The First Australian Tour of England — May-September 1878

There had been earlier Australian tours of England — Aboriginal XI in 1868 — but none by a representative European-Australian side. The 1878 tour was conceived after the 1876-77 success.

John Conway, the manager, raised £4,000 in subscriptions in Australia. The team sailed via Suez in March 1878.

The 1878 Australian touring side comprised five New South Welshmen (Spofforth, Murdoch, Garrett, Charles and Alec Bannerman), four Victorians (Allan, Horan, Blackham, Boyle), one Tasmanian (George Bailey) and one Anglo-Australian who would shortly defect (Midwinter). They sailed from Sydney in March 1878. Their famous one-day demolition of MCC at Lord's on 27 May made the tour. Other highlights included beating Yorkshire at Huddersfield (Spofforth 12 wickets), beating Middlesex by 98 runs, and a famous 10-wicket victory over the unofficial county champions Gloucestershire at Clifton College in early September. They lost to Cambridge University, Nottinghamshire and the Players. After the English summer they sailed for North America and played New York and Philadelphia teams. The tour returned 750 pounds per player — a sum that turned every member of the side into a comfortable man at home. None of the fixtures held Test status, but several were retrospectively listed as first-class. The tour's structural achievement was to make Australian cricket a regular paying enterprise — and it directly led to the 1878-79 Lord Harris return tour and to the 1880 Oval Test, the first Test in England.

“It was the year that established the fame of Australian cricket once and for all.”

The 1878 tour's success ensured a return Lord Harris tour to Australia in 1878-79 and the second Australian tour of England in 1880. From 1880 the cycle of mutual tours became a regular fixture and the Test era proper began.