Eric Bryant

Who was Eric Bryant?

Leonard Eric Bryant, born at Weston-super-Mare, Somerset on 2 June 1936 and died at Brent Knoll, Somerset on 28 November 1999, played first-class cricket for Somerset between 1958 and 1960.

A left-handed lower order batsman and a slow left-arm spin bowler whose action was allegedly modelled on that of Tony Lock, Bryant played 15 matches for the Somerset side that finished third in the County Championship in 1958, equalling the best-ever finish by the county to that time. He took only 25 wickets, but that included five in an innings – five for 64 – against Worcestershire to win the match where Australian Colin McCool made his highest score in English cricket. Wisden noted that Bryant "showed promise".

However, he played only a handful matches in the drier summer of 1959 and in his first first-class game of 1960, against Gloucestershire at Bath, he was no-balled five times by umpire Hugo Yarnold for throwing. Though he reappeared in two further matches that summer without incident, he was not re-engaged by Somerset at the end of the season and did not appear again in first-class cricket.