Melbourne Cricket Ground

For other meanings, see MCG (disambiguation).

The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) is an iconic Australian sporting venue located in Yarra Park in inner Melbourne, home to the Melbourne Cricket Club. It holds the world record for the highest light towers. The MCG is an easy walk from the city centre, and is serviced by Richmond and Jolimont train stations.

Internationally, the MCG is remembered as the centrepiece stadium of the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games. The open-air stadium is also one of the world's most famous cricket venues, with the well-attended Boxing Day test match held there every year, starting on Boxing Day. Throughout the winter, it serves as the home of Australian Rules Football, with at least one game held there every week (usually more), and in late September the AFL Grand Final fills the stadium to capacity. Until the 1970s, more than 120,000 people were occasionally crammed into the venue - the record crowd standing at around 130,000 for a Billy Graham religious event in 1959, closely followed by 121,696 for the 1970 VFL Grand Final. Regulations now limit the maximum capacity to just over 100,000.

The MCG, often referred to as "The G", has also hosted other events, from International Rules between the Australian Football League and Gaelic Athletic Association, to international rugby, football (soccer) World Cup qualifiers, and even rock concerts. When Madonna visited with her Girlie Show Tour in 1993 she called it "The G Spot".

During the lunch break at the 2005 Boxing Day Cricket Test, it was announced by Australian Federal Treasurer, Peter Costello, that the MCG would be added to the Australian Heritage Register.

Early History

On the September 23, 1853, occupancy of the present site, which was part of a "Police Paddock", was given to the Melbourne Cricket Club by Lieutenant Governor Charles La Trobe. This followed the forced resumption of land from the then-15-year-old Club to build Australia's first steam train railway.The MCG - The People's Ground (2003). MCG Official Site The First Members' Pavilion was erected the following year, and the first cricket match was played on September 30, 1854.

The first intercolonial cricket match to be played at the MCG was between New South Wales and Victoria on March 26 and 27, 1856Victoria v New South Wales in 1855/56 (2005). Cricket Archive. That match was also notable for a dispute which arose after the umpires had tossed and which Victoria had won. The New South Wales players insisted that, as the visiting team, they had the choice of batting or bowling. Victoria eventually relented and were sent in. New South Wales won the match by three wickets.

The first football match was played on the MCG on July 12 1859, between Melbourne Football Club and South Yarra.

A visiting Surrey XI, captained by HH Stephenson, played a World XI there in 1862, beginning on New Year's Day.

On Boxing Day 1866 an Indigenous Australian team played at the MCG with 11,000 spectators against an MCC team. That team went on to tour England in 1868 and played at the ground three more times before 1869.

The MCG was one of the venues for the first bicycle race in Victoria, in July 1869.

Stadium Development

The MCG was redesigned and drained by RC Bagot in 1861. In 1876 the reversible stand was built, located at the northern end of the ground, but in 1884 a grandstand replaced the old reversible stand which had burnt down. In 1881 beside the MCC pavilion was constructed a new members' pavilion, with the foundation stone being put in place by Prince George of Wales, and Prince Albert Victor on July 4. It was opened in December that year. It was also the year that a telephone was installed at the grounds, and the wickets and goal posts were changed from running east-west to run north-south. In 1882 a scorecard was put in place, showing details of the batsman's name and how he was dismissed, possibly the first one of this kind in the world. The Grandstand was extended with a double-deck in 1897. In 1900 it was lit up with electric lights. An open wooden stand was built on the south side of the ground in 1904, and The Grey Smith Stand (then known as the New Stand before 1912) was erected in 1906.

In 1936 the Southern Stand was opened. 1956 saw the completion and opening of the Olympic Stand in time for the 1956 Summer Olympics. The Duke of Edinburgh on March 3 1967 laid a foundation stone for a new Western Stand, which was completed in 1968 (known as the Ponsford Stand after 1986).

The Great Southern Stand was erected in 1992 as part of a major southern redevelopment for the 1992 Cricket World Cup. In doing so, more than one half of the MCG was rebuilt. The new stand was built at a cost of AUD$150 million and a capacity of 48,000.

The 1928 Members' stand, as well as the 1956 Northern and Olympic stands were demolished in late 2002. They were replaced with a massive new structure in time for Melbourne to host the 2006 Commonwealth Games. The redevelopments total cost exceeded AUD$400 million and pushed the grounds capacity over the 100,000 mark (when standing room is taken into account).

Sporting Events

Australian rules football

Several Australian Football League (AFL) clubs use the MCG as their home ground; currently Melbourne, Richmond, Collingwood and Hawthorn. Spectator numbers for Australian Rules Football are larger than for any other sport in Australia. It makes more money for the MCG than any of the other sports played there. Most finals games held in Melbourne in the current era are played at the MCG. Before 2004 some interstate clubs like the Brisbane Lions were forced to play "home" finals at the MCG, due to a contract between the AFL and the MCC, which stipulated that at least five finals matches must be played there per year. This rule has been relaxed in order to allow interstate sides to have true home matches. However, Melbourne clubs based out of Telstra Dome (which will eventually be owned by the Australian Football League) — as well as Geelong — may still be required to play their home finals at the MCG. The Grand Final is always played at the MCG regardless of what interstate teams may be playing.

What is believed to have been the very first game of Australian Football is believed to have been played on Richmond Paddock (later known as Yarra Park, just adjacent to where the current MCG stands) on July 31, 1858.

Despite still being called the Melbourne Cricket Ground, it is much more often used for football. It also reflects that it is Melbourne's most popular sport, winter or otherwise. The MCG has a long traditional history with Australian Rules Football and is often referred to the heart for it.

Carlton played their first home matches on the MCG back in 1885. In 1965 the Richmond Tigers played St Kilda in their first home match at the MCG. In 1985 North Melbourne played their first home game against Collingwood at the MCG. Collingwood played their first home match at the MCG in 1994. Hawthorn played their first home match at the MCG in 2000.

The first of nearly 2200 VFL/AFL games to be played at the MCG was on 15 May, 1897, with Melbourne beating Geelong 64 to 19.

Kevin Bartlett holds the records for having scored the most goals, and played the most matches at the MCG. Two players have scored 14 goals for an AFL or VFL game in one match at the MCG: Gary Ablett in 1989 and 1993, and John Longmire in 1990.

A State of Origin football match was held on July 1 1989 between Victoria and South Australia, attended by 91,960 people.

Before an AFL match between Richmond Football Club and Carlton Football Club on 27 August 1999, the city end scoreboard caught fire, causing the start of play to be delayed by half an hour.

The Birth of Test Cricket

The first cricket match deemed to be a Test was played at the MCG between Australia and England commencing on March 15, 1877 1st Test: Australia v England at Melbourne Cricket Ground, 15-19 March 1877 (2004). href="http://articles.gourt.com/en/19 March">19 March 1877.html www.baggygreen.com.au and was won by Australia by 45 runs.

By 1882 the tradition of England-Australia cricket tours was well established, with a total of eight Tests having been played, five of them at the MCG, two at the Sydney Cricket Ground and one at The Oval in London. Then, in 1882, England lost to a visiting Australian team in England for the first time. The match was played at The Oval in August in what was said to be a difficult pitch. Australian bowler Fred Spofforth decimated the English batting after a shocking start by the Australians and the result was a nailbiting finish in which Australia won by seven runs — still one of the closest finishes in Test cricket history. The defeat was widely recorded in the English press and a mock obituary was published in The Sporting Times, lamenting the death of English cricket and noted that "the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia".

Later that year, the Honourable Ivo Bligh led a team of eight amateurs and four professionals to Australia to recover them, with the first two matches of the tour played at the MCG. The firstAustralia v England in 1882/83 (2003). Cricket Archive being a timeless match (as was the custom in those days) that commenced on December 30. On New Year's Day the attendance was 23,000, and Australia won the match by nine wickets in three days. The second matchAustralia v England in 1882/83 IFW Bligh's XI in Australia 1882/83 (2nd Test) (2003). Cricket Archive commenced on January 19 1883 and was won comfortably by England by an innings and 27 runs.

Two further matches were played by the tourists in Sydney, with the first being won by England and the second by Australia. The second Sydney match was subsequently deemed to not be of Test status, so England had won with the series and had "recovered The Ashes" as Bligh had set out to do. A group of Melbourne women presented Bligh with a small urn and the Ashes tradition was then firmly established.

Later Cricket

Donald Bradman's record at the MCG is an average of 128 runs in 17 innings. In the 11 Tests that he played there, he made at least one century in nine of them.

An incident in the second Test of the 1960-61 series involved the West Indies player Joe Solomon being given out after his hat fell on the stumps after being bowled at by Richie Benaud. The crowd sided with the West Indies over the Australians.

Not only was the first Test match played at the MCG, the first One-day International match was also played there, on January 5 1971, between Australia and England. Australia won the 40-over match by 5 wickets. The next ODI was played on August 1972, some 19 months laterList of ODI matches. Cricinfo.com.

In 1977, Australia and England played in a Centenary Test match at the MCG to commemorate 100 years of Tests played between the two countriesCentenary Test: Australia v England at Melbourne Cricket Ground, 12-17 March 1977 (2004). href="http://articles.gourt.com/en/17 March">17 March 1977.html Cricinfo.com. Remarkably, the 45-run win to Australia was exactly the same result as the match 100 years earlier.

On February 1 1981 the infamous underarm incident occurred at the MCG at the third final of the World Series Cup, with New Zealand needing six runs from the final delivery. The Australian captain Greg Chappell ordered the bowler (his brother, Trevor Chappell) to bowl underarm to avoid the possibility that the No. 10 New Zealand batsman Brian McKechnie would score a six from the last ball to tie the match. Australia won the game but the New Zealand batsmen marched off in disgust and since that day the underarm bowling incident has been a source of discussion, both heated and jocular, between Australians and New Zealanders.

In February and March 1985 the Benson & Hedges World Championship of Cricket was played at the MCG, a one day international tournament involving all of the then Test match playing countries to celebrate 150 years of the Australian state of Victoria. Some matches were also played at Sydney Cricket Ground.

During the 1995 Boxing Day Test at the MCG, Australian umpire Darrell Hair called Sri Lankan spin bowler Muttiah Muralitharan for throwing the ball, rather than bowling it, seven times during the match. The other umpires did not call him once and this caused a controversy, although he was later called for throwing by other umpires seven other times in different matches.

The MCG is known for its great atmosphere, much of which is generated in the infamous Bay 13. In a One-day International cricket match in the late 1990s, the behaviour of bay 13 was so bad, that Shane Warne had to enter the ground from his dressing rooms and tell the crowd to settle down at the request of opposing England captain Alec Stewart. Ground announcer Tony Schibecci has also become an important part of the "G"'s proceedings. Also in the 1990s, the warm up stretches performed by Merv Hughes would often be mimicked by the crowd.

Number	Teams	Match type	Attendance	Date
Highest attendance records for cricket matches at the MCG
1	Australia v West Indies	Test	90,800	11 February 1961
2	Australia v England	Test	87,789	4 January 1937
3	England v Pakistan	World Cup Final (day/night)	87,182	25 March 1992
4	Australia v West Indies	Benson & Hedges	86,133	22 January 1984
5	Australia v West Indies	Test	85,661	26 December 1975

Olympic and Commonwealth Games

The MCG was the host stadium of the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games.

The stadium held 107,700 people for the opening ceremony of the 1956 Summer Olympics.

The olympic flame went to the MCG on 30 July 2000 before its way to the 2000 Summer Olympics. It also went to the MCG on 5 June 2004 before the 2004 Summer Olympics.

The Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the 2006 Commonwealth Games were held at the MCG, as well as athletics events during the games. The games began on 15 March and ended on 26 March.

Football (soccer)

On February 9 2006, Victorian premier Steve Bracks and Football Federation Australia chairman Frank Lowy announced that the MCG would host a world class event each year from 2006 until 2009 inclusive. It comes as the game is gaining popularity in the country following the qualification for the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany.

The agreement sees an annual fixture at the MCG, beginning with a clash between Australia and European champions Greece on May 25, 2006 in front of a sell-out crowd of 95,103, before the Socceroos left to contest in the World Cup finals. The Socceroos will also host a match in 2007 against a world class nation, a FIFA World Cup qualifier in 2008, and another in 2009 which could possibly decide Australia's participation in the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

Other matches played at the MCG include the following:

A 1998 FIFA World Cup qualifier between the Socceroos and Iran on Saturday 29 November 1997. The match was drawn 2-all, with Iran progressing on the away goal rule.

An exhibition match between Manchester United and the Socceroos on 15 July 1999.

A friendly match between Brazil B and the Socceroos on 17 November 1999.

An Olympic Tournament group match between Italy and the Olyroos on 13 September 2000.

A 2002 FIFA World Cup qualifier between the Socceroos and Uruguay on Tuesday 20 November 2001. The Socceroos won 1-0, however Uruguay progressed after later winning the second leg 3-0.

Other major events

The first baseball game recorded being played at the MCG was in October 1885, by a team from the USS Enterprise, against an MCC chosen team (and the MCG also recorded the largest crowd ever at a baseball game (over 100,000) for an exhibition match during the 1956 Olympics).

Rugby league was first played at the grounds in 1914, with a New South Wales team playing England.

The first rugby league State of Origin match at the MCG was played on June 8 1994, attracting a then record league crowd in Australia of 87,161.

Australia played New Zealand at rugby union at the MCG on 26 July 1997, losing 18-33 in front of a crowd of 90,119.

During World War II the stand was used by the Australian and American army. It was used by the US Army Air Forces who moved into the MCG and gave the name of their base "Camp Murphy". It was also used by the First Division of the US Marine Corps, an RAAF Technical Training unit and as the RAAF Personnel Depot. The RAAF stayed at the MCG until 27 October 1945.

Queen Elizabeth II visited the MCG in 1954 twice for an assembly and display, and again in 1958 for another display. She attended a Richmond versus Fitzroy match on 5 April 1970, and also attended the Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony at the ground on 15 March 2006.

A record for attendance at the grounds was set by religious leader Billy Graham whose event in 1959 was attended by at least 130,000 people.

The first rock concert to be held at the ground was one by David Cassidy in 1974. In 1978 David Bowie held a concert there. In 1993, Paul McCartney, U2 and Madonna held concerts, drawing huge crowds. The Rolling Stones held concerts in 1995, Michael Jackson in 1996, the Three Tenors in 1997, Elton John and Billy Joel in 1998.

Pope John Paul II held a service at the MCG on 27 November 1986, and a celebration there of the Polish community the next day.

Number	Attendance	Event	Date
All time highest attendance records at the MCG
1	130,000	Billy Graham Crusade	15 March 1959
2	121,696	VFL Grand Final Carlton v Collingwood	26 September 1970
3	120,000	40th Eucharistic Congress	25 February 1973
4	119,165	VFL Grand Final Carlton v Richmond	27 September 1969
5	118,192	VFL Grand Final Hawthorn v St Kilda	25 September 1971

Footnotes

External links

Melbourne Cricket Ground | Melbourne Cricket Ground

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