William Brazier
William Brazier was an English cricketer of the late 18th century. He was an all-rounder who batted right-handed. Using an underarm action, he was a right arm fast bowler. He played mostly for Kent. Brazier also played for Surrey, England, and various ad hoc teams. He was born at Cudham, Kent village north-west of Sevenoaks.
Cricket career
Brazier is first mentioned in sources when he played for Kent against Hampshire at Sevenoaks Vine in 1774. He was then either 18 or 19 years old. He appeared frequently from then until 1776 but, apart from one single wicket match in 1777, he was not recorded again until 1782. Brazier continued to play frequently until 1790. After that, there is only a single appearance in 1794.Brazier's recorded career spanned the 1774 to 1794 seasons, and he is known to have played in more than sixty matches. The exact number cannot be computed because of missing or incomplete match scorecards. The CricketArchive database, for example, lists 54 but their collection is limited to those matches from which they have a scorecard on the database, and there are more matches without scorecards in which Brazier is known to have played. Using CricketArchive's fifty matches, Brazier scored 1,216 runs in these with a highest score of 79, and took 42 wickets with a best performance of five in one innings. He held 15 catches.
Brazier played as a given man for Surrey in 1776. He made several appearances for teams called England.
Although Brazier played for a left-handed team in 1790, Scores and Biographies says he was a right-handed batsman who bowled fast and was a powerful hitter. The same source described him as a farmer at Cudham who continued to play village cricket until 1819. He was a "useful all-rounder" who "hit the ball particularly hard", according to Ashley Mote. James Pycroft, writing in 1851, described him as one of Kent's three best players.
Brazier died at Cudham in 1829.