12 March 2007

Bowled over by the nation’s cricketing place names

To celebrate the cricketing carnival now underway in the Caribbean, Ordnance Survey has decided to show its support for the home nations, England and Scotland, with a search of its free online gazetteer for all things leather on willow.

The gazetteer – at www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/didyouknow – has more than 250,000 place names across Britain shown on the familiar OS Explorer Maps and OS Landranger Maps. They include hundreds of villages, settlements and landscape features with a distinctly cricketing theme.

Most of the England team are represented across the country. Fast man Jimmy Anderson is also a village in Dorset, while one-day wizard Paul Collingwood can be visited in Northumberland or at any of the six other places or features that carry his name.

In a nod to England’s man behind the stumps, Nixonstown is in Cumbria, while Jon Lewis fans might enjoy a visit to Butt of Lewis on the coast of Scotland. Middlesex man Jamie Dalrymple shares his name with a village in East Ayrshire and bowler Liam Plunkett could take a trip to the south-west of England, to Preston Plunkett.

Not forgetting the men flying the saltire for Scotland, veteran Dougie Brown has Brown Hill in Aberdeenshire and Edinburgh-born opening bowler John Bain could take a dip in Loch Bain in western Scotland, while skipper Craig Wright may like to visit Wright’s Green in Essex.

The country is full of places and features with a cricketing theme, like Wicket Nook in Derbyshire; so let’s hope that none of the players paid a visit to Duck End (in Essex) before flying out to the West Indies, but instead climbed Run Hill on the Shetland Islands. If no one drops a Catch (Flintshire, Wales) there is even a chance that the teams won’t come home until the tournament is Over (Cheshire)!

The place names search facility is a fun way to discover the rich variety of names across Great Britain. Web browsers can even download and print a free map of their favourite cricketing site.

Ordnance Survey wishes both teams the best of luck!

Notes to Editors

1. Ordnance Survey is Great Britain’s national mapping agency, providing the most accurate and up-to-date geographic data, relied on by government, business and the public.

2. Ordnance Survey, the OS Symbol, Explorer, Landranger and OS are registered trademarks of Ordnance Survey.

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Head of Corporate Communications - Rob Andrews

Email: rob.andrews@ordnancesurvey.co.uk

Phone: (+44) 023 8079 2265

Senior Communications & PR Officer - Paul Beauchamp

Email: paul.beauchamp@ordnancesurvey.co.uk

Phone: (+44) 023 8079 2568

Press Office fax: (+44) 023 8030 5295