Bill Voce
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 England (ENG) |
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| Batting style | Right-hand bat | |
| Bowling type | Left-arm fast-medium | |
| Tests | First-class | |
| Matches | 27 | 426 |
| Runs scored | 308 | 7590 |
| Batting average | 13.39 | 19.21 |
| 100s/50s | -/1 | 4/26 |
| Top score | 66 | 129 |
| Balls bowled | 6360 | 85500 |
| Wickets | 98 | 1558 |
| Bowling average | 27.88 | 23.08 |
| 5 wickets in innings | 3 | 84 |
| 10 wickets in match | 2 | 20 |
| Best bowling | 7/70 | 8/30 |
| Catches/stumpings | 15/- | 288/- |
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Test debut: 11 January 1930 |
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William Voce (8 August 1909, Annesley Woodhouse, Nottinghamshire, England - 6 June 1984, Lenton, Nottinghamshire) was an English cricket player. He played for the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club and the English cricket team, and was an instrumental part of England's infamous Bodyline tour of Australia in 1932-1933.
Voce was a left-arm fast bowler from a working class background in the coal-mining districts around Nottingham. His first-class cricket career began in 1927 with Nottinghamshire. In 1929 he was selected for the English tour of the West Indies and made his Test debut in the first Test at Bridgetown, Barbados, on 11 January, 1930.
Following Australia's tour of England in the summer of 1930, when Don Bradman scored freely against the English bowling, Voce was part of a meeting convened between future English captain Douglas Jardine and Nottinghamshire captain Arthur Carr to come up with a tactic to defeat Bradman and the Australians. Voce and his fellow Nottinghamshire fast bowler Harold Larwood agreed to a suggestion by Jardine that bowling fast rising balls into the batsmen's bodies, with several catching fielders on the leg side would be an effective tactic. Over the next two years, Voce and Larwood practised this modified form of leg theory for Nottinghamshire, causing severe problems for opposing batsmen.
For the 1932-1933 English tour of Australia, Larwood and Voce were both named in the side to be captained by Jardine. The bowlers implemented Jardine's tactic, bowling fast and short at the Australian batsmen, with Voce inflicting several bruising injuries. The Australian media dubbed the tactic Bodyline. This resulted in severe ill-feeling between the cricket teams, and the countries. (See Bodyline for details.
Although he was somewhat slower than Larwood, his line, from left-arm over the wicket, and the steeper bounce that he obtained from his height, made him formidable enough and the batsmen got no relief when facing him. His job in that 1932-33 series was to maintain the pressure and he did it nobly, taking, besides, fifteen wickets in four matches.
Quite Ironically Wasim Akram with Waqar Younis used a similar strategy to great effect against England, New Zealand and Zimbabwe during 1992-1993.
Following the Bodyline series, Voce negotiated the minefield of political fallout within English cricket and continued playing for England both before and after the hiatus enforced by World War II. He was named a Wisden Cricketer of the Year for 1933. He played his last Test match against Australia at Melbourne in 1947. Right up to his death in 1984, Voce was reluctant to discuss the Bodyline series.
Voce played 27 Test matches, scoring 308 runs at an average of 13.39, and taking 98 wickets at an average of 27.88.However, even though he toured Australia three times, he never played for England against Australia in England.
