Dick Lilley

Dick Lilley

File:Ranji 1897 page 044 Lilley at the wicket.jpg Lilley at the wicket
Cricket information
Batting style	Right-hand bat
Bowling style	Right-arm medium
International information
National side	English
Career statistics
Competition Tests First-class Matches 35 416 Runs scored 903 15597 Batting average 20.52 26.30 100s/50s -/4 16/77 Top score 84 171 Balls bowled 25 2324 Wickets 1 41 Bowling average 23.00 36.21 5 wickets in innings - 1 10 wickets in match - - Best bowling 1/23 6/46 Catches/stumpings 70/22 715/196
Source: [1]

Arthur Frederick Augustus ("Dick") Lilley (28 November 1866, Holloway Head, Warwickshire – 17 November 1929, Sandy Park, Bristol) was an English cricketer who played in 35 Tests from 1896 to 1909, more than any other England wicket-keeper in the first sixty years of Test cricket.

The conservative cricket establishment of the time was not effusive in its appreciation of this great keeper mainly because he broke with the tradition of standing up to the faster bowlers as was practised by all the great keepers till then. He did so on the advice of W. G. Grace who, on seeing him standing up to Tom Richardson, the legendary England fast bowler, suggested that he would "do better by standing back", which Lilley did for the rest of his career.

He was renowned for his cricketing knowledge, and advised English captains. However, he once started to set the field without consulting his county skipper, Frank Foster, 23 years his junior, who told him there and then to mind his own business. Foster later advised the Warwickshire committee to drop him. Lilley last played for Warwickshire in July 1911, and the county went on to win the championship that year.