Don Bennett

Donald Bennett (18 December 1933 – 12 June 2014) was an English first-class cricketer and footballer.

Background Don Bennett was born in Wakefield, Yorkshire.

As a right-arm fast-medium bowler and right-handed batsman, Bennett played for Middlesex County Cricket Club between 1950 and 1968, appearing in over four-hundred matches. He scored 10,656 runs and took 784 wickets in first-class cricket.

He went on to become a long-serving coach (1969-1997) before he retired after forty-seven years of service to the club.

In retirement, he was elected to the General Committee and also served a term as President.

In football, he joined Arsenal in 1950 as an amateur, and then as a professional a year later. He played as a winger and then fullback for nine years in the second XI.

In 1959 he moved to Coventry City where he made 73 appearances before retiring in 1962.

Mike Brearley, who kept wicket for Bennett in the bowler's later years, recalled him to be a "stylish middle-order batsman and a lithe and athletic fielder."

Cricket career As a cricketer, Bennett made his first-class debut as a sixteen-year-old for Middlesex in 1950. He scored over 1,000 runs in a season in 1953 and 1955, and took 50 wickets in a season seven times. Bennett, who also played for the Marylebone Cricket Club, retired in 1968 and succeeded Jack Robertson as County Coach. He was survived by two sons and his wife, Pat.