Tony Pigott’s only Test match, for England, came under most unusual circumstances.
New Zealand had not impressed in the first Test match of the home series of 1983/84. As Ian Botham followed his 5-59 with 138, England secured a 244-run lead. They could not convert it to a win, but should nevertheless have been favourites ahead of the second match.
Unfortunately, the camp was hit by injuries between the games. When Graham Dilley and Neil Foster were both ruled out, the visitors looked for replacements. Tony Pigott, a Sussex fast bowler who was playing for Wellington, was one of two options among English nationals in New Zealand at that point. They chose him over Neil Mallender, who was playing for Otago.
The touring committee reached out to Pigott. The problem was, he was supposed to get married on February 6, the fourth day of the Test. He had to postpone that. Initially optimistic of a Test cap, Pigott had given up hope when he took field for Wellington at Palmerston North. But then came an emergency call, and Pigott left the game and flew out to Christchurch.
They thrust a Test cap at him out of the kitbag, Nick Cook lent him his England sweater, and that was that. Botham provided him with one-size-fits-all strategic inputs: “John Wright, not very good against the short ball – bounce him. Bruce Edgar – outside off stump. Martin Crowe – bounce him. Jeff Crowe – bounce him. And Richard Hadlee – definitely bounce him.”
It was not easy for Pigott, who would often bowl downhill for Sussex. Now, for England, the team management decided that captain Bob Willis and Norman Cowans would bowl downhill, and Botham and Pigott up it. It was not going to be easy, for Pigott was suffering from shin compartment syndrome (“bloody painful for a bowler”), but he did not reveal that. When manager Alan Smith asked him, Pigott assured that he was fit.
“So there I was bowling up the hill into the wind with painful shins,” Pigott told The Telegraph decades later. “But if there had been a brick wall in front of the stumps I would have run through it. Playing for England was so special.”
To be fair, he began well, coming on first-change after Geoff Howarth won the toss and opted to bat. After seven overs, his figures read 2-11 (Edgar and Coney), but now he ran into Hadlee, who tore into the English attack to smash an 81-ball 99. From 137-5, Hadlee lifted New Zealand to 307.
Pigott finished with 2-75. Hadlee took a chunk of the runs he conceded. “Richard loved facing Tony and he smashed him. Poor old Tony kept running in and bowling little outswingers which were coming into the left-handed Richard, and he just hit them,” recalled Coney.
Botham’s attempts to bounce Hadlee did not work either, as Cook later described: “There was no love lost between Botham and Hadlee, and Botham kept trying to bounce him out and of course that didn’t work. Hadlee cut and carved and pulled.”
England finished the day on 7-1. Rain delayed play on the second day. When it resumed, Hadlee broke the top order with a spell of 3-2, leaving England reeling at 10-4. They finished the day on 53-7, and were bowled out for 82 on the third morning as Hadlee, Lance Cairns, and Ewen Chatfield took three wickets apiece.
Howarth enforced the follow-on. This time England did marginally better to reach 93, but that did not prevent them from getting bowled out for two sub-100 scores for the first time since 1894/95. Pigott made four and eight not out.
Hadlee finished with 5-28, which gave him match figures of 35-15-44-8 – an incredible all-round feat even by his standards – surpassing Botham’s heroics in the previous Test. Throughout the decade, they would be compared to Kapil Dev and Pigott’s Sussex teammate Imran Khan.
Willis did not defend his team after the match: “We had the worst of the pitch, but it is no good hiding behind excuses. We played badly throughout the match. Our bowling was some of the worst I have ever seen in Test cricket.”
“This is one of my proudest moments in cricket. Some people might consider it a freak result, but we worked hard for it and once we had England on the hook we refused to let them off,” said Howarth, before announcing “our objective must now be to try and win the series.”
New Zealand fulfilled that objective with a draw in the decider at Auckland.
The second Test had got over the day before Pigott’s scheduled wedding. He did not play another Test, though he came close to picked for the 1986/87 Ashes: England went with Gladstone small instead. He did, however, finish his first-class career with 672 wickets and 4,841 runs. His stint as chief executive at Sussex was marked by some bold decisions. He passed away in 2026.
