1997 English cricket season
The 1997 cricket season was the 400th in England since the earliest known definite reference to cricket in January 1597 (i.e., Old Style – 1598 New Style), and the 98th in which the County Championship has been an official competition. The season centred on the six-Test Ashes series against Australia. England won the first, at Edgbaston, by the decisive margin of nine wickets, and the rain-affected second Test at Lord's was drawn, but any English optimism was short-lived. Australia won the next three games by huge margins to secure the series and retain The Ashes, and England's three-day victory in the final game at The Oval was little more than a consolation prize. The three-match ODI series which preceded the Tests produced a statistical curiosity, with England winning each match by an identical margin, six wickets.
The Britannic Assurance County Championship went to Glamorgan for the first time since 1969, by a margin of just four points from Kent. The combination of captain Matthew Maynard and Steve James' batting and Waqar Younis' and Steve Watkin's bowling propelled them to the title, although the matter was not settled until the final match of the season, when Glamorgan's maximum-points thrashing of Somerset at Taunton ensured that Kent's own victory over Surrey was irrelevant.
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