Les Hatton (statistician)
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Leslie Walter Hatton (1934 – 28 February 2003) was an English musician and statistician.
Les Hatton was a professional musician. Originally he played clarinet, flute and saxophone with the Royal Artillery band before joining sundry dance bands in the Midlands. He later became a draughtsman and a tooling engineer, although he continued to freelance in jazz clubs and the theatre pits. One of his last gigs was for the Cancer Research Players.
He was the historian and statistician for Worcestershire County Cricket Club. He achieved a national reputation for his mastery of some of the more arcane statistical areas and contributed to Wisden. He served as a committee member of the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians (1978–2003) and marketing manager (1993–1996). He edited the ACS Grounds series and the ACS 2nd XI Annual (1988–2003) to general acclaim. He established himself as the leading Sunday League statistician from the competition's start in 1969. In 1987 he produced a record book for this event to mark the end of John Player's eighteen year sponsorship and he revised this in 1993 when the 40-over format originally ended.
He was honoured by the association with the 1992 ACS Statistician of the Year Award for his work on the Sunday League, Worcestershire cricket and the First-Class Counties 2nd XI cricket.
He was a lifelong supporter of Wolverhampton Wanderers and he was acknowledged to be a mine of information. He was also a member of the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA).
Les Hatton died from cancer in 2003, aged 68. He was well represented at his funeral. He was succeeded by the Gloucestershire scorer Keith Gerrish as editor of the ACS 2nd XI Annual.
