European Cricket Council
Encyclopedia
The European Cricket Council (ECC) is an international body which oversees 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...

 in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an countries other than the Test
Test cricket
Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...

-playing cricketing nation of England and Wales
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...

.

Activities

The ECC is the regional authority for Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 under the auspices of the worldwide governing authority of cricket, the International Cricket Council (ICC)
International Cricket Council
The International Cricket Council is the international governing body of cricket. It was founded as the Imperial Cricket Conference in 1909 by representatives from England, Australia and South Africa, renamed the International Cricket Conference in 1965, and took up its current name in 1989.The...

. It is based in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England
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...

, and hosts their executive meetings at Lord's Cricket Ground
Lord's Cricket Ground
Lord's Cricket Ground is a cricket venue in St John's Wood, London. Named after its founder, Thomas Lord, it is owned by Marylebone Cricket Club and is the home of Middlesex County Cricket Club, the England and Wales Cricket Board , the European Cricket Council and, until August 2005, the...

. Its current Chairman is Roger Knight
Roger Knight
Roger David Verdon Knight OBE, MA, BA, DipEd is an English administrator, cricketer and schoolmaster. He was awarded the OBE in 2007...

.

The ECC is responsible for the promotion and development of the game of cricket across the European continent and Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 (for cricketing purposes, as with nearly all sports, Israel is considered to be a European country). Europe is a region where the game has not traditionally flourished. Cricket also faces tough competition from much more popular sports, such as football
Football (soccer)
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...

. It lists its key objectives as: Participation, High Performance, Tournament Structure, Widening the Market, and promoting the Spirit of Cricket.

The ECC is responsible for organising the European Cricket Championship
European Cricket Championship
The European Cricket Championship is a group of various tournaments in which national cricket sides throughout Europe compete. The tournament is designed to encourage and develop the best players in countries where cricket is not a major sport and Europe's only Test cricket playing country,...

 along with junior, indoor and women's tournaments. The tournament structure is part of the qualification for the Cricket ICC World Cup.

The ECC runs development programmes that support coaching, umpiring, training, clinics and sports medicine programmes in member countries. These programmes are the responsibility of the European Development Manager and a small team of staff, within the framework of the ICC Development Programmes’s Key Objectives. Responsibility for hosting and supporting the ICC’s five regional programmes falls to the Full Member in each region, in this case the England and Wales Cricket Board
England and Wales Cricket Board
The England and Wales Cricket Board is the governing body of cricket in England and Wales. It was created on 1 January 1997 combining the roles of the Test and County Cricket Board, the National Cricket Association and the Cricket Council...

 (ECB), who have, in turn, involved Marylebone Cricket Club
Marylebone Cricket Club
Marylebone Cricket Club is a cricket club in London founded in 1787. Its influence and longevity now witness it as a private members' club dedicated to the development of cricket. It owns, and is based at, Lord's Cricket Ground in St John's Wood, London NW8. MCC was formerly the governing body of...

 (MCC) on the basis of MCC’s existing strong links with Europe.

The programme is financed largely by the ICC (through the biennial ICC Champions Trophy
ICC Champions Trophy
The ICC Champions Trophy is a One Day International cricket tournament, second in importance only to the Cricket World Cup. It was inaugurated as the ICC Knock Out tournament in 1998 and has been played every two years since, changing its name to the Champions Trophy in 2002...

, played between Full Members and Associate qualifiers) with assistance from the ECB and MCC, and a growing level of commercial sponsorship.

History

Cricket is recorded as having first been played in Europe by Admiral Nelson's troops and sailors whilst they were stationed in Naples in 1793. The game quickly grew in popularity, and was regularly played at amateur level throughout the 19th century. Many professional clubs formed at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, the most famous of which, the Milan Cricket and Football Club, was the fore-runner of A.C. Milan. However, the rise of Fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...

 across Europe in the 1920s and 1930s saw a decline in the game's popularity. Although it continued to be played at amateur level, it wasn't until the 1990s that it began to revive on a larger scale.

The ECC was founded in 1997, replacing the administration heavy European Cricket Federation, and has expanded from an initial membership of 14, to now having has 37 member associations (as of 2006). 9 of the member nations have ICC associate status, a further 17 have affiliate status, and 11 are ICC prospective members. The game continues to grow in popularity, and three ECC members, Scotland, Ireland
Irish cricket team
The Ireland cricket team is the cricket team representing all of Ireland. Because of political difficulties, the Irish Cricket Union was not elected to the International Cricket Council until 1993, and qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 2007. The Irish Cricket Union is the...

, and The Netherlands
Dutch cricket team
The Dutch cricket team is a national cricket team representing the Netherlands. It is administered by the Koninklijke Nederlandse Cricket Bond which is based in Nieuwegein in the centre of the country and is older than many renowned cricket clubs in the West Indies, Australia, and New...

, along with test status England, competed in the 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup
2007 Cricket World Cup
The 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup was the ninth edition of the ICC Cricket World Cup tournament that took place in the West Indies from 13 March to 28 April 2007, using the sport's One Day International format...

 and the 2009 Twenty20 World Cup.

ECC Associate Nations

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ECC Affiliate Nations

Official Site Official Site Official Site Official Site Official website
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Official Site Official Site Official Site Official Site Official Site

ECC Prospective Nations

Official site Official site

External links

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