Wicket-keeper
fielding position in cricket, who stands behind the wicket or stumps, ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises
In cricket, the wicket-keeper is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket, ready to stop deliveries that pass the batsman, and take a catch, stump the batsman out, or run out a batsman when occasion arises. The wicket-keeper is the only member of the fielding side permitted to wear gloves and external leg guards. The role of the keeper is governed by Law 27 of the Laws of Cricket.
Stance
Initially, during the bowling of the ball the wicket-keeper crouches in a full squatting position but partly stands up as the ball is received. Australian wicket-keeper Sammy Carter (1878 to 1948) was the first to squat on his haunches rather than bend over from the waist (stooping).
Purposes
The keeper's major function is to stop deliveries that pass the batsman (in order to prevent runs being scored as 'byes'), but he can also attempt to dismiss the batsman in various ways:
The most common dismissal effected by the keeper is for him to catch a ball that has nicked the batsman's bat, called an edge, before it bounces. Sometimes the keeper is also in the best position to catch a ball that has been hit high in the air. More catches are taken by wicket-keepers than by any other fielding position.
The keeper can stump the batsman by using the ball to remove the bails from the stumps, if the batsman is out of his crease after a delivery has passed the stumps into the keeper's hands. The keeper must then dislodge the bail(s) and the batsman is out if he is still outside the crease.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Wicket-keeper” is fielding position in cricket, who stands behind the wicket or stumps, ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Wicket-keeper, fielding and position, not as a finished interpretation.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 3, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q692525. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1878 and 1948.
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This entry incorporates text from “Wicket-keeper” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.