Yorkshire’s 15-year-old wicketkeeper, Barney Gibson, became the youngest player to have played first-class cricket in England when he made his debut against Durham University yesterday.
The youngster broke a 144-year-old record which was previously held by Charles Young when he was selected by Hampshire to play first-class cricket at the age of 15 years and 131 days.
Gibson, who is still in school, expressed his excitement on breaking the unique record and said that he is happy to be playing for Yorkshire’s first team. He added that he was a little shaky for the initial part of the game but settled his nerves pretty soon.
He said, "It feels excellent to have gone into the history books. I was astonished when I heard I was playing for the first team and I just thought, 'Right it's time to step up to the mark’. For the first couple of overs I felt a bit shaky, but then I just tried to be myself and do what I normally do, just stand there and catch it.”
Yorkshire’s Director of Cricket, Martyn Moxon, also praised his young wicketkeeper and said that his county believes in giving opportunities to the younger players if they are good enough and Gibson has proved that he belongs at this level of the sport.
Moxon said that Gibson took a brilliant catch to open his account in first-class cricket and a wicketkeeper of any level would have been proud of that effort. He added that Gibson has never kept wickets against bowlers of this pace before but he has been outstanding and the best part about him is that he is mentally very mature.
"We like to give our young players a chance, but they have to be good enough and Barney's proved he's good enough at this moment in time. His first catch today was outstanding and would have been a good catch for a keeper of any age. He'll not have kept to that kind of pace very much, but he's not fazed by the occasion or the publicity he's now getting. For someone so young he's very level-headed," Moxon said.
