Colin Herbert Dredge (born 4 August 1954) is an English former
first-class cricket
First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is of three or more days scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officially adju ...
er who played for
Somerset County Cricket Club
Somerset County Cricket Club is one of eighteen first-class cricket, first-class county cricket, county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the Historic counties of England, historic county of Somer ...
. He was known as the "Demon of Frome", a nickname coined by journalist,
Alan Gibson.
Colin Dredge made his debut for Somerset on 16 June 1976 against Worcester and was awarded his Somerset Cap in 1978. He made useful contributions as a regular for the County side until 1986. He played 194 first-class matches and 209 one-day matches, including 4 one-day finals, winning the
Benson & Hedges Cup in 1981 and 1982 and the
Nat West Trophy in 1983. Dredge was not selected for the final of the
Gillette Cup in 1979, but played the following day in the crucial win over Nottinghamshire which clinched the
John Player League . For much of his career he was overshadowed by Test bowlers
Joel Garner,
Ian Botham and
Vic Marks, but he did win one man-of -the-match award by taking 4-23 against Kent in the 1978 Gillette Cup quarter-final. In 3-day matches he took over 50 wickets in a season 4 times, including 63 in 1980 when he took 5 wickets in an innings on 5 occasions. Batting as a tailender, he made 4 scores over 50 and he took 84 catches.
Dredge was involved in the extremely close finish to the
John Player League in 1976 when he was run out on the final delivery of the last match of the season, going for the run that would have won Somerset a first major trophy.
Luck and a helicopter
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Dredge had seven brothers, all of whom played for Frome. He still lives in the town, working in Westbury for Network Rail.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Dredge, Colin (Cricketer)
1954 births
People from Frome
English cricketers
Somerset cricketers
Living people
Cricketers from Somerset
20th-century English sportsmen