University graduate helps secure cricket success

Stephen Moore and Paul Horton both hit half centuries. The pair shared an opening stand of 131 inside 17 overs, passing their 1,000 runs for the season in the process. 

Moore joined Lancashire in the autumn of 2009 after leaving Worcestershire, where he spent a prolific seven seasons. The right-handed four day opener and one day No.3 was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, but moved to England with his English parents at the age of 18.

Moore has scored just over 11,035 career runs in all forms of cricket, with 7,228 of them coming in the first class arena. He will be the first to admit that 2009 was not his best season – he only scored 738 runs in the County Championship for Worcestershire – after scoring 1,451 in first class cricket in 2008. But he scored a memorable 120 against Australia in a friendly for England Lions at New Road, and it prompted the England selectors and their performance director David Parsons to name his as one of their A grade players in the ECB’s Performance Programme squad for the winter of 2009/10.Moore said that he lost his consistency in ‘09, but there were patches when he demonstrated great strides of improvement. No doubt the 107 he scored against Lancashire at Old Trafford in the Championship made a big impression. 2010, his first at Old Trafford, would have definitely provided a mixture of emotions for the player. He scored two brilliant hundreds in 40-over cricket, one against Surrey at Whitgift School and the other against his former county on his return to New Road.

Moore is a keen saxophonist and guitarist, while his wife is also a singer. Given time, Moore will surely add quality and steel to Lancashire’s top order in all forms of the game.