'Foreign' cricket played at Royal Grammar School in Guildford hundreds of years ago

Reflecting on England’s latest cricketing success against South Africa made me think about the origins of the game and Guildford’s part in its history.

As far back as 1589, a court case referred to a sport called creckett being played at the Royal Grammar School in Guildford.

A player by the name of John Derick recalled that as a young man at the school “he and diverse of his fellowes did runne and play there at creckett and other plaies.”

This was thought to be the earliest written reference to cricket until last year when Paul Campbell, of the Australian National University in Canberra said he had uncovered a reference to the sport in a 1533 poem, attributed to John Skelton.

Skelton described Flemish weavers, who had settled in southern and eastern England in the 14th century, as “kings of crekettes,” suggesting that cricket – that most quintessential facet of English life – was in fact a foreign import.

A German academic, Dr Heiner Gillmeister, of the University Bonn, supported this theory when he suggested that the term cricket had its roots in the Flemish phrase "met de krik ketsen", or "to chase with a curved stick".

John Derick, who played cricket at the Royal Grammar School all those hundreds of years ago, may also have been Flemish, judging by his name. But you don’t see us playing cricket with the Belgians these days, although they do have a team.

The picture shows famous English cricketer William Caffyn in action during the 19th century.