North v South — The Annual Fixture That Defined English Cricket, 1840s

North v South had been played informally since the late eighteenth century but acquired its definitive form in the 1830s as county cricket became more organised. By the 1840s it was a fixed part of the calendar, played both at Lord's and at a northern venue (often Sheffield or Nottingham). The selection was contentious every year — who counted as a Northerner, who as a Southerner — but the calibre of play was the highest in England outside the AEE's strongest fixtures. Alfred Mynn and Fuller Pilch represented the South in the early 1840s; William Clarke and George Parr represented the North. John Wisden's eight-wicket first innings against a full North attack in 1850 — all eight bowled — was the most dramatic single performance in the fixture's history. The match gradually lost its primacy when the formal county championship was proposed in the 1860s, but through the 1840s it remained the highest stage of English cricket.