Lancashire County Cricket Club

Lancashire County Cricket Club is the traditional county of Lancashire in English cricket. The club has been granted first-class status since it was established on 1864. Lancashire's home ground is Old Trafford Cricket Ground however, the team also play matches at other venues around the county. Lancashire was one of the founding members of the County Championship in 1890. The team has won nine times in the tournament the most recent time in 2011. The team's limited overs is known as Lancashire Lightning.

Lancashire was widely recognized for being the Champion County Four times between 1879-1889. The county won its first two County Championship titles in the 1897 and 1904 seasons. Between 1926 between 1926 and 1934, they won the title five times. In the most of the interwar period, Lancashire along with their neighbor Yorkshire had the top two squads within England in the English Premier League. Roses matches between them were typically one of the highlights of the local season. in 1950, Lancashire had a shared title with Surrey. This County Championship was restructured in 2000 with Lancashire in Division 1. They were the winners of this year's 2011, the County Championship, a period of 77 years between the last time they won an outright title in 1934.

When Archie MacLaren was born in 1895 Archie MacLaren scored 424 runs in his innings for Lancashire, which remains the highest score ever scored by an Englishman in the first-class of cricket. Johnny Briggs, who's career lasted between 1879 and 1900 is the only player to record 10,000 runs and also take 1,000 wickets in the game for Lancashire. Ernest Tyldesley, younger brother of Johnny Tyldesley is the most prolific run-scorer in the club, scoring 34,222 runs in 573 games of Lancashire from 1909 to 1936. A fast-bowler Brian Statham took an all-time record number of wickets in 430 first-class games between 1950 and 1968. England player Cyril Washbrook became Lancashire's first professional captain in the year 1954.

The Lancashire team in the latter half of the 1960s and early 1970s, captained by Jack Bond and featuring the West Indian batsman Clive Lloyd was successful in the game of limited-overs cricket, winning the Sunday League in 1969 and 1970 as well as The Gillette Cup four times between 1970 between 1970 and 1975. Lancashire won the Benson and Hedges Cup in 1984, three times between 1991 and 1996 and it won in three consecutive years the Sunday League in 1989, 1998 and 1999. They won the Twenty20 Cup for the first time in 2015.

The oldest cricket club in Lancashire

It is possible that cricket did not reach Lancashire before about the end of 18th century. As per the advice of the Association of Cricket Statisticians (ACS), the earliest known report of the sport played in Lancashire was found within the Manchester Journal dated Saturday, 1 September 1781. It was a match of eleven-a-side held on the previous Monday 27 August at Brinnington Moor. It involved a team composed of printers and a team representing communities of Haughton and Bredbury that were winners. Because Bredbury was then in Cheshire, the match is the earliest reference for that county , too.


In 1816, The Manchester Cricket Club was founded and soon became the main north-country rival from Nottingham Cricket Club and Sheffield Cricket Club. On July 23-26, 1849, the Sheffield as well as Manchester clubs met at Hyde Park in Sheffield but the match was referred to as Yorkshire against Lancashire. It was the first cricket match to involve a team using Lancashire as its nickname and is often believed to have been the first Roses Match. Yorkshire took five wickets to win. Teams named Yorkshire even though they were based on Yorkshire, which is based on the Sheffield club, were active since 1833. The Roses Match is one of the oldest and most renowned cricket rivalries. In 1857 the Manchester club relocated towards Old Trafford, which has been the home of Lancashire cricket ever since.

The history of the county team

On the 12th of January 1864, Manchester Cricket Club organised a meeting in the Queen's Hotel in Manchester for the intention of forming a club for the representation of the county. It was comprised of thirteen local clubs: Broughton, Longsight, Manchester and Western from the Manchester area; Huyton, Liverpool and Northern from Merseyside; Accrington, Ashton, Blackburn, Oldham, Whalley and Wigan from towns outside of the region. Lancashire County Cricket Club began its existence in created with the goal of, it was said, "spreading a thorough knowledge and appreciation of the game throughout Lancashire". It was planned to hold games at home on alternate days in Old Trafford, Aigburth, Preston, Blackburn and at "other places to help introduce good cricket throughout the county".

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The new county club played its first-ever official game at Warrington at Birkenhead Park on Wednesday 15 June 1864, but it was not a first-class game. The first inter-county match that was first-class began in 1865 and was held at Old Trafford against Middlesex; Lancashire beat Middlesex by 62 roos, but Middlesex's V. E. Walker was the sole wicket taker in the second innings of Lancashire.

Early successes

The first Lancashire team was dependent on amateurs, which led to problems. While they were content to play at Old Trafford, they were less inclined to travel for away fixtures. The early 1870s were when the team was heavily dominated by A. N. Hornby's batting. The quality of the cricket team increased with the addition in the form of professional cricketers, Dick Barlow and Alex Watson. The effect of Barlow as well as Hornby was such that their partnership in batting was immortalised in the poem At Lord's composed by Francis Thompson. It was strengthened by A. G. Steel who was a naive player, often regarded next to W. G. Grace as the country's most effective all-rounder. Johnny Briggs, a professional from Sutton-in-Ashfield and the only player to hit 10,000 runs and take 1,000 wickets for Lancashire as well as wicketkeeper Dick Pilling, who in 1891 was named by Wisden Cricketers' Almanac as the second-best wicket-keeper in the world behind Jack Blackham. As Lancashire's reliability improved, also did their support. in 1878, 28,000 spectators over for three consecutive days went to watch Lancashire perform in Gloucestershire.


The first victory of the club occurred in 1879. At that time, the majority of the press apart from Wisden - agreed the fact that Lancashire and Nottinghamshire jointly champions. Lancashire was the champion county in 1881 and again shared it with Nottinghamshire when it was 1882.


Dick Barlow carried his bat for only 5 not out in Lancashire's total of 69 runs in two and a quarter hours against Nottinghamshire on an extremely slippery, wet Trent Bridge pitch in July 1882. Barlow along with his long-time opener pair Hornby are the opening batsmen immortalized in the famous poem by Francis Thompson. The year was 1884. Old Trafford became the second ground, after The Oval, to stage a Test match in England. Although it was raining on the first day, 12,000 fans took part on the second; the game in England and Australia was the draw.


Controversy emerged during the 1880s; Kent and Nottinghamshire objected to the bowling activities that were performed by John Crossland and George Nash. Nottinghamshire even went as far as refusing to play Lancashire. Though the 1880s saw an uneasy period with disappointing results for the club however, it was also the period during which several club records were established. In 1885, George Kemp (later 1st Baron Rochdale) made Lancashire's debut century in the Roses Match. The same year, Johnny Briggs and Dick Pilling established a record first-class partnership with the wicket tenth in 173. This record remained in place until 1899, and was never rivaled by Lancashire. The club shared its title as champions Surrey in 1889.

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