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Richie Benaud  

Richie Benaud

May 26, 2004
Richie Benaud: 'Unparalleled knowledge and insight' © Getty Images
Richie Benaud, who at Lord's became the first person to watch 500 Test matches as a player or commentator, last night received another honour - a lifetime achievement award from Britain's Royal Television Society.
The award was presented at a dinner at London's Hilton Hotel. Benaud's citation observed: "His broadcasts bring us unparalleled knowledge and insight ... no man is better prepared - never mind the statistician alongside him, providing information, he's already worked out all the information for himself. He also manages to make the modern game as compelling as the old game - every day for this remarkable person is as exciting as the day before."
Benaud, who's now 73, splits his time between Channel 9 in Australia and Channel 4 in England, and his English employers walked off with an award of their own - C4's cricket coverage, produced by Sunset + Vine, was named as the best outside broadcast of 2003, just pipping ITV Sport's coverage of the rugby World Cup.

SICC’s Patron is Richie Benaud, one of cricket’s all-time greats. Now a successful author and television commentator, he is also a leading advocate for The Spirit of Cricket,  the preface to The Laws of Cricket that seeks to rekindle the game’s tradition of fair play and sportsmanship.

Read Richie’s books and interviews and you will see references to his fondness for Sarasota. He knows the area well and visits whenever he can. He opened the club’s pavillion in April 1994.

Career Highlights

In a 1st class career spanning 19 years from 1948 to 1967, Richie scored 11,719 runs and took 945 wickets. He played for Australia 63 times, 28 of them as captain, and never lost a test series as captain. He was the first to achieve the Test Double of 2000 runs and 200 wickets, a feat since equalled by only a handful of players. He is one of only 10 Australians to score 10,000 runs and take 500 wickets.

Benaud in Print

Richie’s surpassing knowledge of and love for cricket is evident in his nine books:

Spin Me A Spinner
The Appeal of Cricket
Willow Patterns
The New Champions
Tale of Two Tests
Way of Cricket
Benaud on Reflection
Anything but.....AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY
MY SPIN ON CRICKET