Steve Wilkinson (cricketer)

Stephen George Wilkinson (born 12 January 1949) is a former cricketer who played first-class and List A cricket for Somerset between 1971 and 1974.^[1] He was born at Hounslow, then in Middlesex, now in London.

Wilkinson played as a right-handed opening or middle-order batsman. He appeared in second eleven matches for Middlesex in 1967 and then for Somerset in Minor Counties second eleven games in 1971. After one limited-overs appearance for the Somerset first team in 1971, he played nine first-class matches in 1972, batting mostly at No 3. He scored consistently but not prolifically, and passed 50 only twice in all of his 18 first-class matches, both times in his first season. In his second match, he made 69 against Surrey at The Oval, putting on 157 for the second wicket with Roy Virgin.^[2] In his next match he made 50 against Essex.^[3] But thereafter his highest first-class score was only 33. He was out of form in first-class cricket in 1973, though made his highest limited-overs score, 70, in the match against Gloucestershire at Somerset's ground in Bristol, the Imperial Athletic Ground, that year.^[4] He played only a handful of matches in 1974 and left the Somerset staff at the end of the season.

Wilkinson's batting style was upright, orthodox and technically correct – too correct for his captain, Brian Close: according to one report, Close told him "You play too straight lad", though that was after a straight drive from Wilkinson had got Close run out at the bowler's end.^[5]

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