Steven John Mullaney (born 19 November 1986) is an English retired

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 best known for his time playing for, and captaining,

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 ...

. During his 18 year career he also played for

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...

and

Trent Rockets Trent Rockets are a franchise 100-ball cricket side based in the city of Nottingham. The team represents the Historic counties of England, historic counties of Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire in the newly founded The Hundred (cri ...

along with representing England at the

2006 Under-19 Cricket World Cup The 2006 ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup was played in Sri Lanka from 2 to 15 February 2006. It was the sixth edition of the Under-19 Cricket World Cup. The final was played between Pakistan and India in Colombo, which Pakistan won by 38 runs, e ...

Early career and youth internationals

Born in

Warrington Warrington () is an industrial town in the Borough of Warrington, borough of the same name in Cheshire, England. The town sits on the banks of the River Mersey and was Historic counties of England, historically part of Lancashire. It is east o ...

, Cheshire, Mullaney joined Lancashire in 2003. Along with Karl Brown, Steven Croft, and Tom Smith he was part of the first intake of Lancashire's cricket academy. Between 2005 and 2006, Mullaney played two Youth

Test matches Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to: * Test cricket * Indoor cricket, Test match (indoor cricket) * Test match (rugby union) * Test match (rugby league) * Test match (associa ...

. He debuted on 2 February 2005; playing for England U-19s for India U-19s, Mullaney bowled 8 overs for 42 runs in the match and scored 29

not out In cricket, a batsman is not out if they come out to bat in an innings and have not been dismissed by the end of an innings. The batsman is also ''not out'' while their innings is still in progress. Occurrence At least one batter is not out at ...

(29*) and 14, batting at number six in the first

innings An innings is one of the divisions of a cricket match during which one team takes its turn to bat. Innings also means the period in which an individual player bats (acts as either striker or nonstriker). In cricket and rounders, "innings" is ...

and number five in the second. England lost the match by an innings and 137 runs. His second and final Test was in July 2006 and also against India U-19s. He scored 0 and 31, both times batting at seven, and conceded 43 runs from 11 overs. He finished the tournament as England's leading wicket-taker, from 5 matches he took 9 wickets at an average of 15.11. Also between 2005 and 2006, Mullaney played 15 Youth

One Day International One Day International (ODI) is a format of cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of fifty overs, with the game lasting up to 7 hours. The World Cup, generally held every four yea ...

s. In that time, he scored 169 runs at 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 16.90, with a highest score of 40, and took 10

wicket In the sport of cricket, the term wicket has several meanings: * It is either of the two sets of three Stump (cricket), stumps and two Bail (cricket), bails at each end of the Cricket pitch, pitch. The Fielding (cricket), fielding team's playe ...

s at an

of 29.40 and best bowling figures of 3 wickets for 26 runs (3/26). During his time in the team, Mullaney took part in the 2006 U-19 World Cup. He had been dropped from the squad after a tour of Sri Lanka in December 2005, but was selected to play in the World Cup in February 2006 after England had a winless tour of Bangladesh.

Lancashire

Mullaney made his first-class, list A, and

Twenty20 Twenty20 (abbreviated T20) is a shortened format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the county cricket, inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two t ...

debuts for Lancashire in 2006. His first team cricket with Lancashire in 2006–2009 was limited, and in that time he played 4 first-class matches, 7 list A matches, and three Twenty20 matches. In April 2007, Mullaney scored his maiden first-class

century A century is a period of 100 years or 10 decades. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word ''century'' comes from the Latin ''centum'', meaning ''one hundred''. ''Century'' is sometimes abbreviated as c. ...

. Playing against

Durham University Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament (UK), Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by r ...

, his innings of 165

(165*) came at quicker than a run a ball and allowed Lancashire to win the match. His first hundred runs came off 92 balls and the next 65 from 26 and included 10

sixes Sixes, home to approximately 14,540, is an unincorporated community in western Cherokee County, Georgia, United States, located about three miles west of Holly Springs and near the eastern shore of current-day Lake Allatoona. The community i ...

. It beat his previous highest score of 44. In the 2007 cricket season, Mullaney played for

Northern Cricket Club The Northern Cricket Club, located in Crosby, Merseyside, Crosby on north Merseyside, England, was founded in 1859. The original clubhouse was in Rawson Road in nearby Seaforth, Merseyside, Seaforth until 1879, when the club moved to Haigh Road i ...

, in the

Liverpool and District Cricket Competition The Love Lane Liverpool and District Cricket Competition is regarded as the top level of competition for recreational club cricket in the Liverpool area and since 2000 has been a designated ECB Premier League. The Competition operates a three d ...

, averaging 70 with the bat and taking over 30 wickets. After he spent the winter of 2007/08 playing

grade cricket Grade cricket (also known as premier cricket) is the name of the senior inter-club or district cricket competitions in each of the Australian states and territories. The term may refer to: *Victorian Premier Cricket * NSW Premier Cricket * Queens ...

for

McKinnon McKinnon, MacKinnon or Mackinnon is a Scottish surname. ( Gaelic: ''Mac Fhionghain''), Notable people with this surname include: * Allan McKinnon (1917–1990), Canadian politician, MP – Victoria 1972-1988 * Alexander "Alex" McKinnon (1895� ...

in the Victorian Turf Cricket Association, Mullaney signed a professional contract with Atherton Cricket Club in the Bolton Association at the start of the 2008 season. Speaking of his move from Northern to Atherton, Mullaney said "Northern was the turning point in my career, and I have left on really good terms to try and better myself. The league therton play inwill not be quite as good, and the wickets aren't quite as good, but it will be a new challenge" and that "I think getting into the pro-ing side of things is an added pressure – but it is a pressure I am really looking forward to". He set his sights on establishing himself in Lancashire's second team in the 2008 season and then force his way into the first team. In 2009, Mullaney was a regular in the top order of the Lancashire second team which progressed to the final of the

Second XI Championship The Second XI Championship is a season-long cricket competition in England that is competed for by the reserve teams of those county cricket clubs that have first-class status. The competition started in 1959 and has been contested annually eve ...

and the semi-final of the Second XI Trophy.

Nottinghamshire

At the end of the 2009 season he turned down a two-year contract with Lancashire and signed for

. Mullaney won the Nottinghamshire player of the year award in 2013 having moved up to the opening slot in the county championship, scoring two centuries. He also made an average contribution with the ball, in the side's YB40 title-winning side and the t20 team's progression to the quarterfinals. He was appointed club captain on 14 November 2017, replacing the long-serving

Chris Read Christopher Mark Wells Read (born 10 August 1978) is an English former cricketer who was the captain of Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club. He played for the England cricket team in 15 Tests and 36 ODIs. He was a wicket-keeper. Personal life ...

Franchise cricket

In April 2022, he was bought by the

for the 2022 season of The Hundred.

Retirement and move into coaching

Having spent his final season as a player-coach and captaining Nottinghamshire's second XI, Mullaney retired from professional cricket in October 2024, moving into a purely coaching role at the club.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mullaney, Steven 1986 births Living people Cricketers from Warrington English cricketers Lancashire cricketers Nottinghamshire cricketers Nottinghamshire cricket captains North v South cricketers Trent Rockets cricketers English expatriate sportspeople in Australia