A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE FIXTURE LIST
Back in 2001 someone suggested to us that a free online fixture arranging service for cricket clubs would be ‘a good thing’ and so, despite knowing next to nothing about making web sites, we registered the domain name and set about producing a site.
Back then there were very few software options around for what is effectively a classified ad site – putting together clubs who had fixture dates to offer each other. We eventually tracked down some software, uploaded it to a server and despite absolutely no previous knowledge of CGI/PERL but with the help of some extensive, albeit almost incomprehensible instructions, produced a site that worked well for many years.
The original Fixture List banner – a period piece!
Few of the images survive from that period but suffice to say that those that do were not of great quality as evidenced by our original top banner graphic above – but of course in those days many were still on dial on modems and optimised images were the order of the day … well that is our excuse and we are sticking with it.
Eventually the original software became obsolete, we had a one season flirtation with some alternative software that produced howls of anguish from our regular users, and subsequently moved to an online variant of our original software which has served us well for some years. But the internet moves on, many more people were accessing with mobile devices so in 2017 we are moved the site to Word Press and set up a new ‘classified’ system. That first option we tried proved not to be entirely stable so we are now on yet another variant which looks stable (for now!).
In 2018 we have had to pay out for a Secure Server Certificate for the site to meet new requirements but now hopefully we are good to go for many more years yet.
The Fixture List has always been a totally free service and that is not going to change – we believe in these challenging times for the game cricket clubs need all the help they can get to keep going and if The Fixture List can help with that we are pleased to be here doing what we can.
As of September 2018 around 24,500 fixtures requests have been posted to our site.
We welcome feedback but please remember that this is free service and replies may not always be prompt!
Julia