The Gibraltar National Cricket Team is an associate member team which represents the British overseas territory of Gibraltar. The team plays in the international cricket series and has been an associate member of the International Cricket Council since 1969, the year of its membership. The team is at present ranked in the sixth position amongst the European non-test teams. The captain of this team is Christian Rocca and the coach of the team is Rich Askew. The first recorded match of this team was in 16th June 1982, playing versus Kenya team at Solihull.

The Early years of this team

In Gibraltar, cricket was played by the British servicemen since the late 18th century. The game was mainly played in a cricket ground which was situated to the north side of the Rock of Gibraltar in 1800. The locals too started playing this game along with the servicemen by 1822. Ultimately, by 1883, the Gibraltar Cricket Club got formed as the backbone of civilian cricket till the 20th century.

Country Gibraltar Gibraltar
City Gibraltar
Founded 1969
Website gibcricket.com

By 1890, the Australian national cricket team arrived in a ship on their way to England tour and docked in the Gibraltar Harbor after a collision with two other ships. So, this team played a game against the Gibraltar Garrison team in which the home team got dismissed for 25 and the Australian team won this game by 150 for 8. By 1930s, the game of cricket flourished with the home team producing many local born players and unfortunately due to the Second World War, the game procedure got stopped. Amidst all this, the ground where the game used to be played got converted to military and airfield grounds.

Post War years

Post 1950s, the Gibraltar Cricket Association got formed in 1960. In 1969, the club was elected as an associate member of the ICC. In 1982, the team took active part in the second ICC Trophy without any victory on their hand. So, they improved their fielding and batting skills after which in 1986, they gained their first ever international win against the Israel team. In the next tournament of the ICC in 1987, they succeeded and won against East and Central Africa, Israel and Singapore team. With this, the team reached the plate competition and finished in the 20th place in the ICC Trophy in 1994. They played their first European Championship in Copenhagen in the year 1996 and finished in the sixth place after losing to Scotland team in a playoff match.

In the ICC Trophy, the Gibraltar team finished in the 19th place and played rather poorly in the European Championship in 1998. With this, the team finished in the last position in the ten team tournament. By 1999, the team hosted the quadrangular tournament which involved other teams like Italy, Israel and France and in this tournament, the home team lost in the finals to Italy. The European Championship was held later on which was split between two divisions in 2000, and the Gibraltar team got placed in Division two, and won the game. In 2001, this team travelled to Canada and took part in the ICC Trophy, where in all of the three matches, they lost.

However, they defended their European Division Two title and could not continue further in 2004, as they finished in the fifth position out of the six teams. However, in 2005 they did not get to participate in the ICC Trophy as they were not qualified for the same. In 2006, this team finished in the fourth position in the Division two of the European Championship after they lost to Germany. By 2009, this team was placed in the sixth position at the Global Division Seven tournament and was demoted to Division Eight.

Major Achievements

In 1986, the team achieved their first international victory against the Israel team. In the next tournament of the ICC in 1987, they succeeded and won against East and Central Africa, Israel and Singapore team.

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