At the start of the batting innings, any player who believes they are a potent fast bowler should aim to bowl with the new ball. Because the ball is new, shiny, and firm, which promotes more swing and seam movement, now is possibly the best time to bowl. But there is also a lot of responsibility involved in bowling with a fresh ball. Fast bowlers will have to maintain pressure, take wickets, and prevent the opposition batsmen from getting off to a fast start! Scroll down to read Cricket Tips and Tricks: Top Tips to Bowl With a New Ball.
Some fast bowlers are more adept at using the fresh ball than others. But what is it about them that is so superior? We’re going to examine that in this post! I’ll give you a few of my best tips that should make you a much better new ball bowler. While some of them provide technical advice, others are more concentrated on the often-ignored mental and tactical aspects of bowling! After reading the advice and applying it, you should have all the resources necessary to become a superb strike bowler!
Cricket Tips And Tricks: Top Tips To Bowl With A New Ball
Here are my 8 tips for bowling with the new ball:
- Make sure you warm up properly
- Mark out your run-up and rehearse it
- Get enough fielders in catching positions
- Make the batsman play at as many deliveries as possible
- Learn to swing the ball with good control
- Learn to control seam position
- Bowl with a new ball during practice sessions
- Keep your hands and the ball as dry as possible
Now that I’ve gone over each of them in greater detail, you can see what you should be going for!
Make Sure You Warm Up Properly
To bowl a decent spell with the new ball, you must ensure that your body is prepared. You must properly warm up before doing this! Your muscles will become more flexible and loose when you warm up, which will help you bowl more quickly and prevent injuries! Fast bowlers frequently have injuries, especially as they age. Thus, the importance of warming up increases with age! In an international match, a fast bowler would never take the field without first warming up properly.
What are you supposed to do, then? I split the warm-up into two separate halves. Stretching is the first of these, and cardiovascular exercise is the second. Below, let’s examine each of these.
Stretching first. Targeting the lower body in particular is crucial while doing this because, if you’re a quick bowler, these are the areas that will be under the most strain. Stretching out your hamstrings, quadriceps, calves, and groin muscles should be your main goals. Make sure to stretch these muscles before every bowling inning.
However, if you want to see a significant improvement in your flexibility, I’d also advise stretching them on days when you don’t play cricket! Watch the video below for some inspiration if you’re looking for ideas on what kinds of stretches you can do! You can use certain stretches from the routine, but you don’t have to complete them. I promise that as your range of motion increases and your flexibility increases, your bowling speed will improve!
This brings us to the cardiac portion of the warm-up. Before you start bowling, it’s a good idea to engage in a little cardiovascular exercise, such as a jog or brisk walk, since this will aid in increasing body temperature and improve blood flow and oxygen delivery to your muscles. You can avoid injuries and perform at a higher level by doing all of these things. Although I believe a stretching warm-up is more crucial for bowling, you could still want to give it a shot!
Mark Out Your run-up and Rehearse It
Before you bowl the first ball, you should take some time to measure and mark out your run-up. This will help you establish the tone for the innings and bowl accurately. To make sure you’ve measured your run-up correctly, it would be ideal if you also practiced it!
This method of measuring and laying out your run-up will allow you to know when it is ideal for you to approach the crease without worrying too much about how long your strides will be or if you will bowl a no-ball. It is not a good idea to be thinking about things like this as you rush to bowl. Instead, you can concentrate entirely on your bowling strategy and how to remove the batsman once you’ve taken care of any run-up concerns.
Thus, as soon as you get onto the field at the start of the inning, begin charting your run-up. In an ideal world, you will already be familiar with and have rehearsed your run-up a lot. If so, all you have to do is measure it and proceed. The distance you cover to reach the crease during a run-up is often measured in strides. My run-up, for instance, was fifteen paces long. I would therefore place my foot on the popping crease at the beginning of each inning and take 15 strides back, noting my landing with my boot or by putting a marker on the outfield.
It’s usually a good idea to rehearse a little after marking out your run to make sure everything feels correct. To accomplish this, start at the location you have designated, run up normally (without holding the ball in your hands), and watch where your front foot lands during your bowling motion. Move your marker back a little if you think you’re going to land your front foot over the popping crease. Mark slightly forward if you aren’t getting near enough to the popping crease.
Get Enough Fielders In Catching Positions
To maximize your chances of taking wickets with the new ball, collaborate with the captain to set your fielders in the most dangerous locations. Depending on your bowling style and the batsman you are facing, many stances are the most dangerous. But no matter what, there are a few positions you should constantly be thinking about!
You want to have a good number of fielders relatively close to the bat to take advantage of any mishit strokes the batsmen may make when the ball is fresh, in the air, and off the seam. A case in point is slip fielders! These fielders are utilized to catch any edges that fly wide of the wicketkeeper. They stand in a diagonal line relatively near to the keeper. In cricket, it is not uncommon for the ball to strike the batsman’s edge, particularly when the ball is brand-new.
Slip fielders assist you in making the most of this! A few slips at the beginning of an innings and any times when the bowling side is winning are common in amateur cricket. Three or four slip fielders are frequently spotted in professional cricket matches, waiting for a catch.
Another excellent alternative is to have a fielder positioned at short leg for bowlers who are quicker and more aggressive. The new ball bowler would frequently bowl short deliveries at the batsman with this fielder in position in the hopes that they would be hit on the gloves or high on the bat, causing the ball to jump up and land in front of the short-leg fielder.
You can use the diagram I’ve supplied below to see possible field placements when bowling with the new ball. Since these field placements are frequently utilized at the best stages of the game, you really ought to give them some thought as well!
It’s noticeable that most fielders are positioned in the inner circle. Because of this, it is more difficult for batters to steal singles early in an inning and get on base. As new ball bowlers, our goal should be to put more pressure on a single batsman by bowling several deliveries in quick succession.
The batter is also encouraged to play aggressive shots when there are fielders nearby, as they are aware that clearing the in-fielders will result in a boundary. Naturally, this helps the bowler because the batter is more likely to make a mistake when they play aggressive shots when the ball is swinging!
Make The Batsman Play At As Many Deliveries As Possible
This is, in my opinion, the most significant piece of advice I’ve provided in this post. Many opening batsmen will be trying to leave as many deliveries as they can early in their innings. They do this in an attempt to get their bearings, get their feet moving, and get acclimated to the pitch’s bounce and tempo. Making the batsmen play shots at as many balls as you can, whether they are attacking or defensive strokes, should be your primary goal as a new ball bowler. You have a far better chance of forcing them into a shot if you can make them play while the ball is moving around a lot and they haven’t been at the crease for very long.
Consequently, how can one “make the batsman play”? It all boils down to how accurate you are. With each ball you bowl, you should ideally be posing a threat to all three of the primary methods of dismissal. The three primary ways to be dismissed are caught behind, LBW, and bowled. You should try to bowl at the off stump or just outside it, in what is called the “corridor of uncertainty,” to pose a threat to the batsman with all three of these methods of removal. The batsman is more likely to play a shot when you bowl on this line because they are unsure of whether they can leave the ball or not.
The ball should strike the top of the off stump when you bowl, therefore that’s the length you should aim for. This indicates that the ball will typically pass the batsman at a height of around knee height. Below is a diagram showing the zone that new ball bowlers should aim for!
It is quite challenging to bowl the ball consistently in one zone, and mastering it requires a lot of practice. Fortunately, there are a variety of approaches available to improve accuracy, such as combining technical adjustments with drills.
Learn To Swing The Ball With Good Control
Arguably, the most potent tool available to new ball bowlers is getting the ball to swing. It will be much more lethal if they can manage to blend that swing with a good degree of control and accuracy!
New ball bowlers might employ one of two primary swing bowling methods. They are the outswing and the inswing. Many bowlers will naturally get the ball to swing in a certain direction as a result of their action. Consider me as an example. Whenever I bowl, the ball always swings in the direction of the right-handers. I didn’t have to put much effort into developing this! I have, however, had to put in a lot of effort to get the ball to swing away from right-handers.
Bowlers will need to train hard in the nets if they want to emulate the truly exceptional new balls bowlers like Dale Steyn and James Anderson, who can swing the ball both ways!
To learn how to get outswing on the new ball I would recommend following these four main rules:
- Hold the ball in the correct outswing grip (shown below)
- Make sure the seam is angled towards the direction of the first slip, as shown in the diagram below
- As you release the ball, try to make sure that your index finger is the last finger to make contact with it. This pushes the seam in the required direction for inswing
To learn how to get inswing on the new ball I would recommend following these four main rules:
- Hold the ball in the correct grip for the inswinger (shown below)
- Make sure the seam is angled towards leg slip/fine leg, as shown in the diagram below
- As you release the ball, try to make sure that your middle finger is the last finger to make contact with it. This pushes the seam in the required direction for inswing
Regular practice of bowling is the only way to regulate the swing. You should, in my opinion, be able to practice bowling with a cricket ball for at least an hour a week, and ideally much more! You’ll become proficient at bowling certain lines to maximize the effectiveness of your swing. For instance, you should aim for the middle or leg stump if you’re bowling an outswing to a right-hander and the ball is swinging a lot. In this manner, the ball will swing and land outside the off stump. As an alternative, you should aim for the off stump if the ball is only slightly swinging.
This way, when the ball reaches the batsman, the little swing will take it right outside the off stump!
Cricket Tips And Tricks: Top Tips To Bowl With A New Ball: Learn To Control Seam Position
Now that we have discussed swing bowling, it is appropriate to discuss seam movement. This is yet another crucial tool in the arsenal of a novice ball bowler! Just as risky as getting the ball to swing is moving it off the seam, and that happens more frequently when the ball is young and the seam is tougher.
If you’re wondering how seam movement happens, I can tell you that a lot of it has to do with how you position your wrist and hand as you release the ball. Your arm should be in a linear posture and your wrist should be locked at the moment of release, as seen in the image on the left below.
It is simpler to control the delivery line when your wrist and hand are in this concentrated position when the ball leaves your hand and stays precisely behind the ball. When the ball moves in the direction of the batsman, it also helps to keep the seam straight.
When the ball bounces, the upright seam is more likely to come into touch with the pitch. This is depicted in the following diagram! Seam movement is caused by this kind of interaction between the seam and the pitch.
It is easy to lose control of the line and seam location during flight while bowling with a loose wrist since it is not fully behind the ball. This may cause the ball to emerge with a disorganized seam, which makes achieving seam movement more difficult.
Bowl With A New Ball During Practice Sessions
Should you have perused my previous blog entries, you are aware of the significance I ascribe to simulating game conditions in your training sessions. If you’re trying to practice your new ball-bowling technique, this should be the same!
A question for you: If you never bowl with a new ball during practice, why would you expect yourself to bowl consistently well with one during a game?
The main component of fast bowling is “feel,” and from my experience, using a new ball can feel a little different than using an old one. The seam is frequently much more noticeable, and the more recent ball is much harder. As such, you might sense that the new ball is slightly larger in your hand. It’s possible that your fingers won’t fit over the seam as easily. You must acclimate to all of these, and practice sessions are the only opportunity to do so! You will never become accustomed to holding the new ball if you practice with an outdated ball that you have been using in the nets for months.
You will never become accustomed to managing the amount of swing that a new ball can offer. You will never experience the sensation of precisely releasing the fresh ball from your fingers.
Cricket Tips And Tricks: Top Tips To Bowl With A New Ball: Conclusion
I would advise practicing with the new ball for at least an hour every week if your goal is to improve your new ball bowling skills. Of course, if you have more time, you can accomplish more! You should be practicing the things I’ve listed in this post during this practice session. Your ability to dominate with the new ball will improve if you do this for an extended period.
