Geoff Hurst claimed his ‘future lay with cricket’ just four years before World Cup Final hattrick!

Geoff Hurst is England's most legendary striker, being the first player to score a hattrick in the World Cup final when England beat West Germany in 1966.

Hurst spent the majority of his club career with West Ham United, scoring 180 goals in 411 appearances for 'The Hammers' in 14 years.

He would later make over 100 appearances for Stoke City and finished his career in England with West Brom in 1976.

Hurst made 49 appearances for England between 1966 and 1972, scoring 24 goals and helping England to their World Cup triumph and late run in the 1968 European Championships.

Hurst is an England legend and the main reason for their World Cup victory, but in a different life, Hurst could have been an England Ashes legend and not a World Cup legend.

Before football, Geoff Hurst's first love was cricket, with Hurst regularly missing summer training camps to be a wicketkeeper until 1964.

The former England striker played for Essex school boys and first played with Bobby Moore in that cricket side, not West Ham United or England.

His success at youth level earned him a place in the Essex Second team, scoring 20 on his debut against Kent Seconds.

In 1962, Hurst played his only First-Class match for Essex against Lancashire in Liverpool and failed to make an impression.

In the first innings, Hurst batted tenth and did walk out to bat, but Trevor Bailey declared for Essex before he got a run, with his team up 296 for eight wickets.

In the second innings, Hurst batted eighth and was put up against fast bowler Colin Hilton. Hurst was bowled out for zero runs, making his only First-Class appearance a forgettable one.

Although Hurst failed to make an impact at the elite level, he continued to play for the Essex Seconds until 1964.

In 23 second-team matches, Hurst hit four fifties, scoring 797 runs (20.43 runs a match) and taking 15 catches and five stumpings.

According to cricketcountry.com, Hurst said: "Four years before the 1966 World Cup, I was still playing more cricket than football. I thought my future probably lay with cricket."

Luckily for England football fans, Hurst picked football over Cricket and is now the last surviving player of their World Cup triumph in 1966 after Sir Bobby Charlton passed away last weekend.

If Hurst had picked his beloved cricket over the sport he dominated, who knows where English football would be today?