Career
A right-arm medium pace bowler and a right-handed lower middle-order hitter, Burgess is described by Cricinfo as "a good old-fashioned county professional". After his retirement from professional cricket, Burgess qualified as a first-class umpire, and stood in over 500 county cricket matches between 1990 and 2008, when he retired. He also umpired a number of international matches, including Youth Test matches, Youth One Day Internationals and Women"s One Day Internationals.
An education at Millfield School helped to steer all-round sportsman Burgess to a career in cricket.
Although the Somerset side at the time was not known for signing local talent, earning it a tag of "a team of all nations", Burgess became an exception. He appeared for Somerset Second XI regularly between 1963 and 1966, impressing with both bat and ball.
He made his debut for the first-team in a match against the touring West Indians in July 1966, and the step-up proved tough. Burgess recorded scores of 1 and 35 with the bat as Somerset followed-on, and opening the bowling, he finished with figures of 0/101.
Despite his unimpressive entrance into first-class cricket, Burgess was selected for the County Championship match against Lancashire the day after the conclusion of the West Indians match.
Burgess claimed his first wicket in county cricket during a Gillette Cup match against Warwickshire in early August, a match that was also his List A debut. Burgess finished his first season with 406 runs from 21 innings at an average of 20.30 in first-class cricket.
