Trent Bridge is located in Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. Located just across the River Trent, the stadium is named after a bridge over the river.
It serves as the home ground and headquarters to the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club and is mostly used for international cricket matches across all formats of the game.
It has the capacity to seat approximately 17,500 (15,358, before the renovations in 2007) spectators. Trent Bridge is considered to be one of the best grounds in the world to watch cricket.
History
Trent Bridge was first used as a cricket ground in the 1830s. The first recorded cricket match was held on an area of ground behind the Trent Bridge Inn in 1838.
The stadium was inaugurated by William Clarke, the then captain of the All England Cricket Team and husband of the owner of the Trent Bridge Inn. A stand is named in his memory in the stadium.
Trent Bridge hosted its first Test match in 1899, for England playing against Australia.
It has a small history of hosting football games too, to the extent to it hosting just one international football game in February 1967, with England beating Ireland 6-0.
Major Matches
Trent Bridge was one of the three venues for the 2009 ICC World Twenty20. It hosted all three games in Group A which consisted of India, Ireland and Bangladesh, two games of Group C consisting of West Indies, Sri Lanka and Australia and three in the super 8 stage of the tournament.
Most importantly, it hosted the semi-finals which was played between South Africa and Pakistan, which Pakistan won by a narrow margin of 7 runs. Pakistan went ahead to win the tournament.
It has also hosted the finals of the Twenty20 (now replaced by Friends Provident t20) cup, a former domestic T20 tournament played by the teams of Wales and England.
In the Test matches held at Trent Bridge, the highest team total is 658 for 8 declared, scored by England against Australia in 1938.
Controversies
In a Test match played at the Trent Bridge between England and India during the 29th July - 2nd August, 2011, a controversy erupted on the third day related to the run out of the English batsman Ian Bell. Ian Morgan, the batsman at the striker’s end flicked the last ball of the last over before tea to deep square leg.
Praveen Kumar, failed to field the ball and Bell thought that the ball had reached the boundary. As he was heading towards the pavilion with Morgan, the Indian team took off the bails and appealed for a run-out.
After a long discussion between on-field umpires Marais Erasmus, Asad Rauf and the third umpire Billy Bowden, he was given out on 137. After a long discussion between the officials and both the teams, the appeal was withdrawn and so was the decision.
Recent Matches
Trent Bridge hosted the Test match this year where the hosts England playing South Africa in July. The South African team emerged victories by a huge margin of 340 runs.
West Indies were supposed to play England on the 21st of September this year but the game was ultimately washed out due to rain.
