One-day name: | Warwickshire Bears |
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Twenty20 name: | Birmingham Bears |
Captain: | Ian Bell |
Coach: | Jim Troughton |
Overseas player(s): | Jeetan Patel |
Founded: | 1882 |
Home ground: | Edgbaston |
Capacity: | 25,000 |
First-class debut: |
Nottinghamshire in 1894 at Trent Bridge |
Championship wins: | 7 |
One-Day Cup/Pro40/Sunday League wins: | 5 |
FP Trophy wins: | 5 |
Twenty20 Cup wins: | 1 (2014) |
Official website: | WarwickshireCCC.com |
2015 season |
Warwickshire County Cricket Club is one of eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Warwickshire. Its 50 overs team is called the Warwickshire Bears and its T20 team the Birmingham Bears. Founded in 1882, the club held minor status until it was classified as an unofficial first-class team by substantial sources in 1894; classified as an official first-class team from 1895 by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and the County Championship clubs; classified as a List A team since the beginning of limited overs cricket in 1963; and classified as a senior Twenty20 team since 2003. Warwickshire's kit colours are black and gold and the shirt sponsor is Gullivers Sports Travel. The club's home is Edgbaston Cricket Ground in south Birmingham, which regularly hosts Test and One Day International matches.
Cricket may have reached Warwickshire by the end of the 17th century. The Warwickshire & Staffordshire Journal was certainly aware of the sport in 1738 for it carried a report of a London v Mitcham game at the Artillery Ground on 11 August (London won by 1 wicket).
The earliest confirmed reference to cricket in the county is a match announcement in Aris’ Gazette on 15 July 1751.
There was a prominent club in Coventry towards the end of the 18th century which played two well-documented matches against Leicester in 1787 and 1788. Reports of both games are included in Fresh Light on 18th Century Cricket by G. B. Buckley. Leicester won both games by 45 and 28 runs respectively.