The fixture card and all those who know the club well can recite evidence of cricket on Aldborough Green in 1859 and therefore and quite rightly assume the formation of the club prior to that date.

As yet the exact date the club was formed remains a mystery,  but the earliest reference is catalogued in an unpublished journal entitled “Cricketing References in Norwich Newspapers, 1701 to 1800″ (Penny J. S, Norwich, 1979). The extract is from The Norfolk Chronicle and reports a cricket match on 22nd July 1797 in which Gentlemen of Aldborough were included in a composite team of Aylsham and District, “On Thurfday fe’ennight was played a match at Cricket, between the gentlemen of Lyng and Elfing, against Aylfham, Blickling, Aldborough, and Thurgaton, which was decided in favour of the former, by seven wickets to go down”.

So played one, lost one!

Cricket at Aylsham was chronicled in 1792 where The Norfolk Chronicle (August 18th) reports home news as, ” Last Monday Afternoon was decided at Aylsham a Cricket Match between married men and youths not pubescent, (11 on each side), which terminated, after a strong and furious contest, in favour of the rising generation.”

So the Aylsham match appears to be an 18th century equivalent to the modern day ”Dads versus Lads”. With the youth winning it is perhaps no surprise that Aylsham calls upon the services of the neighbouring parishes by 1797. Maybe this is another morsel of evidence that reflects cricket of today with players being drawn from surrounding villages to make up a team. In fact in The Rothmans Book of Village Cricket (Murphy, 1992),  Aldborough’s team doyen Ron Dobbie states, “the cricket team is happy to sweep a five mile area around Aylsham to find players, especially at harvest time”.