United States v Canada (1844)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

United States of America v Canada (1844) was the first ever official international cricket match^[1] to be played. It was contested by the national teams of the USA and Canada. The match took place between 25 and 27 September 1844 at the St George's Cricket Club, Bloomingdale Park in New York. Canada won by 23 runs. The game was watched by between 10,000 and 20,000 spectators and around $120,000 worth of bets were placed.

1 The Background
2 The Match
3 Match Details
4 See also
5 References

[edit] The Background

The origins of the match lay four years earlier when a team from the St George's Club turned up in Toronto, almost destitute after a hard slog by stage coach through New York State, and across Lake Ontario by steamer. A certain Mr Phillpotts had invited St George's to play the Toronto Cricket Club at home, but when the 18 men arrived on 28 August, 1840, the Canadians were not expecting them and their mysterious host could not be found.

Despite the lack of preparations, a cricket match was hastily arranged, which was attended by a good number of spectators, a brass band and Sir George Arthur, the Governor of Upper Canada. The New Yorkers won, and left on such good terms that they invited the Canadians down for what was to be the first international cricket match.

[edit] The Match

The US team was drawn from clubs in Philadelphia, Washington DC and Boston, as well as a number in New York. Likewise, the Canadians tried to present a representative national team, rather than simply the Toronto CC team. Advertisements and posters for the game found in libraries have the game between the USA and Canada, rather than two city teams.

The game was scheduled for two days and the score after the first day saw Canada with 82, beating the USA's 64 runs. On the second day, bad weather prevented play, so the game was extended to a third day when Canada scored 62 and the USA 58. So, finally Canada won by 23 runs. The US player Wheatcroft arrived too late on the third day and was replaced by Alfred Marsh^[2].