Cheshire County Cricket Club
Encyclopedia
Cheshire County Cricket Club is one of the county clubs which make up the Minor Counties
Minor counties of English cricket
The Minor Counties are the cricketing counties of England and Wales that are not afforded first-class status. The game is administered by the Minor Counties Cricket Association which comes under the England and Wales Cricket Board...

 in the English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 domestic cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...

 structure, representing the historic county
Historic counties of England
The historic counties of England are subdivisions of England established for administration by the Normans and in most cases based on earlier Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and shires...

 of Cheshire
Cheshire
Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...

 and playing in the Minor Counties Championship and the MCCA Knockout Trophy
MCCA Knockout Trophy
The Minor Counties Cricket Association Knockout Cup was started in 1983 as a knockout one-day competition for the Minor Counties in English cricket...

.

The club is based at Cheadle
Cheadle, Greater Manchester
Cheadle is a suburb in the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport in Greater Manchester, England. It borders the districts of Cheadle Hulme, Gatley, Heald Green and Cheadle Heath in Stockport, and the East Didsbury area of Manchester. As of 2001 it had a population of 14,261.-Early history:There has...

 and plays matches around the county at Boughton Hall in Chester
Chester
Chester is a city in Cheshire, England. Lying on the River Dee, close to the border with Wales, it is home to 77,040 inhabitants, and is the largest and most populous settlement of the wider unitary authority area of Cheshire West and Chester, which had a population of 328,100 according to the...

, Nantwich
Nantwich
Nantwich is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England. The town gives its name to the parliamentary constituency of Crewe and Nantwich...

, New Brighton
New Brighton, Merseyside
New Brighton is a seaside resort forming part of the town of Wallasey, in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, in the metropolitan county of Merseyside, England. It is located at the northeastern tip of the Wirral Peninsula, within the historic county boundaries of Cheshire, and has sandy beaches...

, Grappenhall
Grappenhall
Grappenhall is a suburban village in Warrington, Cheshire, England. It is situated along the Bridgewater Canal, and forms one of the principal settlements of Grappenhall and Thelwall civil parish...

 and Alderley Edge
Alderley Edge
Alderley Edge is a village and civil parish within the unitary authority of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England. According to the 2001 census the parish had a population of 4,409....

.

The Minor Counties play three-day matches at a level below that of the first-class
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

 game. At present, Cheshire competes in the Western Division of the Minor Counties Championship.

Honours

  • Minor Counties Championship (4) - 1967, 1985, 1988, 2007; shared (2) - 2001, 2005
  • MCCA Knockout Trophy (3) - 1983, 1987, 1996

Earliest cricket

Cricket may not have reached Cheshire until the 18th century. The earliest reference to the game being played there is in 1781 .

Origin of club

According to Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...

there was a county organisation as early as 1819. The present club was founded on 29 September 1908 and entered the Minor Counties Championship for the first time the following year, 1909.

Club history

Cheshire has won the Minor Counties Championship four times, and twice shared the title. It won the title outright in 1967, 1985, 1988 and 2007. It shared the accolade in 2001 with Lincolnshire
Lincolnshire County Cricket Club
Lincolnshire County Cricket Club is one of the county clubs, which make up the Minor Counties in the English domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Lincolnshire and playing in the Minor Counties Championship and the MCCA Knockout Trophy...

 and in 2005 with Suffolk
Suffolk County Cricket Club
Suffolk County Cricket Club is one of the county clubs which make up the Minor Counties in the English domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Suffolk....

.

Cheshire has won the MCCA Knockout Trophy
MCCA Knockout Trophy
The Minor Counties Cricket Association Knockout Cup was started in 1983 as a knockout one-day competition for the Minor Counties in English cricket...

 three times since its inception in 1983. It won in 1983, 1987 and 1996.

Famous players

The following Cheshire cricketers also made an impact on the first-class
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

 game:
  • Bob Barber
    Bob Barber
    Robert William Barber is a former English cricketer who played first-class cricket for Cambridge University, Lancashire and Warwickshire from 1954 to 1969. He also played 28 Test matches for England...

  • Winston Benjamin
    Winston Benjamin
    Winston Keithroy Matthew Benjamin is an Antiguan cricketer who played 21 Tests and 85 One Day Internationals for the West Indies. He made his Test debut against India at Delhi on the 1987–88 tour...

  • Mudassar Nazar
    Mudassar Nazar
    Mudassar Nazar is a former Pakistani cricketer with a career in Test cricket for Pakistan and in league cricket in Pakistan and England...

  • Geoff Miller
    Geoff Miller
    Geoffrey Miller is an English former cricketer, who played in thirty four Tests and twenty five ODIs for England from 1976 to 1984...

  • Barry Wood
  • Chris Schofield
    Chris Schofield
    Christopher Paul Schofield is an English cricketer, one of the few leg-spinners to play Test cricket for England in recent times....


Further reading

  • Rowland Bowen
    Rowland Bowen
    Major Rowland Francis Bowen was a cricket researcher, historian and writer....

    , Cricket: A History of its Growth and Development, Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1970
  • E W Swanton (editor), Barclays World of Cricket, Guild, 1986

  • Playfair Cricket Annual
    Playfair Cricket Annual
    Playfair Cricket Annual is a compact annual about cricket that is published in the United Kingdom each April, just before the English cricket season is due to begin. Its main purposes are to review the previous English season and to provide detailed career records and potted biographies of current...

     – various editions
  • Wisden Cricketers Almanack – various editions
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