Remembering Ken Shuttleworth
We are very sorry to hear of the passing of the former Lancashire and England fast bowler Ken Shuttleworth who recently passed away peacefully.
Ken was a tall, strongly built, fearsome right-handed bowler, was born in St Helens. He joined Lancashire in 1964 and captured the wicket of Geoff Boycott as his first wicket. He was a genuine fast bowler with his long run and magnificent side-on action and provided good support for Brian Statham. In 1968 he took 65 first-class wickets, at Leyton taking 7-41. Two years later he took 74 wickets averaging just over 21.
He toured Pakistan with the Commonwealth Team in 1967/8 under the captaincy of Richie Benaud. He played for England v Rest of the World at Lord’s and was chosen to go to Australia with Ray Illingworth’s Ashes winning side and took 5-47 at Brisbane. Lancashire’s success in the one-day game in the 1970s was aided by his accurate short spells. He took 5-13 at Trent Bridge in 1972 including the wicket of Gary Sobers.
He also had some rewarding days as a flamboyant hard-hitting tail-end batsman before transferring via Leicestershire to league cricket in Staffordshire. He took 484 wickets for Lancashire averaging 22.92 in 177 matches. After a few years in business he returned to the game as a first-class umpire for a number of years.
He was inducted into Lancashire’s Hall of Fame and was a regular visitor to Emirates Old Trafford coming to many of the matches with his wife Barbara and daughters Sara and Hannah.
Ken will be greatly missed with his dry sense of humour, modesty and his great love of Lancashire Cricket, a place that had so many happy memories for him.
Our thoughts are with his wife Barbara and daughters Sara and Hannah at this time.
Rev Malcolm Lorimer