Colin Reid Miller (born 6 February 1964) is an Australian former
cricketer
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...
who played 18
Tests
Test(s), testing, or TEST may refer to:
* Test (assessment), an educational assessment intended to measure the respondents' knowledge or other abilities
Arts and entertainment
* ''Test'' (2013 film), an American film
* ''Test'' (2014 film), ...
for Australia between 1998 and 2001. In May 2002, Miller announced his retirement from cricket.
Miller was a bowler capable of performing effectively either as a right-arm
fast-medium or
off break
Off spin is a type of finger spin bowling in cricket. A bowler who uses this technique is called an off spinner. Off spinners are right-handed spin bowlers who use their fingers to spin the ball. Their normal delivery is an off break, which sp ...
bowler and achieved a Test average of 26.15. A
tailend batsman who made three fifties in 126
first-class matches, he is particularly remembered for appearing with his hair dyed blue in a Test match against the
West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Great ...
in 2001.
Playing career
Born in
Footscray,
Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a me ...
, Miller played two games for Victoria in 1985–86, but unable to command a regular place in the state team he moved to South Australia, where he played from 1988–89 to 1991–92. He then moved to Tasmania, where he played from 1992–93 to 1999–2000, before returning to Victoria for 2000–01 and 2001–02. In the 1997–98 season he took 70 wickets at 24.98, including his best innings figures of 7 for 49, when he bowled unchanged throughout Victoria's second innings.
Miller began as a right-arm fast-medium bowler, but changed to right-arm offbreak spin after an ankle injury. He mixed both styles with considerable success, and was a surprise addition to the Australian Test team at the age of 34, being able to act both as the second spin bowler and the third
pace bowler. He played Test cricket principally as an off-spinner, and took 69 wickets at an average of 26.15. His best innings and match figures came in the Third Test against West Indies in Adelaide in 2000–01, when he took 5 for 81 and 5 for 32. He won the award for the
Australian Test Player of the Year in 2001.
He toured England with Australia A in 1998, then toured Pakistan with the senior Australian side in 1998–99, making his Test debut. He also toured West Indies, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, New Zealand, India and England with the Test team.
He played with blue hair in a Test match against the
West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Great ...
in 2001. His hair apparently made West Indies captain
Courtney Walsh
Courtney Andrew Walsh OJ (born 30 October 1962) is a former Jamaican cricketer who represented the West Indies from 1984 to 2001, captaining the West Indies in 22 Test matches. He is a fast bowler and considered one of the all-time greats, bes ...
laugh.
He retired from
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 one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officia ...
in 2002.
Miller played for
Chorley Cricket Club as the Pro in 1986,
Rawtenstall
Rawtenstall () is a town in the borough of Rossendale, Lancashire, England. The town lies 15 miles/24 km north of Manchester, 22 miles/35 km east of Preston and 45 miles/70 km south east of the county town of Lancaster. The town is at the cent ...
in the
Lancashire League in 1990 and 1991, finishing 1990 with 1078 runs and 100 wickets and 1991 with 780 runs and 108 wickets. During the 1997 and 1998 (European) summers, Miller played in the Netherlands for HCC Rood en Wit () and apart from taking many wickets was also very successful with the bat.
Coaching career
He coached the Katandra Cricket Club in the
Shepparton
Shepparton () ( Yortayorta: ''Kanny-goopna'') is a city located on the floodplain of the Goulburn River in northern Victoria, Australia, approximately north-northeast of Melbourne. As of the 2021 census, the estimated population of Sheppart ...
Cricket Association in 2004–05. He was short listed for the job of
Bangladesh
Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million pe ...
's head coach following the
2007 Cricket World Cup
The 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup was the ninth Cricket World Cup, a One Day International (ODI) cricket tournament that took place in the West Indies from 13 March to 28 April 2007. There were a total of 51 matches played, three fewer than at the ...
but he was later ruled out of the position.
In 2013,
USACA
The United States of America Cricket Association (USACA), headquartered at Miami Beach, was the national governing body for all cricket in the United States, until it was replaced by USA Cricket in 2019. The board was formed in 1965.
USACA ...
chief executive
Darren Beazley announced Miller as a USACA ambassador for cricket. In 2004, he was one of several former international cricketers to sign up and play in Pro Cricket, a Twenty20 domestic professional league in the USA that folded after one season.
Statistics
References
External links
*
Colin Miller at CricketArchive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, Colin
1964 births
Living people
Australia Test cricketers
South Australia cricketers
Tasmania cricketers
Victoria cricketers
Australian expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Australian cricketers
Cricketers from Melbourne
People from Footscray, Victoria
Australian expatriate cricketers
Australian expatriate sportspeople in the Netherlands
Australian expatriate sportspeople in England