3rd May 2009
Kids in school and sports clubs get told all kinds of stuff by their teachers and coaches about the ‘right way’ to play. But sometimes rules are meant to be broken…Here are some well-rehearsed cricketing lines.
‘Cricket is a side-on game’. This is kind of true – a good working principle, and a helpful way of thinking about how to bat, bowl and field. But even the most side-on bowler relies for speed and hostility on the torque achieved by throwing his leading leg across his body in a braced position as he delivers the ball. Then as the bowling arm pulls down across the body, he twists and breaks away sharply to his left to avoid tearing up the pitch with his boots, and incurring the umpire’s displeasure. And many bowlers approach the bowling crease front-on: it helps them with their accuracy. Batters need stereoscopic vision to locate the trajectory of the ball. The intriguing Northamptonshire batsman Colin Milburn, eighteen stone of pure relocated Geordie, was a magnificent hitter of a cricket ball until the car smash in which he lost one eye. He was never the same player thereafter. Some players, like the West Indian Shivnarine Chanderpaul watch the ball from a stance that starts with their whole body facing down the pitch, before they shift to a side-on position as they attempt to play. And to avoid falling over, a batsman must shift to front-on when playing the ball to leg (left-hand side for a right handed player).
‘Try to tread on the ball’…is what kids are told to think about when batting. In fact in all my years of watching cricket, I’ve never seen anyone actually achieve this, and if they did, presumably severe ankle injury would result. What the coach means is more commonly put as ‘Get to the pitch of the ball’. It’s sensible to cut down the risk of what will happen once the ball lands on the surface by hitting it as close to that point as possible. That way the ball, once hit, stays on the ground, and is more likely to go where you intend it. Needless to say the bowler will stop you trying to do this, perhaps by bowling at your head.
‘Never run on a misfield’. The greatest batsmen know where the fielders are standing, and can guide the ball into the gaps between them. When this happens and one of the two batters judges there’s time to do so, she’ll call the other one through to run to the opposite end of the 22 yard pitch (= one run scored). The good batsman also has the judgement as to which ball is ripe for hitting extra hard through the fielders to the boundary (= four runs scored - or the maximum six if it clears the ropes without bouncing). If the ball isn’t quite hit to the boundary, the batsmen can judge how many times they can run up and down before the ball is returned. On the largest grounds around the world, such as Melbourne, Australia, or The Oval in London an all-run four is possible. The fielders are always on the alert to throw the ball such that the wickets (stumps!) can be broken before the batsman makes their ground. I suppose that sometimes a fielder might kid on that they’re not in control of the ball when they really are, and lull a batter into thinking there’s a run when there isn’t – hence the advice given above. A lot of fun can be had when a batsman isn’t the best judge of a run. Anecdotally the worst of the lot was a man called Denis Compton, for whom any call to run was described as a basis for negotiation. Since it takes less than three seconds to run from one end of the pitch to the other flat out, you can see that he who hesitates or indulges in prolonged conversation is generally speaking lost! (Today Compton would have been an even bigger star than he was in the forties and fifties – suave, rakish, multi-talented, and the head which for years advertised Brylcreem. He liked a drink too.)
‘Play with a straight bat’. It’s said that to be sure of hitting the ball in the middle of the bat, the bat needs to come down straight. Actually, some of the greatest batters don’t do/haven’t done this. And thinking about whether your bat is coming down straight (behind you!) is about the quickest way to get bowled out.
‘Get behind the line of the ball’. This makes good sense, but can be hard to train the body to do when a rock is being hurled very fast in your direction. Sometimes when the bowling is very hostile batsmen evolve a survival strategy by standing very slightly to the leg-side of a high-bouncing throat-threatening ball. The courageous Surrey batsman/wicketkeeper Alec Stewart tried this against the brutal West Indian bowling of the early nineties, and it worked for a while. But it’s a measure of last resort.
‘Wait for the ball to come to you’. The greatest batsman, like all great sportspeople, seem to have more time to do what they want than ordinary folk. In cricket this means that they play the ball late (although we’re talking fractions of a second here), delaying a decision as to what to do and thus widening the options. For most players, the advice comes down to being optimally relaxed. Too much effort and snatching at the ball never got anyone anywhere. Too laid-back and you’ll be on your way too. I once watched a fellow-student try to bat after a 20-pint night on the beer. He was still playing a hopeful waft at the previous ball when the bowler was running in for the next one. (Bit of a stretch – but you know what I mean!)
‘Find the corridor of uncertainty’. Bowlers hold the cards. Theirs is the action from which comes the batter’s reaction. So the clever bowler is always looking for a weakness to exploit. He may bowl a sequence of balls to unsettle the batsman or get him over-confident about their respective abilities. But the best place to bowl – the banker – is in a channel just to the off-side of the batsman on a ‘good length’ such that she can neither go forward comfortably to the pitch of the ball or step back to a position where she can accurately judge the bounce. This channel is the ‘corridor of uncertainty’.
‘Do what the opposition least wants’. This is good advice for a captain. It works in business too. And politics. In fact, there’s a whole book to be written applying cricket’s moral and practical principles to the rest of life. I won’t want to read this particular piece of self-help (‘Men are from Lords, women are from the Gabba*’?) although the royalties from writing it might be nice.
* A well known Brisbane cricket-ground
Kids in school and sports clubs get told all kinds of stuff by their teachers and coaches about the ‘right way’ to play. But sometimes rules are meant to be broken…Here are some well-rehearsed cricketing lines.
‘Cricket is a side-on game’. This is kind of true – a good working principle, and a helpful way of thinking about how to bat, bowl and field. But even the most side-on bowler relies for speed and hostility on the torque achieved by throwing his leading leg across his body in a braced position as he delivers the ball. Then as the bowling arm pulls down across the body, he twists and breaks away sharply to his left to avoid tearing up the pitch with his boots, and incurring the umpire’s displeasure. And many bowlers approach the bowling crease front-on: it helps them with their accuracy. Batters need stereoscopic vision to locate the trajectory of the ball. The intriguing Northamptonshire batsman Colin Milburn, eighteen stone of pure relocated Geordie, was a magnificent hitter of a cricket ball until the car smash in which he lost one eye. He was never the same player thereafter. Some players, like the West Indian Shivnarine Chanderpaul watch the ball from a stance that starts with their whole body facing down the pitch, before they shift to a side-on position as they attempt to play. And to avoid falling over, a batsman must shift to front-on when playing the ball to leg (left-hand side for a right handed player).
‘Try to tread on the ball’…is what kids are told to think about when batting. In fact in all my years of watching cricket, I’ve never seen anyone actually achieve this, and if they did, presumably severe ankle injury would result. What the coach means is more commonly put as ‘Get to the pitch of the ball’. It’s sensible to cut down the risk of what will happen once the ball lands on the surface by hitting it as close to that point as possible. That way the ball, once hit, stays on the ground, and is more likely to go where you intend it. Needless to say the bowler will stop you trying to do this, perhaps by bowling at your head.
‘Never run on a misfield’. The greatest batsmen know where the fielders are standing, and can guide the ball into the gaps between them. When this happens and one of the two batters judges there’s time to do so, she’ll call the other one through to run to the opposite end of the 22 yard pitch (= one run scored). The good batsman also has the judgement as to which ball is ripe for hitting extra hard through the fielders to the boundary (= four runs scored - or the maximum six if it clears the ropes without bouncing). If the ball isn’t quite hit to the boundary, the batsmen can judge how many times they can run up and down before the ball is returned. On the largest grounds around the world, such as Melbourne, Australia, or The Oval in London an all-run four is possible. The fielders are always on the alert to throw the ball such that the wickets (stumps!) can be broken before the batsman makes their ground. I suppose that sometimes a fielder might kid on that they’re not in control of the ball when they really are, and lull a batter into thinking there’s a run when there isn’t – hence the advice given above. A lot of fun can be had when a batsman isn’t the best judge of a run. Anecdotally the worst of the lot was a man called Denis Compton, for whom any call to run was described as a basis for negotiation. Since it takes less than three seconds to run from one end of the pitch to the other flat out, you can see that he who hesitates or indulges in prolonged conversation is generally speaking lost! (Today Compton would have been an even bigger star than he was in the forties and fifties – suave, rakish, multi-talented, and the head which for years advertised Brylcreem. He liked a drink too.)
‘Play with a straight bat’. It’s said that to be sure of hitting the ball in the middle of the bat, the bat needs to come down straight. Actually, some of the greatest batters don’t do/haven’t done this. And thinking about whether your bat is coming down straight (behind you!) is about the quickest way to get bowled out.
‘Get behind the line of the ball’. This makes good sense, but can be hard to train the body to do when a rock is being hurled very fast in your direction. Sometimes when the bowling is very hostile batsmen evolve a survival strategy by standing very slightly to the leg-side of a high-bouncing throat-threatening ball. The courageous Surrey batsman/wicketkeeper Alec Stewart tried this against the brutal West Indian bowling of the early nineties, and it worked for a while. But it’s a measure of last resort.
‘Wait for the ball to come to you’. The greatest batsman, like all great sportspeople, seem to have more time to do what they want than ordinary folk. In cricket this means that they play the ball late (although we’re talking fractions of a second here), delaying a decision as to what to do and thus widening the options. For most players, the advice comes down to being optimally relaxed. Too much effort and snatching at the ball never got anyone anywhere. Too laid-back and you’ll be on your way too. I once watched a fellow-student try to bat after a 20-pint night on the beer. He was still playing a hopeful waft at the previous ball when the bowler was running in for the next one. (Bit of a stretch – but you know what I mean!)
‘Find the corridor of uncertainty’. Bowlers hold the cards. Theirs is the action from which comes the batter’s reaction. So the clever bowler is always looking for a weakness to exploit. He may bowl a sequence of balls to unsettle the batsman or get him over-confident about their respective abilities. But the best place to bowl – the banker – is in a channel just to the off-side of the batsman on a ‘good length’ such that she can neither go forward comfortably to the pitch of the ball or step back to a position where she can accurately judge the bounce. This channel is the ‘corridor of uncertainty’.
‘Do what the opposition least wants’. This is good advice for a captain. It works in business too. And politics. In fact, there’s a whole book to be written applying cricket’s moral and practical principles to the rest of life. I won’t want to read this particular piece of self-help (‘Men are from Lords, women are from the Gabba*’?) although the royalties from writing it might be nice.
* A well known Brisbane cricket-ground
