How To Play Cricket

By Author: Martin O Flynn
Total Articles: 5
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What is Cricket

Cricket is a ball & bat team sport popular in England, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and over 100 other countries around the world. It has its origins in early 18th century England.

The Objective of The Game

Cricket involves a match between two teams with 11 players on each side.

The objective is for the batting team to score as many runs as they can without being dismissed. The other team needs to field and bowl thus trying to dismiss the other teams batsmen and limit the runs being scored.

When the batting team has no available bats men or has {{exhausted all their overs, the teams swap and it is now the fielding teams turn to bat and try to out score the competition.

Team Structure

A cricket team is composed of 11 players. An effective team would comprise of 5 batsmen, 5 bowlers and 1 wicketkeeper. The captain decides on key decisions such as rotation of bowlers and the batting order.

Bowlings

There are 3 types of bowler;

1. Fast Bowler
2. Medium Bowler
3. Spinner

The fast bowler takes a long run ...
... up to build momentum and power. Many fast bowlers rely totally on speed to defeat the batsman,throwing the ball at over 90 MPH. Others use a mixture of gulie, curves or spin to deceive the batsmen into mistiming the strike and thus resulting in the ball being "caught behind" by the wicketkeeper.

The medium bowler relies on accuracy and perseverance to limit the scoring rate and tire the batsman's concentration.

The 'spinner' bowls at a slow pace relying on gulie to beat the batsman.

Dismissals

The fielding team can eliminate the batsman in several ways, by
1) catching him out. This is done when the batsman hits the ball with
his bat and a fielder catches the ball on the full (without bouncing).

2) bowling him out. This occurs when the bowler bowls the ball and
the ball strikes the batsman's stumps or bails.

3) leg before wicket, or LBW. This occurs when the bowler bowls it
and the stumps being hit by the ball are prevented when the batsman's
leg gets in the way.

4) stumped, when the batsman comes forward to hit the hit but steps
out of his crease, misses the ball and the fielder behind the stumps
collects the ball hits the stumps before the batsman gets back behind
his crease.

5) run out, when the batsman attempts to score a run but has his
stumps hit by the ball before he reaches the other crease.

6) Hit wicket, when the batsman hits his own stumps while trying to
hit the ball.

7) retired, when the batsman voluntarily decides to finish his innings,

Fielding
Fielding refers to the players position on the field.

The 'Wicket-keeper' is stationed behind the Wicket which is being protected by the batsman. His goal is to gather any balls missed by the batsman.

Another key position is the bowler (outlined above).
The other nine positons are determined by the Captain and are not fixed. They include positions such as 'long leg', 'slip' and 'third man'.

Batting

Batsmen play in a 'batting order' decided by the captain. The teams best batsmen are played in descending order such that the 'openers' have the best chance of scoring against the strongest bowlers.

The batsman's objectivel is to hit the ball off the flat surface of the baldes surface. This ensures maximum power and direction. A weaker shot will result if the balls is struck with the side of the bat called an 'edge'.

The batsman will not always try to strike the ball as hard as possible as many simply 'block' the ball away from fielders to score the run.

The batsman can use different types of stokes which are named after the type of swing or direction of the shot; 'hook', 'pull', 'drive', 'cut'.

The batsman can let the ball go through to the 'Wicket keeper' provided he is sure it won't hit his wicket.

Runs

The batsmans primary objective is to prevent the ball hitting the wicket and secondary to score runs by striking the ball to give him and his partner time to run to the other end of the pitch before the fielding side can return to the ball. For the run to count, both runners must touch the ground behind the crease with either their bats or their bodies.

It is the batsman who decides if a run is to be attempted as he has a superior view of the ball's progress.

Running is a calculated risk as the fielder could break the wicket while the batsman is out of his ground. In this situation the batsman is 'run out'.

Innings

Innings refers to the collective performance of the batting site. All 11 members of the batting side are meant to have their turn to bat but an 'innings' can end before they all get the chance. Ordinarily each team as one or two innings apiece.

The aim of the bowler and his fielders is to dismiss the batsman such that he needs to leave the field and be replaced by another batsman. When 10 batman on the team have been dismissed, then the whole team is dismissed and the innings is over.

Overs

The bowler bowls the ball in sets of six deliveries (or "balls") and each set of six balls is called an over. This name came about because the umpire calls "Over!" when six balls have been bowled.
Martin O Flynn wrote this article on behalf of Hobeze.com - The Cricket Netwok

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