What is Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a 20-metre (22-yard) pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striking the ball bowled at the wicket with the bat, while the bowling and fielding side tries to prevent this and dismiss each batter (so they are “out”). Means of dismissal include being bowled, when the ball hits the stumps and dislodges the bails, and by the fielding side catching the ball after it is hit by the bat, but before it hits the ground. When ten batters have been dismissed, the innings ends and the teams swap roles. The game is adjudicated by two umpires, aided by a third umpire and match referee in international matches. They communicate with two off-field scorers who record the match’s statistical information.
There are quite a few formats ranging from Twenty20, played over a few hours with each team batting for a single innings of 20 overs, to Test matches, played over five days with unlimited overs and the teams each batting for two innings of unlimited length. Traditionally cricketers play in all-white kit, but in limited overs cricket they wear club or team colours. In addition to the basic kit, some players wear protective gear to prevent injury caused by the ball, which is a hard, solid spheroid made of compressed leather with a slightly raised sewn seam enclosing a cork core layered with tightly wound string.
Cricket History
Early Cricket (Pre 1799)
Cricket On The Artillery Ground
There is a consensus of expert opinion that cricket may have been invented during Saxon or Norman times by children living in the Weald, an area of dense woodlands and clearings in south-east England. The first reference to cricket being played as an adult sport was in 1611, and in the same year, a dictionary defined cricket as a boys’ game. There is also the thought that cricket may have derived from bowls, by the intervention of a batsman trying to stop the ball from reaching its target by hitting it away.
Village cricket had developed by the middle of the 17th century and the first English “county teams” were formed in the second half of the century, as “local experts” from village cricket were employed as the earliest professionals. The first known game in which the teams use county names is in 1709.
Early village cricket
In the first half of the 18th Century cricket established itself as a leading sport in London and the south-eastern counties of England. Its spread was limited by the constraints of travel, but it was slowly gaining popularity in other parts of England and Women’s Cricket dates back to the 1745, when the first known match was played in Surrey.
In 1744, the first Laws of Cricket were written and subsequently amended in 1774, when innovations such as lbw, a 3rd stump, – the middle stump and a maximum bat width were added. The codes were drawn up by the “Star and Garter Club” whose members ultimately founded the famous Marylebone Cricket Club at Lord’s in 1787. MCC immediately became the custodian of the Laws and has made revisions ever since then to the current day.
The First instances of cricket
Rolling the ball along the ground was superseded sometime after 1760 when bowlers began to pitch the ball and in response to that innovation the straight bat replaced the old “hockey-stick” style of bat. The Hambledon Club in Hampshire was the focal point of the game for about thirty years until the formation of MCC and the opening of Lord’s Cricket Ground in 1787.
Cricket was introduced to North America via the English colonies as early as the 17th century, and in the 18th century it arrived in other parts of the globe. It was introduced to the West Indies by colonists and to India by British East India Company mariners. It arrived in Australia almost as soon as colonisation began in 1788 and the sport reached New Zealand and South Africa in the early years of the 19th century.
Laws of Cricket
• Law 1: The Players • Law 2 Subs & Runners, Btsman Fldsmn Leaving,Btsmn retiring, Commencing Inns •Law 3: The Umpires • Law 4: The Scorers • Law 5: The Ball •Law 6: The Bat •Law 7: The Pitch •Law 8: The Wickets •Law 9: The Bowling, Popping and Return Creases • Law 10: Rolling Sweeping, Mowing, Watering the Pitch & Remarking of Creases
• Law 11: Covering The Pitch • Law 12: Innings • Law 13: The Follow-On • Law 14: Declarations • Law 15: Start Of Play • Law 16: Intervals • Law 17: Cessation Of Play • Law 18: Scoring • Law 19: Boundaries • Law 20: Lost Ball • Law 21: The Result • Law 22: The Over • Law 23: Dead Ball • Law 24: No Ball • Law 25: Wide Ball • Law 26: Bye and Leg Bye • Law 27: Appeals • Law 28: The Wicket Is Down • Law 29: Batsman Out Of His Ground • Law 30: Bowled • Law 31: Timed Out • Law 32: Caught • Law 33: Handled The Ball • Law 34: Hit The Ball Twice • Law 35: Hit Wicket • Law 36: Leg Before Wicket • Law 37: Obstructing The Field • Law 38: Run Out • Law 39: Stumped • Law 40: The Wicket-Keeper • Law 41: The Fieldsman • Law 42: Unfair Play
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