Line and Length

Line & Length

A History of the Geelong Cricket Club

The Geelong Cricket Club’s present-day logo declares that the club was “established in 1993”. Through painstaking analysis of historical evidence, however, Line & Length reveals how the club can trace its history to the 1840s and Geelong’s first decade as a township. That rich journey reveals a story that has historical threads woven deep into the fabric of the broader Geelong community and its surrounding regions. It begins in the club’s foundational years—from the mid 1800s up to the 1880s—during which time it was known as the Corio Cricket Club, the earliest iteration of today’s Geelong Cricket Club. Next, there came an amalgamation with the Geelong Football Club in 1884, which saw the town’s leading cricket and football teams joining forces under the banner of the Geelong Cricket & Football Club.

It was during this period that the club was involved in several historic firsts, including participating in the Geelong Cricket Association’s inaugural season of 1896-97, and its entry into metropolitan pennant via the Victorian Cricket Association’s Sub-District competition on the eve of WWI. After the amalgamation with the football club was dissolved—amicably—in the middle of the 20th century, Geelong Cricket Club went into a hiatus before reforming so it could re-join Melbourne’s Sub-District competition in the 1960s. Through all these iterations the club’s ultimate aim was to reach Victoria’s elite competition, District Cricket—later Premier Cricket—but failed bids tested the resolve of all involved. Success finally came with the VCA’s invitation to Geelong to join Premier Cricket for the 1993-94 season.