NEWS

Cricket Legend John Crawley Joins Magdalen College School, Oxford

Magdalen College School is delighted to announce the appointment of a new Head of Cricket from February 2012. John Crawley will be joining the school’s ever-growing team of sports professionals and working alongside Phillip DeFreitas (former England international cricketer), Tevita Vaikona (Saracens and former Tongan rugby international), Todd Williams (former Australian hockey international) and others.

John had a long and distinguished career as a professional cricketer. Over the course of 20 years he captained Lancashire, Hampshire, Cambridge, Combined Universities and England A – in all he has 50 Caps for England (37 tests and 13 ODIs). As well as his time on the field, John has supported the game in numerous other ways. He serves on the MCC Youth cricket subcommittee, as mentor to Cambridge MCCU and has been part of the Marlborough College High Performance Group, which is involved in mentoring and supporting the College’s sports scholars. John also has an enviable academic pedigree: he was educated at Manchester Grammar School and then read History at Trinity College, Cambridge. He will be working with the school’s History department alongside his time with MCS’s cricketers.

John joins MCS from Marlborough College where he was Director of the Marlborough Association – developing the College’s external relations and communications activities – and where he worked with cricketers in the school at all levels, from younger age groups to the First XI.

Master Dr Tim Hands said “John Crawley is a cricketer – and a person – of the highest calibre. All cricket fans will remember with pleasure and admiration the way he dedicated his century against India to the memory of his mother. Modern sportsmen too often have time for little else. But John, in a great tradition that goes back through Atherton and Brearley, has always been an intellectual as well as a cricketer. We believe the school gets the results it does because of, not despite, its emphasis on extracurricular achievement. So John’s appointment is wonderful news.”

James Hodgson, Fellow Cambridge Blue and Usher at MCS, added “We’re delighted to be able to offer John the opportunity to be involved with History again, and hope to be able to provide a launch pad for an equally rewarding second career for him. The pupils here will be extremely fortunate to learn from his wide ranging experience.”