Cricket has been traced to shepherds in England who started playing the early forms of cricket sometime in the 17th century. The first laws of cricket were written in 1774. Since then they have been changed on numerous occasions. Pretty much everything has changed since then. The early cricket bats were long curved pieces of wood resembling a thick hockey stick. The stumps consisted of two wickets and one bail in between. The only law of the game that has remained constant is the length of the pitch at 22 yards.

Speaking of the stumps, initially the afore-mentioned shepherds would bat in-front of a tree stump, hence the term “stumps”. As the game progressed it was at times played in front of a wicket-gate – which led to the term “wickets”.
Early bowlers would bowl the ball underarm – and cricket records tell stories of great underarm lob bowlers. Overarm bowling was initially illegal. It was introduced to cricket by a Kent cricketer, John Willes. He actually learnt it from his sister, Christina Willes who found her skirt was getting in the way when she tried to bowl underarm!

In 1868 an Englishman called Charles Lawrence based in Australia put together a team of aborigines and took them to England. This was the first ever Australian tour to England, and each player wore a cap of a different colour so that the spectators could identify them. The team played 47 matches against a number of local teams of which they won 14, lost 14 and drew the rest. Apart from playing cricket the aborigines showcased a number of unique sports including the backwards race, boomerang throwing and cricket ball dodging.

There are 10 ways in which a batsman can get out in cricket: Caught, Bowled, Leg Before Wicket, Run Out, Stumped, Handling the ball, Obstructing the field, Hit the ball twice, Hit Wicket, Timed out.

Test Cricket
When and where the first-ever Test match was played? And between which two teams?
On March 15, 16, 17, 19, 18 77 at Melbourne between Australia and England

Who scored the first hundred in Test cricket, when and where and what was his score?
Ans: Charles Bannerman of Australia, in 1876-77 at Melbourne and he scored 165

Who has scored the most Test runs?
Ans: Sachan Tendulkar of India (12273 runs)

Who has taken the most Test wickets?
Ans: Muttiah Muralitharan of Sri Lanka (756 wickets)

Who has made the most Test hundreds?
Ans: Sachin Tendulkar of India (40)

Who has made the most Test appearances?
Ans: Steve Waugh of Australia (168)

One Day Cricket

When and where the inaugural One-day International match was played? And between whom?
Ans: On January 5, 1971 at Melbourne, between Australia and Enagland.

Who has played the most One-day Internationals?
Ans: Sanath Jayasuria (421)

Memorable Debuts

RE "Tip" Foster holds the world record for the highest score on test debut. He scored 287 on test debut for England vs Australia in 1903-04. He is also the only man to captain England at both football and cricket.

Lawrence Rowe of the West Indies however, managed to score more runs than Foster in his first test making 214 and 100* in 1971-72. The only other cricketer to score 2 centuries on test debut is Yasir Hameed of Pakistan who made 170 and 108 against Bangladesh in 2003.

Playing his first test for New Zealand versus India in Calcutta (1965), Bruce Taylor scored 105 and took 5/86. He remains the only cricketer to score a century and take a five-for on test debut.

On first-class debut for Barbados in 1966-67 Geoff Greenidge (no relation to Gordon) scored 205 and took 7/124 against Jamaica. He was also the last white man to play test cricket for the West Indies.

Mohammed Azharuddin scored a century on test debut. Clearly he enjoyed the feeling. He followed it up with centuries in his next two matches and remains the only test cricketer to score three centuries in his first three tests.

Narendra Hirwani, playing his first test for India against the West Indies at Madras in 1998, took an astonishing 16 wickets for 136 runs. Remarkably he broke the world-record for the best debut figures by just 1 run! Bob Massie of Australia had earlier taken 16 for 137 on his debut.

Soon after migrating to New Zealand, Albert Moss played for Cantebury and took 10/28 in an innings. The only ten-for on first-class debut.

And some disappointing ones

Marvan Atapattu of Sri Lanka had a rather unfortunate start to his test career. His first six test innings were 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0. Remarkably he forced his way back into the Sri Lankan team, and has not scored 6 test double centuries - a record for Sri Lanka.
Australian Arthur Chipperfield (1934), West Indian Robert Christiani (1947-48) and Pakistani Asim Kamal ( 2003-04) are the only batsman to score 99 on test debut.

Khalid Hasan of Pakistan made his test debut in 1954 aged just 16 years and 352 days. Four days later his test career was over and is the youngest ever one-cap wonder and played is last day of test cricket at just 16 years and 356 days - a record.

Legend has it that Dr. Roy Park's wife missed his entire test career because she dropped her knitting. Park was dismissed first ball in his only test innings as his wife bent down to pick up her knitting! There was more cricket in the family though, as their daughter married future Australian captain Ian Johnson.

Dennis Smith of New Zealand dismissed Eddie Paynter of England with his first ball in test cricket (1932-33). Unfortunately it was a bit of a false dawn. Smith never took another wicket in test cricket!

Jack MacBryan is probably the unluckiest test cricketer ever. In his only test for England in 1924 only 66.5 overs were possible due to rain. He is the ONLY test cricketer to have never batted, bowled or taken a catch in his entire test career!

Records Galore
At Colombo in 1996-97 India won the toss and batted first. Having scored 537/8 they declared trying to bowl Sril Lanka out for under 337. How wrong they were! Sri Lanka scored 952/6 (a test record) with Sanath Jayasuriya (340) and Roshan Mahanama (225) putting on 576 runs (a test record and 1 run short of the first-class record). They also became the only pair to bat through 2 full days of test cricket.

At the other end of the spectrum, New Zealand were dismissed by England for 26 at Auckland in 1954-55 - a test record for the lowest team total.

The highest first-class score in 1107 by Victoria vs New South Wales in 1926-27. The lowest score by a full team is 12 - by Northamptonshire vs Gloucestershire in 1907!

Alec Bedser took 14/99 in a test against England in 1953 - the best bowling figures by a bowler in a losing cause.

Ricky Ponting holds the equivalent batting record scoring 242 in a losing cause against India at Adelaide in 2003-04.

Australia's Clarrie Grimmet and India's Dilip Doshi are the only bowlers to take 100 test wickets having started their international careers after the age of 30.

Mario Zagallo of Brazil won the football world cup both as a player and as coach. Geoff Marsh has achieved the same feat in cricket, winning in 1987 as a player and in 1999 as coach.

One of the greatest bowlers in history, Hedley Verity took 10/10 against Nottinghamshire in 1932 - the best bowling figures in first-class history. It is also the only ten-for to include a hat trick. He died during WW-II after having being take prisoner in Italy.

Who is the worst bowler is test cricket? Well that's a toughie! Statistically speaking it is Rawl Lewis of the West Indies whose three match test career saw a bowling average of 318 (the worst in test history) at a strike rate of 585. However, Roger Wijesuriya of Sri Lanka has the worst strike rate of 586 - though he has a better average of 294!

Ken Suttle of Sussex played in 423 consecutive first-class matches between 1954 and 1969 - the longest streak by any cricketer.

Western Province bowler, Bob Crisp is the only bowler to have taken 4 wickets in 4 balls twice in his first-class career.

In 1899, 13-year old Arthur Collins scored 628* in a junior match for Clarke's House at Clifton College. This remains the highest score in any form of cricket. He then took 11 wickets to help his team beat North Tower by an innings and 688 runs! Collins never played first-class cricket and was killed in WW-I.

The record for the highest partnership in any form of cricket is held by two slightly better known players. Sachin Tendulkar (329*) and Vinod Kambli (349*) put on an unbeaten stand of 664 for their school in the Harris Shield tournament.

Women's Cricket - Janette Brittin of England scored 1935 runs for England in 27 tests, making 5 test centuries - both world records. Kiran Baluch of Pakistan scored 242 against the West Indies in 2003-04, a world record.

Charles Bannerman scored the first test century. Billy Murdoch, who played for both Australia and England scored the first test double century (he also hit the first ever six in test cricket). Andy Sandham of England scored the first triple century (in what was his last test match), and Brian Lara has scored the only quadruple century.

Five batsmen have been left stranded on 99* in a test match. Strangely enough this is a fairly recent phenomenon. The unlucky batsmen are Geoff Boycott, Steve Waugh, Alex Tudor, Shaun Pollock and Andrew Hall. While four of them managed test centuries, 99* is the highest test score for Alex Tudor. Mike Atherton once declared England's innings and left Grame Hick stuck on 98*. Andy Flower of Zimbabwe was left on 199* against South Africa (he added 142 in the second innings for good measure), and the greatest of them all Sir Don Bradman was once left stranded on 299*.

Bizarre Incidents

Indian batsmen had a strange jinx - for a long time Gundappa Vishwanath was the only Indian batsman to have scored a century on test debut and managed another test century in his career. In recent times this has changed - Mohammed Azharuddin, Sourav Ganguly and Virender Sehwag have all helped break the jinx!

Montague Druitt was a fast bowler who played for Winchester College, Incogniti and Dorset, and was a playing member of the MCC. In 1888 he drowned himself in the Thames. Druitt was suspected to be Jack the Ripper.

In 1958 playing against New Zealand at Headingley England's innings were opened by a rugby player and a football player! Arthur Milton represented England in one football match (vs. Austria in 1951) and Mike Smith won one rugby cap for England (vs. Wales in 1956).

Hemulal Yadav of Tripura has a strange claim to fame. His is the only cricketer to have been given out 'Timed Out' in first-class cricket. Harold Heygate was also given out 'Timed Out', but the prevailing rules meant that the entire innings for the whole team ended.

Making his debut for England against Bangaldesh in 2005 Chris Tremlett took two wickets in two balls. On his hat trick ball Mohammad Ashraful defended the ball which bounced on the ground, then actually landed on the stumps but the bails did not fall, and so Tremlett was denied a hat trick.

In a test match in Faislabad in 1997-98, Mushtaq Ahmed was bowling to Pat Symcox. Symcox missed the ball which went between the stumps knocking back middle stump. However, the heat had fused together the bails, and they did not fall. The middle stump bounced back into place and Symcox continued on his way to 81 - his second highest test score!

In a 1951 in a test versus England, Alex Moir of New Zealand bowled 2 successive overs, the last before tea and the first after the interval! The only other time this happened in test cricket was in an Ashes test in 1921. Declarations had just been introduced in test cricket, but you were not allowed to declare on the first day if less than 100 minutes of play remained. In the 4th test of the series the first day had been washed out, and on day 2 the England captain, Lionel Tennyson wanted to declare but the Australian captain Warwick Armstrong claimed they could not since effectively it was still the first day. A 25 minute argument ensued, and no one noticed that Armstrong bowled the last over before the hold up and the first over immediately after it!

On the 1974 tour to England, Indian opener, Sudhir Naik was accused of stealing a pair of socks from Marks & Spencers.

John Thayer, who played 7 first-class matches in the USA was the only first-class cricket on board the Titanic. Richard Williams, who was also on board survived and went on to win the Wimbledon doubles title in 1920.

John Traicos is the only man to be born in one country and play test cricket for two other countries. He was born in Egypt and played test cricket for South Africa in the 1970s and then for Zimbabwe when they were awarded test status in the 1990s.