The ‘cricket and other insects’ quiz: Which England cricketer was nicknamed ‘The Cockroach’ by the Australians?

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When South Africa won a Test in England for the first time, in 1935, the star was Xen Balaskas, a leg-spinner of Greek origin. His nine Tests would fetched him only 22 wickets, but nine of them came in the 1935 Lord’s Test. While he bowled brilliantly, he was aided by an invasion by leatherjackets (crane flies) that left the pitch bone dry. South Africa won the toss, and that was that. It was perhaps the most significant impact caused by insects in a Test match.

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Cricket has had myriad rendezvous with insects. Australia won the Nagpur Test of 2004/05 to clinch their only (till date) Test series win in India since 1969/70. When Australia captain Adam Gilchrist found a cockroach in his soy sauce ahead of the Test, the restaurant manager quickly swallowed it “as if to destroy the evidence”. Gilchrist later commented that “he took one for the team.”

Not all encounters have been happy: in 1932, for example, former Surrey captain Kingsmill Key died of blood poisoning from an insect bite – a rare fate for a first-class cricketer.

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Despite sharing its name with an insect, cricket’s etymology has nothing to do with entomology. Take our quiz to test your knowledge on the sports’s myriad encounters with insects.

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Quiz! How well do you know cricket and other insects?

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