Can you help with our new research projects?
Stuck at home, with no cricket to watch, and looking for something to do?
The ACS has launched a new series of collaborative research projects, and we need our members’ help.
The internet provides access to a huge number of local newspapers, without having to go to the library, so you can get involved even if you’re self-isolating. Among the subjects we want to work on are women’s cricket (compiling a definitive list of major domestic matches), league cricket, national competitions, research into county committees, scorebooks (where are historic scorebooks kept?) and several more. We’re open to further suggestions!
For more details on what we’re planning and how you can help, read Peter Griffiths’s proposals which include contact details for the project co-ordinators. Links to the first results are on our Research page.
What is the ACS?
Who is the oldest man to hit a Test match century? What is the most expensive bowling analysis in first-class cricket? Does a match start with the toss, the call of ‘Play’ or the first delivery?
If you are intrigued by such conundrums, or if you’re interested in the origins and history of the game, you’ll find a group of like minds in the ACS. Founded in 1973, we are an international body represented in over 20 countries, and our members include most of the world’s leading cricket statisticians and several of its most accomplished historians and biographers.
Our principal purpose is ‘to promote and encourage research into the statistical and historical aspects of cricket throughout the world at all levels and to publish the findings’. Members of the ACS have significantly contributed to a wider understanding of the game and have led the way in uncovering many biographical details of first-class cricketers.
We have around a thousand members all over the world. Membership is open to everyone – all you need to join us is to share our interest in the statistics and history of the game.
Members receive our quarterly journal, The Cricket Statistician, and an annual voucher towards the cost of our publications. They are entitled to a 33% discount on subscriptions to the Cricket Archive website and to the CSW cricket database. Members can also join our email forum to share information, ask questions and chat about topical cricketing issues. Details about the email forum and discounts are available in the Members Area; any member who does not have the password for this page should contact webmaster@bert.privatepages.co.uk.
We publish a range of titles which are available in the ACS Online Shop.
The website includes several valuable research tools open to all visitors:
- The digitised version of Cricket: A Weekly Record of the Game, the magazine which ran from 1882 to 1914.
- The ACS Online Cricket Records Section, which is updated on a daily basis and covers first-class cricket, Test cricket, List A, Twenty20 and women’s international cricket, with some minor cricket records too.
- The archive of The Cricket Statistician up to 2016 in digitised form; copies of more recent issues are still on sale in the shop.
- Our Research Section which contains further resources, including the first part of a massive A to Z of Kent Cricketers, compiled by Derek Carlaw, currently covering all Kent players who appeared between 1806 and 1914, and County Cricket: Sundry Extras, biographical details compiled by David Jeater on over a thousand county cricketers with achievements in areas of public life away from cricket.
- Ask the ACS, a collection of statistical questions and answers on specialised one-off matters.
You can also follow the Association via Twitter, at @ACScricket.
If you are looking for an answer to any question about cricket, seeking clarification about a particular record or feat, or searching for information on a team or a particular player, please send an email to secretary@bert.privatepages.co.uk and the Secretary will point you in the right direction.
#1920 cricket @ACScricket
Our new Collaborative Research Projects are coming along nicely, and the first fruits are available via the Research page.
But we’re planning another project to enliven this year without a cricket season, via the @ACScricket Twitter account.
From 1 May, we’ll be reliving the 1920 season, with the hashtag #1920cricket.
We don’t yet know whether there will be any Championship cricket in 2020, but back in 1920 the County Championship is hitting its stride again after the war, with three-day matches restored after 1919’s two-day experiment, and the competition building up to a thrilling climax.
There are no international tourists, but the county players are hoping to win a place on England’s tour to Australia in 1920/21 for the first Test series in nearly seven years.
Curiosities of the season include 13 hat-tricks (11 in the Championship) and victory for a team who were all out for 22 in their first innings.
The first ball will be bowled on 1 May, when Surrey host Northamptonshire at The Oval.
Thanks to Chris Overson, who’s researching our daily bulletins from a century ago.
Follow #1920cricket at @ACScricket for day-to-day updates as the 1920 season develops!
Thank you, Philip!
After serving on the ACS’s General Committee for a total of 41 years, Philip Bailey has now stood down from that position – for the time being at least.
Philip will be known to many of our members as the statistical power behind many thrones, both inside and outside the ACS. There is no doubt that, without his efforts over all this time, the ACS would not be the flourishing and respected organisation that it is today.
We feel sure that all members would like to join with the Committee in giving our grateful thanks to Philip for all that he has done for the Association over the years.
He is not leaving us altogether, though, and we are very pleased that he will continue to undertake all the many tasks, outside his committee role, that he carries out on the ACS’s behalf.
A fuller thank-you to Philip, and a suitable presentation, will be made at the rearranged AGM in due course.
Keith Walmsley
Chairman
Eric Midwinter wins Brooke-Lambert Trophy
We are delighted to announce that Eric Midwinter has been awarded the Brooke-Lambert Trophy for the Statistician of the Year.
Sadly, he could not be presented with the trophy amid the applause of our members, as the AGM on 21 March has had to be postponed because of the Covid-19 emergency.
But you can read the Hon. Secretary’s citation explaining why Eric has earned the award, and Eric’s response, here.
Eric has also sent us a shortened version of the talk he was due to give after the AGM, entitled Cricket in My Life, in which he expounds on the significance of cricket and comedy in his own life and in popular culture.
Latest Publications
Our latest publications are now available in the ACS Online Shop: Mark Rowe’s Tour de Farce: Anti-apartheid protest and South Africa’s cancelled 1970 cricket tour of England, and our regular spring annuals, the ACS International Cricket Year Book and the Second Eleven Annual.
Last year we published the ACS Overseas First-Class Annual 2019, containing full scores of all first-class matches played throughout the world in 2018/19, First-Class Matches Pakistan 1980/81 to 1983-84, and A Game Sustained: The impact of the First World War on cricket in Yorkshire 1914-20, Jeremy Lonsdale’s sequel to the well-received A Game Taken Seriously.
Many earlier publications are available in the online shop, including extra copies of the ACS Journal, The Cricket Statistician.
If you need to get in touch with ACS Sales, their contact details are here.
More ACS news
ACS AGM
The 47th AGM of the Association which was due to be held on Saturday 21 March 2020 was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. A new date will be announced when circumstances permit.
Minutes of the 46th AGM, which took place in Derby on 23 March 2019, are available, alongside those of previous AGMs, in the Members Area at the AGM Minutes page.
Join the ACS
If you are not yet a member of the Association, we very much hope that you will consider joining. Click on Join the ACS and follow the links and instructions there.
Once you have joined, you will have access to the Members Area and can subscribe to the Members’ Email Forum. Members can obtain the password for the Members Area by sending an email to webmaster@bert.privatepages.co.uk.