Cricket

Click on one of the subpages below to read about cricket matches and the cricket club in Wateringbury.

The first recorded match in Wateringbury was in 1848. But John Major in his book More than a Game quotes many examples of cricket being played around Wateringbury from a much earlier time:

• The biographer of a puritan Otham vicar, Thomas Wilson, described that he had seen in the 'prophane' Maidstone of the 1630s .."Crickets and many other sports open and publicly [played] on the Lords Day" (page 26).

• In 1646 4 gentlemen of Maidstone played a game at Cox Heath and were sued by their opponents for not delivering the wager. (page 32).

• The Sackvilles at Knole, Sevenoaks, were early aristocratic supporters and Knole was the first cricket ground known to have been regularly mown, rolled and cosseted. (pages 49-54).

• West Malling was an early location for cricket (Wikipedia mentions, uncited, a 1705 match there between West Kent and Chatham) and Major records a match in 1838 there between James Dearman and Alfred Mynn (page 163).

• Penenden Heath was the site of a match in 1807 between Kent and England at which over-arm bowling was extensively used - "This bowling met with great opposition" (pages 128-129).

At the next village of Teston, the cricket ball factory was in existence until 2000.

Jack Hubble was a famous Wateringbury born cricketer but there were at least two other Wateringbury born men who played for Kent, Lionel White and Herbert Leney. Another Leney, Frederick Barcham Leney, born in Maidstone but closely associated with Wateringbury also played for Kent.

Lt-Col Sir Kildare Dixon Borrowes, a cricketer, lived at the Orpines shortly after WW1.

For a report of a girls cricket match against Mereworth see Girls Friendly Society (1911).

Ian Lambert has kindly written a history of cricket in Wateringbury which is attached as a pdf file below.