Kent County Cricket Club in 1906
After dominating county cricket in the early years of Queen Victoria's reign, the players who made up Kent's great side of the 1840s had retired and by the 1850s the county had been reduced to often having to amalgamate with other sides to produce a challenging team. The formation of a County Club in Maidstone in 1859 and the amalgamation of this with the original Kent Cricket Club in 1870 to create the modern Kent County Cricket Club, provided the basis for re-emergence, although the club suffered from financial instability and Lord Harris's view was that Kent could not hope to compete at the level it once had throughout the 1870s and 1880s. When the County Championship was formerly established in 1890 Kent were initially able to finish only in mid table.
Sport in Sussex
Sussex played a key role in the development of the sport of cricket and is generally held to have been invented or developed in the Weald of Sussex and Kent. Founded in 1839, Sussex County Cricket Club (Sussex CCC) is the oldest of the county cricket clubs and represents Sussex in the eighteen-club County Championship. Sussex CCC have won the men's County Championship three times, while the Sussex Women cricket team has won the women's County Championship four times. Recreational cricket is also popular in Sussex and is governed by the Sussex Cricket Board, which merged with Sussex CCC in 2015. Founded in 1971, the Sussex Cricket League is the top level of recreational club cricket in Sussex and from 2016 includes a team representing Guernsey. The England and Wales Cricket Board has recognised the league's top division as a designated ECB Premier League since 1999. Notable Sussex cricketers include former England women's captain Holly Colvin and former England international Clare Connor.