St Lawrence Ground

The Spitfire Ground, St Lawrence sits in Canterbury as an old place that has kept its shape through changes. The ground was established in 1847 on farmland laid out around a pre-existing lime tree, and Fuller Pilch helped arrange the playing area. The iron structure known as the Les Ames Stand remains the oldest extant building here, while the Pavilion opened in 1890. Kent County Cricket Club purchased the ground from the 2nd Earl Sondes in 1896 for £4,500.

The playing surface is natural grass, and the capacity sits at 6,000. A significant redevelopment took place in 2017 on the north side, which forced the boundary forward and removed the famous lime tree that had given the ground its character for over a century. The Frank Woolley Stand replaced the wooden Telegraph Stand in 1927, and the Colin Cowdrey Stand arrived in the 1980s.

This is the venue for Canterbury Cricket Week, the oldest cricket festival in the world, held since 1847. The ground hosted England's preparation base for the 1999 Cricket World Cup and an ODI between England and Kenya on May 18, 1999. It has hosted three other men's ODIs in 2000, 2003, and 2005, and numerous women's internationals, including England's first women's Test match against the West Indies in 1979 and the last women's Test match against Australia in 2015. In 2011, it hosted the first day/night County Championship match as a trial. The ground was known as St Lawrence Ground from 1847 until 2013, when it entered a sponsorship deal with Shepherd Neame.

Notable non-cricket events have included concerts by Elton John in June 2006 and Michael Bublé in July 2022. The pitch is natural grass, and the ground sits at Old Dover Rd, Canterbury CT1 3NZ.