Frederick John Titmus MBE (24 November 1932 – 23 March 2011)[1] was an English cricketer, whose first-class career, mostly for Middlesex with a short stint for Surrey, spanned five decades.

Grace, Wilfred Rhodes and George Hirst to take 2,500 wickets and make 20,000 runs in first-class cricket.

[3] Although he was best known for his off-spin (though at first he bowled medium pace as well), he was an accomplished lower-order batsman who deserved to be called an all-rounder, even opening the batting for England on six occasions.

Outside cricket, Titmus was also a footballer; at one stage he was contracted to Watford as a professional, having earlier played for amateur club Leytonstone, and then for Chelsea as a junior.

1961 was his best year with the bat, as he scored 1,703 runs at a fine average of 37.02, including 14 half-centuries; he passed 50 more than a hundred times in the course of his first-class career.

For five years Titmus was consistently selected for England, and he produced some outstanding displays, not least in India in 1963–64, when in the course of a five-Test series (packed into just six weeks) he picked up 27 wickets to help relieve the monotony as every game finished in a draw.

Meanwhile, he continued to be invaluable for Middlesex, achieving up to 100 wickets in most years and contributing when batting, as well as captaining the county side between 1965 and 1968.

Titmus was involved in an accident shortly before the Third when, whilst swimming, he caught his foot in the propeller of a boat that was being driven by the wife of one of the senior members of the English cricket team.

Titmus's batting gradually became less effective, and from 1969 onwards he passed 50 only six more times, though he did make an unbeaten 112 against Warwickshire as late as 1976.

Having coached in South Africa on several occasions earlier in his career, in the 1975/76 season Titmus played for Orange Free State in that country's Currie Cup competition, and took 42 wickets at 16.30.