International Cricket
Test cricket officially began in March 1877 but the term was applied retrospectively to the early matches and there have been instances of retrospective recognition since. A key point is that Test cricket is a form of first-class cricket but is a different form of competition within the concept to, say, the County Championship or the Ranji Trophy. Although several international matches had taken place before 1890, it was not until then that the term "Test cricket" was coined by the Australian cricket chronicler Clarence Moody when compiling a list of matches in his Australian Cricket and Cricketers. Moody's list gained approval in Australia and was then accepted by the leading English authority, C. W. Alcock, who quoted it in Cricket.
Retrospective Test status has been granted to the West Indies v England series in 1929–30 and the 1945–46 match at Basin Reserve, Wellington between New Zealand and Australia. Conversely, the 1970 series between England and a Rest of the World XI was initially presented as a Test series but this status was later rescinded.
The ICC maintains lists of matches that it regards as first-class or ListA. Generally, these are in agreement with CricketArchive but they exclude the unofficial Tests played in the rebel tours of South Africa in the 1970s and 1980s. On the other hand, the limited over internationals played in these tours are recognised as ListA.
Read more about this topic: Variations In First-class Cricket Statistics
Famous quotes containing the word cricket:
“The thing that struck me forcefully was the feeling of great age about the place. Standing on that old parade ground, which is now a cricket field, I could feel the dead generations crowding me. Here was the oldest settlement of freedmen in the Western world, no doubt. Men who had thrown off the bands of slavery by their own courage and ingenuity. The courage and daring of the Maroons strike like a purple beam across the history of Jamaica.”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)