First-Class cricket will be celebrating its 250th anniversary in 2022 with the Broadhalfpenny Down Preservation Trust hosting a special New Year’s Day cricket game to kick off a year of celebrations.
Broadhalfpenny Down, the home of the Hambledon Club, was the location of the inaugural First-Class cricket match in June 1772 between Hampshire and an All-England team.
2022 will see a number of cricketing events hosted at the ground, known as ‘the cradle of cricket’, with a special cricket match on New Year’s Day kicking off the celebrations.
In the 18th Century the Hambledon Club was the acknowledged authority on the Laws of Cricket, and responsible for the development of new techniques and the laws of cricket. These varied from the addition of a third stump to the size of the bat.
It's only the third time that the ground has seen play on New Year's Day. In 1929 a charity cricket match was played between the Hampshire Eskimos and The Invalids Cricket Club, a club founded in 1919 for players wounded in WW1. At the turn of the millennium Hambledon CC arranged a match commencing at the stroke of midnight using car headlights to light the ground, play was then halted due to bad light and resumed later in the day when daylight illuminated the proceedings. Adie Aymes Benefit Invitation XI beat a Hambledon team by 2 wickets knocking off the 61 required for victory.
The two teams who will brave the cold this time are the Broadhalfpenny Brigands and the Hampshire Huskies, an invitational team of local club cricketers and cricket nuts.
Extract from www.ageasbowl.com, 16 December 2021
Comments