Lord’s Cricket Stadium: The Mecca of Cricket
There are three Cricket grounds in the world on which every cricketer would love to play at least once in his lifetime. These three grounds are Melbourne’s MCG, Kolkata’s Eden Gardens and London’s Lord’s Cricket Ground. Among all these three cricket grounds probably the Lord’s has even greater stature in the minds of cricketers, mainly because of its long and rich history. The Lord’s Cricket Ground has the honor to host three ICC Cricket World Cup finals, more than any other cricket ground of the world.
The name of the ground was named after its founder Thomas Lord. You will be surprised to know that the current ground is not the original Lord’s which Thomas Lord established in 1814. This is actually a third ground which was established between 1787 and 1814. For various reasons the Lord’s cricket ground had to be changed during those days and finally in 1814 the current ground was established. To mark the 200th anniversary of the Lord’s Cricket Ground a friendly 50 over cricket match was organized in June 2014 between the MCC XI and the Rest of the World XI, captained by Sachin Tendulkar and Shane Warne respectively.
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The owner of the lords stadium London is Marylebone Cricket Club or the MCC and ECB or the England and Wales Cricket Board is their only tenant. The ground has the capacity to accommodate around 28, 000 spectators and it is situated at St. John’s Wood in London. Pavilion End and the Nursery End are its two ends which are some of the most popular names among cricket lovers. The first-ever test match was played here on 21st July 1884 between England and Australia and these two teams met again on 26th August 1972 to play the first-ever One Day International game here.
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Nine different stands or viewing areas you will find at the Lord’s Cricket Ground. These are…
Lord’s Cricket Ground Stand Names:
- Pavilion
- Warner Stand
- Grandstand
- Media Center
- Edrich Stand
- Mound Stand
- The Tavern
- Allen Stand
The Lord’s cricket ground has a distinguished pavilion with two different rooms for the home and visiting teams. The galleries of these two rooms overseas the ground. To travel to and from the ground to the pavilion each player has to go through a ‘Long Room’ where all the distinguished MCC members sit and watch the game of cricket. There is a famous weather vane on the ground which is called the ‘Old Father Time’. The media center at the Stadium is the state of the art and was erupted during the 1999 ICC Cricket World Cup which was hosted by England.
To match the need of the fans for the day and night games after so many reluctant years MCC decided to install floodlights on the ground in the mid-2000s and finally, they came into action in 2007. But they had to remove as the residents around the ground complained about light pollution. In 2009 the Westminister Council approved retractable floodlights specially designed for the ground which minimizes the light spillage into nearby homes and since then there is the regular day and night matches take place at the Lord’s Stadium.
