Hey Blog! Once again, I have returned to the cricket pitch this year, and now I’m playing for the Under 17s, I thought I’d let you know how this season has gone.
I have relayed the specifics of cricket before: hit ball with bat far as you can and run, other people catch ball, throw ball to hit sticks, when sticks get hit you get out. Of course it’s a bit more complex than that, but the principle is the same. There are three jobs: batting, bowling and fielding – the latter being the one you spend the most time doing, as it takes up half the game. The fielding team is also the bowling team, but it switches after an innings (half the game) and then you bat for the rest. Generally, it’s 11-a-side, and this is how I play all the matches at the moment. Since you bat in pairs, ten wickets means the end of the game as there isn’t a last pair. However, this is rare because at my level, there are only 20 overs (sets of six balls) in an innings, so as the rate of wickets is low, we’re generally only about 8 men in by the end of the game.
While I haven’t been able to play many matches, having had exams at the beginning of the season, I have attended all the training I could, and my batting and bowling have improved as a result. My biggest difficulty has been that my style of bowling needs to go higher than the roof of the net where we practice, so I have had to experiment, diversifying into spin bowling. In batting, I need more practice sending the ball in different directions, rather than just attempting to hit it the same way most times. Unpredictability is helpful in getting runs and wickets both. My most likely method to get out is still to be bowled, however, so I need to work on my defensive shots as well.
As I was in exam mode for the beginning of the outdoor season, I haven’t played that many matches and as a result haven’t been able to make much of a contribution overall. I’m good with that – if I wanted to be in the middle, I’d have to practice a lot more. And with the finger that I broke last year, I both lost some training time and am careful not to break it again. One of the coaches has broken a finger so many times it doesn’t open properly, and I don’t want that when I play the piano. I get enough small bruises as it is without adding phalangeal trauma to the mix! So sit back, clap, and watch the game.