A WEEKEND of shock results and indiscipline among the England team at the Cricket World Cup was put firmly into perspective by the murder of former Kent and England all-rounder Bob Woolmer.

The 58-year-old coach to the Pakistan squad was found strangled on the fifth-floor of his hotel room in Jamaica and later pronounced dead at the University Hospital in Kingston.

The killing came just hours after Pakistan crashed out of the World Cup following their shock defeat to Ireland.

Former England seam bowler and Warwickshire skipper and committee man, Tim Munton, said Woolmer will be remembered as one of the game's most innovative coaches and the first to embrace computerised video coaching techniques.

He added: "I worked very closely with him back then, but he has since become renowned as one of the most challenging and innovative coaches of his generation.

"Wherever he has been around the world he has won respect. He challenged everything, from the way you prepared for the game to the technology and how that should be used.

"I am sure his team-mates from Kent will tell you what he was like as a player, but I had some great times with him when he was our coach at Warwickshire and I am sure the guys from South African and Pakistan would say the same of him since He will be sadly missed by us all."

Though born in Kanpur in India, the son of a British business executive who skippered local regional side Uttar Pradesh, Woolmer moved to England aged seven to be schooled at Yardley Court in Tonbridge.

He was at Skinner's School in Tunbridge Wells when, at the age of 15, he came to the attention of then Kent 2nd XI coach Colin Page.

He made his first team debut in 1968, aged 20, making an unbeaten 50 against Essex at The Mote.

Within two years Woolmer had developed from a lower-middle order batsman into a graceful, right-handed top-order player and a key member of the county's most successful side ever.

His medium-pace bowling and an ability to swing the ball both ways was instrumental in securing the county championship title in 1970, so much so that he finished the campaign second in the bowling averages.

Within five years his all-round talents were recognised on the international stage with selection for England in the Ashes series of 1975, and a debut at Lord’s - he would win 10 of his Test caps against the old enemy.

He was named one of Wisden's cricketers of the year for 1976 but arguably, his talents reached their peak in 1977 - the season Kent shared the championship title with Middlesex - when Woolmer finished top of the bowling ranks and second in the batting.

The following summer Kent retained their title with Woolmer second in the bowling averages and third in the batting.

After a promising start, his international career tailed off and a short stint playing World Series Cricket under the Kerry Packer banner in 1977 only served to sour relationships with Kent’s committee and the Test selectors.

His England career ended after 19 caps, the last of them back at Lord's against Australia in 1981, after which he was unceremoniously dropped with a batting average of 33.09 and having taken only four Test scalps.

He retired in 1984 after 279 matches for Kent. Woolmer scored 12.634 runs at an average of 35.09 and having taken 334 wickets costing 23.28 apiece - making him one of only 16 Kent players to post a career double of 5,000 runs and 250 wickets.

He rejoined the county in 1987 for a brief stint as coach and went on to lead Warwickshire to their historic treble in 1994.

His successful stint as coach to South Africa was over-shadowed by the Hansie Cronje match-fixing scandal, while an otherwise productive three-year term as coach to Pakistan ended with last Saturday's shock St Patrick's Day defeat to Ireland.

What has been revealed since has been so much more shocking for the world of cricket and beyond.