Joe Root is wearing a black armband for the final day of the fifth Ashes Test at the Kia Oval in memory of Richard Ibbotson, an important figure in Sheffield cricket, who passed away suddenly.

Ibbotson was the chair at Sheffield Collegiate CC, Root’s boyhood cricket club. The club also produced former England captain Michael Vaughan and ICC Elite Panel umpire Richard Kettleborough. Vaughan played with Root’s father, Matt, for the second XI as a teenager.

Ahead of Root’s first Ashes tour at captain, he visited the club’s home ground at Abbeydale Park with Vaughan to recall his memories as a youngster: “Me and my brother would be on the sidelines knocking a ball around, getting into trouble for disrupting the game or badgering the players to come and throw balls at us,” he said.

Ibbotson was involved at Sheffield Collegiate as a player and administrator for decades, including shepherding the club through the Covid-19 pandemic and helping to secure a Sport England grant to help the club meet its expenses at the time.

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