Jimmy Allan

ALLAN, JAMES MOFFAT, who died in April 2005, aged 73, was regarded as the best all-rounder Scotland ever produced. Jimmy Allan made a sensational start to first-class cricket, returning figures of 7-7-0-1 on his debut for Oxford University against Yorkshire in 1953; five of the maidens were to Len Hutton. The following week, against Australia, he dismissed Keith Miller and Ian Craig in his opening over, and it was not until his fourth of the day - his 11th in first-class cricket - that someone finally hit a run off him. Allan's team-mate Colin Cowdrey recommended him to Kent and, in 1955, while still an undergraduate, he came close to the double, scoring two centuries at Northampton. He gained a Blue every year between 1953 and 1956, then returned north. For the next decade he played most of his cricket for Edinburgh Academicals (later for Ayr) and Scotland, before joining Warwickshire for three seasons in the mid-1960s. Allan was a very gifted slow left-arm bowler with clever variations of pace; as a batsman, he was determined rather than brilliant. In 60 matches for Scotland, he never scored a century, though he ran out of partners on 99 against the 1965 New Zealanders and took 11 for 123 in the match against the 1971 Pakistanis.
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack