1760 English cricket season

1760 English cricket season

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1760 was the 64th English cricket season since the earliest known important match was played. Details have survived of no important eleven-a-side and no single wicket matches. ^{[note 1]} A number of minor matches have been recorded (see Buckley, Maun, and McCann) with additional news items, some in a military context, which is a sign of the times.

Bowen recorded that "Winchester beat Eton in Port Meadow, Oxford". ^[3]

The drain of manpower and economic resource to the Seven Years' War might explain the paucity of matches but another cause could have been the sort of rows that accompanied the implementation of both roundarm and overarm. It must have been in the decade or so before 1770 that bowlers stopped trundling the ball along the ground and started pitching it. It is feasible to suggest that some patrons may have withdrawn their support in disgust at such a radical change and even that whole teams may have refused to play each other. Strangely, in contrast to the bitterness and fury generated by the later roundarm and overarm controversies, the sources are very quiet about the pitching issue. ^[4]

Notes

1. Some eleven-a-side matches played before 1864 have been rated "first-class" by certain sources, but there was no such standard at the time. The term came into common use from around 1864, when overarm bowling was legalised, and was formally defined as a standard by a meeting at Lord's, in May 1894, of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and the county clubs which were then competing in the County Championship. The ruling was effective from the beginning of the 1895 season, but pre-1895 matches of the same standard have no official definition of status because the ruling is not retrospective. However, matches of a similar standard since the beginning of the 1864 season are generally considered to have an unofficial first-class status. ^[1] Pre-1864 matches which are included in the ACS' "Important Match Guide" may generally be regarded as top-class or, at least, historically significant. ^[2] For further information, see First-class cricket.

References

1. ACS 1982, pp. 4–5.
2. ACS 1981, pp. 1–40.
3. Bowen 1970, p. 265.
4. From Lads to Lord's; The History of Cricket: 1300 – 1787

Bibliography

• 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.
• Bowen, Rowland (1970). Cricket: A History of its Growth and Development. Eyre & Spottiswoode.
• Buckley, G. B. (1935). Fresh Light on 18th Century Cricket. Cotterell.
• Maun, Ian (2011). From Commons to Lord's, Volume Two: 1751 to 1770. Martin Wilson. ISBN   978-0-9569066-0-1.
• McCann, Tim (2004). Sussex Cricket in the Eighteenth Century. Sussex Record Society.