The Denis Compton Oval 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 ...

ground located at the Shenley Cricket Centre in

Shenley Shenley is a village and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England, between Barnet and St Albans. The village is located 14 miles from Central London. History The history of Shenley stretches back a thousand years or more – it is mentioned in ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...

, England. The ground was opened by

Denis Compton Denis Charles Scott Compton (23 May 1918 – 23 April 1997) was an English multi-sportsman. As a cricketer he played in 78 Test matches and spent his whole cricket career with Middlesex. As a footballer, he played as a winger and spent most o ...

and the main ground was named in his honour. At the heart of the centre is the 19th-century

pavilion In architecture, ''pavilion'' has several meanings: * It may be a subsidiary building that is either positioned separately or as an attachment to a main building. Often it is associated with pleasure. In palaces and traditional mansions of Asia ...

, originally designed by the legendary cricketer

W. G. Grace William Gilbert Grace (18 July 1848 – 23 October 1915) was an English Amateur status in first-class cricket, amateur cricketer who was important in the development of the sport and is widely considered one of its greatest players. He played ...

Domestic cricket

The first recorded match on the ground was in 1993, when

played the

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...

. Their first

Minor Counties Championship The NCCA 3 Day Championship (previously the Minor Counties Cricket Championship) is a season-long competition in England and Wales that is contested by the members of the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), the so-called national cou ...

match played on the ground was between

and

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

. From 1995 to 2000, the ground played host to 5 Minor Counties Championship matches and 8

MCCA Knockout Trophy The National Counties Cricket Association Knockout Cup was started in 1983 as a knockout one-day competition for the National Counties in English cricket. At first it was known as the ''English Industrial Estates Cup'', before being called the ...

matches. The ground has played host to a number of first-class matches. The first first-class match played on the ground was in 1996 and was contested between the Marylebone Cricket Club and South Africa A. The Marylebone Cricket Club have used the ground for 2 further first-class matches in 1997 and 1999.

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

have also used the ground for 3 first-class matches from 2002 to 2004, all against touring international teams. The ground has also played host to

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 ...

matches. The Marylebone Cricket Club used the ground for a single List-A match against the touring

Pakistanis Pakistanis ( ur, , translit=Pākistānī Qaum, ) are the citizens and nationals of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. According to the 2017 Pakistani national census, the population of Pakistan stood at over 213 million people, making it the w ...

in 1996. Middlesex have used the ground for 3 List-A matches, the last of which came when the county played the touring

West Indians A West Indian is a native or inhabitant of the West Indies (the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago). For more than 100 years the words ''West Indian'' specifically described natives of the West Indies, but by 1661 Europeans had begun to use it ...

. In local domestic cricket the ground is home to Shenley Village Cricket Club, who play in the Championship of the Hertfordshire Premier Cricket League.

Women's international cricket

Women's Test cricket Women's Test cricket is the longest format of women's cricket and is the female equivalent to men's Test cricket. Matches comprise four-innings and are held over a maximum of four days between two of the leading cricketing nations. The rules gov ...

matches have also been held on the ground. The first Women's Test match played at the Oval was between

England women The England women's cricket team represents England and Wales in international women's cricket. Since 1998, they have been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), having been previously governed by the Women's Cricket Association ...

and India women. From 1999 to 2003, the ground played host to 4 Women's Test matches, the last of which was between England women and South Africa women. In addition to hosting Women's Test matches, the ground has hosted 5

Women's One Day International cricket Women's One Day International (WODI) is the limited overs form of women's cricket. Matches are scheduled for 50 overs, equivalent to the men's game. The first women's ODIs were played in 1973, as part of the first Women's World Cup which was ...

matches. The first Women's ODI held on the ground was between Ireland women and New Zealand women during the

1993 Women's Cricket World Cup The 1993 Women's Cricket World Cup was an international cricket tournament played in England from 20 July to 1 August 1993. Hosted by England for the second time, it was the fifth edition of the Women's Cricket World Cup, and came over four years ...

.Women's One-Day International Matches played on Denis Compton Oval
/ref>

References

External links

on CricketArchive

on

Cricinfo ESPN cricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a d ...

{{Hertfordshire CCC Cricket grounds in Hertfordshire Shenley