Wisden overview
His nickname, Lordy, is an allusion to Ted Dexter, and Brown can be just as destructive - if not more so. One of the biggest crowd-pleasers in the county game, he has been unfortunate to be pigeonholed as a one-day player. In first-class cricket he scores heavily and quickly, lofting the ball over the infield on the off side with a mixture of power and style, and mauls anything pitched short of a length. His rampaging 268 in an astonishing match against Glamorgan at The Oval in 2002 is the highest score in a senior limited-overs game anywhere in the world. Picked for England in the one-day series against India in 1996, he was branded a clown by The Times after a helter-skelter 34 in the first game. A duck followed, but Brown responded by smacking a century in the final match. It proved to be the high point of his international career, and although he hit a 31-ball 50 against South Africa in 1998 - the fastest in the history of the Texaco Trophy - he was quietly dropped after the mini World Cup in Bangladesh in 1998-99. A gem in Surrey's middle order, Brown is also a sharp slip fielder and a good team man with a mischievous sense of humour. He may also be the best current batsman in England not to play a Test. Lawrence Booth

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