MC Travel Special | Cricket pilgrimage in England: A fan’s destinations

There's enough history packed in the Lord's Cricket Ground and between the walls to make a paid tour worthwhile. (Photo: Ank Kumar via Wikimedia Commons CC Zero)

Cricket fans are a curious species. When in Sydney, they will probably skip the Opera House and sneak away for a tour of the Bradman Museum in nearby Bowral. Or when in Mumbai, perhaps try to click a selfie next to the nameplates of residents in Sportsfield Cooperative Housing Society, an otherwise innocuous-looking nine-storeyed building that has had six Indian Test captains among its residents.

What about England, then, where the sport had started five centuries ago? The inclination to preserve history has made England a dream destination for cricket fans – and that stretches beyond watching an Ashes Test match or a late-season County Championship clash. Here is a list of must-visit places for a cricket fan in England.

Lord’s

Even before you walk past the Grace Gates, you realise why Lord’s insist on being called the Home of Cricket. Do take the paid tour. It may seem a bit expensive, but there is a lot of history packed in that ground and between the walls to make it worthwhile.

Even if the Long Room, the pavilion, the dressing rooms, and the state-of-art, futuristic media centre are not enough for you, the MCC Museum will be. It boasts of kits and gear used by cricketing legends; the original Ashes urn that Ivo Bligh brought back from Australia to England in 1883; and if you are an Indian fan, the 1983 World Cup trophy.

While still at Lord’s, try out the MCC Library - it has no parallel in the world in terms of sheer volume of books. Note that non-members can access the library only by appointment, which is impossible to get on a match day. A fire had destroyed much of the archives in 1826, but two centuries’ worth of material is a lot.

South London

Before you enter through the Jack Hobbs Gates, do take note of the iconic gasometers outside The Oval, England’s oldest Test venue. After Lord’s, you may not feel like taking another ground tour. In that case, travel about 11 miles south, to Mitcham.

Founded in 1685, Mitcham Cricket Club is the oldest active cricket club in the world. The Mitcham Cricket Green, used in the same year, is the oldest cricket venue still in use, and is – rather unusually – separated from ground by a road. The adjacent pub that used to put up touring cricketers (including Australians) was destroyed in the Second World War, but the history has been preserved otherwise.

JW McKenzie & Co.

Epsom is about ten kilometres from the Mitcham Cricket Green. There, at 12 Stoneleigh Park Road, almost in obscurity, lies what some cricket fans hail as the ultimate destination. JW McKenize & Co. – set to turn 50 in 2023 – is the only physical outlet in the entire world that sells solely cricket books and memorabilia.

For decades, cricket fans, readers, researchers, writers, collectors, and even cricketers have visited the store. If you cannot find a cricket book or collectible at McKenzie’s, you will probably not get it anywhere in the world.

Broadhalfpenny Down and Bat & Ball Inn

The stone monument marking the site of Broadhalfpenny Down was erected back in 1908 – but that is recent history for the cricketing history of Hambledon in Hampshire, where cricket took off in the second half of the 18th century. The venue has not changed much in 250 years, some would say.

Cricket existed at least in the 16th century, which makes Hambledon Club’s claim of being the Cradle of Cricket erroneous. However, there is little doubt over the fact that it was in Hambledon that cricket, as we know today, began to take shape.

The Bat & Ball Inn is opposite Broadhalfpenny Down. The inn was owned by Hambledon captain Richard Nyren between 1762 and 1772, and has hosted many a great cricketer over the past two centuries and a half. If you step inside, do notice the cricketing artefacts everywhere inside it.

The Bat & Ball inn. (Image: BenShade at English Wikipedia via Wikimedia Commons CC3.0)

Trent Bridge Inn and Kirkby-in-Ashfield

The Trent Bridge ground boasts of bats of the greatest cricketing heroes of Nottinghamshire, though the library will probably not be the same after the unfortunate demise of the venerable librarian, Peter Wynne-Thomas.

Instead, walk down to the Trent Bridge Inn. Nottinghamshire captain-manager William Clarke had married Mary Chapman, daughter of the inn, and built the cricket ground on the empty space behind the inn in 1838. As was often the case back then, the cricketers who came to play would be put up in the inn.

About 15 miles north-west is the town of Kirkby in Ashfield. In the town centre, you will find an enormous bronze statue of local hero Harold Larwood set to unleash a thunderbolt. Up against him is a bronze Donald Bradman, Larwood’s great rival, bat held aloft. At silly mid off is Bill Voce, Larwood’s fellow local partner in crime in the Bodyline series.

Headingley Lodge

If you check in, you can watch the day’s cricket at the historic venue out of the window. It is as simple as that. However, you are unlikely to get a room during international matches, when the cricketers are often put up here. But watching Yorkshire – the most successful team in the history of the County Championship – play at home is being part of history.

Nevill Ground

It is almost impossible to miss the rhododendrons in the photographs of Kapil Dev’s iconic unbeaten 175. They are in full bloom in June, which is typically the month in which the Tunbridge Wells Cricket Week festival is organised - it has been held almost every year since 1902 (though COVID-19 has played spoilsport in 2022). The pavilion here had to be rebuilt after suffragettes burnt it down in 1913.

Even if you do not care much for history, Nevill Ground competes with the grounds at Stroud, Lynton Lynmouth, Arundel, New Road, and Sedbergh for the unofficial crown of the most picturesque cricket ground in England.