Martin Paul Bicknell (born 14 January 1969) is a former English

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

er. He played in four Test matches, with the last two, against

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

in 2003, coming ten years after the first two in the 1993 Ashes series. England had played 114 matches between his appearances, a record. He was considered most unlucky to be constantly overlooked for selection in home Test matches when constantly proving himself a prolific wicket taker in county cricket. He was a very effective medium-fast swing and seam bowler who reached one thousand first-class

wickets In the sport of cricket, the term wicket has several meanings: * It is either of the two sets of three stumps and two bails at each end of the pitch. The fielding team's players can hit the wicket with the ball in a number of ways to get a ...

for his county,

Surrey Surrey () is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Greater London to the northeast, Kent to the east, East Sussex, East and West Sussex to the south, and Hampshire and Berkshire to the wes ...

, in 2005, having achieved the milestone in all first-class matches the previous year. In 2000 he had match figures of 16-119 for Surrey against

Leicestershire Leicestershire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It is bordered by Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire to the north, Rutland to the east, Northamptonshire to the south-east, Warw ...

Guildford Guildford () is a town in west Surrey, England, around south-west of central London. As of the 2011 census, the town has a population of about 77,000 and is the seat of the wider Borough of Guildford, which had around inhabitants in . The nam ...

, the second best match figures ever returned for the county. His figures in the second innings were 9-47. His best innings figures were 9-45, against

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

The Oval The Oval, currently named for sponsorship reasons as the Kia Oval, is an international cricket ground in Kennington, located in the borough of Lambeth, in south London. The Oval has been the home ground of Surrey County Cricket Club sinc ...

in 1988. He was also an increasingly useful tail-end batsman, verging on

all-rounder An all-rounder is a cricketer who regularly performs well at both batting and bowling. Although all bowlers must bat and quite a handful of batsmen do bowl occasionally, most players are skilled in only one of the two disciplines and are cons ...

status, with three first-class centuries to his name and an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

of 24.87. His brother Darren Bicknell was a sound county batsman formerly with Surrey and finishing his career with

Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated ''Notts.'') is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. The county is bordered by South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. Th ...

. Bicknell lives in Churt, Farnham, He is married to Sarah, and has four children: Ellie, Charlotte, Mia-May and Millie-Coco. Bicknell was a

Wisden Cricketer of the Year The ''Wisden'' Cricketers of the Year are cricketers selected for the honour by the annual publication ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', based "primarily for their influence on the previous English season". The award began in 1889 with the naming ...

in 2001. He made his first-class debut in 1986. Having initially intended to cease playing at the end of the 2006 season, he was struck by a series of niggling injuries which forced him to announce an earlier retirement from first-class cricket on 9 August 2006, moving on to take up a post at

Charterhouse School Charterhouse is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) in Godalming, Surrey, England. Founded by Thomas Sutton in 1611 on the site of the old Carthusian monastery in Charter ...

as the Master in Charge of Cricket. His autobiography, ''Bickers''. was published in 2008.Entry for ''Bickers'' on Amazon
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* {{DEFAULTSORT:Bicknell, Martin 1969 births Living people England One Day International cricketers England Test cricketers English cricketers Cricketers from Guildford Surrey cricketers Wisden Cricketers of the Year Test and County Cricket Board Under-25s XI cricketers First-Class Counties Select XI cricketers 20th-century English sportsmen