With scorecards from each of Nottinghamshire's forthcoming home fixtures to be made available online, trentbridge.co.uk takes a look at the noble art of scoring.
A triangle here, a circle there. Cricket is beloved for its intricacies, not least the time-honoured tradition of scoring.
The result is a carefully crafted timepiece, each stroke of the pen or pencil representing a brief moment in time. It serves to provide instantaneous information, or trigger nostalgic memories.
That the scorecard has scarcely changed since the inception of scorekeeping, save for some added detail, is somewhat remarkable. Bartholomew Good’s match winning knock of 20 in Nottinghamshire’s 1835 victory against Sussex jumps out of the card as vividly as a pair of Haseeb Hameed tons against Worcestershire would 186 years later.
As many a club cricketer will know, the scorer is the staple of any side, the glue holding the team together, for little would be achieved without them. The dismissed batter’s hopeful peer over the shoulder is an all-too-familiar sight for those in the chair.
Some opt for contemporary apps on tablets and laptops to do their business, while just as many carry coloured stationary to compile books of meticulous neatness.
The activity extends to a popular pastime whilst spectating a game, too; a contemporaneous bank of data the result of painstaking concentration. Even whilst fans are encouraged to watch via streams as we await the return to grounds, it is a skill which can be just as easily practiced from home.
Every forthcoming Nottinghamshire scorecard for the 2021 season at Trent Bridge will be available to download from each fixture's matchday guide, allowing you to log every Luke Fletcher wicket, Ben Slater run and Tom Moores dismissal wherever you are following the Green and Golds.
You can find scorecards from our first few fixtures of the season below:
Nottinghamshire v Durham, 8-11 April 2021
Nottinghamshire v Warwickshire, 15-18 April 2021
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Tickets to witness Notts Outlaws’ defence of their Vitality Blast title in 2021 are now on general sale.
