Ian Healy
Encyclopedia
Ian Andrew Healy (born 30 April 1964) is a former cricket
er who played for Queensland
and Australia. A specialist wicketkeeper and useful right-hand middle-order batsman, he made an unheralded entry to international cricket in 1988, after only six first-class games. His work ethic and combativeness was much needed by an Australian team that was performing poorly. Over the next decade, Healy was a key member of the side as it enjoyed a sustained period of success. By the time of his retirement, Healy held the world record for most Test dismissals by a wicket-keeper.
Healy was a very useful batsman, who improved dramatically during the second half of his career. All of his four first-class centuries were scored in Test matches. He could be handy as a hitter late in the innings during ODIs: he averaged 21 while scoring at a rate of 83.8 runs per hundred balls. Although touted as a potential leader of the team early in his career, a series of on-field misdemeanours counted against him when the position was vacant. He captained Australia in eight ODIs when the regular skipper Mark Taylor
was injured.
. Healy and his family relocated 600 km north to the small town of Biloela
in 1972, due to his father’s transfer in his job as a bank manager. Rod Marsh
inspired Healy to take up wicket-keeping; he also played basketball, soccer, squash and rugby league. He represented the Queensland under-11 team and later attended a clinic conducted by the touring Queensland
cricketers. The team’s wicket-keeper John Maclean
gave him some specialist coaching, which gave his junior career further impetus.
During his later years in the town, Healy played alongside adults, which accelerated his progress. Returning to Brisbane with his family at the age of 17, he joined the Northern Suburbs club in Brisbane’s grade competition in 1982. After three matches for the Queensland Colts as a specialist batsman, Healy made his first-class debut in 1986–87 as a replacement for the injured Peter Anderson. However, Anderson remained the first choice as the state’s wicketkeeper for the next eighteen months, during which time Healy managed only six first-class appearances.
, Greg Dyer
and Steve Rixon
had all been tried with little success. Australian selector Greg Chappell
had watched Healy’s progress in Queensland, and believed that he offered the lower-order batting stability and determined approach to the game that the Australian team was lacking.
By his own admission, Healy was overwhelmed by his sudden elevation and took some time to settle in to the team. The selectors persevered with him through the difficult Pakistan tour and the subsequent home series against the West Indies, even though Australia lost both series.
An improvement in the team’s performances coincided with Healy’s establishment as a Test-class player. On the tour of England in 1989, he was safe behind the stumps in taking 14 Test catches, but averaged only 17.16 with the bat, as Australia won 4–0 to regain the Ashes. In seven Tests against New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Pakistan during the extended season of 1989–90, Healy accepted 23 catches and recorded a top score of 48.
. With the introduction to the team of Shane Warne
, Healy was able to demonstrate his skills standing up to the stumps and reading the varied deliveries of the spinner. In his first 39 Tests, Healy stumped two batsmen. In 14 Tests between 1992 and 1993, he stumped ten batsmen while taking 52 catches.
Healy followed up with another century, against New Zealand at Perth in 1993–94. Healy was also well known for his energy and optimism behind the stumps, and could frequently be heard on effects microphones encouraging the rest of the team, perhaps most prominently praise of Shane Warne
, expressed as 'Bowling, Warnie'. Notable too was his attitude to injuries; despite breaking all of his fingers during his thirteen-year career he only ever missed one Test match, replaced by Phil Emery
in Pakistan.
Healy twice captained an Australian XI, in tour matches against the West Indians in 1991–92 and 1992–93. In 1993, he led an official Australian team at the Hong Kong six-a-side tournament and replaced Allan Border
as captain of Queensland in 1992–93. However, when Border retired at the end of the 1994 tour of South Africa, Healy was not seen as viable successor as Australian captain for two reasons. Firstly, only one wicket-keeper had led Australia in the previous one hundred years. Secondly, his various on-field confrontations were sometimes held against him.
, a wicket-keeper himself had displayed the potential to play this type of game since his ODI debut the previous year. Gilchrist then became the ODI team’s wicket-keeper as well, allowing Australia to play an extra specialist (bowler or batsman) in the batting place previously occupied by Healy. Both Healy and Taylor made their disappointment with the decision known. However, Gilchrist hit a brilliant century during the finals of the Carlton and United Series, which Australia won after failing to qualify for the previous season. Healy finished his ODI career with a world record 233 dismissals, a mark since overtaken by Gilchrist, Mark Boucher
, Moin Khan
and Kumar Sangakkara
.
Healy maintained his Test place, beginning the season with scores of 68 at Brisbane and 85 at Perth, against New Zealand. His only other innings of substance was 46 not out against South Africa in the second Test at Sydney. On the subsequent tour of India, Healy top-scored with 90 in the first Test at Chennai, which Australia lost.
from the bowling of Colin Miller
, during the first Test against Pakistan at Rawalpindi. It was his 104th Test compared with Marsh's 96 Tests. Healy ended with 395 dismissals from 119 Tests. This tally was subsequently overtaken by South African wicketkeeper Mark Boucher (in his 103rd test, 16 fewer than Healy) and other Australian wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist in his 96th test which was his last. Boucher is currently the world record holder.
He also jointly holds the record in Test cricket (along with Mark Taylor
) of being the only cricketers to have been run out
in both innings of a Test on two occasions.
During the lead-up to the 1999–2000 season, the selectors made it clear that they wanted Adam Gilchrist to keep for the Test team as well as the ODI side. Initially, Healy requested that he be allowed to play one more season and then retire, which was refused. He then asked to play the first Test, scheduled for his home ground at Brisbane, as a farewell. This, too, was refused, so he announced his immediate retirement from all forms of the game in a statement released on 28 October 1999. In response to the tremendous public farewells afforded to Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath
and Justin Langer
at the end of the fifth Test at Sydney in 2006–07, Healy called for long-standing players to have their farewells to the game managed more appropriately than his own.
, Wally Grout
and Don Tallon
. He was also recognised as a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1994. Since retiring he has gone on to a career as a news presenter for Channel Nine in Brisbane, as well as coaching the Somerville House cricket team. Healy (since 1999) has been a cricket commentator. In 2008 he was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame
.
guest commentated for the Nine Network
. Whilst Symonds was talking about raising money for breast cancer research, Healy, unaware that he was on camera, gesticulated playing a tiny violin for which he was criticized. He made a public apology to women who had suffered breast cancer.
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
er who played for Queensland
Queensland Bulls
The Queensland cricket team, nicknamed the Bulls, are the Brisbane-based Queensland representative cricket team in Australia's domestic cricket tournaments:*Sheffield Shield, 4-day matches with first-class status, since the 1926/27 season...
and Australia. A specialist wicketkeeper and useful right-hand middle-order batsman, he made an unheralded entry to international cricket in 1988, after only six first-class games. His work ethic and combativeness was much needed by an Australian team that was performing poorly. Over the next decade, Healy was a key member of the side as it enjoyed a sustained period of success. By the time of his retirement, Healy held the world record for most Test dismissals by a wicket-keeper.
Healy was a very useful batsman, who improved dramatically during the second half of his career. All of his four first-class centuries were scored in Test matches. He could be handy as a hitter late in the innings during ODIs: he averaged 21 while scoring at a rate of 83.8 runs per hundred balls. Although touted as a potential leader of the team early in his career, a series of on-field misdemeanours counted against him when the position was vacant. He captained Australia in eight ODIs when the regular skipper Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor (cricketer)
Mark Anthony Taylor, AO is a former Australian cricket player and Test opening batsman from 1988–1999, as well as captain from 1994–1999, succeeding Allan Border...
was injured.
Early days
Born in the Brisbane suburb of Spring Hill, Healy was educated at Brisbane State High SchoolBrisbane State High School
Brisbane State High School is a partially selective, co-educational, state secondary school, located in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It is a member of the Great Public Schools' Association of Queensland, and the Queensland Girls' Secondary Schools Sports Association...
. Healy and his family relocated 600 km north to the small town of Biloela
Biloela, Queensland
Biloela is a rural town in Central Queensland, Australia. It is situated inland from the port city of Gladstone at the junction of the Burnett and Dawson highways...
in 1972, due to his father’s transfer in his job as a bank manager. Rod Marsh
Rod Marsh
Rodney William Marsh MBE is a former Australian wicketkeeper.A colourful character, Marsh had a Test career spanning from the 1970–71 to the 1983–84 Australian season. In 96 Tests, he set a world record of 355 wicketkeeping dismissals, the same number his pace bowling Western...
inspired Healy to take up wicket-keeping; he also played basketball, soccer, squash and rugby league. He represented the Queensland under-11 team and later attended a clinic conducted by the touring Queensland
Queensland Bulls
The Queensland cricket team, nicknamed the Bulls, are the Brisbane-based Queensland representative cricket team in Australia's domestic cricket tournaments:*Sheffield Shield, 4-day matches with first-class status, since the 1926/27 season...
cricketers. The team’s wicket-keeper John Maclean
John Maclean (cricketer)
John Alexander Maclean is a former Australian cricketer who played in 4 Tests and 2 ODIs from 1978 to 1979. John was educated at Brisbane State High School....
gave him some specialist coaching, which gave his junior career further impetus.
During his later years in the town, Healy played alongside adults, which accelerated his progress. Returning to Brisbane with his family at the age of 17, he joined the Northern Suburbs club in Brisbane’s grade competition in 1982. After three matches for the Queensland Colts as a specialist batsman, Healy made his first-class debut in 1986–87 as a replacement for the injured Peter Anderson. However, Anderson remained the first choice as the state’s wicketkeeper for the next eighteen months, during which time Healy managed only six first-class appearances.
International career
Given his small number of games for Queensland, Healy’s selection for the Australian team to tour Pakistan in late 1988 was a major surprise. The wicket-keeping position had proved a problem for Australia since the 1984 retirement of Healy’s boyhood hero, Rod Marsh. Wayne B. Phillips, Tim ZoehrerTim Zoehrer
Timothy Joseph Zoehrer is a former Australian cricket player. He played as a wicket-keeper....
, Greg Dyer
Greg Dyer
Gregory Charles Dyer is a former New South Wales and Australian wicketkeeper. Dyer played in 6 Tests and 23 ODIs from 1986 to 1988, including playing in the victorious 1987 World Cup Final....
and Steve Rixon
Steve Rixon
Stephen John Rixon is the newly appointed Australian cricket fielding coach.He played in 13 Tests and 6 One Day Internationals between 1977 and 1985. He came into the Australian side as wicket-keeper in 1977–78 after Rodney Marsh joined World Series Cricket, losing his place on Marsh's return...
had all been tried with little success. Australian selector Greg Chappell
Greg Chappell
Gregory Stephen Chappell MBE is a former cricketer who captained Australia between 1975 and 1977 and then joined the breakaway World Series Cricket organisation, before returning to the Australian captaincy in 1979, a position he held until his retirement 1983...
had watched Healy’s progress in Queensland, and believed that he offered the lower-order batting stability and determined approach to the game that the Australian team was lacking.
By his own admission, Healy was overwhelmed by his sudden elevation and took some time to settle in to the team. The selectors persevered with him through the difficult Pakistan tour and the subsequent home series against the West Indies, even though Australia lost both series.
An improvement in the team’s performances coincided with Healy’s establishment as a Test-class player. On the tour of England in 1989, he was safe behind the stumps in taking 14 Test catches, but averaged only 17.16 with the bat, as Australia won 4–0 to regain the Ashes. In seven Tests against New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Pakistan during the extended season of 1989–90, Healy accepted 23 catches and recorded a top score of 48.
First century
Although Australia lost the series with the West Indies and drew with New Zealand in 1992–93, the team had a successful tour of England in 1993 when Healy hit his maiden Test century. His form had gradually improved, culminating in an unbeaten 102 at Old Trafford when he dominated a partnership with Steve WaughSteve Waugh
Stephen Rodger "Steve" Waugh, AO is a former Australian cricketer and fraternal twin of cricketer Mark Waugh. A right-handed batsman, he was also a successful medium-pace bowler...
. With the introduction to the team of Shane Warne
Shane Warne
Shane Keith Warne is a former Australian international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. In 2000, he was selected by a panel of cricket experts as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet...
, Healy was able to demonstrate his skills standing up to the stumps and reading the varied deliveries of the spinner. In his first 39 Tests, Healy stumped two batsmen. In 14 Tests between 1992 and 1993, he stumped ten batsmen while taking 52 catches.
Shane Warne
Shane Keith Warne is a former Australian international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. In 2000, he was selected by a panel of cricket experts as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the Century, the only specialist bowler selected in the quintet...
, expressed as 'Bowling, Warnie'. Notable too was his attitude to injuries; despite breaking all of his fingers during his thirteen-year career he only ever missed one Test match, replaced by Phil Emery
Phil Emery
Philip Allen Emery is a former Australian and New South Wales cricketer. He was a wicket-keeper and valuable left-handed batsman....
in Pakistan.
Healy twice captained an Australian XI, in tour matches against the West Indians in 1991–92 and 1992–93. In 1993, he led an official Australian team at the Hong Kong six-a-side tournament and replaced Allan Border
Allan Border
Allan Robert Border AO is a former Australian cricketer. A batsman, Border was for many years the captain of the Australian team. His playing nickname was "A.B.". He played 156 Test matches in his career, a record until it was passed by fellow Australian Steve Waugh...
as captain of Queensland in 1992–93. However, when Border retired at the end of the 1994 tour of South Africa, Healy was not seen as viable successor as Australian captain for two reasons. Firstly, only one wicket-keeper had led Australia in the previous one hundred years. Secondly, his various on-field confrontations were sometimes held against him.
Omitted from ODI team
Australia made the much-debated decision to separate the teams for playing Tests and ODIs for the 1997–98 season. This affected Healy and the captain, Mark Taylor, both of whom were dropped from the ODI team. Sri Lanka won the 1996 World Cup utilising a strategy of ultra-aggressive opening batsmen hitting as many runs as possible in the early overs of the innings. Adam GilchristAdam Gilchrist
Adam Craig Gilchrist AM , nicknamed "Gilly" or "Churchy", is an Australian international cricketer who currently captains Kings XI Punjab and recently captained Middlesex. He is an attacking left-handed batsman and record-breaking wicket-keeper, who redefined the role for the Australian national...
, a wicket-keeper himself had displayed the potential to play this type of game since his ODI debut the previous year. Gilchrist then became the ODI team’s wicket-keeper as well, allowing Australia to play an extra specialist (bowler or batsman) in the batting place previously occupied by Healy. Both Healy and Taylor made their disappointment with the decision known. However, Gilchrist hit a brilliant century during the finals of the Carlton and United Series, which Australia won after failing to qualify for the previous season. Healy finished his ODI career with a world record 233 dismissals, a mark since overtaken by Gilchrist, Mark Boucher
Mark Boucher
Mark Verdon Boucher is a South African cricketer, who holds the record for the most Test dismissals by a wicket-keeper. He was educated at Selborne College and has represented Border, Africa XI, ICC World XI, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Kolkata Knight Riders of the Indian Premier League, and...
, Moin Khan
Moin Khan
Mohammad Moin Khan , popularly known as Moin Khan , is a former Pakistani cricketer, primarily a wicketkeeper-batsman, who remained a member of the Pakistani national cricket team from 1990 to 2004. He has also captained the Pakistani side. He made his international debut against the West Indies at...
and Kumar Sangakkara
Kumar Sangakkara
Kumar Sangakkara is a Sri Lankan, Sinhalese cricketer and the former captain of the Sri Lanka national cricket team. He is a left-handed top-order batsman...
.
Healy maintained his Test place, beginning the season with scores of 68 at Brisbane and 85 at Perth, against New Zealand. His only other innings of substance was 46 not out against South Africa in the second Test at Sydney. On the subsequent tour of India, Healy top-scored with 90 in the first Test at Chennai, which Australia lost.
World Records
On 4 October 1998, Healy broke Rod Marsh's world record of 355 dismissals when he caught Wasim AkramWasim Akram
Wasim Akram is a former Pakistani left arm fast bowler and left-handed batsman in cricketer and model. who represented the Pakistan national cricket team in Test cricket and One Day International matches....
from the bowling of Colin Miller
Colin Miller (cricketer)
Colin Reid Miller is a former Australian cricketer. Known for his ever-changing hair colour; he played with blue hair in a test match against the West Indies in 2001. His hair apparently made West Indies captain Courtney Walsh laugh.Miller began as a right-arm fast-medium bowler, but changed to...
, during the first Test against Pakistan at Rawalpindi. It was his 104th Test compared with Marsh's 96 Tests. Healy ended with 395 dismissals from 119 Tests. This tally was subsequently overtaken by South African wicketkeeper Mark Boucher (in his 103rd test, 16 fewer than Healy) and other Australian wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist in his 96th test which was his last. Boucher is currently the world record holder.
He also jointly holds the record in Test cricket (along with Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor (cricketer)
Mark Anthony Taylor, AO is a former Australian cricket player and Test opening batsman from 1988–1999, as well as captain from 1994–1999, succeeding Allan Border...
) of being the only cricketers to have been run out
Run out
Run out is a method of dismissal in the sport of cricket. It is governed by Law 38 of the Laws of cricket.-The rules:A batsman is out Run out if at any time while the ball is in play no part of his bat or person is grounded behind the popping crease and his wicket is fairly put down by the opposing...
in both innings of a Test on two occasions.
Forlorn farewell
After four months off, the Australian team toured Sri Lanka in August and September 1999. In the three Tests, Healy made only 25 runs and took four catches. The team made a brief visit to Zimbabwe the following month, to play the inaugural Test between the two nations, at Harare. Healy made five and took two catches.During the lead-up to the 1999–2000 season, the selectors made it clear that they wanted Adam Gilchrist to keep for the Test team as well as the ODI side. Initially, Healy requested that he be allowed to play one more season and then retire, which was refused. He then asked to play the first Test, scheduled for his home ground at Brisbane, as a farewell. This, too, was refused, so he announced his immediate retirement from all forms of the game in a statement released on 28 October 1999. In response to the tremendous public farewells afforded to Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath
Glenn McGrath
Glenn Donald McGrath AM , nicknamed "Pigeon", is a former Australian cricket player. He is one of the most highly regarded fast-medium pace bowlers in cricketing history, and a leading contributor to Australia's domination of world cricket from the mid-1990s to the early 21st century...
and Justin Langer
Justin Langer
Justin Lee Langer AM is a former international cricketer who represented Australia in 105 Test matches and the current Assistant Coach and Batting Coach of the Australian cricket team. A left-handed batsman, his opening partnership with Matthew Hayden was one of the most successful of all time...
at the end of the fifth Test at Sydney in 2006–07, Healy called for long-standing players to have their farewells to the game managed more appropriately than his own.
Post retirement
Healy's performances were acknowledged when he was selected as the wicketkeeper in the Australian Cricket Board's team of the 20th century, ahead of greats such as Rod MarshRod Marsh
Rodney William Marsh MBE is a former Australian wicketkeeper.A colourful character, Marsh had a Test career spanning from the 1970–71 to the 1983–84 Australian season. In 96 Tests, he set a world record of 355 wicketkeeping dismissals, the same number his pace bowling Western...
, Wally Grout
Wally Grout
Arthur Theodore Wallace Grout was a Test cricketer who kept wicket for Australia and Queensland.Grout played in 51 Test matches between 1957 and 1966...
and Don Tallon
Don Tallon
Donald "Don" Tallon was an Australian cricketer who played 21 Test matches as a wicket-keeper between 1946 and 1953...
. He was also recognised as a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1994. Since retiring he has gone on to a career as a news presenter for Channel Nine in Brisbane, as well as coaching the Somerville House cricket team. Healy (since 1999) has been a cricket commentator. In 2008 he was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame
Australian Cricket Hall of Fame
The Australian Cricket Hall of Fame is a part of the Australian Gallery of Sport and Olympic Museum in the National Sports Museum at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. This Hall of Fame commemorates the greatest Australian cricketers of all time....
.
Breast Cancer incident
In the 07/08 summer of cricket season, Andrew SymondsAndrew Symonds
Andrew Symonds is a former Australian cricket team all-rounder. A two-time World Cup winner, Symonds is a right-handed middle order batsman and alternates between medium pace and off-spin bowling....
guest commentated for the Nine Network
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
. Whilst Symonds was talking about raising money for breast cancer research, Healy, unaware that he was on camera, gesticulated playing a tiny violin for which he was criticized. He made a public apology to women who had suffered breast cancer.