Nicholas Arthur Folland (born 17 September 1963) is a 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 represented

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 ...

between 1992 and 1994. He is now a school headmaster.

Life and career

Nick Folland studied at

Loughborough University Loughborough University (abbreviated as ''Lough'' or ''Lboro'' for Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a public university, public research university in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, England. It has been a university sinc ...

, gaining a BSc and a PGCE. After graduating, he taught young deaf people for three years before joining the staff at

Blundell's School Blundell's School is an Private schools in the United Kingdom, independent co-educational boarding school, boarding and Day school, day school in the English Public School (United Kingdom), public school tradition, located in Tiverton, Devon, T ...

Devon Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...

. Folland came into

county cricket Inter-county cricket matches have been played since the early 18th century, involving teams that are representative of the historic counties of England and Wales. Two county championship competitions have existed since the late 19th century at ...

unusually late; following success at

Minor Counties The National Counties, known as the Minor Counties before 2020, are the cricketing counties of England and Wales that do not have first-class status. The game is administered by the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), which comes unde ...

level with

, he was persuaded by Somerset that he could combine his teaching with a professional cricket career and made his debut in regular first-class cricket in 1992, at the age of 28. He had played one first-class match earlier for the

representative side against the Indian tourists in 1990. Folland went on to play 32 first-class matches and 68 at

List A List A cricket is a classification of the Limited overs cricket, limited-overs (one-day) form of the sport of cricket, with games lasting up to eight hours. List A cricket includes One Day International (ODI) matches and various domestic competit ...

level. The highlight of his career was the two first-class centuries in a match that he made in 1993 against

Sussex Sussex (Help:IPA/English, /ˈsʌsɪks/; from the Old English ''Sūþseaxe''; lit. 'South Saxons'; 'Sussex') is an area within South East England that was historically a kingdom of Sussex, kingdom and, later, a Historic counties of England, ...

. These turned out to be the only two first-class hundreds of his career. He left regular cricket midway through the 1994 season, deciding, according to

Wisden ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "Bible of cricket" (or variations thereof) has been applied to ''Wi ...

, that "regular first-class cricket was not for him". He was the Head of Blundell's preparatory school for ten years. He became Head of St John's on the Hill Preparatory School in

Chepstow Chepstow () is a town and community in Monmouthshire, Wales, adjoining the border with Gloucestershire, England. It is located on the tidal River Wye, about above its confluence with the River Severn, and adjoining the western end of the ...

Monmouthshire Monmouthshire ( ; ) is a Principal areas of Wales, county in the South East Wales, south east of Wales. It borders Powys to the north; the English counties of Herefordshire and Gloucestershire to the north and east; the Severn Estuary to the s ...

, in 2011. From 2015 to 2021, he was Headmaster of Sherborne Prep. His brother, Neil, taught at

Haberdashers' Aske's Boys School Haberdashers' Boys' School (formerly Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School) is a 4–18 boys Independent school (United Kingdom) in Elstree, Hertfordshire, England. It is a member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference. The school wa ...

with his Devon teammate Doug Yeabsley.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Folland, Nick 1963 births English cricketers Somerset cricketers Devon cricketers Living people Minor Counties cricketers Devon cricket captains Cricketers from Bristol Alumni of Loughborough University Heads of schools in England 20th-century English sportsmen