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1864 was the 78th season of cricket in England (since the foundation of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC)). It was a significant year in cricket history, as it saw the legalisation of overarm bowling and the first edition of John Wisden's Cricketers' Almanac.

Inter-county cricket

The first-class county teams in 1864 were: Cambridgeshire, Hampshire, Kent, Middlesex, Notts, Surrey, Sussex and Yorkshire. The unofficial concept of a "champion county" took a new turn when periodicals began publishing tables of inter-county results, although there was still no formal or agreed method of deciding positions in the table. Haygarth usually refers to 'generally agreed' when announcing the Champion County.^[1]

Table^[2]
	Team	P	W	L	D	Pts^[3]
1	Surrey	8	6	0	2	6
2	Cambridgeshire	3	3	0	0	3
	Sussex	8	5	2	1	3
4	Middlesex	4	3	1	0	2
5	Nottinghamshire	7	3	4	0	-1
6	Yorkshire	7	2	4	1	-2
7	Hampshire	4	0	4	0	-4
8	Kent	7	0	7	0	-7

Events

Law 10 was rewritten by the MCC to allow a bowler to bring his arm through at any height providing he kept it straight and did not throw the ball. The issue of overarm bowling had crystallised in the Willsher-Lillywhite incident of August 1862.
12 January – formation of Lancashire County Cricket Club at a meeting in Manchester.
27–29 January – Otago v. Canterbury at Dunedin was the start of first-class cricket in New Zealand.
Madras v. Calcutta was the start of first-class cricket in India.
First issue of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack. It was titled John Wisden's Cricketers' Almanac until the 1937 edition.
6–7 June – Middlesex County Cricket Club played its initial first-class match v. Sussex at Islington
9 June – Playing for MCC against Oxford University, H.E. Bull becomes only the second player,^[4] and the first since 1827,^[5] to be dismissed hit the ball twice in a first-class game.^[6]
7–8 July – Hampshire County Cricket Club played its initial first-class match v. Sussex at the Antelope Ground, Southampton
11–12 July – First appearance of WG Grace in a "big" match, though his first-class debut would not occur until the following season.^[7]
MCC finally purchased the freehold of Lord's Cricket Ground for £18,333 6s 8d with money advanced by William Nicholson.

Leading batsmen (qualification 10 innings)

1864 English season leading batsmen^[8]
Name	Team	Matches	Inns	Not outs	Runs	Hig score	100s	Av
George Anderson	Yorkshire	6	11	5	255	99*	0	42.50
Heathfield Stephenson	Surrey & All England Eleven	15	25	4	824	119	2	39.23
Will Mortlock	Surrey County Cricket Club	18	25	0	855	105	1	34.20
Tom Hayward Sr.	Cambridgeshire	8	12	0	355	66	0	29.58
Bob Carpenter	Cambridgeshire	8	11	1	270	52	0	27.00

Leading bowlers (qualification 800 balls)

1864 English season leading bowlers^[9]
Name	Team	Balls	Runs	Wickets	Best	5w inns	10w match	Av
George Tarrant	Cambridgeshire	1610	590	67	7/30	8	4	8.80
James Grundy	MCC & Nottinghamshire	3466	1109	99	9/19	10	2	11.31
William Fuller-Maitland	Oxford University	1117	521	48	8/48	4	2	11.84
Edward Walker	Middlesex & Southgate	1054	519	42	9/63	4	2	12.35
Edgar Willsher	Kent & All England Eleven	3486	1065	79	7/47	6	0	13.48