Information Madness

David Shepherd, a great Umpire with hearty frame and smiling, ruddy face of a West Country landlord, who became a formidable adjudicator, who had a sharp eye and an exceptional rapport with the players died on October 27th after a long struggle with cancer.

David Robert Shepherd was born on December 27 1940 at Instow, a village in Devon where his parents ran the post office. The business was eventually passed down to David's older brother in the early 1960s, and until recently Shepherd liked to help out, delivering newspapers whenever he had a break in his hectic sporting itinerary. His wife Jenny observed that "some of our neighbours thought it was funny to see him on the telly one day and then on their doorstep at 6.30am the next".

After attending grammar school in Barnstaple and St Luke's College in Exeter, Shepherd set out on a career as a teacher – an experience that was to inform his expert handling of professional cricketers later in life. He made a belated entry to the first-class game at the age of 25, when his maiden appearance for Gloucestershire produced a rumbustious century against Oxford University.

Overall, Shepherd stood in 92 Test matches and 172 one-day internationals, figures that only the Jamaican Steve Bucknor and the South African Rudi Koertzen have bettered.

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