The Spitfire Sessions: The Art of Wicketkeeping
Friday 3rd July 2020
Kent Cricket is delighted to announce this week’s panel for ‘The Spitfire Sessions’ will see three former Kent wicketkeepers, Steve Marsh, Geraint Jones and Niall O’Brien, discuss what it takes to be the man behind Kent’s stumps.
The area of cricketing brilliance with which Kent has become especially noted, is in producing world class wicket-keepers. Since 1870, the Club has been blessed with some of the finest wicketkeepers in the first-class game.
The next instalment of The Spitfire Sessions, taking place on Monday 6th July at 19:00, will give members and supporters an insight into three of Kent’s great wicketkeepers.
Submit your questions in advance for the panel now >>>
The Spitfire Sessions will be available to watch live on Kent Cricket’s official Facebook Page, as well as directly through Zoom.
This forum is open to all, and the panel will be answering questions put to them by supporters and stakeholders. Supporters are asked to submit questions to the club in advance via e-mail to TheSpitfireSessions.Kent@ecb.co.uk.
From the advanced questions received, a star question will be selected by the panel and awarded with a prize, kindly donated by Shepherd Neame.
The Spitfire Sessions are proudly supported by Shepherd Neame >>>
Steve Marsh spent the entirety of his professional career at Kent, making 613 appearances for the county over an 18-year period.
A prolific wicketkeeper-batsman, Marsh scored over 13,000 runs for Kent and took 1,012 catches, also enacting 97 stumpings with the gloves.
Following the retirement of Mark Benson in 1996, Marsh captained the county until 1998.
Geraint Jones, recently a finalist in a poll to find Kent Supporters’ Favourite Wicketkeeper of the first 150 Years of the Club, was behind the stumps for Kent for a majority of the ‘noughties’. A 2007 Twenty20 Cup winner and 2005 Ashes winner with England, Jones also played one-day international cricket for the country of his birth, Papua New Guinea.
Niall O’Brien, a former Irish left-handed batsman and wicketkeeper began his domestic career with Kent in 2004. Renowned for his competitiveness behind the stumps, O’Brien scored over 9000 first class runs and took nearly 500 first class catches. Perhaps the highlight of his career was his innings that forced the cricketing world to take note of Ireland. He scored a brilliant 72 on St Patrick’s Day, to help Ireland claim victory over Pakistan in the 2007 World Cup. He later contributed 63 against England in the tournament. He also went on to be one of Ireland’s most capped players.
