Fast bowler Stuart Meaker continued to impress in his third season at Surrey, playing in more than half the county’s Championship matches and taking 28 wickets at 32.00, a really good return for a
side which struggled throughout.
Starting the summer in the 2nd XI, he took 12 for 156 against Middlesex and then smashed 150 off 199 balls against Somerset. Recalled to the 1st XI, he took a career-best 5 for 48 against Gloucestershire at The Oval, prompting Derek Pringle to write in the Daily Telegraph: “He is an eager 21-year-old with the physique and strut of a scrum-half … and he banged the ball in short at a fair lick and then, when he felt he had got the batsmen playing back, he fired it into the blockhole.”
An injury briefly sidelined him, but he returned and held down a place for the rest of the summer, taking a second five-for against Glamorgan in September.