Territorializing Turf - Pissing not Required

Cricket as you know is an outdoor sport played everywhere on roads, ground, 
parks and anywhere that could accomodate the required yards to bowl. Generally
the batsmen don't have much problem handling the bat, i.e playing with it. Bowling
is a totally different pie coz stroke of the bat is not lost with the shine and the wind conditions don't dictate your grip and so on...



All the time playing with a hard tennis and a cork ball never playing on the mat and turf until now made me feel like a novice after playing on the real thing. Recently I got the opportunity to play on both Mat and Turf; a great experience.

The pace of the ball goes down in the order of Tennis on ground >> Glaze on the Mat >> Glaze on Turf, momentum being more in the reverse order. The first time I was to bowl; called up my brother a night before to get tips to which he said "Keep the seam straight and the ball will do the rest". It worked wonderfully and surprised myself with the bounce and speed generated. It seems that the mat has the skid property which allows the ball to zip past the batsman quickly and adds to the bounce as well.

That day moisture was minimal and the ball continued to hold it's line and moved a little now and then after seaming. Actual fun began after a few subsequent matches we played when moisture was plenty and wind was good. After being popular for many days it was time to taste the other side of it. My first over was ok but the second and third over snapped me to the reality of bowling. Suddenly the ball started going out of control; moving really wide after seaming ending up in lot's of wides.

Next over my skipper reluctantly asked me to bowl another over. Already shit scared i approached to bowl now losing the rhythm and getting wacked for 24 runs in that very over mostly of wides not kept by the keeper, a straight four due to a full toss in an effort to control the ball. After the over, it was time to do serious thinking and almost everyone was giving me advice about getting it right. Out of those i picked up things which seemed correct for my situation. These points might seem lame to you but i never thought of them before:

1. Losing line and length then shorten your run up. (Helped in my first Turf match)

2. Not sure about the run up (hair falling on your eyes; my case ;D)i.e. out of sync approach towards the crease then stop immediately, don't go into the delivery.

3. You can scare the batsman with pace and bounce but won't get him out unless you make him play. (answered my doubts about not getting more wickets)

4. Never rush to bowl the next ball, don't jog or walk fast to being the next bowl. Take your time relax walk normally and think about the previous delivery.

5. Turf is slippery, regular shoes won't help you. Get spiked shoes; they help to retain the grip while you bowl and field (specially for a pace bowler).

6. In your first over never try to generate pace, concentrate more on the line and length. Once your body gets used to it, start putting in more pace and bounce.

My first Turf match was against Synopsis and was offered to bowl from the 2nd over from the pavilion end. Mouth dry, throat dry with a funny sensation in my stomatch i started the 19 yards run to deliver the ball. First ball was wide travelling around waist height. Second ball followed the first one, and i could feel me going out of balance, the shoes were not holding the ground just like my captain pointed out.

The ball was moving just like it was doing in our internal matches. After seaming the ball was moving out, sort of an out cutter. Now using the advice of shortening my run-up i tried to ball, this time i banged in short with out pace; ball rested on the boundary waiting for us to fetch it back. My captain having panic attack came to me and said don't bowl short unless you have pace. Till now i had bowled only 1 ball. I stopped for a while to think and decided to bowl round the stumps. This time the movement was helping me to beat the batsman. Even though the pace was missing the movement and length restricted the bats from playing further shorts and i continued bowling round in the next over without giving more runs.

As suggested about the bowling shoes by the skipper, i persuaded him to come with me for the purchase and finally before the match day against AMD, i got my bowling shoes and was less bothered about one thing.

I was eager to try the new shoes and wore them with 2 pairs of socks on, yes you need two pairs of socks, so that the shoe is firmly in place and you don't injure yourself on the field. Today was an exciting day, trying new shoes that you've never tried and when the ball in not fully in control. This time the feeling was no different than the first match, anyway first ball went wide. I thought about it and controlled it this time with very few runs (around 3 runs). The other thing bothering me was that openers were left and right handed batsmen. I had to deal one more thing apart from the troubles facing already.

Somehow i noticed that the ball was seaming out naturally and it helped me to take out their left hand batsman, pitched on the off stump and it staightned geting him out.

From the above experience, all i can say is modifying my thinking process has helped a lot.