his side from losing. He joined

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

in 2012. In his first season with the county, he won the player of the year. 2013 was a different proposition altogether for Davies as he found himself left out for much of Kent's season. Despite that, he claimed 25 County Championship wickets. This was the fourth best in the squad, despite having missed 6 games. Davies retired from cricket in 2014, due to a shoulder injury.

Career-best performances

Personal life

His brother,

Andrew Andrew is the English form of the given name, common in many countries. The word is derived from the , ''Andreas'', itself related to ''aner/andros'', "man" (as opposed to "woman"), thus meaning "manly" and, as consequence, "brave", "strong", "c ...

, is a professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who has played for clubs such as

Middlesbrough Middlesbrough ( ), colloquially known as Boro, is a port town in the Borough of Middlesbrough, North Yorkshire, England. Lying to the south of the River Tees, Middlesbrough forms part of the Teesside Built up area, built-up area and the Tees Va ...

Bradford City Bradford City Association Football Club is an English professional football club in Bradford, West Yorkshire. The club competes in , the third tier of English football, and is managed by Graham Alexander. The club was founded in 1903 and ...

and Ross County FC.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Davies, Mark 1980 births Living people Durham cricketers English cricketers Cricketers from Stockton-on-Tees Durham Cricket Board cricketers Nottinghamshire cricketers Kent cricketers Cricketers from Yorkshire