Thomas Walker (16 November 1762 – 1 March 1831) was an English cricketer who played for Hampshire in the days of the Hambledon Club and later for Surrey.

Walker worked out that he could generate more bounce and variation of pace if he bowled with his arm away from his body and soon realised that these deliveries gave the batsman added problems.

[2] He failed to get the new style accepted during his career although he sowed the seeds of a bowling revolution that took place a generation later.

On one occasion the frustrated bowler Lord Frederick Beauclerk is reported to have thrown down his hat and shouted: "You confounded old beast!"

[4] In a match at Bourne Paddock on 8–12 August 1786, playing for White Conduit Club versus Kent, Walker came very close to scoring two centuries in the match and would have been the first known achiever of this feat had he scored five more runs in his first innings.