Nelson cricket team is a

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

team representing the

Nelson Region (Let him, who has earned it, bear the palm) , image_map = Nelson CC.PNG , mapsize = 200px , map_caption = , coordinates = , coor_pinpoint = , coordinates_footnotes = ...

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. It played

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...

from 1874 to 1891, and currently competes in the

Hawke Cup The Hawke Cup is a non-first-class cricket competition for New Zealand's district associations. Apart from 1910–11, 1912–13 and 2000–01 the competition has always been on a challenge basis. To win the Hawke Cup, the challengers must beat t ...

Playing history

Cricket was first reported as being played in Nelson in the ''Nelson Examiner'' in March 1844, in a match between the Surveyors of the Land Company and Nelson. Nelson as a representative team played interprovincial cricket as early as 1862, later first playing first-class cricket in 1873-74 against

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

at the

Basin Reserve The Basin Reserve (commonly known as "The Basin") is a cricket ground in Wellington, New Zealand. It has been used for Test matches, and is the main home ground for the Wellington Firebirds first-class team. The Basin Reserve is the only cricke ...

, becoming the fifth team to play first-class cricket in New Zealand. This match is also notable for having ended in a tie, the eighth time this had happened and one of sixty occasions overall that a first-class match has ended in such a result. Over the coming seasons, Nelson averaged one first-class match a year, all but one of them against Wellington, before appearing in first-class cricket for a final time in 1891 against Wellington at Trafalgar Park. Nelson played 17 times in first-class cricket, winning nine and losing seven. Nelson used three home grounds during this period, all of them in the city of

Nelson Nelson may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Nelson'' (1918 film), a historical film directed by Maurice Elvey * ''Nelson'' (1926 film), a historical film directed by Walter Summers * ''Nelson'' (opera), an opera by Lennox Berkeley to a lib ...

: Victory Square, the

Botanical Gardens A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...

and Trafalgar Park. The 17 matches were extremely low-scoring affairs. Only twice did a side reach 200, and on 40 occasions a side was dismissed for under 100. Nelson's highest team score was 238 at

in 1880-81, when

Louis Balmain Louis Henry Fletcher Balmain (17 January 1858 – 1904) was a cricketer who played one match of first-class cricket for Nelson in New Zealand in the 1880-81 season. Batting at number three, Balmain made 50 and 40, the two highest scores on eithe ...

, in his only first-class match, top-scored with 40, having also top-scored with 50, Nelson's first individual fifty, in the first innings. Nelson's only other fifty was a 52 made by Andrew Bennett at Wellington in 1886-87. The best innings and match figures were 9 for 43 and 5 for 20 (14 for 63 in the match) by Thomas Eden in 1875-76. Bennett, in his only other first-class match, took 6 for 13 and 6 for 5 for Nelson in 1885-86. The origin of the "

" superstition in cricket is unknown. However, in both Nelson's first and last innings in first-class cricket they were dismissed for 111 – "Nelson".

Current status

Nelson today compete in the

, which is played below first-class level. Nelson have won the competition several times, and hold the record for the longest period of holding the trophy, from December 1958 to February 1965. They also held the title from 1979 to 1983. In 1963-64, defending their title against Waikato, Nelson made 632, a Hawke Cup record. The record stood until Nelson beat it in 1983-84, when they scored 641 for seven defending their title against

Taranaki Taranaki is a region in the west of New Zealand's North Island. It is named after its main geographical feature, the stratovolcano of Mount Taranaki, also known as Mount Egmont. The main centre is the city of New Plymouth. The New Plymouth Dist ...

. In their next match, in 1984-85, they beat it again, scoring 649 against Wairarapa. The record stood until Manawatu beat it with 650 all out in 1993-94. The Nelson Cricket Association relocated from Trafalgar Park to

Saxton Oval Saxton Oval, also known as Saxton Field, is a cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balan ...

in 2009. The Nelson Cricket Association forms part of the

Central Districts cricket team The Central Stags, formerly known as Central Districts, are a first-class cricket team based in central New Zealand. They are the men's representative side of the Central Districts Cricket Association. They compete in the Plunket Shield firs ...

, which competes in first-class,

List A List A cricket is a classification of the limited-overs (one-day) form of the sport of cricket, with games lasting up to eight hours. List A cricket includes One Day International (ODI) matches and various domestic competitions in which the numbe ...

and

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

domestic cricket competitions.

References

External links

Nelson Cricket Association
at CricketArchive {{New Zealand first-class cricket clubs Cricket teams in New Zealand Cricket in Central Districts Sport in Nelson, New Zealand Former senior cricket clubs in New Zealand