1878-79 Australia v England Series
Date	2 January 1879 – 4 January 1879
Location	Australia
Result	The one match Test series was won by Australia
Teams  Australia  England Captains Dave Gregory Lord Harris Most runs Alick Bannerman (73) Fred Spofforth (39) Lord Harris (69) Charlie Absolom (58) Most wickets Fred Spofforth (13) Frank Allan (4) Tom Emmett (7)
← →

An English cricket team captained by Lord Harris toured Australia and New Zealand in 1878–79 in a private tour organised by the Melbourne Cricket Club. The team's match against Australia in January 1879 was retrospectively given Test match status, making it the third Test ever and the third between Australia and England, though it was not part of The Ashes which began in 1882.

Harris' tour party arrived in Australia just two months after the touring Australians had returned from England. They were scheduled to play five tour matches, two each against New South Wales and Victoria and one against the combined Australians. Whilst in Sydney, the notorious Sydney Riot of 1879 occurred as a result of the tourists match against New South Wales. The English team, which is sometimes referred to as Lord Harris' XI, also visited New Zealand where they played a single match in Christchurch. From there, they travelled home via the Pacific and the US, stopping in Hoboken en route to play one further match there.^[1]

Henry Maul (1850–1940), a batsman, played in eight of the minor matches on the tour, and later had a long career with Warwickshire in their pre-first-class days, but never played first-class cricket.^[2] Frank Penn, the only other tourist not to play in the Test, played in the one-off Test against Australia in 1880.

Australia	England
Dave Gregory (c) Frank Allan Alick Bannerman Charles Bannerman Jack Blackham (wk) Harry Boyle Tom Garrett Tom Horan Thomas Kelly Billy Murdoch Fred Spofforth	Lord Harris (c) Charlie Absolom Tom Emmett Leland Hone (wk) A. N. Hornby A. P. Lucas Francis MacKinnon Vernon Royle Sandford Schultz George Ulyett A. J. Webbe

2–4 January 1879 (Timeless Test) Scorecard

England	v	Australia
113 (54 overs) Charlie Absolom 52 Fred Spofforth 6/48 (25 overs)		256 (159.3 overs) Alick Bannerman 73 Tom Emmett 7/68 (59 overs)
160 (68 overs) Lord Harris 36 Fred Spofforth 7/62 (35 overs)		0/19 (2.3 overs) Charles Bannerman 15*

Australia won by 10 wickets Melbourne Cricket Ground, Melbourne Umpires: P. Coady (Aus) and George Coulthard (Aus)

• England won the toss and elected to bat.
• Frank Allan (Aus), Alick Bannerman (Aus), Harry Boyle (Aus), Charlie Absolom (Eng), Lord Harris (Eng), Leland Hone (Eng), A. N. Hornby (Eng), A. P. Lucas (Eng), Francis MacKinnon (Eng), Vernon Royle (Eng), Sandford Schultz (Eng) and A. J. Webbe (Eng) made their Test debut.
• Fred Spofforth (Aus) became the first player to ever take a hat-trick in Test cricket.

v t e The Ashes
List of Ashes series
1850	1884 1886 1888 1890 1893 1896 1899 1882–83 1884–85 1886–87 1887–88 1891–92 1894–95 1897–98
1900	1902 1905 1909 1912 World War I 1921 1926 1930 1934 1938 World War II 1948 1901–02 1903–04 1907–08 1911–12 1920–21 1924–25 1928–29 1932–33 1936–37 1946–47
1950	1953 1956 1961 1964 1968 1972 1975 1977 1981 1985 1989 1993 1997 1950–51 1954–55 1958–59 1962–63 1965–66 1970–71 1974–75 1978–79 1982–83 1986–87 1990–91 1994–95 1998–99
2000	2001 2005 2009 2013 2015 2019 2023 2002–03 2006–07 2010–11 2013–14 2017–18 2021–22
Non-Ashes Australia v England Test series 1876–77 1878–79 1880 1881–82 1882 1945 1976–77 1979–80 1980 1987–88 2027
Matches in white background were played in England, yellow – in Australia.