BR at the Ashes – Beard of the Week Cricket Special

Beardrevered has come over all cricket – we’re totally obsessed! According to our new BFF Jonathan Agnew, (@Aggerscricket) cricket is in. That’s right, cricket is fashionable again my dear and to top it off, England have retained the Ashes. You must have heard about THAT (even if you don’t know what it means).

Mind you, that’s only Mr Agnew’s opinion. We thought we’d better carry out our own research to see if this age-old game could really be the craze du jour. More importantly it would be the perfect opportunity to start the crusade for BR’s ultimate bearded cricket player – game on!

With a little help from our fabulous cricket pals, we jumped on the Ashes tour bus and headed north to Manchester for the 3rd test at Old Trafford. We thought we would would start with the current England and Australian teams – there had to be some decent facial hair amongst those virile sportsmen. So how surprised and disappointed were we when we turned up with our camera on training day (hoping to be blown away) and we couldn’t find a single worthy candidate on the pitch; the stubble was virtually non-existent. Thankfully match day made up for the lack of hirsute sportsman and we spotted 1 or 2 worthy attempts in the crowd (see below). We especially revered Gordon’s luscious white beard (as well as his fabulous pink suit). Maybe Aggers has a point there..

So the quest continues and we have made our way to Durham for the 4th Test. We now know we won’t find cricket beard nirvana in the current UK and AUS teams so perhaps we should look back to the past for inspiration – to over a century of cricket’s most famous facial follicles. From W.G. Grace’s flowing masterpiece to Hashim Amla’s contemporary equivalent; Merv Hughes’ handlebarred splendour and the short and neat varieties favoured by Malcolm Marshall and Mike Gatting. Wispy moustaches (but they don’t count really) sported by both Jack Russell and Graham Gooch and finally Inzamam-ul-Haq and Curtly Ambrose complete the magnificent set.

No surprises to say our prize (but just for today, mind you) goes to Mr Grace whose beard is described by The Cordon’s Matt Cleary as Cricket’s greatest beard. This large lump of England looked equal parts Ned Kelly after a diet of turkey fat and beer, and Cuban leader Fidel Castro. A colossus of the game, WG’s beard had the thickness of a wombat, badger or wolverine carcass. Top stuff (see full article here). So…Howzat?

Image Source: Unknown and Beardrevered.com