After joining the RAF as a National Serviceman in 1958 (he called it "training in advanced shirking"), and rising to the rank of corporal, he was commissioned as an accountant officer in the secretarial branch in November 1963.
Two of his six years' service were spent at NATO headquarters at Fontainebleau, outside Paris, and on leaving the RAF in 1965 he developed his handlebar moustache into a full beard.
[9] After a trial period, Frindall continued to score for the BBC until his death, watching all 246 Test matches in England from June 1966 to 2008.
[9] He covered 377 Tests for the BBC in all, forming a close working relationship with John Arlott and Brian Johnston, providing continuity with later commentators such as Jonathan Agnew.
[10] The concentration needed to maintain such consistently high-quality work was immense, and Frindall believed it was his time in the RAF that prepared him for the task.
Every scorecard, like the wagon-wheels he produced to show where a batsman scored his runs after playing a significant innings, was a work of art.
[11] Frindall's work was so meticulously accurate that the commentators would habitually trust his figures if they differed from the official scoreboard.
When the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians attempted to revise the status of many 19th century and pre-war matches, which would have produced statistics that are different from the conventional, Frindall was among those who objected to their "rewriting of history".
[1] Away from TMS he lived in Wiltshire, latterly at Urchfont near Devizes,[16] and was an accomplished after-dinner speaker, telling tales of the commentary box, which often displayed his excellent powers of mimicry; he could do Arlott and Trueman brilliantly.
[9] Frindall died at the Great Western Hospital in Swindon on 29 January 2009, following a short illness after contracting Legionnaires' disease during a charity cricketing tour of Dubai with the Lord's Taverners.