MONTHLY ROUND-UP: AUGUST 1866
The Old Westminsters have strengthened their grip on the Metropolitan League championship trophy after winning four of their five games in August. Most crucial were wins over chasers Clapham and Angel, with two wins in a single day against the latter. Angel won their other three games in the month but the damage was done by those two defeats against the Westminsters, and they now sit three games behind. Clapham are also three back after a mixed month.
The Regent’s Park are a further game behind in fourth place, after a narrow 1-0 defeat to the Westminsters in a game which could have kept them very much in the running. It’s a close battle between Kensington and the City of London Club to avoid last place, with Kensington still one game ahead after both teams could manage only a single victory from four games in August.
History was made to end the month as for the first time, a pitcher made his way through an entire game without giving up a single hit to his opponents. The man to do it was Frederick Maiden of Clapham, in his team’s 1-0 victory over the City of London Club. He even had to pitch ten innings to get there, as it took Clapham that long to find the single run to win the game. So dominant was Maiden that the only City Club man to reach base was lead-off hitter Albert Barnett in the first inning, owing to an error by Clapham second baseman Cuthbert Ellwood, with Maiden then proceeding to dismiss the next thirty batters he faced.
