Ian Healy

Ian Andrew Healy was a former Australian Cricketer. He doubles as a wicket-keeper and also as a strong middle-order batsman. Healy started his cricket career in 1986-87 by playing first class cricket for Queensland, Australia. He was introduced to the Australian national cricket team in 1988 after playing only 6 first class games.

Healy started slow but excelled greatly during the second half of his career. He was also given the captaincy of the team while Mark Taylor, the regular skipper was injured. He led the Australian team for 8 one-day internationals. Rod Marsh, a very famous wicket-keeper of his time retired in 1984. This created a vacancy in the team which was eventually filled up by Healy. His introduction to the team came as a surprise for everyone, including Healy himself. He improved himself gradually to prove worthy for the admission.

Healy showed his true colors in the following years. He performed well in the 1992-93 series when Australia played against West Indies and New Zealand. He made his debut century in the test series. He also demonstrated his wicket-keeping skills by dismissing 52 batsmen between 1992 and 1993.

The Australian team management decided to omit Healy along with Mark Taylor from the ODI squad in order to form separate teams for test cricket and ODI. Although Healy was still a regular at for Test cricket matches. Healy surpassed Rod Marsh’s record of 355 dismissals in 1998 while playing for Pakistan. Healy dismissed a total of 395 batsmen during his entire career.

He retired from test cricket as well as ODI matches in 1999. After his retirement, Healy started his second career as a commentator and a news presenter for Channel Nine. He also coaches the Somerville House cricket team.

Career Highlights

Selected as the wicket keeper for the Australian Cricket Board cricket team of the 20th century in 1999.

Inducted as the Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1994.

Inducted to the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame in 2008.