Mark Benson

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	Tests	ODIs
Mark Richard Benson England (Eng)
Batting style	Left-hand bat
Bowling type	Right-arm offbreak
Matches	1	1
Runs scored	51	24
Batting average	25.50	24.00
100s/50s	-/-	-/-
Top score	30	24
Balls bowled	N/A	N/A
Wickets	N/A	N/A
Bowling average	N/A	N/A
5 wickets in innings	N/A	N/A
10 wickets in match	N/A	n/a
Best bowling	N/A	N/A
Catches/stumpings	-/-	-/-
As of 1 January 2006 Source: Cricinfo.com

Mark Richard Benson (born 6 July 1958) is a former England cricketer, and now a ICC Elite Panel cricket umpire. Mark is currently the only Elite Panel umpire to have ever played test cricket.

Benson was born in Shoreham-by-Sea, Sussex, England. He played first-class cricket for Kent from 1980 to 1995. He was a left-hand opening batsman, with a career batting average of 40.23. He played for England in one Test match and one one-day international in 1986.

After retiring from playing he became an umpire. He umpired his first first-class match in 1997, and made his international debut in a one-day international between England and the West Indies at Trent Bridge on 27 June 2004. His Test umpiring debut followed in October 2004 when he officiated in the Test between Bangladesh and New Zealand at Dhaka. In January 2006 he officiated seven of the fifteen matches in the VB Series between Australia, South Africa and Sri Lanka in Australia. In April 2006, having stood in eight Tests and twenty-four one-day internationals, Benson was rewarded for his outstanding performance when he became one of three umpires promoted from the Emirates International panel to the Emirates ICC Elite umpire panel, the others being Billy Doctrove and Asad Rauf.

Whilst umpiring the second test between South Africa and India at Durban on 28 December 2006 Benson had to leave the field, after suffering from heart palpatations.^[1]

1 Early life
2 Playing career
3 Umpiring career
4 Umpiring statistics
5 Heart palpitations
6 Trivia
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Early life

Although born in Sussex, Benson spent most of his early years living in West Africa. He had very little opportunity to play cricket or other sports. Mark went to school in England however, boarding at Sutton Valence in Kent between the ages of 14 and 18. Here he developed his talent at sport. Not only cricket, Benson was both a talented rugby and hockey player and was never certain that cricket was his best sport. According to Sutton Valence school books, Benson broke every batting record possible at a school level so attempted a county trial. When 19 he suffered an injury to his knee and most feared that it was the end of his chance to become a professional sportsman, even his knee surgeons. Benson suffered another set back as Sussex told him he was not near a county level of cricket.

[edit] Playing career

Once reaching the Kent first team it did not take long for him to cement his place and in 1986 he made his debut for England against India. After making his name on the international stage he continued to impress on the county stage and in 1990 was honoured with the captaincy of Kent. On his first day as captain he scored a career high score of 257 against Hampshire.

In 1995 Benson had an impressive season. Along with fellow opening batsman, Trevor Ward they made opening partnerships of over 100 nearly every innings. Together they guided Kent to a surprising final at Lord's to play Lancashire. However, the week before Benson broke his finger and was unable to play for Kent meaning their opening partnership was halved and so was their impact. Unable to create foundations for the rest of the innings the team crumbled with only De Silva offering any resistance^{[citation needed]}. Kent suffered a poor defeat but Benson was heading towards the end of his career and was desperate to win Kent a trophy after their 17 year drought. Benson got himself fit for the close of the season where he felt that they stood a chance of winning the National Championship. Benson and the team got even more focused and steered the ship toward the target and Kent won.

	1st Class	One Day
Matches	292	269
Innings	491	257
Runs	18387	7838
Highest Score	257	119
Average	40.23	31.86
100/50	99/48	5/53

At the end of 1995 Benson was forced to retire due to a major knee injury. He ended his career breaking many records^{[citation needed]} and scoring over 18,000 1st class runs and near 8,000 one day runs. Benson was very unfortunate regarding his international career, only able to play one test match due to injury.

[edit] Umpiring career

Mark Benson
Born	July 6, 1958 (age 48) Shoreham by Sea, Sussex, England
Nationality	English
Tests Umpired	15
Years	2004-present
ODIs Umpired	43
Years	2004-present

After retiring from playing Benson spent a period of a few years rehabilitating from his knee injury which required many operations. Once his period of rehabilitation was completed he was eager to get back and involved in cricket and became an umpire.

He umpired his first first-class match in 1997, and, after several impressive seasons, the ECB appointed him as one of their umpires on the Emirates International Panel of ICC Umpires in 2004. In the same year he umpired his first one day international (ODI), the match between England and West Indies at Trent Bridge in June 2004. He impressed the players with his accurate decision making, and the ICC rewarded his exemplary umpiring by appointing him to his first test match in October 2004 - the 1st test between Bangladesh and New Zealand at Dhaka, where he stood alongside Daryl Harper, who acted as Benson's mentor during his first seasons at international level and stood with him in many of his early matches.

The ICC was impressed and started to appoint Benson to more and more high profile fixtures. Most notably he was the ICC-appointed official in 7 of the 15 matches of the 2006 VB Series featuring Australia, South Africa and Sri Lanka. His decision making proved to be faultless and when the ICC decided to expand the ICC Elite Umpire Panel in April 2006 Benson was all but guaranteed a place, being regarded as a better umpire than some who were already on the panel.

He has maintained his high standards since his elevation to the Elite Panel, achieving over 95%^{[citation needed]} of his decisions correct. He acted as the fourth umpire in the final of the 2006 Champions Trophy, and is one of the four front runners to stand in the 2007 Cricket World Cup final, the others being Rudi Koertzen, Simon Taufel and Steve Bucknor.

[edit] Umpiring statistics

	First	Last	Total
Tests	Bangladesh v New Zealand at Dhaka, Oct 2004	South Africa v India at Durban, Dec 2006	15
ODIs	England v West Indies at Nottingham, Jun 2004	Bangladesh v South Africa at Guyana, Apr 2007	43

Forthcoming Appointments

Super 8 stage of 2007 Cricket World Cup.

[edit] Heart palpitations

Whilst umpiring the second test between South Africa and India at Durban on 28 December 2006 Benson had to leave the field, after suffering from heart palpitations. Mark was taken to a nearby hospital where he had to spend a few nights. On 14 February, 2007, he had surgery on his heart and the doctors believe that they have solved the problem^{[citation needed]} so that he should be fit to stand in the Cricket World Cup in the Caribbean.

[edit] Trivia

Benson has the fourth highest average (at 40.23) for a player with more than 10,000 runs for Kent.
Mark has the third highest rate of innings taken to score a century, at a century every 10.23 innings.
Brian Luckhurst voted Benson as Kent's greatest ever post-war opening batsmen and referred to him as his generations’ unsung hero.^{[citation needed]}
Along with Neil Taylor, Benson holds the highest ever opening partnership for Kent, together scoring 300.
Benson is the 7th highest century scorer in Kent's history.
Mark has scored the 11th most runs ever for Kent.
Mark is married to Sarah Benson (formally Sarah Waitt) and has two children.
Benson has scored centuries in both innings of a 4 Day match.
Benson appears 3 times on Kent's list of player to have scored over 1,500 runs in a single season.
At the time of Mark score of 257, it was the 9th highest number of runs in a single innings for Kent.
Benson is highly respected by all the teams, and is regarded by many as one of the better umpires on the elite panel.