A first-class coach

With the rugby union World Cup due to start in a week and a half (and me back in a frenzy of blogging after editing our World Cup supplement), here is a little-known crossover fact I've dug up: Graham Henry, the coach of the All Blacks, is one of only two New Zealand coaches never to have worn the famous black jersey himself but he did play half a dozen games of first-class cricket in the 1960s - with a pretty feeble batting average of 1.66. Mind you, to judge from this picture his ability to drink would match any Test cricketer of the 1960s.

Henry was a wicketkeeper for Canterbury in 1965-66 and scored a whopping eight runs in six innings for them. Understandably, even in those days when a keeper didn't need to bat like a Gilchrist, he was soon dropped but then showed up two years later for Otago, who rather oddly asked him to open the batting against his former side. Henry was dismissed for 0 and 2, both times being the victim of Dick Motz, the New Zealand Test bowler who died four months ago, and his second attempt at first-class cricket ended there. I suspect his second sporting career may end in rather more success.

Comments

[Brian Carpenter]

I remember Henry being asked about his first-class cricketr career a few years ago when he was coachng Wales. I think he said something along the lines of 'as a cricketer I was a very good drinker', although I think he may have used a more blunt term than 'drinker'.