Cricket seasons are the times of the year when cricket is played.
Because top-class cricket is almost always played outdoors, on uncovered pitches, and rain prevents play, the seasons in each country are geared to coincide with the driest months of the year. The hours of daylight and the temperature are also factors in some countries. For example, in England the winter days are too short and often too dark, and the temperature is too low, for playing cricket to be practical.
When designating cricket seasons, the convention is to use a single year for a northern hemisphere summer season, and a dashed pair of years to indicate a southern hemisphere summer. Hence, 1948 for the English summer season and 1948–49 for the Australian summer that followed some months later.
In the UK, the cricket season starts mid-April and ends in September, whereas in Australia, the cricket season begins in October and ends in February or March.
Famous quotes containing the words cricket and/or season:
“All cries are thin and terse;
The field has droned the summer’s final mass;
A cricket like a dwindled hearse
Crawls from the dry grass.”
—Richard Wilbur (b. 1921)
“Methoughts a legion of foul fiends
Environed me, and howled in mine ears
Such hideous cries that with the very noise
I trembling waked, and for a season after
Could not believe but that I was in hell,
Such terrible impression made my dream.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)