Graham Thorpe, who has died aged 55, was the finest England middle-order batsman of his era, a nuggety left-hander who made a century on his debut against a strong Australian attack and who was as adept against spin as he was pace. He played in 100 Test matches and, but for back trouble and the emergence of Kevin Pietersen, would have remained an international cricketer for longer. Although a technically sound batsman brought up on true pitches at the Oval, Thorpe did not fit into the mould of classic England stroke-makers.
He might well have been drawn to football, for he was talented enough to represent England under-18s. His character was more complicated than his batting and he could be truculent, and sometimes suffered from depression, yet he was also single-minded and fearless. When Wisden named Thorpe as one of its five cricketers of the year in 1998, he was described as having the face and demeanour of a poker player.
“The eyes say nothing, the straight-set mouth betrays no emotion. He does not believe in small talk. Yet the runs have piled up in front of him like piles of chips.
” Indeed they did, for he finished his career with an aggregate of 6,744 in Test cricket at the highly respectable average of 44.66. He struck 16 hundreds.
But some questioned his commitment to the esprit de corps. In the harsh opinion of Mike Gatting, at the time an England selector, “Graham Thorpe only brings runs to the table.” Dispirited and run down, Thorpe excused himself from a .