Cowdrey Lecture

2025 MCC COWDREY LECTURE, FEATURING MICHAEL VAUGHAN, JONATHAN AGNEW, PHIL TUFNELL, AND EBONY RAINFORD-BRENT.

Details of the 2026 lecture will be available soon. 

The 2025 MCC Cowdrey lecture took place last year on Thursday 3 April. You can watch again on the Lord’s YouTube channel via the link below.

Part of the Test Match Special (TMS) commentary team, the quartet provided a peek into the commentary box during an evening of informal cricket chat and discussion in front of an audience of 600 guests.

• Michael Vaughan scored 7,728 international runs across all three formats and led England to its famous Ashes victory in 2005.

• A fast bowler who played for England in the 80s, Jonathan Agnew has been presenting TMS for over 30 years.

• Ebony Rainford-Brent’s was part of England’s World Cup and Ashes winning squads in 2009 and is the founder of the ACE programme.

• No stranger to Lord’s, Phil Tufnell spent his 16-year domestic career with Middlesex and played 62 international matches for England, claiming 140 wickets.

You can also view previous MCC Cowdrey Lectures delivered by cricketing enthusiasts and legends such as Sir Andrew Strauss (2023), Stephen Fry (2021) and Mike Brearley (2019) – see below for the full list.
 

History

The event is named after Lord Colin Cowdrey, the former England captain who is credited with initiating the ‘Spirit of Cricket’ – an outline for fair play that was later officially added as a preamble to the Laws of Cricket.

Lord Cowdrey passed away in December 2000 and in his memory, the Cowdrey Lecture was born. The first lecture took place in 2001 and was delivered by the former Australian captain Richie Benaud.

The speakers have customarily been distinguished former cricketers or cricketing personalities, other than when Desmond Tutu delivered the Lecture in 2008. Kumar Sangakkara, in 2011, is the only player who was still active in their playing career at the time of giving the Lecture.

The last lecture was delivered by the stars of the popular cricket podcast, Tailenders.
 

Previous Speakers

The full list of previous speakers are as follows: