December — English champion
Tom Cribb retains his title by defeating Afro-American
Tom Molineaux, who was born into
slavery, in the 39th round of their championship bout
The impact of the
Napoleonic War has been felt by cricket since 1797, when inter-county matches simply ceased, and there has been a steady decline in both number and quality of major matches during the first decade of the 19th century until they became few and far between after 1810. Nevertheless, the impact of this war has been less severe than that of the
Seven Years' War because of the existence this time of
MCC and other well-organised clubs like
Brighton and
Montpelier. These clubs manage to co-ordinate cricket activities during the war emergency and, as it were, keep the game going.
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abNote that scorecards created in the first quarter of the 19th century are not necessarily accurate or complete; therefore any summary of runs, wickets or catches can only represent the known totals and the missing data prevents effective computation of averages