Mike Procter, cricketing all-rounder who lost out to apartheid but led Gloucestershire to glory – obituary

Mike Procter on his teammates’ shoulders at Lord’s after Gloucestershire’s victory against Kent in the 1977 Benson & Hedges Cup final – Ken Kelly/Popperfoto

Mike Procter, the cricketer, who has died aged 77, was one of the finest all-rounders of any generation, a bustling fast bowler and hard-hitting middle-order batsman who might have achieved even greater fame during his peak in the 1970s but for the fact that his team, South Africa, were banned for 20 years from the international game.

Procter was outstanding in seven Test matches for his country before its apartheid policies led to prohibition in 1970. But unlike some of his South African contemporaries he did not succumb to bitterness, boredom or disillusionment as a result of his exclusion from the very top level of cricket.

Instead he took the more rounded view that his misfortune was a minor one when measured against the toll taken on ordinary lives by the racist laws of South Africa, later arguing that the forfeiture of a career in Test cricket was nothing “compared to the great suffering of 40 million people”.

Procter on his way to making 101 for Gloucestershire in the Gillette Cup semi-final against Worcestershire in 1973 – Patrick Eagar/Popperfoto

Harnessing that spirit of acceptance, Procter was able to concentrate on the alternative path of becoming a leading light in English county cricket, in which he excelled for Gloucestershire from 1965 to 1981, helping them to win the Gillette Cup in 1973 and the Benson & Hedges Trophy in 1977, by which time he had become club captain.

In the English winters he played variously for Natal, Western Province and Orange Free state, and had a six-year period with Rhodesia in the Currie Cup from 1970 to 1976, while in lieu of international cricket there were appearances in unofficial Tests for a Rest of the World XI in 1970 and a World XI in Kerry Packer’s World Series.

Possessed of an awkward, open-chested delivery stride that made him look as if he was bowling off the “wrong” foot, Procter could be devastatingly effective as a fiercely quick opening bowler, as his first-class career average of 19.53 attested. He was also a dangerous attacking batsman who was well suited to one-day cricket, although he was just as capable of doing great damage in the longer form of the game, as he did when scoring six consecutive first-class centuries, joining Don Bradman and CB Fry as one of only three players to have done so, for Rhodesia in 1971.

Aside from his great individual talents, Procter’s overriding strength was his commitment to the team effort. A rare cricketer who was genuinely disinterested in averages and personal landmarks, he derived his biggest satisfaction from winning, whatever his personal contribution to a match may have been.

Michael John Procter was born on September 15 1946 in Durban to Woodrow Procter, who had played cricket for Eastern Province before the Second World War, and Lorraine. At Hilton boarding school in Natal he initially shone as a wicketkeeper-batsman until he was persuaded to take up bowling, a move that led to his selection for the South African schools side, of which he was vice captain to the soon-to-be-great batsman Barry Richards on a tour to England in 1963.

Two years later he and Richards were signed up by Gloucestershire, making their first-team debuts as teenagers that year against the touring South Africans, although they both spent the rest of the time in the Second XI. Procter was taken on as Gloucestershire’s designated overseas professional in 1968, while Richards went to Hampshire.

Procter in 1977 during his hat-trick spell against Hampshire in the Benson & Hedges Cup semi-final – Patrick Eagar/Popperfoto

By then Procter had already made his Test debut, as a 20-year-old, in the third Test of South Africa’s home series against Australia. He was his side’s top wicket-taker in that match with seven dismissals, and retained his place for the final two Tests of the series, grabbing a further eight wickets, though doing little with the bat.

His next four Tests were also at home against Australia, in early 1970, and this time his batting caught up with his bowling; he finished the series with 26 wickets at an average of 13.57 and scored 209 runs at 54.85, prompting him to be chosen as one of Wisden’s Cricketers of the Year.

The curtain came down on South Africa’s international participation immediately after that series, and though Procter played five games later in the year for a strong Rest of the World XI, hastily assembled for a five-match summer tour of England in South Africa’s absence, thereafter he was forced to turn his attention to less exalted forms of cricket.

Applying himself assiduously to that task, in the South African domestic game he became the only man to twice make more than 500 runs and take 50 wickets in a season, in 1971–72 and then 1972–73 for Rhodesia. But it was with Gloucestershire – sometimes referred to as “Proctershire” in recognition of his overwhelming influence there – that he made the biggest impact and won the greatest popularity.

Described by the former Hampshire and England captain Mark Nicholas as “colourful, swashbuckling and undeniably lovable”, over 13 years with the county Procter was involved in a long string of notable performances – among them a century and a hat-trick on the same day in two matches, against Essex in 1972 and Leicestershire in 1979; an innings of 109 not out in a total of 135 in the 40-over John Player League in 1974; a hat-trick of LBWs against Yorkshire in 1979; a century before lunch and 13 wickets for 73 runs against Warwickshire in 1977; and, as captain in the same year, four wickets in five balls against Hampshire in a Benson and Hedges Cup semi-final that set his team up for their victory in that competition.

He finished with Gloucestershire in 1981, and the following year, despite having come to terms with the reality of South Africa’s ban, agreed to play for an unofficial South Africa team in six matches against a touring English rebel XI led by Graham Gooch. His participation in another unsanctioned venture, the World Series in Australia, had come three years earlier in 1978-79.

For a time Procter continued to play for Natal, where he became director of cricket, before joining Northamptonshire as their coach in 1991, overseeing a NatWest Trophy final win in his second year. He was then South Africa’s coach on their return to the international fold, helping them to the semi-finals of the 1992 World Cup.

Procter in the commentary box in 1998 – Patrick Eagar/Popperfoto

After some commentating on television, he worked as a match referee in 162 one-day internationals and 47 Tests, including the 2006 Oval Test between England and Pakistan, when the tourists refused to take the field after tea in protest at the umpires’ decision to penalise them for ball-tampering.

He was also at the centre of a bruising controversy in Australia in 2008, when he banned India’s Harbajan Singh for three matches for the alleged use of racist language, only for the decision to be roundly criticised and overturned.

From 2008 to 2010 he was chairman of the South African selectors, after which he dedicated much of his time to setting up and running the Mike Procter Foundation, which focused on using sport to help underprivileged children in his home country.

Mike Procter is survived by his wife, Maryna Godwin, a former professional tennis player whom he married in 1969, and their two daughters and a son.

Mike Procter, born September 15 1946, died 17 February 17 2024

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