Cricket

The first recorded match on the ground was in 1887, when Derbyshire

Derbyshire County Cricket Club

Derbyshire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the England and Wales domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Derbyshire...

 hosted Lancashire

Lancashire County Cricket Club

Lancashire County Cricket Club represents the historic county of Lancashire in cricket's County Championship. The club was founded in 1864 as a successor to Manchester Cricket Club and has played at Old Trafford since then...

 in the ground's first and only first-class

First-class cricket

First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

 match. The match was played on a 'fiery' wicket, with the match, scheduled for three days, ending after two days in Lancashire's favour.

Cricket continued to be played on the ground until at least 1961, when the last recorded match on the ground, between Long Eaton Cricket Association and Derbyshire Juniors, was held.

Football

The Recreation Ground was the home ground of Long Eaton Rangers F.C.

Long Eaton Rangers F.C.

Long Eaton Rangers F.C. was a football club based in Long Eaton, England. They were founding members of the second ever league, The Combination in 1888, and when that folded, the Football Alliance in 1889. In 1890, they joined the Midland League and were runners up one year, however, they left the...

 In 1887 the club won the Birmingham Challenge Cup by beating West Bromwich Albion

West Bromwich Albion F.C.

West Bromwich Albion Football Club, also known as West Brom, The Baggies, The Throstles, Albion or WBA, are an English Premier League association football club based in West Bromwich in the West Midlands...

. The club during its existence played Nottingham Forest

Nottingham Forest F.C.

Nottingham Forest Football Club is an English Association Football club based in West Bridgford, Nottingham, that plays in the Football League Championship...

, Newton Heath

Manchester United F.C.

Manchester United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, that plays in the Premier League. Founded as Newton Heath LYR Football Club in 1878, the club changed its name to Manchester United in 1902 and moved to Old Trafford in 1910.The 1958...

 and Sheffield Wednesday

Sheffield Wednesday F.C.

Sheffield Wednesday Football Club are a football club based in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, who are currently competing in the Football League One in the 2011-12 season, in England. Sheffield Wednesday are one of the oldest professional clubs in the world and the fourth oldest in the...

 in the Football Alliance

Football Alliance

The Football Alliance was an association football league in England which ran for three seasons, from 1889–90 to 1891–92.It was formed by 12 clubs as a rival to the Football League, which had begun in the 1888–89 season, also with 12 member clubs...

.

Post-1928

After 1928 the original ground was demolished, making way initially for a Greyhound racing

Greyhound racing

Greyhound racing is the sport of racing greyhounds. The dogs chase a lure on a track until they arrive at the finish line. The one that arrives first is the winner....

 track. The new stadium was constructed by F. Perks and Son and had seven wooden grandstands, although most were destroyed by fire in 1948. In 1929, a cinder track

Cinder track

A cinder track is type of race track, generally purposed for athletics or horse racing, whose surface is composed of cinders. For running tracks, most cinder surfaces have been replaced by all-weather synthetic surfaces, which provide greater durability, more consistent results, and are less...

 was laid to cater for speedway

Motorcycle speedway

Motorcycle speedway, usually referred to as speedway, is a motorcycle sport involving four and sometimes up to six riders competing over four anti-clockwise laps of an oval circuit. Speedway motorcycles use only one gear and have no brakes and racing takes place on a flat oval track usually...

. The idea was to enter a Long Eaton speedway team into the English league, although when initial races attracted only modest crowds, it was decided not to enter a team. Speedway reappeared, with Long Eaton Archers joining the National League Division Three in 1951. Speedway continued at the venue until 1997, with the home team name being changed a number of times to the Rangers, Nottingham Outlaws and lastly the Invaders, with the Invaders winning the National League

Speedway National League

The National League was the top division of Speedway in the United Kingdom from 1932 until 1965 when it became known as the British League. Prior to 1932 there were only small regional leagues competing within the sport in the UK. The National League was re-incarnated in 1975 as the second division...

 title in 1984.

As well as speedway, the ground also hosted Stock car racing

Stock car racing

Stock car racing is a form of automobile racing found mainly in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Great Britain, Brazil and Argentina. Traditionally, races are run on oval tracks measuring approximately in length...

, becoming one of the main venues in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 for the sport. During the 1950s, cycling

Cycling

Cycling, also called bicycling or biking, is the use of bicycles for transport, recreation, or for sport. Persons engaged in cycling are cyclists or bicyclists...

, midget car racing

Midget car racing

Midget cars, also Speedcars in Australia, are very small race cars with a very high power-to-weight ratio and typically use four-cylinder engines.-Cars:Typically, these cars have 300 to 400 horsepower and weigh...

 and trotting

Inter Dominion

The Inter Dominion is a harness racing competition that has been contested since 1936 in Australia and New Zealand. The host of the series is rotated between the six harness racing states of Australia and the North and South Islands of New Zealand...

 becoming staple events. The 1960s brought the arrival of hot rod

Hot rod

Hot rods are typically American cars with large engines modified for linear speed. The origin of the term "hot rod" is unclear. One explanation is that the term is a contraction of "hot roadster," meaning a roadster that was modified for speed. Another possible origin includes modifications to or...

 and banger racing

Banger racing

Banger Racing is a tarmac or dirt track racing type of motorsport event popularised in both North America and Europe and especially United Kingdom, Ireland, Belgium and the Netherlands in which drivers of old vehicles race against one another around a race track and the race is...

. The stadium continued to host events until its doors finally closed in 1997.

Following its closure, the ground became derelict and what locals considered an eyesore. In June 2010, bulldozers moved in to clear the site for housing.

External links

• Recreation Ground on CricketArchive
  CricketArchive
  CricketArchive is a website that aims to provide a comprehensive archive of records relating to the sport of cricket. It claims to be the most comprehensive cricket database on the internet, including scorecards for all matches of first-class cricket , List A cricket , Women's Test cricket and...
  
  
• Recreation Ground on Cricinfo
  Cricinfo
  ESPNcricinfo is believed to be the largest cricket-related website on the World Wide Web. Content includes news,articles, live scorecards,live text commentary and a comprehensive and searchable database called 'StatsGuru', of historical matches and players from the 18th century to the present...