Billy Mead

Sebastian William Mead (born 3 February 1999) is an English cricketer who made his first-class cricket debut for Kent County Cricket Club in May 2022. Mead is a right-handed batter who typically plays as a wicket-keeper.

Mead was born at Winchester in Hampshire, grew up at Longparish, and was educated at Marlborough College on a sport scholarship.[1][2] He played cricket for the school XI for five years, captaining the college in 2017 when he scored 1,009 runs during the season, including a Marlborough record 214 not out,[lower-alpha 1][3] and was considered a candidate for the honour of Wisden's Schools Cricketer of the Year.[7][8][9][10] His great-uncle Mike Griffith, who had been the last cricketer to score 1,000 runs in a season for Marlborough in 1961,[3] played more than 350 matches for Sussex County Cricket Club and was an England and Great Britain hockey international,[7][11] whilst his great-grandfather Billy Griffith played three Test matches for England and captained Sussex.[12] Mead also played rackets at school, winning the under-18 Renny Cup championship at Queen's Club in 2016.[13][14]

Mead made his debut for Kent in May 2022 in a first-class match against a Sri Lanka Development XI.[15] He scored a century on debut, making 106 not out to become the 14th player to score a century for Kent on their debut first-class appearance for the club and the seventh to do so in their first first-class match.[16][17][18] He had played age-group cricket for Hampshire sides and Second XI cricket for Hampshire, Somerset, Surrey and Warwickshire before impressing for Kent's Second XI at the start of the 2022 season.[19][20] He also played for MCC Young Cricketers in the Second XI Championship in 2018 and 2019 and for Cape Town Cricket Club in the 2017/18 South African club season, spending two northern winters at Gary Kirsten's cricket academy in Cape Town.[2][18]