Rod Marsh A Life in Cricket Author:Mark Browning Rod Marsh has dedicated his life to cricket. He was unarguably one of the world's greatest wicketkeepers and he was, in his day, Australia's greatest wicketkeeper-batsman, indeed the first to score a Test century. Since his retirement as a player his dedication has continued. While some ex-cricketers become commentators or join the speakers' cir... more »cuit, Marsh has been more directly involved with the game than that, heading Australia's Cricket Academy, and then England's. Now, and not without some raised eyebrows, he has become an England selector. Mark Browning revels in the spirit of the game -- including its sometimes larrikin spirit -- and has written a deeply appreciative account of the career Rod Marsh, from his formative years in Perth, when Western Australia was still isolated from much of the Australian cricketing scene, through his rising career as cricketer and then coach. There is plenty of meaty stuff here: selection controversies, money matters, World Series Cricket and the healing of the rift, the drinking records as well as the cricketing ones, friendships and some feuds, the question of captaincy, but above all there is Rod Marsh's fully professional dedication to the game he loves and at which he excelled. As well as tapping his appreciative memories and the public record, Mark Browning has included insightful interview material with a number of Marsh's cricketing contemporaries including Bob Massie, John Inverarity, Ian Redpath and Tony Greig. It is a well-rounded and particularly informative biography.« less