Wednesday 22nd May 2013 marks the 50th anniversary of Nottinghamshire’s first domestic one-day fixture, a Gillette Cup tie against Yorkshire at Middlesbrough.
Back in the early 1960s the cricketing authorities were concerned about a slump in county championship attendances and sought to re-invigorate the game with a new one-day competition.
As a trial event, a year earlier, Notts had joined Leicestershire, Derbyshire and eventual winners, Northants for a Midlands Counties Knockout Cup. Following the success of that competition, the MCC scheduled a new national competition for the following year, involving all seventeen (as it was then) first class counties.
In that inaugural 1963 campaign the matches were played as 65 overs per side, with a bowler being able to bowl a maximum of 15 overs.
With an odd number of entrants, Lancashire and Leicestershire were drawn to face each other in a preliminary match, with the American safety razor company ‘Gillette’ on board as sponsors.
The competition was therefore called, ‘The First Class Knockout Competition for the Gillette Cup’.
The initial match began at Old Trafford on 1 May 1963 but dragged into a second day, due to bad weather, with Lancashire eventually being successful and going through to the first round proper.
All of the other entrants, including Nottinghamshire, began their one-day careers on 22nd May 1963.
The matches were scheduled for:
Glamorgan v Somerset (Cardiff Arms Park)
Gloucs v Middx (Ashley Down Ground, Bristol)
Hants v Derbyshire (Dean Park, Bournemouth)
Kent v Sussex (Nevill Ground, Tunbridge Wells)
Lancs v Essex (Old Trafford, Manchester)
Northants v Warwicks (County Ground, Northampton)
Worcs v Surrey (New Road, Worcester)
Yorkshire v Notts (Acklam Park, Middlesbrough)
Notts selected the following side for their inaugural match; J B Bolus, NB Whittingham, A Gill, M Hill, HM Winfield, C Forbes, BD Wells, K Gillhouley, G Millman (captain and wicketekeeper), IJ Davison, J Cotton.
Yorkshire’s captain, Brian Close, won the toss and elected to field first. Brian Bolus, appearing against the county he’d left just a few months earlier, opened the batting for Notts and scored the county’s first one-day century, although with little support from the other end.
Bolus ended on 100 not out in a Nottinghamshire total of 159 all out, from 64 overs, with Yorkshire’s England fast bowler Fred Trueman claiming figures of 15-2-30-4.
The White Rose county were fully extended, not reaching their target until the penultimate over – but two futire England captain’s, Close and Raymond Illingworth, were there at the end to see their county over the line.
Keith Gillhouley was the pick of the Notts attack, taking 4-33 from 14 overs.
Although he finished on the losing side Brian Bolus was the recipient of the man-of-the-match award for his splendid hundred.
Sussex went on to lift the Gillette Cup in that maiden season, defeating Worcestershire in the Lord’s Final.
In fifty years of domestic one-day cricket Notts have won two one-day finals at Lord’s:
1987 NatWest Trophy - defeated Northants by 3 wkts
1989 Benson and Hedges Cup - defeated Essex by 3 wkts
They have appeared in two other finals:
1982 Benson and Hedges Cup - lost to Somerset by 9 wickets
1985 NatWest Trophy - lost to Essex by 1 run.
Additionally, on one occasion, in 1991 Notts won the domestic Sunday League competition, sponsored at the time by Refuge Assurance.
In recent times Notts’ have added the name ‘Outlaws’ to their one-day side and how fitting it would be in this ‘Golden Summer of Cricket’ if the current side could celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of one-day matches with a trophy.
The Outlaws have won their opening three matches this season, in the Yorkshire Bank 40 competition and are next in action on Thursday 24 May, when they face Warwickshire Bears at Edgbaston.
Remaining matches 2013
Thursday 24 May v Warwickshire Bears (Edgbaston)
Sunday 26 May v Netherlands (Trent Bridge)
Sunday 16 June v Warwickshire Bears (Trent Bridge)
Wednesday 19 June v Netherlands (Truro, Cornwall)
Friday 21 June v Sussex Sharks (Trent Bridge)
Sunday 11 August v Northants Steelbacks (Trent Bridge)
Tuesday 13 August v Worcestershire (Trent Bridge)
Thursday 15 August v Sussex Sharks (Hove)
Monday 26 August v Kent Spitfires (Canterbury)
The semi finals and final of this season’s competition will be held during September, with Lord’s hosting the Final on Saturday 21 September 2013.