An author and cricket historian who has dedicated more than 40 years researching the game he loves says he's honoured to have an award named after him.

Howard Milton, from Gravesend , will give his name to the accolade celebrating the best cricketing scholarship in the country.

The award, presented by The Cricket Society and British Society of Sports History, is in its first year this year and the inaugural winner is the Sussex Cricket Museum.

The museum – based at the home of Sussex County Cricket Club at the County Ground in Eaton Road, Hove – has been praised for producing "consistently high quality original research" into the game across a variety of historical, contemporary and various subjects in Sussex.

Howard, who earlier this year co-published a book on all the grounds Kent County Cricket Club has used to mark the club's 150th anniversary , welcomed the selection of the first winners of the award which bears his name.

He said: "I’m thrilled to be honoured with the naming of this award. The first winners are an excellent choice. It is the Museum with its publications that sets the standards which all other counties should seek to achieve.”

The former Gravesend Grammar School pupil has worked as a cricket librarian, statistician, researcher and author throughout his life.

The book published this summer called Kent County Cricket Grounds: 150 Years of Cricket Across the Garden of Eden delves into the annals of Kent cricket history regaling stories about the 18 grounds used by Kent during the club's illustrious – and at times not so illustrious – existence.

The Howard Milton Award for Cricket Scholarship is now set to become an annual event to recognise "outstanding and/or unsung contribution to cricket scholarship".

The prize celebrates "good cricket writing and research" both in academic or popular spheres about the game.

Winners are chosen by a panel from both societies.

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