Cricket thoughts

As I start typing this, I'm about to hide behind the sofa so I can :

Watch the cricket off Skysports on the proper telly,
Have the Grand Prix going off iPlayer on my desktop PC monitor.
(the laptop doesn't really have the puff for it any more, plus it would get in the way of me trolling Facebook and forums)

Plus I'm wanting to avoid "downer" and born of frustration posts which have been a theme lately.

There's a few things that have struck a chord from this morning from the cricket commentary :

Superstition. Andrew Strauss before today never got more than 6 runs the next morning after scoring a 100 the day before. He's on +10 now (112 not out), so hopefully that bit of superstition is behind him. It had been in his mind though, you could see the smile from under the helmet.

No ball trouble - this is where a bowler flings the ball down from a position that's too close to the batsman. It's deemed an illegal ball where if the batsman gets out it doesn't matter plus the bowler has to try again. One of our boys was out twice yesterday on no balls. (Didn't last much long after)

I had a massive problem with no balls when I bowled. For my main action, my run up was really bad. It should be 10 or 11 running paces to get you to the stumps in the right position and with enough momentum to deliver the ball at pace without taking much out of yourself. My run up was horrible, there was a lot of shuffling before I got to a running stride. And that shuffling meant my landing point was fairly random, leading to me giving away no balls.

A no ball is bad enough before it gives runs away (hated doing that)
But if you would have taken a wicket with it ... that's a game changer.

There's no worse feeling in cricket than turning around to see the umpire give that No Ball signal just after you've just sent the stumps flying.

Anyway - they've been talking about a West Indian fast bowler called Kemar Roach who has been having the huge no ball trouble, which has given me a suggestion I'd have tried out had I still been able to do the bowling - mark a closer reference to work off instead of where you start the run (or shuffle). Moving the start point back gave me worse trouble, as I'd stretch my run to get to that closer reference point.

Short balls - they're giving young Jonny Bairstow a hard time at the moment. Most of the time, a bowler will try and get the ball so it would hit the stumps or just outside. It'll be coming past your body typically at knee to hip height.

But ... a valid tactic is to pull the bounce point back a bit, with the target being the batsman's throat. Above that is no good because it's easy to duck. Throat high is perfect because it takes a decision to figure out what to do with it, duck out of the way or try and whack it. I used to love short bowling because it made my blood sing. Plus I had good shots against it. In the level of cricket I play, if I hit the ball in the air it was unlikely a fielder would get to it let alone catch it so it would be a safe shot.

I used to encourage it too when I wore a sunhat for batting, by occasionally stopping the bowler as he was about to come in and adjusting the hat in a "Hit that" kind of suggestion (Mind games). I loved the challenge and accepted it as part of my job in the team - absorb the dangerous stuff so it doesn't get the better players out.

And my "you really are talking mindless drivel" detector is going off ...

Time to concentrate on the cricket and the motor racing, while trying to avoid a headache (coffee soon will sort that out - when I said I had no vices, I lied) and hoping my lungs improved. A short attack of housework yesterday has led to my lungs being full of dusty rubbish. [hack][hack][cough]. But the floor is looking a bit better :-)

PS For some reason I watched the Norway vs England football last night. Let's just say it hasn't convinced me to go out of my way to watch any more football any time soon.
PS2 The couple of times I have been hit on the head while batting, it wasn't a short ball, the ball came off the top edge of my bat. The closest I've come to wearing a short ball is the one that got me on the tip of the elbow - just bounced more than I expected.