In a Middlesex v Surrey match at Lord's in June 1803, the Buckinghamshire professional William Fennex did something contemporaries called 'astonishing': he advanced down the pitch to drive the ball before it pitched. Until that moment batters had played strictly from the crease, blocking length balls and waiting for the loose ball to cut. Fennex's running attack is the first recorded use of the technique that became the foundation of modern off-side play.
Pre-1803 batting orthodoxy held the popping crease as a near-sacred line. The bat was used to block length balls; only short and over-pitched balls were attacked, and never with footwork.
Fennex had been experimenting with the running drive in club matches around Buckingham through the 1790s. By 1803 he had decided to use it in a major fixture.
Fennex, born at Buckingham in 1763, had played for Middlesex sides since the 1780s and was known as a fearless straight driver. By 1803 he was nearly forty and at the height of his powers. In the second innings of the Middlesex v Surrey match he twice ran two paces down the pitch to drive a David Harris pace ball back over the bowler's head — a stroke that contemporary watchers had simply never seen. Fennex himself, late in life, told the cricket writer William Denison that his father had cuffed him round the ear when he first tried the stroke at home, on the grounds that 'leaving your ground is a mortal sin'. The Lord's match made the stroke a public possession of the game.
First innings: Fennex scores 19 from the crease in the conventional manner
Second innings, ball 14: Fennex steps two paces down the wicket, drives Harris straight
Ball 22: Repeats the stroke for another boundary
Bowled later attempting a third advance
Watching Surrey players debate the legitimacy of the stroke at the close
1763
Fennex born at Buckingham
1780s
Begins major-match career for Middlesex
Jun 1803
First public use of the running drive at Lord's
1810s
Stroke widely adopted by leading batters
“I was the first who jumped in at the ball before it had time to pitch. My father, when he saw me first do it, said 'Hey, hey, boy! What is this? Do you call that play?' But I did call it play, and I have called it play ever since.”
Fennex used the running drive for the rest of his career. By 1810 the leading Lord's batters — Beauclerk, Lambert, Beldham — had all incorporated some version of it.
The birth of the advancing drive — and of every batter who has ever charged the bowler.
Cricket historians credit Fennex with inventing the advancing drive. Every charge down the pitch since, from Trumper to Tendulkar, descends from his 1803 demonstration.
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1811-07-04
The 1811 Lord's season was the leanest of the Middle Ground years. With the Napoleonic blockade at its tightest, willow scarce, professionals diverted to militia service and the betting public's purses thin, only fourteen major matches were played at Lord's all summer. The 1811 season is the clearest measure of cricket's wartime contraction.
Officers vs Civilians
1812-12-15
By the close of 1812 cricket was being played regularly in both Madras and Bombay — the earliest documented fixtures in either Presidency. Garrison officers and civilian East India Company servants ran the matches; the Madras Gazette and Bombay Courier preserved the earliest scoresheets. The Calcutta game (documented 1804) had been joined by all three Presidency capitals.
Kent vs MCC
1813-09-09
On 9-10 September 1813 Kent played the MCC at the Vine, Sevenoaks — the first post-war major match at the historic Kent ground and the start of the Vine's revival as a regular major venue. The Vine had hosted little major cricket since 1808; the September 1813 fixture marked its return to the front rank.