Martin Francis Kent is a former Australian cricket

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 in 3 Tests

Test cricket

Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...

 and 5 ODIs in 1981.

This elegant right-handed batsman was unfortunate to play only three times for his country. He scored 140 on his debut for Queensland in 1974–75 season but the powerful Australian middle order of the seventies, dominated by the Chappell brothers and Doug Walters

Doug Walters

Kevin Douglas Walters MBE in Dungog New South Wales, known as Doug Walters, is a former Australian cricketer. He was known as an attacking batsman, and also as a typical ocker.-First-class career:...

 kept him out of contention for international honours. Opportunity did arise when Kerry Packer bought up most of the leading stars in 1977, but he chose World Series Cricket

World Series Cricket

World Series Cricket was a break away professional cricket competition staged between 1977 and 1979 and organised by Kerry Packer for his Australian television network, Nine Network. The matches ran in opposition to established international cricket...

 instead of staying with the traditional game. He would certainly have played in the 1978–79 Ashes series otherwise.

He was finally chosen to tour England in 1981 but the trip was not a happy one for Kim Hughes

Kim Hughes

Kimberley John Hughes is a former cricketer who played for Western Australia, Natal and Australia. He captained Australia in 28 Tests between 1979 and 1984 before captaining a "rebel" Australian team in a tour of South Africa, who at the time were subject to a sporting boycott.A right-handed...

' side against a revitalised Ian Botham

Ian Botham

Sir Ian Terence Botham OBE is a former England Test cricketer and Test team captain, and current cricket commentator. He was a genuine all-rounder with 14 centuries and 383 wickets in Test cricket, and remains well-known by his nickname "Beefy"...

. Kent was one of Australia's few positives, coming into the side for the final three tests he scored 171 runs, including a fifty as a makeshift opener at the Oval. A serious back injury cost him his place however, he missed most of the 1981–82 season and was forced into premature retirement. In 64 first-class

First-class cricket

First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

matches he scored a total of 3567 runs at 36.03 with a best of 171 against Tasmania. He was a fine slip catcher, taking 60 catches in all.