Back in the Windows Phone 8.1 days, we had an official application for Cricinfo in the form of ESPNcricinfo - it's the definitive source of cricket information and news online and Windows Phone was well placed with the application. This application, though it works on Windows 10 Mobile and might be retrieved via the library solution if you've grabbed it in the past, has been withdrawn officially from the Windows Store. There are a handful of third party applications, but they just wrap the ESPNcricinfo web site, and not very well. Meaning that it's best to go straight to the Edge browser and pin the very good Cricinfo web site straight to your Start screen.

The concept's not new, of course. I've covered it several times, most recently in the withdrawal of the LinkedIn WP8.1 application. The idea is that since 99% of the content on Cricinfo (or LinkedIn) is HTML5 text and tags, i.e. designed for web pages, why not show it all in a web browser? You do lose out in terms of notifications and you have to live with the Edge address bar, but otherwise the content is nigh on indistinguishable from what a dedicated application would present.

So, there's no official app anymore, but here's ESPN's Cricinfo running in Edge on my Lumia 950:

Almost a Windows 10 application in web form? There are certainly navigation similarities. This is espncricinfo.com in Edge on Windows 10 Mobile...

As usual with making web sites easier to get to, you can 'Pin this page to start', as shown. You get the ESPN Cricinfo 'favicon' as your tile graphic, though don't expect 'live' updates!

Not bad at all - performance is good and the ESPN site has hamburger menu navigation, so it's almost like having a Windows 10 application.

Comments welcome? Am I settling for second best too easily? I do feel that in this case the heavy information-based content is well suited to browser (rather than app) delivery.

PS. If you do resurrect the old 8.1 Silverlight application, do let us know how well (or otherwise) it works!