Have You Played Creckett? Trivia Quiz

Answer: 16th Century

This first definite reference is dated back to 1597, where a court record quotes Mr Derrick as having "played creckett" at the Grammar School in the 1540s.

Answer: They were prosecuted for "defiling the Sabbath"

It's highly unlikely that the two men were religious, therefore they wouldn't have been joining any party celebrating the publication of a Bible - although the King James version was published in 1611. Cromwell would only have been 12 years of age in 1611, therefore he didn't have an army they could have been conscripted into. Shakespeare wrote his last play in 1611 (The Tempest) but didn't die until 1616 - so if they did officiate at his funeral, it was 5 years later!

Cricket on a Sunday has only become socially acceptable in the UK since the late 1960s - and even then, in the early days, there was a lot of opposition from churchgoers to a sport being played on the Sabbath.

Answer: There were usually only two stumps

The "wicket" is the three bits of wood (that are standardized at 28 inches in height for adult cricket) standing vertically out of the ground, with two bails resting on grooves across the top of them. The "wickets" are also known as "the stumps". The whole assembly must be a standard 9 inches wide.

Traditionally, the "wicket" was made from a "wicket" gate - and therefore could be any width. This obviously led to all sorts of shenanigans as sides attempted to gain an advantage by choosing wider or narrower "wickets". Eventually, people settled on two stumps, but again, there was no standard width - so again, there could be all sorts of problems arising from this. Once these were standardized at 5 inches width (with one bail sitting on top of the two stumps), batsmen soon found that they could guard their wickets either by putting their leg in front of them, or by choosing to have a very wide bat made for themselves.

As a batsman myself, I think this was all very fair, of course! Eventually, in 1774, standard laws were drawn up for the game, which increased the number of stumps to three, with two bails across them. At the same time, the LBW (Leg Before Wicket) Law was bought in, to stop batsmen indiscriminately covering the wicket with their legs, and another Law was brought in limiting the width of the bat. These laws have stayed in placed fundamentally unchanged since that time, thus ensuring an equal contest between batsman and bowler.

Answer: Georgia, 1737

William Stephens was a planter, living in Georgia, having received his education at Winchester College and then Cambridge University before moving to the USA. In 1737, he wrote; "Many of our townsmen, freeholders, inmates and servants were assembled in the principal square at cricket and divers other athletick sports." (Courtesy of Cricinfo).

There is further evidence of cricket being played regularly in New York throughout the 1740s and 1750s, as well as in Baltimore. After the revolution, when the question of giving a title to the Chief Executive Officer of the United States was being discussed, John Adams is reported as saying "There are Presidents of fire companies and cricket clubs". Therefore, the role of cricket in the United States may well be a lot more significant than many of us think.

These days, there are a number of flourishing leagues throughout the USA. As well as being popular along the East coast, both the California State Leagues and the Texan State leagues are extremely popular, with almost 100 clubs playing in a number of highly competitive leagues throughout Texas.

Answer: crooked staff

Randle Cotgrave's French-English Dictionary, published in 1611, describes the word "crosse" as follows - "a cricket staffe, or a crooked staff wherein boyes play at cricket".

This would make perfect sense, as pictorial evidence of the earliest cricket bats show them to be precisely that - a rather thick staff, which is curved at one end. A lot more similar to a modern hockey stick or golf club - or indeed to a Gaelic hurling stick, which is believed to have its origins in prehistoric times. It is likely that the design of the cricket bat changed to the straighter bat that we know today sometime toward the end of the 18th century, at around the time when bowling "grubber" balls (which shot along the ground) was outlawed.

Answer: Christina Willes

John Willes (1777-1852) was an early cricket enthusiast. He played in the first Gentlemen v Players match in 1806, built his own indoor practice arena, and employed his own cricket coach. However, it was his sister who first bowled with a roundarm action to him. Legend has it - though intuition would tend to back this up - that she had problems bowling underarm because of her voluminous skirts. Therefore it was physically easier for her to bowl with a roundarm action. So impressed was Willes with the trajectory of the ball that he tried the action out whilst playing for Kent versus the MCC at Lord's. The umpire promptly called "no ball" at Willes' first roundarm attempt. Willes was outraged, jumped on to his horse, and apparently would have nothing to do with cricket ever again.

Roundarm bowling caught on though, and in due course, it was passed into the Laws of the game as a legitimate method of delivering the ball.

Answer: USA and Canada

The match took place at Bloomingdale Park in New York on September 25th - 27th. The match came about because of mix up some 4 years previously, when a team from the St George's Sports Club in the USA turned up in Toronto to play a match against the local side. The home team weren't expecting them, and as such, had no side ready to play against the New York side. A team was hastily assembled, and a good time was had by all - so much so, that the Americans invited the Canadians to play an international match back in New York a few years later. And hence North America has yet another very important piece of cricket history for which it can take credit.

For what its worth, that first ever match was won by Canada by 23 runs. Crowds estimated at between 10,000 and 20,000 turned up to watch the game over the course of the three days.

Answer: The Barbarians

International touring became popular towards the end of the 19th Century, with England a particularly attractive destination for sides from all over the world. All three of these teams visited England in the 1880s - whereas the Barbarians are a rugby union team.

Answer: All these

An England side toured New Zealand and Australia in 1876-77 under the captaincy of James Lillywhite. Lillywhite incidentally gave his name to the Sports Shop which can still be found to this day, on Picaddilly Circus in London. After playing some initial games in Australia, the side sailed to New Zealand to play 8 games before sailing back across the Tasman Sea for one final fixture in Australia. The journey took six days, and all of the side were violently sea sick for the duration of the crossing.

They also travelled back to Australia without their only recognized wicketkeeper, Ted Pooley. He had been detained in New Zealand after a bar room fracas. Therefore England had to press John Selby into emergency wicketkeeping duties. England were expecting to play a Victorian side, but when they turned up in Melbourne, they found that they were playing a representative side calling themselves "Australia". The match started within hours of the bedraggled squad landing back in Australia, and the host team duly won the game by 45 runs. A "re-match" was hastily organized, won comfortably by the England team - amidst accustaions that they had "thrown" the first game in order to secure better betting odds on them winning in the second match. Sour grapes, I reckon - an Aussie win in an Ashes Test match has hardly been a minority event over the years, has it?

Answer: India

Bulgaria became an Affiliate member of the International Cricket Council in 2008. The game in England was already well established before Lord Harris' lifetime - and Pakistan didn't come into existence until after Lord Harris had passed away.

Lord Harris - or George Robert Canning Harris, 4th Baron Harris, GCSI, GCIE to give him his full dues, was one of the most influential people of the 19th Century regarding the development of cricket. He enoyed a fine playing pedigree at Eton College and Oxford University before joining Kent and eventually captaining England. After retiring, he became a keen administrator, taking a leading role both in the establishing of the Laws of cricket, as well as being a key administrator with the MCC, the sport's ruling body at the time.

In 1890, he was appointed as the Governor of Bombay. By all accounts, he didn't do a great job of the political side of the role - but he did a huge amount to support cricket in India. This included helping to establish clubs and regular competition by diverting funds and land in the right (cricketing!) direction. However, the main criticisms of his tenure was that he spent too much time supporting cricket in India to the detriment of the substantive tasks of his role there.