Page 2 - Clydesdale origins (Autosaved) #3_Neat

The story of Clydesdale Cricket Club, its founding, evolvement, good fortune, various patronages and its
success as THE premier sports club in the Glasgow area, is one that is not readily evident to those outside of
Scottish cricket circles.

The majority of the population of Scotland is unaware of this club and that Clydesdale Cricket Club is deprived
of the praise and recognition it so richly deserves to receive as probably being one of the country’s most
important sporting institutions. The landscape of much of Scotland’s sporting history of the last 160 odd years
would be very different if Clydesdale had not been involved along the way. In fact, the importance of the early
Clydesdale story is not even appreciated, let alone known, by the majority of the membership of the club. The
club has played key roles in the establishment of cricket, football, rugby, athletics and hockey as sports and

pastimes to be enjoyed by the people of Glasgow and also Scotland.

It has had internationalists in all five fields and is currently at the fore-front of examples to be used as
templates of “best working practice” in the engagement, encouragement and development of children in
participation in Scotland’s two biggest team sports after football, namely cricket and hockey.

Clydesdale’s fortunes have ebbed and flowed over the years, but it has remained constant and consistent in
what it delivers: access to all for participation in sport and recreation, irrespective of capability, to those that
wish to do so. And it does so and will continue to do so.

Clydesdale Cricket Club had been founded in 1848 by an Archibald Campbell
of Hawick. The club started off with an initial membership of 27 created by
the merger of the Thistle and Wallace-grove Cricket Clubs into a single
entity, Clydesdale.

The first games played in 1848 by this new “merged” club, Clydesdale, were
at a field in the Kinning Park area of Glasgow, on ground leased from a Mr.
Tweedie, whose occupation has simply been described as a "cow feeder".
This field had been previously used by the now defunct Wallace-grove
Cricket Club.

In 1849, Clydesdale moved the short distance of 500 yards south-west to fields leased from a Mr Meiklewham,
just west of the newly built General Terminus Railway in Kinning Park, and it was there that they remained

until 1876.