Obituary – Greg Haire

[By Tom Wood – Parramatta District Cricket Club Historian]

Sadly, the Parramatta Club lost another past player with the recent passing of former lower grades allrounder Greg Haire, who was the younger brother of ex Parramatta first-grade player and well-known NSW Premier Cricket Coach Michael Haire.

Greg was only engaged in a relatively brief career with the club – 1976/77 to 1981/82 but he proved to be a popular and well liked person amongst his fellow clubmates.

He showed himself to be a more than capable allrounder, an accurate and clever right-armed medium-pacer and sound right-handed middle-order batsman whose performances, in his stay with the club, suggested that he possessed the potential to establish himself in the higher grades had he remained longer with the ‘two-blues’ – he did played a Second grade game in 1977/78.

Greg commenced his association with Parramatta with the Fifth Grade ‘B’ team in 1976/77 and was an instant success proving to be the team’s leading player in its drive to annex the Minor Premiership. He starred with the ball grabbing 41wickets at praiseworthy 12.49 – highlights being 6/46 v. Mosman, 5/22 & 4/29 v. Sydney University ‘B’, and 5/30 v. Cumberland ‘A’ – and his batting produced a useful 262 runs @ 32.75 (H.S. – 62 v. Bankstown [SF] and 55 v. Cumberland ‘A’).

In 1977/78 strong early season form in Fourth Grade - 259 runs @ 43.17 and 14 wickets @ 8.29 – featuring a sensational performance against Sutherland – 92 with the bat and 7/14 with the ball, earned Greg promotion to Third and Second grade.

His Overall Playing statistics with Parramatta were:

Grade	Innings	N.O.	H.S.	Runs	Ave.	Catches	Runs	Wickets	Ave.
5th Grade	15	5	62	311	31.10	7	619	49	12.63
4th Grade	9	1	92	283	35.38	4	220	23	9.57
3rd Grade	4	-	4	7	1.75	3	128	4	32.00
2nd Grade	1	-	15	15		-	-	-	-
Total	29	6	92	616	26.78	14	967	76	12.72

Vale Greg Haire – rest in peace.