Norfolk County Cricket Club

Norfolk County Cricket Club
Norfolk CCC v Cumberland CCC (July 2008)
Captain:	George Walker
Founded:	1876
Home ground:	Manor Park, Horsford
Minor Counties wins:	5 (including 2 shared)
MCCA Trophy wins:	5
Official website:	Norfolk CCC

Norfolk County Cricket Club is one of twenty minor county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Norfolk.

The team is currently a member of the Minor Counties Championship Eastern Division and plays in the MCCA Knockout Trophy. Norfolk played List A matches occasionally until 2004 but is not classified as a List A team.^[1] The club's main home venue is the Manor Park ground in Horsford, though it has used other locations throughout the county.

Honours

Minor Counties Championship (3) - 1905, 1910, 1913; shared (2) - 1895, 2002
MCCA Knockout Trophy (5) - 1986, 1997, 2001, 2005, 2009

History

Cricket may have reached Norfolk by the end of the 17th century. The earliest reference to cricket in the county is dated 1745. The first county match played by the team was Norfolk v Suffolk at Bury St Edmunds Race Course on Thursday 23 August 1764, which was won by Norfolk. This was reported in the Gazetteer & London Daily Advertiser on Tuesday 28 August. More games against Suffolk followed.

A number of teams representing the county existed in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first noted Norfolk club of the 19th century was that based at Holt and the Norfolk v MCC match of 1820, in which William Ward made a then world record score of 278, was in fact the Holt Club with E. H. Budd, Thomas Vigne and Felix Ladbroke as given men. This was a "borderline" match in terms of its status but, because of its historical importance it has been rated a first-class match.^[2]^[3] In any case, the addition of the three given men raised the standard of the Holt/Norfolk team above the general run of Holt matches. The Holt club declined from the mid-1820s.

After that, the centre of county cricket was Norwich and a prominent club was founded there on 11 January 1827. For a few seasons, prior to Fuller Pilch's departure for Kent about 1835, Norfolk could put a fairly strong eleven into the field. Their only major county opponent, however, was Sheffield Cricket Club (playing as Yorkshire) whom they played five times: in 1833, 1834 (twice), 1835 and 1836. Apart from the games against Yorkshire, the main opponents of the Norfolk team were Suffolk and MCC. Norfolk played Cambridge Town Club (effectively Cambridgeshire) in the 1840s but Norfolk generally fared very poorly.

The present club was founded on 14 October 1876 and played its first matches in 1877. The county joined the Minor Counties Championship when it was formed in 1895. It missed the 1896 season, and also did not compete in 1902 and 1903, but otherwise has remained at that level ever since.

Norfolk has won the Minor Counties Championship five times, two of them shared. It won the first Championship in 1895, sharing with Durham and Worcestershire. It won outright in 1905, 1910 and 1913. Its most recent success was a shared title with Herefordshire in 2002. Norfolk has won the MCCA Knockout Trophy a record five times since its inception in 1983. It won in 1986, 1997, 2001, 2005 and 2009.

Grounds

For more details on this topic, see List of Norfolk County Cricket Club grounds.

Norfolk's main ground since 2001 has been Manor Park, Horsford on the northern fringes of Norwich. Prior to this the County Ground, Lakenham close to the centre of the city had been used. This was redeveloped in the early 21st century and the cricket pitch and historic pavilion destroyed.^[4] The club has played home matches on eight other grounds within the county.

Players

Players who represented Norfolk and who have subsequently gone on to play over first-class matches or Test cricket include:

Bill Edrich – 39 Tests for England between 1938 and 1954–5
John Edrich – 77 Tests and seven ODIs for England between 1963 and 1976
Geoff Edrich – 339 first-class appearances for Lancashire between 1946 and 1958
Michael Barton – Surrey captain from 1949 to 1951. 147 first-class matches played.
Peter Parfitt – 37 Tests for England between 1961 and 1972
Clive Radley – eight Tests and four ODIs for England in 1978. 559 first-class matches played.
Martin Saggers – three Tests for England in 2003–04. 119 first-class matches played.

Test Match Special commentator Henry Blofeld played one List A match and 44 times in minor counties competitions for Norfolk between 1956 and 1965.

References

↑ "List A events played by Norfolk". CricketArchive. Retrieved 6 December 2015.
↑ ACS (1981). A Guide to Important Cricket Matches Played in the British Isles 1709 – 1863. Nottingham: ACS.
↑ ACS (1982). A Guide to First-Class Cricket Matches Played in the British Isles. Nottingham: ACS.
↑ Lakenham's historic cricket ground pavilion demolished, BBC News website, 2015-03-10. Retrieved 2016-02-14.

External sources