Cricket

by A. G. Steel; R. H. Lyttelton

The two ‘spins,’ from the leg and the off, are the chief and most important for all practical purposes. If a bowler by constant practice has acquired the power of twisting the ball from off or leg at will, and can at the same time bowl a ‘good length,’ he has laid a tolerable foundation for future success. We say tolerable, because, in bowling, twist, as we shall see later on, is not everything; it is an essential element in good bowling, but it is only one of several, all of which must combine together before anyone can earn the reputation of a first-class bowler.

The two other spins which can be put on the ball are what have been called the ‘upward vertical’ and the ‘downward vertical.’ By the ‘upward vertical,’ I mean when the ball spins in its way to the ground vertically, and upwards with regard to the bowler. It may be compared to the spin imparted to the billiard ball in the screw stroke. This is effected by striking the ball low down, which makes it revolve in its course upwards. The effect this upward revolution has is seen when the striker’s ball meets the object ball, the former having a decided inclination to stop and return to the striker. In the same way a cricket ball, when made to revolve upwards, has a tendency to stop and go slower off the pitch than it went before it reached the ground.

This twist, as a matter of fact, is never practised; and it is a great pity that more attention has not been paid to it. Of course it is very much more difficult to make the ball revolve in this manner than in either the leg or the off break, but it is quite within the powers of the possessor of a fairly strong set of fingers. The lower half only of the ball should be held, so that the upper half protrudes above the hand and fingers, and at the moment of delivery, which must be from the level of the shoulder or lower, the fingers and hand must impart as much upward spin as possible.

The downward vertical spin is the reverse of this, and is caused by the upper half of the ball being grasped instead of the lower, as in the upward. This spin imparts to the ball a tendency to come quicker from the pitch than the pace in the air would seem to suggest, and is analogous to the ‘following up’ stroke at billiards. The latter is made by striking the ball at the top, making it revolve downwards and vertically from the striker. Very many bowlers possess this downward spin in their bowling without being at all aware of the fact. They know, as also do those who play against them, that every now and then one of their balls will, in cricket slang, ‘make haste from the pitch.’ The batsman finds he has mistaken the pace of the ball, which flies past him before he is anything like ready to play it, and when his stumps lie prostrate, as often as not he will come back to the pavilion with the old, old story, ‘Bowled with a shooter;’ whereas, in fact, the ball has hit the middle or even upper part of his stumps. He has entirely lost the ball from the pitch owing to his misjudgment of its pace, and concludes erroneously that it has shot underneath his bat.

We have now considered the four kinds of spin which can be put on to a cricket ball. Of course there may be combinations of two kinds, as, for instance, the ball may be spinning from right to left or left to right, and at the same time be revolving to a certain extent vertically downwards or upwards; but it would be impossible to discuss the result of every such combination.

The ball may break from ‘leg,’ and at the same time show by its acceleration in speed after the pitch that it has been revolving downwards as well, and the same may happen with the break from the ‘off;’ but such variations are beyond the reach of any practical discussion.

Let us now turn to another element of good bowling—change of pace. It does not require any great amount of technical cricket knowledge to understand that, if a bowler delivers every ball at the same uniform pace, his bowling is easier for a batsman to judge and play than when he is continually altering and changing the pace. If a batsman misjudges the pace of the ball he often loses his wicket. If he plays too slow for a fast ball, or too fast for a slow one, he generally makes a fatal mistake. As it is necessary for a shooter to accurately judge the pace of a driven grouse before pulling the trigger, so is it equally necessary for a batsman to judge the pace of the ball before he plays to it. This power of judging pace only comes after long experience; but when it does exist it seems to be exercised almost intuitively, and without any conscious thought—indeed there is often no time for thought.

Perhaps the one thing which made Mr. Spofforth, the famous Australian bowler, superior at his best to all others, and has earned him the reputation of being the best bowler that has ever lived, was his wonderful power of changing the pace of the ball without making it perceptible to the batsman. In his bowling the same run, action, and exertion were apparently used for delivering a slow or medium-paced ball as for a fast one. Many a time, especially on his first arrival in England, when this bowling was strange to our batsmen, the ball seemed to dislodge the bails long after the bat had completed the stroke, and was perhaps high in the air. Change of pace, to be effective, must not mean change of action; and the first thing a bowler who wishes to practise this art must understand, is that the slightest variation in style or action for a slower or faster ball will at once put the batsman on the qui vive and destroy the effect of the device.

C. T. B. Turner, the Australian bowler, was a great adept at changing the pace of the ball without sounding any warning note to the batsman. He is one of the very finest bowlers we have ever seen bowl; he has great command over the ball, and a beautiful and easy delivery. His performances in this country have been wonderful; the only defect in his bowling which, in the writer’s opinion, keeps him from being considered Spofforth’s equal is that his action is too easy to see. A good batsman is not so likely to be deceived by him as readily as by Spofforth’s windmill deliveries.