In 1961 there were 64 'outgrounds' where county cricket teams brought the professional game to the people on park pitches and school fields. By 2001 the number had dwindled to 16 and continues to fall. This book recalls the venues that once hosted the traditional cricket festivals around the country, where marquees and temporary structures would accommodate the players and spectators and international stars could be seen close-up at Blackpool, Scarborough or Weston-super-Mare.

Britain's Lost Cricket Festivals: The Idyllic Club Grounds That Will Never Again Host the World's Best Players

Chris Arnot

London: Aurum Press, 2014

From county grounds where Denis Compton hit a century to the smallest village field Britain's Lost Cricket Grounds movingly shows how picturesque greenery gave way to shopping malls and housing estates. The cricket ground is as much a part of the British landscape as the parish church. Hastings used to have a historic ground in the middle of the town surrounded by elegant houses - but then recently it disappeared under a shopping precinct with a branch of River Island where the wicket used to be. Yorkshire used to play at Sheffield's Bramall Lane - until the football club built grandstands over it. Like so many companies with works grounds, Guinness have closed their cricket ground at Park Royal and sold it for an industrial estate. Now, in a further addition to Aurum's successful 'Lost' series, following Britain's Lost Cities and Lost Victorian Britain, Guardian journalist Chris Arnot tours the country in search of our most lamented lost cricket grounds, hearing reminiscences from former players and spectators, and finding what, if anything, is left nowadays, apart from the poignant photographs of their picturesque heyday that make this a nostalgic and rueful trip back in time.

Britain's Lost Cricket Grounds: Forty Hallowed Homes of Cricket That Will Never See Another Ball Bowled

Sports & Outdoors

Other Team Sports

Aurum Press Ltd

The Day We Won the Cup: England Then and Now

Soccer

Step Beach Press

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Books by Chris Arnot