Lord's

Lord's today is not on its original 18th-century site; it is the third of three grounds which Thomas Lord established between 1787 and 1814. His first ground, now referred to as Lord's Old Ground, was where Dorset Square now stands. Lord's Middle Ground was in use from 1811 to 1813, before being abandoned for the construction of Regent's Canal which carved its way through the outfield. Lord's present ground is about 250 yards (230 m) north-west of the previous Middle Ground site. The ground can hold 31,100 spectators, its capacity increasing between 2017 and 2022 as part of MCC's ongoing redevelopment plans.

History

Background

Thomas Lord, acting on behalf of the Islington-based White Conduit Club, opened his first ground in May 1787. The site in Marylebone was leased from the Portman estate, and was where Dorset Square now stands. Lord was a ground staff bowler at White Conduit, but he was reckoned to have business acumen, and so he was chosen for the task of finding a new, and private, venue for the club. He was backed against any losses by the Earl of Winchilsea and Colonel Charles Lennox. The White Conduit moved to the new ground soon afterwards, and reconstituted themselves as Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC).

In 1811, feeling obliged to relocate because of a rise in rent, Lord removed his turf and relaid it at his second ground. Now known as the "Middle Ground", it was on the Eyre Estate in St John's Wood, west of Regent's Park. This venture was short-lived because it lay on the route which Parliament determined for the Regent's Canal. The Eyre family offered Lord another plot nearby; and he again relocated his turf.

The new ground, also in St John's Wood, had both a duck pond and a pronounced slope which runs diagonally across the field from north to south. In terms of the modern ground, this is from the Grand Stand (north side) down to the Tavern and Mound Stands in the south. The drop is around 8 ft 2 in (2.49 m). Bowlers operating from the Pavilion End are bowling downhill; and uphill from the Nursery End.

Early years

Lord's Tavern was built in 1813–14, followed by a wooden pavilion in 1814. The new ground opened in the 1814 season, with MCC playing Hertfordshire in what is believed to have been the first match there on 22 June 1814.

The first century to be scored at the ground was made by Frederick Woodbridge (107) for Epsom against Middlesex in August 1815, with Epsom's Felix Ladbroke (116) recording the second century in the same match. The annual Eton v Harrow match, which had first been played at Lord's Old Ground in 1805, returned to the present ground on 29/30 July 1818. From 1822, the fixture became almost an annual event at Lord's. Lord's witnessed cricket's first double-century when William Ward scored 278 for the MCC against Norfolk in 1820. Ward's effort was a world record score which beat the 167 scored by James Aylward in 1777, and remained unbroken for 56 years until W. G. Grace's innings of 344 in 1876.

The original Lord's Pavilion, which had recently been renovated at great expense, was destroyed by fire on the night of 28 July 1825, following the first Winchester v Harrow match which had been completed that day. MCC's records and archives, including countless unique documents, were lost. The Pavilion was promptly rebuilt by Lord.

Also in 1825, the future of the ground as a whole was placed in jeopardy when Lord proposed redeveloping it with housing. This was at a time when St John's Wood was seeing rapid development. It was prevented by William Ward, who purchased the ground from Lord for £5,000. His purchase was celebrated in the following anonymous poem:

And of all who frequent the ground named after Lord,

On the list first and foremost should stand Mr Ward.

No man will deny, I am sure, when I say

That he's without rival first bat of the day,

And although he has grown a little too stout,

Even Matthews is bothered at bowling him out.

He's our life blood and soul in this noblest of games,

And yet on our praises he's many more claims;

No pride, although rich, condescending and free,

And a well informed man and a City MP.

The first University Match between Oxford and Cambridge was held at Lord's in 1827, at the instigation of Charles Wordsworth, establishing what would be the oldest first-class fixture in the world until 2020. The ground remained under the ownership of Ward until 1835, after which it was handed over to James Dark. The Pavilion was refurbished in 1838, with the addition of gas lighting. Around this time Lord's could still be considered a country ground, with open countryside to the north and west. Lord's was described by Lord Cottesloe in 1845 as being a primitive venue, with low benches put in a circle around the ground at a good distance providing seating for spectators. Improvements to the ground were gradually made, with the introduction of a telegraph scoreboard in 1846. The Pavilion was extended on its north side in 1848 with an annex providing a separate entrance to the cricket field for professional players. In the same year scorecards were introduced for the first time, from a portable press, and drainage was installed in 1849–50.

An Australian Aboriginal cricket team toured England in 1868, with Lord's hosting one of their matches to a mixed response, with The Times describing the tourists as "a travestie upon cricketing at Lord's" and "the conquered natives of a convict colony". Dark proposed to part with his interest in the ground in 1863, for the fee of £15,000 for the remaining 29+1⁄2 years of his lease. An agreement was reached in 1864, with Dark, who was seriously ill, selling his interests at Lord's for £11,000. The landlord of the ground, Isaac Moses, offered to sell it outright for £21,000 in 1865, which was reduced to £18,150. William Nicholson, who was a member of the MCC Committee at the time advanced the money on a mortgage, with his proposal for the MCC to buy the ground being unanimously passed at a special general meeting on 2 May 1866. Following this purchase, a number of developments took place. These included the addition of cricket nets for members to practice and the construction of a grandstand designed by the architect Arthur Allom, which was built in the winter of 1867–68 and also provided accommodation for the press. The stand was funded by a private syndicate of MCC members, purchased by the club in 1869. The wicket at Lord's was heavily criticised in the 1860s due to its poor condition, with Frederick Gale suggesting that nine cricket grounds out of ten within 20 miles of London would have a better wicket; the condition was deemed so poor as to be dangerous that Sussex refused to play there in 1864.

Continued developments

By the 1860s and 1870s, the great social occasions of the season were the public school match between Eton and Harrow, the Varsity Match between Oxford and Cambridge, and the Gentlemen v Players, with all three matches attracting great crowds. Crowds became so large that they encroached on the playing area, which necessitated the introduction of the boundary system in 1866. Further crowd control measures were initiated in 1871, with the introduction of turnstiles. The Pavilion was expanded in the mid-1860s and shortly thereafter it was decided to replace the original tavern with a new construction commencing in December 1867. At this time a nascent county game was beginning to take shape. With Lord's hosting more county matches, the pitches subsequently improved with umpires overseeing their preparation.

Middlesex County Cricket Club, which had been founded in 1864, began playing their home games at Lord's in 1877 after vacating Prince's ground in Chelsea, which had been considered a serious rival to Lord's given its noble backers. In 1873–74, an embankment was built which could accommodate 4,000 spectators in four rows of seats. Four years later a new lodge and was constructed to replace an older lodge, along with a new workshop, stables and a store room at a cost of £1,000. To meet the ever-increasing demand of accommodating more spectators, a temporary stand was constructed on the eastern side of the ground. After many years of complaints regarding the poor condition of the Lord's pitch, the MCC took action by installing Percy Pearce as Ground Superintendent in 1874. Pearce had previously held the same position at the County Ground, Hove. His appointment vastly improved the condition of the wicket, with The Standard describing them as "faultless".

The Australian cricket team captained by Dave Gregory first visited Lord's on 27 May 1878, defeating their MCC hosts by 9 wickets. This was considered a shock result and established not only the fame of the Australian team, but also the ongoing rivalry between England and Australia. Lord's hosted its first Test match during The 1884 Ashes, becoming the third venue in England to host Test cricket after The Oval and Old Trafford. The match was won by England by an innings and 5 runs, with England's A. G. Steel and Edmund Peate recording the first Test century and five-wicket haul at Lord's respectively.

As part of the Golden Jubilee Celebrations for Queen Victoria in 1887, the Kings of Belgium, Denmark, Saxony, and Portugal attended Lord's. It was noted that none of them had any grasp of cricket. In the same year Lord's hosted the MCC's hundredth anniversary celebrations, with MCC playing a celebratory match against England. With only a two-tiered covered grandstand and both increasing membership and spectator numbers, it was decided to build a new pavilion at a cost of £21,000. Construction of the new Lord's Pavilion, which was designed by Thomas Verity, took place in 1889–90. The pavilion it replaced was relocated and painstakingly rebuilt on an estate in Sussex, where it lived out its days as a glorified garden shed. Soon after this, the MCC purchased the land to the east, known today as the Nursery Ground; this had previously been a market garden known as Henderson's Nursery which grew pineapples and tulips. The ground was subsequently threatened by the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway's attempts to purchase land in the area for their line into Marylebone Station. After considering the company's offer, the MCC relinquished a strip of land bordering Wellington Road and was given in exchange the Clergy Orphan School to the south. In order to facilitate the railway into Marylebone Station, the Nursery Ground had to be dug up to allow tunnels to be built between 1894 and 1898 using the cut-and-cover method. Once completed the MS&LR Company laid a new pitch.

It was rumoured that subsequent tunnelling under Wellington Road provided the banking for the Mound Stand, which was constructed in 1898–99 on an area previously occupied by tennis and rackets courts. The rapid development of Lord's was not well met by some, with critics mooting Thomas Lord would "turn in his grave" at the ground's expansion. 1899 saw Albert Trott hit a six over the Pavilion while playing for MCC against the touring Australians, remaining as of 2026 the only batsman to do so. The Imperial Cricket Conference was founded by England, Australia and South Africa in 1909, headquartered at Lord's.

Lord's hosted three of the nine Test matches for the ill-fated 1912 Triangular Tournament which was organised by the South African millionaire Sir Abe Bailey. The ground's centenary was commemorated in June 1914 with a match between MCC, whose team was selected from the touring party from England's recent tour of South Africa, and a Rest of England team. The Rest of England won the three-day match by an innings and 189 runs. Lord's was requisitioned by the Army during the First World War, accommodating the Territorial Army (TA), Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) and Royal Army Service Corps (RASC). Both cooking and wireless instruction classes were held at the ground for military personnel. Once the RAMC departed, the War Office used the Nursery Ground and other buildings as a training centre for Royal Artillery cadets. The Pavilion and its Long Room were used throughout the war for the manufacture of hay nets for horses on the Western Front. Though requisitioned, Lord's held several charity cricket matches during the war, featuring military teams from the various dominions of the British Empire. These matches were well attended and one such match in 1918 between England and the Dominions was attended by George V and the Duke of Connaught.

Inter-war years and WWII

First-class cricket returned to Lord's in 1919, with a series of two-day matches in the County Championship. 1923 saw the installation of the Grace Gates, a tribute to W. G. Grace who had died in 1915. They were inaugurated by Sir Stanley Jackson, who proposed including the words THE GREAT CRICKETER in the dedication. These gates replaced the ground's earlier, less decorative, entrance. With attendances growing in number, it was suggested that Lord's should aim to accommodate crowds of up to 40,000 for Test matches; however, its stands were considered inadequate with the Grandstand described as "hopelessly out of date". To accommodate these crowds, the Old Grandstand was demolished and a new one was built in its place in 1926, designed by the architect Sir Herbert Baker. Completion of the stand was delayed due to the 1926 General Strike. Upon its completion, Baker presented MCC with a weather vane of Father Time removing the bails from the stumps, which was placed on top of the Grandstand. The full weathervane is 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m) tall, with the figure of Father Time standing at 5 ft 4 in (1.63 m). Baker further contributed to the landscape of Lord's by designing the Q (now Allen) Stand next to the Pavilion in 1934, while at the Nursery End Stands were also erected. Careful consideration was taken to preserve the treeline dividing the main ground from the Nursery Ground. The West Indies under the captaincy of Karl Nunes played their first Test match at Lord's in 1928. The ground later hosted the first televised Test match during the Second Test of The 1938 Ashes series.

The 1935 season saw the Lord's pitches badly affected by crane fly larvae, known as leatherjackets. The larvae caused bald patches to appear on the pitch and had to be removed by the ground staff, although spin bowlers did gain some benefit from the bare surfaces.

In contrast to the First World War, Lord's was only partially requisitioned by the military during the Second World War. Lord's hosted matches throughout the war for the London Counties cricket team, amongst others, which attracted large crowds. The ground was spared major damage from the Blitz. An oil bomb landed on the Nursery Ground in 1940, with a high-explosive bomb also narrowly missing the Nursery End Stands in December of the same year. The Grandstand and the Pavilion were hit by incendiary bombs, damaging their roofs. AFS firefighters stationed at Lord's reacted quickly and limited the damage. As the war progressed, the threat came not from the Luftwaffe but the newly developed V-1 flying bomb. Lord's had several near misses from these missiles in 1944, with one bomb landing 200 yards (180 m) short of the ground near to Regent's Park. The Nursery Ground had been requisitioned by the Royal Auxiliary Air Force and converted into a barrage balloon site. The most high-profile war damage was that to Father Time, when one such balloon broke loose and drifted toward the Grandstand, catching Father Time and depositing it into the seating at the front of the stand. International cricket resumed at the end of the war, with Lord's hosting one of the Victory Tests (although not accorded Test status) between the Australian Services cricket team and England.

Post-war years

Following the end of the war attendances at cricket matches grew. The gross attendance of 132,000 and the gate receipts of £43,000 at the Lord's Second Test of The 1948 Ashes series was a record for a Test match in England at that time. This demand necessitated further expansion of the ground, with the construction of the Warner Stand in 1958, which included snack bars and a press box. This stand was the work of the architect Kenneth Peacock and replaced an area of raised ground lined with trees from where it was traditionally possible to watch a match from the comfort of one's own carriage. Prior to the construction of the Warner Stand, all stands at the ground were identified by letters of the alphabet.

The record numbers of spectators who attended Test and County Championship matches began to decline by the end of the 1950s and cricket in England found itself from a position of 2.2 million paid County Championship spectators in 1947, dropping to 719,661 by 1963. To arrest this decline, List A one-day cricket was introduced in 1963, with Lord's hosting its first List A match in the 1963 Gillette Cup between Middlesex and Northamptonshire and later hosted the final of the competition between Sussex and Worcestershire in front of a sell-out 24,000 crowd. It was the first such final held anywhere in the world. Lord's Tavern and its adjoining buildings were demolished in 1968 to make way for the construction of the Tavern Stand, again designed by Peacock. The tavern was subsequently re-sited next to the Grace Gates and was complemented with a banqueting hall. Lord's hosted its first One Day International (ODI) in 1972, with Australia defeating England by 5 wickets. Three years later Lord's hosted the final of the inaugural men's World Cup, with the West Indies triumphing over Australia. Four years later, Lord's held the final of the 1979 World Cup, with the West Indies once against triumphing, this time against England.

The first women's cricket match at Lord's took place in August 1976 when England and Australia played a 60-over ODI which England won by eight wickets. The opportunity to play a women's match at Lord's resulted from lobbying by Rachael Heyhoe Flint, and was given extra impetus by England's victory in the 1973 Women's Cricket World Cup. England's Women XI had to wait another 11 years to play their second match at Lord's. The ground hosted the final of the ICC Women's Cricket World Cup in 1993 with England beating New Zealand to win the World Cup. The ground was not fully opened for the game with only 5,000 spectators attending.

A new indoor cricket school was completed in 1973 at the Nursery End, launched with £75,000 from Sir Jack Hayward and additional funds raised by the Lord's Taverners and the Sports Council. The West Indies appeared in their third successive World Cup final in 1983, but were defeated by 43 runs by India. The Mound Stand's roof was removed in 1985 to make way for a new upper tier designed by Michael Hopkins & Partners, which opened in time for the MCC's bicentenary in 1987. That bicentenary was celebrated with a five-day match between MCC and a Rest of the World XI in August 1987, which ended in a draw after the final day was rained off.

Graham Gooch made the first Test triple-century at Lord's, scoring 333 against India in 1990. The final decade of the 20th–century saw rapid redevelopment of Lord's. The Compton and Edrich Stands were completed in 1991, having run over time and budget. Its indoor school closed in 1994 being replaced by the new state-of-the-art Lord's Indoor Cricket Centre which opened in 1995. The old grandstand was demolished in 1996, with its replacement designed by Nicholas Grimshaw & Partners being completed in 1998. From 1997, Lord's was home to the European Cricket Council (ECC) till 2010, and remains home to ICC Europe, which administers cricket outside of the European full-member nations. With Lord's hosting three matches in the 1999 World Cup, including the final, the MCC set about improving press facilities by constructing the Media Centre at the Nursery End between the Compton and Edrich Stands, offering commanding views towards the Pavilion from behind the bowler's arm. Lord's Media Centre was opened in April 1999 by then MCC president Tony Lewis.

21st-century developments

Lord's hosted its one-hundredth Test match in June 2000, with England defeating the West Indies by two wickets; the match was also notable for the 21 wickets which fell on the second day, the most to fall in a day at a Lord's Test since 1888. The ground also hosted the University Match over three days for the last time in 2000, after which the match alternated between Fenner's at Cambridge and University Parks at Oxford. This fixture continues at Lord's since 2001 as a one-day limited overs match. At the start of the 21st-century, the Lord's slope which offers advantage to both seam and swing bowlers from the Pavilion and Nursery Ends respectively, was under threat of being levelled due to the advent of drop-in pitches. However, the MCC resisted these calls as levelling the pitch would require the rebuilding of Lord's and would mean Test cricket would not be able to be played there for five years. The outfield was notorious for becoming waterlogged due to its clay soil, resulting in considerable lost match time. The entire outfield was relaid in the winter of 2002 with the clay soil being replaced with sand, which has improved drainage. Lord's hosted its first T20 match in the second edition of the Twenty20 Cup in 2004. In 2005 the International Cricket Council (formerly the Imperial Cricket Conference) headquarters, which had been located at Lord's since its foundation in 1909, were closed and moved to the Dubai Sports City in the United Arab Emirates.

Temporary floodlights were installed at the ground in 2007, but were removed in 2008 after complaints of light pollution from local residents. In January 2009, Westminster City Council approved the use of new 48-metre high retractable floodlights designed to minimise light spillage into nearby residences. Council approval stipulated a five-year trial period during which up to 12 matches and 4 practice matches could be played under lights between April and September, with the lights being dimmed to half-strength at 9.50 pm and switched off by 11 pm. The floodlights were first used successfully on 27 May 2009 during the Twenty20 Cup match between Middlesex and Kent. Two weeks after the first use of the floodlights, Lord's hosted its first Twenty20 International in the World Twenty20 between England and the Netherlands, which resulted in a shock last-ball win for the ICC associate nation. Lord's held the 2009 ICC World Twenty20 Final between Pakistan and Sri Lanka, which Pakistan won by 8 wickets.

In 2008 plans were drawn up by the MCC Committee to fund the future £250 million development of the ground by constructing residential apartments and a luxury hotel along the Wellington Road and Grove End Road. Lord's Masterplan was unveiled in 2013, being a twenty-year plan to redevelop the ground and improve its facilities. The first phase of its Masterplan involved the demolition and replacement of the Warner Stand with a new stand, which was built between 2015 and 2017. The new stand has improved facilities for match officials and reduced the number of restricted-view spectator seats from 600 to 100. Phase two of Lord's Masterplan involved the demolition of the Compton and Edrich Stands in 2019, with their replacements being completed in 2021; these provided an extra 2,000 seats and for the first time were linked by a walkway bridge.

Lord's celebrated the two-hundredth anniversary of its present ground in 2014. To mark the occasion, an MCC XI captained by Sachin Tendulkar played a Rest of the World XI led by Shane Warne in a 50-over match.

Two matches of note were played at Lord's Cricket Ground in July 2019. The first of these was 2019 World Cup Final between England and New Zealand, which ended as a tie with both sides each making 241 runs after 50 overs. The final was then decided by a Super Over, which also resulted in a tie. Thus, the winner was decided on the number of boundaries scored in the game and Super Over; this was England's first World Cup triumph. A second match of note followed four days later when Ireland played their first Test match at Lord's, where they bowled England out for 85 on the first morning of the match with Tim Murtagh taking 5 for 13. Despite this, in their second innings Ireland were dismissed for 38, the lowest Test total at Lord's and lost the match by 143 runs.

In August 2022 the ground's East Gate was renamed the Heyhoe Flint Gate in honour of Baroness Heyhoe Flint.

In February 2026, it was reported that Lord's would undergo an overhaul of the Nursery End which would see the brick "prison" wall removed and a glass-fronted pavilion developed, along with two 12-storey apartment blocks to fund the redevelopment of the Tavern Stand. Potentially, a new Lord's museum, a roof over the currently open-air Compton and Edrich Stands, and transformation of the Thomas Lord building into a café and shop were also ideas considered in the plan.