Sledging, drinking, and the most famous moustache in modern cricket history - the round-bellied Australian legend Merv Hughes, who was born today, is a true one-off
. His cult status often obscured the fact that he was an extremely good quick bowler. He was heroic against a rampant West Indies in 1988-89 - he took 13 wickets, including a hat-trick spread over two innings, in defeat in Perth - and his castling of Mike Gatting with the last ball of the fourth day of the first Ashes Test in 1993 was every bit as vital as Shane Warne's "ball of the century" to dismiss Gatting in the first innings. Hughes also had in his locker a hilariously obvious slower "balloon", which somehow did for Chris Broad in Headingley in 1989. He could wave the long handle too, and flogged back-to-back fifties in 1989. Not even the most ardent Hughes devotee would claim he was a great bowler, even though he took 212 Test wickets, but through his love of hard graft, beer and a scrap he become a hero to a nation, and went on to become a selector.
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