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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the sport. For the insect, see Cricket (insect). For other uses,
see Cricket (disambiguation).
"Cricketer" redirects here. For other uses, see Cricketer (disambiguation).
Cricket
Shaun Pollock of South Africa bowls to Michael
Hussey of Australia during the 2005 Boxing Day Test match at
the Melbourne Cricket Ground
Highest governing body International Cricket Council
First played 16th century; South East England
Characteristics
Contact No
Team members 11 players per side (substitutes permitted
in some circumstances)
Mixed-sex No, separate competitions
Type Team sport, Bat-and-Ball
Equipment Cricket ball, Cricket
bat, Wicket (Stumps, Bails), Protective
equipment
Venue Cricket field
Glossary Glossary of cricket terms
Presence
Country or region Worldwide (most popular in the
Commonwealth)
Olympic 1900
Part of a series on
Cricket
Women's cricket
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Forms of cricket
Test cricket
Men's format
Women's format
First-class cricket
Men's format
Women's format
One Day International
Men's format
Women's format
Limited overs (domestic)
Limited overs cricket
List A cricket
Twenty20 International
Men's format
Women's format
Twenty20 (domestic)
Men's format
Women's format
Other forms
100-ball cricket
Backyard cricket
Bete-ombro
Blind cricket
Club cricket
Crocker
Deaf cricket
French cricket
Indoor cricket
o UK variant
Kilikiti
Plaquita
Single wicket
Softball cricket
T10 cricket
Tape ball cricket
Tennis ball cricket
Vigoro
Village cricket
hide
International competitions
ICC World Test Championship
ICC Men's Test Team Rankings
Cricket World Cup
Women's Cricket World Cup
ICC Men's T20 World Cup
ICC Women's T20 World Cup
ICC Champions Trophy
ICC Cricket World Cup League 2
ICC Cricket World Cup Challenge League
Euro T20 Slam
Asia Cup
East Africa Premier League
World Cricket League Africa Region
Cricket at the Olympics
Cricket at the Asian Games
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History of cricket
History of cricket to 1725
History of cricket (1726–1750)
History of cricket (1751–1775)
History of cricket (1776–1800)
History of cricket (1801–1825)
History of women's cricket
Records
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Part of a series on
Bowling techniques
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Fast bowling
Seam
Swing
hide
Spin bowling
Finger
o off spin
o left-arm orthodox
Wrist
o leg spin
o left-arm unorthodox
hide
Fast bowler deliveries
Bouncer
Inswinger
Knuckle ball
Leg cutter
Off cutter
Outswinger
Reverse swing
Slower ball
Yorker
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Spin bowler deliveries
Arm ball
Carrom ball
Doosra
Flipper
Googly
Leg break
Off break
Slider
Teesra
Topspinner
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Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at
the centre of which is a 22-yard (20-metre) pitch with a wicket at each end, each
comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. Two players from the batting team (the
striker and nonstriker) stand in front of either wicket, with one player from
the fielding team (the bowler) bowling the ball towards the striker's wicket from the
opposite end of the pitch. The striker's goal is to hit the bowled ball and then switch
places with the nonstriker, with the batting team scoring one run for each exchange.
Runs are also scored when the ball reaches or crosses the boundary of the field or
when the ball is bowled illegally.
The fielding team tries to prevent runs from being scored by dismissing batters (so they
are "out"). Means of dismissal include being bowled, when the ball hits the striker's
wicket and dislodges the bails, and by the fielding side either catching the ball after it is
hit by the bat, but before it hits the ground, or hitting a wicket with the ball before a
batter can cross the crease in front of the wicket. 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.
Forms of cricket range from Twenty20 (also known as T20), with each team batting for a
single innings of 20 overs (each "over" being a set of 6 fair opportunities for the batting
team to score) and the game generally lasting three to four hours, to Test
matches played over five days. 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.
The earliest known definite reference to cricket is to it being played in South East
England in the mid-16th century. It spread globally with the expansion of the British
Empire, with the first international matches in the second half of the 19th century. The
game's governing body is the International Cricket Council (ICC), which has over 100
members, twelve of which are full members who play Test matches. The game's rules,
the Laws of Cricket, are maintained by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in London. The
sport is followed primarily in South Asia, Australia, New Zealand, the United
Kingdom, Southern Africa and the West Indies.[1]
Women's cricket, which is organised and played separately, has also achieved
international standard.
The most successful side playing international cricket is Australia, which has won
eight One Day International trophies, including six World Cups, more than any other
country and has been the top-rated Test side more than any other country.[citation needed]
History
Main article: History of cricket
Origins
Main article: History of cricket to 1725
A medieval "club ball" game involving an underarm bowl
towards a batter. Ball catchers are shown positioning themselves to catch a ball. Detail
from the Canticles of Holy Mary, 13th century.
Cricket is one of many games in the "club ball" sphere that basically involve hitting a ball
with a hand-held implement; others include baseball (which shares
many similarities with cricket, both belonging in the more specific bat-and-ball
games category[2]), golf, hockey, tennis, squash, badminton and table tennis.[3] In
cricket's case, a key difference is the existence of a solid target structure, the wicket
(originally, it is thought, a "wicket gate" through which sheep were herded), that the
batter must defend.[4] The cricket historian Harry Altham identified three "groups" of "club
ball" games: the "hockey group", in which the ball is driven to and from between two
targets (the goals); the "golf group", in which the ball is driven towards an undefended
target (the hole); and the "cricket group", in which "the ball is aimed at a mark (the
wicket) and driven away from it".[5]
It is generally believed that cricket originated as a children's game in the south-eastern
counties of England, sometime during the medieval period.[4] Although there are claims
for prior dates, the earliest definite reference to cricket being played comes from
evidence given at a court case in Guildford in January 1597 (Old Style, equating to
January 1598 in the modern calendar). The case concerned ownership of a certain plot
of land and the court heard the testimony of a 59-year-old coroner, John Derrick, who
gave witness that:[6][7][8]
Being a scholler in the ffree schoole of Guldeford hee and diverse of his fellows did
runne and play there at creckett and other plaies.
Given Derrick's age, it was about half a century earlier when he was at school and so it
is certain that cricket was being played c. 1550 by boys in Surrey.[8] The view that it was
originally a children's game is reinforced by Randle Cotgrave's 1611 English-French
dictionary in which he defined the noun "crosse" as "the crooked staff wherewith boys
play at cricket" and the verb form "crosser" as "to play at cricket".[9][10]
One possible source for the sport's name is the Old English word "cryce" (or "cricc")
meaning a crutch or staff. In Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, he derived cricket from
"cryce, Saxon, a stick".[6] In Old French, the word "criquet" seems to have meant a kind
of club or stick.[11] Given the strong medieval trade connections between south-east
England and the County of Flanders when the latter belonged to the Duchy of
Burgundy, the name may have been derived from the Middle Dutch (in use
in Flanders at the time) "krick"(-e), meaning a stick (crook).[11] Another possible source is
the Middle Dutch word "krickstoel", meaning a long low stool used for kneeling in church
and which resembled the long low wicket with two stumps used in early cricket.
[12]
According to Heiner Gillmeister, a European language expert of Bonn University,
"cricket" derives from the Middle Dutch phrase for hockey, met de (krik ket)sen (i.e.,
"with the stick chase").[13] Gillmeister has suggested that not only the name but also the
sport itself may be of Flemish origin.[13]
Growth of amateur and professional cricket in England
Evolution of the cricket bat. The original "hockey stick"
(left) evolved into the straight bat from c. 1760 when pitched delivery bowling began.
Although the main object of the game has always been to score the most runs, the early
form of cricket differed from the modern game in certain key technical aspects; the
North American variant of cricket known as wicket retained many of these aspects.
[14]
The ball was bowled underarm by the bowler and along the ground towards
a batter armed with a bat that in shape resembled a hockey stick; the batter defended a
low, two-stump wicket; and runs were called notches because the scorers recorded
them by notching tally sticks.[15][16][17]
In 1611, the year Cotgrave's dictionary was published, ecclesiastical court records
at Sidlesham in Sussex state that two parishioners, Bartholomew Wyatt and Richard
Latter, failed to attend church on Easter Sunday because they were playing cricket.
They were fined 12d each and ordered to do penance.[18] This is the earliest mention of
adult participation in cricket and it was around the same time that the earliest known
organised inter-parish or village match was played – at Chevening, Kent.[6][19] In 1624, a
player called Jasper Vinall died after he was accidentally struck on the head during a
match between two parish teams in Sussex.[20]
Cricket remained a low-key local pursuit for much of the 17th century.[10] It is known,
through numerous references found in the records of ecclesiastical court cases, to have
been proscribed at times by the Puritans before and during the Commonwealth.[21][22] The
problem was nearly always the issue of Sunday play as the Puritans considered cricket
to be "profane" if played on the Sabbath, especially if large crowds or gambling were
involved.[23][24]
According to the social historian Derek Birley, there was a "great upsurge of sport after
the Restoration" in 1660.[25] Several members of the court of King Charles II took a
strong interest in cricket during that era.[26] Gambling on sport became a problem
significant enough for Parliament to pass the 1664 Gambling Act, limiting stakes to £100
which was, in any case, a colossal sum exceeding the annual income of 99% of the
population.[25] Along with horse racing, as well as prizefighting and other types of blood
sport, cricket was perceived to be a gambling sport.[27] Rich patrons made matches for
high stakes, forming teams in which they engaged the first professional players. [28] By the
end of the century, cricket had developed into a major sport that was spreading
throughout England and was already being taken abroad by English mariners and
colonisers – the earliest reference to cricket overseas is dated 1676.[29] A 1697
newspaper report survives of "a great cricket match" played in Sussex "for fifty guineas
apiece" – this is the earliest known contest that is generally considered a First
Class match.[30][31]
The patrons, and other players from the social class known as the "gentry", began to
classify themselves as "amateurs"[fn 1] to establish a clear distinction from the
professionals, who were invariably members of the working class, even to the point of
having separate changing and dining facilities.[32] The gentry, including such high-ranking
nobles as the Dukes of Richmond, exerted their honour code of noblesse oblige to claim
rights of leadership in any sporting contests they took part in, especially as it was
necessary for them to play alongside their "social inferiors" if they were to win their bets.
[33]
In time, a perception took hold that the typical amateur who played in first-class
cricket, until 1962 when amateurism was abolished, was someone with a public
school education who had then gone to one of Cambridge or Oxford University – society
insisted that such people were "officers and gentlemen" whose destiny was to provide
leadership.[34] In a purely financial sense, the cricketing amateur would theoretically claim
expenses for playing while his professional counterpart played under contract and was
paid a wage or match fee; in practice, many amateurs claimed more than actual
expenditure and the derisive term "shamateur" was coined to describe the practice.[35][36]
English cricket in the 18th and 19th centuries
Francis Cotes, The Young Cricketer, 1768
The game underwent major development in the 18th century to become England's
national sport.[37] Its success was underwritten by the twin necessities of patronage and
betting.[38] Cricket was prominent in London as early as 1707 and, in the middle years of
the century, large crowds flocked to matches on the Artillery Ground in Finsbury.[citation
needed]
The single wicket form of the sport attracted huge crowds and wagers to match, its
popularity peaking in the 1748 season.[39] Bowling underwent an evolution around 1760
when bowlers began to pitch the ball instead of rolling or skimming it towards the batter.
This caused a revolution in bat design because, to deal with the bouncing ball, it was
necessary to introduce the modern straight bat in place of the old "hockey stick" shape.
[40][citation needed]
The Hambledon Club was founded in the 1760s and, for the next twenty years until the
formation of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and the opening of Lord's Old Ground in
1787, Hambledon was both the game's greatest club and its focal point.[citation needed] MCC
quickly became the sport's premier club and the custodian of the Laws of Cricket. New
Laws introduced in the latter part of the 18th century included the three stump wicket
and leg before wicket (lbw).[41]
The 19th century saw underarm bowling superseded by first roundarm and
then overarm bowling. Both developments were controversial.[42] Organisation of the
game at county level led to the creation of the county clubs, starting with Sussex in
1839.[43] In December 1889, the eight leading county clubs formed the official County
Championship, which began in 1890.[44]
The first recorded photo of a cricket match taken on 25
July 1857 by Roger Fenton
The most famous player of the 19th century was W. G. Grace, who started his long and
influential career in 1865. It was especially during the career of Grace that the
distinction between amateurs and professionals became blurred by the existence of
players like him who were nominally amateur but, in terms of their financial gain, de
facto professional. Grace himself was said to have been paid more money for playing
cricket than any professional.[citation needed]
The last two decades before the First World War have been called the "Golden Age of
cricket". It is a nostalgic name prompted by the collective sense of loss resulting from
the war, but the period did produce some great players and memorable matches,
especially as organised competition at county and Test level developed.[45]
Cricket becomes an international sport
The first English team to tour overseas, on board ship to
North America, 1859
In 1844, the first-ever international match took place between what were essentially club
teams, from the United States and Canada, in Toronto; Canada won.[46][47] In 1859, a
team of English players went to North America on the first overseas tour.[48] Meanwhile,
the British Empire had been instrumental in spreading the game overseas and by the
middle of the 19th century it had become well established in Australia, the Caribbean,
British India (which includes present-day Pakistan and Bangladesh), New Zealand,
North America and South Africa.[49]
In 1862, an English team made the first tour of Australia.[50] The first Australian team to
travel overseas consisted of Aboriginal stockmen which toured England in 1868.[51]
In 1876–77, an England team took part in what was retrospectively recognized as the
first-ever Test match at the Melbourne Cricket Ground against Australia.[52] The rivalry
between England and Australia gave birth to The Ashes in 1882, and this has remained
Test cricket's most famous contest.[53] Test cricket began to expand in 1888–89
when South Africa played England.[54]
World cricket in the 20th century
Don Bradman of Australia had a record Test batting average of
99.94.
The inter-war years were dominated by Australia's Don Bradman, statistically the
greatest Test batter of all time. Test cricket continued to expand during the 20th century
with the addition of the West Indies (1928), New Zealand (1930) and India (1932) before
the Second World War and then Pakistan (1952), Sri
Lanka (1982), Zimbabwe (1992), Bangladesh (2000), Ireland and Afghanistan (both
2018) in the post-war period.[55][56] South Africa was banned from international cricket from
1970 to 1992 as part of the apartheid boycott.[57]
The rise of limited overs cricket
Cricket entered a new era in 1963 when English counties introduced the limited
overs variant.[58] As it was sure to produce a result, limited overs cricket was lucrative
and the number of matches increased.[59] The first Limited Overs International was
played in 1971 and the governing International Cricket Council (ICC), seeing its
potential, staged the first limited overs Cricket World Cup in 1975.[60] In the 21st century,
a new limited overs form, Twenty20, made an immediate impact.[citation needed] On 22 June
2017, Afghanistan and Ireland became the 11th and 12th ICC full members, enabling
them to play Test cricket.[61]
