Controversies in 1849

4 incidents documented

All-England Eleven at Sheffield — The Biggest Cricket Crowd in England, 1849

All-England Eleven vs Twenty-Two of Sheffield

1849-08-20

The All-England Eleven's August 1849 visit to Sheffield's Hyde Park Ground attracted a crowd estimated at between 12,000 and 15,000 — among the largest ever seen at a cricket match in England at that point. The Sheffield fixture was the AEE's most reliable commercial event, reflecting the city's massive working-class enthusiasm for cricket and its willingness to pay to see the best professionals. The match against Twenty-Two of Sheffield was a showcase of the touring format at its most commercially successful.

#roundarm-era#early-victorian#1840s

⭐Mild

Lillywhite's Cricketers' Almanack — Annual Begins, 1849

n/a

1849-04-01

Frederick Lillywhite, son of the Nonpareil, brought out the first edition of his Guide to Cricketers in the spring of 1849. The annual ran for eighteen consecutive editions until 1866, contained fixture lists, club addresses, players' birthdates and laws, and was the model that John Wisden's 1864 almanack was designed to compete with.

#frederick-lillywhite#lillywhite-guide#1849

⭐Mild

All-England Eleven Spreads Cricket — Manchester, Bristol, Derby and the Country Towns, 1847-49

All-England Eleven vs local sides

1849-08-01

Between 1847 and 1849 the All-England Eleven extended its fixture list from the north and midlands into the West Country, the Welsh borders and East Anglia. Visits to Manchester, Bristol, Derby, Newcastle, Norwich, Stourbridge and dozens of other towns turned cricket from a southern English diversion into a recognisably national game and triggered a wave of local club foundations.

#all-england-eleven#william-clarke#manchester

⭐Mild

John Wisden Emerges as a Bowler — Sussex and AEE, late 1840s

Sussex / All-England Eleven

1849-08-01

John Wisden of Sussex — five feet four and weighing under nine stone — broke into first-class cricket in 1845 as a fast roundarm bowler and within four years was a fixture in the All-England Eleven. By 1849, aged 23, he was being talked of as the most promising young bowler in England; the publishing empire and the all-ten-bowled feat would come later.

#john-wisden#sussex#1849