After the World Cup final finished (well done to India on a great win, by the way) the weather was so lovely I thought I'd pop and have a bowl for an hour or so, and took the camera with me. Here's the result:
Well, it's not brilliant, but there are a couple of aspects that I find pleasing, mainly the classic big kick round with my right leg that has spontaneously arrived without me in any way trying to stick it in there. And of course, the pivot is much better since if it wasn't I wouldn't be kicking my foot out.
There's a couple of very simple things I want to try out next time: Firstly, do I need a run up? It seems to add nothing to the action except instability. At nets tomorrow (full nets with everyone there) I think I'm going to try and bowl off a standing start, or at least off only two steps into a delivery stride, with no 'hop' into it. I seem to have convinced myself I need some jog and jump before I bowl but watching the video today, and previous videos, I just don't see how any of that effort makes a positive contribution to the end result.
Secondly, I need to settle. It's not a problem in full nets, or in a match situation, since in those settings I will necessarily be help up from bowling as quickly as I do in solo nets (quickly in terms of rate of balls bowled, not ball speed) but when I was cutting that video I noticed I simply wasn't giving myself time at the start of my delivery to settle. It's a tiny thing, probably taking less than two seconds a ball, but it may be reducing the value I get from my solo practise. Anyway, something to look at.
Sadly, I rather stupidly neglected to check the battery level before I left home so I only managed to film half my session, and only filmed from one angle. It's amazing how clearly it comes across as it was getting a little dark. Anyway, after the camera gave up I had a little dabble with some lobs, and it's amazing how much turn they generate from a relatively modest amount of spin. I do plan on having further dabbles in future as it's an interesting area of cricketing history. Who knows, maybe someone wanting to make an accurate costume drama involving cricket may want a lob specialist one day... I'm also beginning to think lobs are probably a good way for me to make a start on the flipper, and possibly the wrong-un too.
After a couple of overs of lobs it was back to stock ball bowling, with a shorter run up than on the video, and it seemed rather encouraging. You never do get you best deliveries on film, do you?
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