1728 English cricket season

1728 English cricket season

Cricket formats	major, including single wicket

The overriding impression of the 1728 English cricket season is that teams of county strength were formed to play major matches as the patrons sought stronger combinations to help them in the serious, for them, business of winning wagers. Easily the most successful this year was Edwin Stead whose Kent teams were "too expert" for the Sussex teams led by the Duke of Richmond and Sir William Gage.

List of matches

date	match title	venue	result	source
25 June (Tu)	Edwin Stead's XI v Duke of Richmond's XI	Coxheath	Edwin Stead's XI won?
notes	The date of the Coxheath match is confirmed by G. B. Buckley in his Fresh Light on 18th Century Cricket Appendix B, based on a report in the Kentish Weekly Post on 19 June. Buckley was correcting an oversight in F. S. Ashley-Cooper's Kent Cricket Matches. The full reference is given by Timothy J. McCann and confirms the patrons, date and venue; the 18th century rendition of Coxheath was Cock's Heath. The results of this match and the next one at Penshurst Park are surmised from the report of the Stead v.Gage game (see below).
? July	Duke of Richmond's XI v Edwin Stead's XI	Penshurst Park	Edwin Stead's XI won?
notes	The only known primary source is a brief mention in the Whitehall Evening Post dated 6 August 1728. The results of this match and the previous one at Coxheath are surmised from the report of the Stead v.Gage game (see below).
early August	Edwin Stead's XI v Sir William Gage's XI	Penshurst Park	Edwin Stead's XI won
notes	The results of the first two games above are surmised from the report of this game at Penshurst Park, which states that the victory of Stead's XI over Sir William Gage's XI was "the third time this summer that the Kent men (i.e., Stead's XI) have been too expert for those of Sussex (i.e., Gage's XI)". In the Stead v Gage game, it seems that Stead's team won the game although Gage's XI needed just 7 in their second innings. The report clearly infers that the teams selected by Richmond, Gage and Stead were representative of the respective counties.
date unknown	Duke of Richmond's XI v Sir William Gage's XI	Lewes	result unknown
notes	All that is known is "a match between elevens" organised by the two patrons.

County cricket

This proclamation of Kent's superiority is the first time that the concept of a "Champion County" can be seen in the sources and it is augmented by the "turned the scales" comment made by a reporter after Sussex defeated Kent in 1729. The 1729 report added that the "scale of victory had been on the Kentish side for some years past". In 1730, a newspaper referred to the "Kentish champions". It must be noted, however, that the County Championship was not formally constituted until December 1889 and such claims have no official basis as would be understood now: they should perhaps be viewed as early examples of "bragging rights" but it cannot be said for certain that a form of "championship", or at least the idea of one, was not recognised.

Other events

Swiss traveller César de Saussure noted in his journal the frequency with which he saw cricket being played while he was making his journeys across southern England in June. He referred to county matches as "a commonplace" and wrote that "everyone plays it, the common people and also men of rank".

In several sources, a match Gentlemen of Middlesex v Gentlemen of London is listed as due to take place in Islington on Tuesday (sic), 5 August. In fact, 5 August 1728 was a Monday and recent research has confirmed that the match in question was due to be held on Tuesday, 5 August 1729.