Berkshire County Cricket Club

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Berkshire 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 Berkshire and playing in the Minor Counties Championship and knockout competition.

The club has no fixed address and uses several grounds around the county. These are:

Falkland CC, Wheatlands Lane, Newbury
Finchampstead CC, Finchampstead Park, Finchampstead
Hungerford CC, War Memorial Ground, Bulpit Lane, Hungerford
Hurst CC, Hurst Lodge, Hurst, Reading
Kidmore End CC, Gallowstree Common, Kidmore End, Reading
Maidenhead & Bray CC, Bray Ground, Bray-on-Thames, Maidenhead
Reading CHC, Sonning Lane, Sonning, Reading
Reading School, Playing Fields, Erleigh Road, Reading
Slough CC, Upton Court Road, Slough
Thatcham CC, Browns Sports Field, Bath Road, Thatcham, Newbury

The Minor Counties play three-day matches at a level below that of the first-class game. At present, Berkshire competes in the Western Division of the Minor Counties Championship.

1 Honours
2 Earliest cricket
3 Origin of club
4 Club history
5 Famous players
6 External links
7 References

[edit] Honours

Minor Counties Championship (3) - 1924, 1928, 1953
MCCA Knockout Trophy (1) - 2004

[edit] Earliest cricket

According to Rowland Bowen in his Growth and Development of Cricket, the first reference to cricket being played in the county of Berkshire was in 1751. But cricket certainly reached Berkshire much earlier than that for it originated on the Weald in Saxon or Norman times and was definitely being played in Berkshire's neighbouring county of Surrey in 1550.

The first definite mention of cricket in Berkshire relates to the famous all rounder Thomas Waymark who resided at Bray Wick, near Maidenhead in the 1740s.

In September 1740, a team called "Buckinghamshire, Berkshire & Hertfordshire" played two matches against the famous London Cricket Club at Uxbridge and the Artillery Ground. London won the first "with great difficulty" but no post-match report was found of the second. See H T Waghorn: Cricket Scores 1730 - 1773.

By the late 18th century, Berkshire had become a first-class team. Its strength was in the prominent Oldfield Club of Bray, near Maidenhead, which had a team representative of Berkshire as a county and was capable of taking on other leading teams of the time. The first time we encounter Berkshire as a county team is in a match against Surrey in June 1769 and the county was first-class from then until August 1795 when, after losing to MCC at Lord's, it abruptly ceased to appear in important matches.

For information about Berkshire county teams during the county's period of first-class status and before the formation of Berkshire CCC, see : Berkshire county cricket teams

[edit] Origin of club

The Oldfield Club was effectively a Berkshire county team but it was not formally constituted as a county club. Rowland Bowen's researches discovered evidence of a county organisation by 1841, but it may only have been a loose association of local clubs, as was sometimes the case elsewhere.

Berkshire CCC was founded on 17 March 1895, the same year that the Minor Counties Championship began. It did not compete in the first year of the competition but joined for 1896 and has taken part ever since, winning the title three times.