The Bowler's Art - Brian Wilkins

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someblokecalleddave

someblokecalleddave

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The Bowler's Art - Brian Wilkins;

I've only just got this in the post today and only read a few pages and this looks like a book that you can't be without if you're interested in Spin Bowling...

Walter Mead for instance... Who's he? I hear you ask, well it sounds like he's a bloke that was bowling The Flipper with a very low round arm action some time before Grimmett! He's also an Essex Boy...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Mead_(cricketer)
 
someblokecalleddave said:
The Bowler's Art - Brian Wilkins;

I've only just got this in the post today and only read a few pages and this looks like a book that you can't be without if you're interested in Spin Bowling...

Walter Mead for instance... Who's he? I hear you ask, well it sounds like he's a bloke that was bowling The Flipper with a very low round arm action some time before Grimmett! He's also an Essex Boy...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Mead_(cricketer)[/quote]

I saw that book at the library and only had a quick look at it and thought it was all about swing and put it back on the shelf. Perhaps I shoud have had a better look. I remember posting it up somewhere.
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Yeah the first sections are on swing primarily, but he covers loads of aspects on Spin Bowling - drift for instance and he looks at 'Swerve and spin' which I guess once I've got through it is going to translate as drift. He makes some big statements with regards research prior to his and some assumptions that have stood for a long time and have never been explained or challenged. It looks pretty heavy going, but I'm sure I'll get something from it.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
Yeah the first sections are on swing primarily, but he covers loads of aspects on Spin Bowling - drift for instance and he looks at 'Swerve and spin' which I guess once I've got through it is going to translate as drift. He makes some big statements with regards research prior to his and some assumptions that have stood for a long time and have never been explained or challenged. It looks pretty heavy going, but I'm sure I'll get something from it.
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I just tracked down a copy of the Wilkins book from the public library. I am heading out now to borrow the book. Cant wait to read it, sounds good dave.
 
He is writing in 1991 and i found when i did my research on the flipper a couple of years back most of the sources he uses but I have discovered a fair few more as well. Plus a lot of newspaper reports of grimmett and his mystery ball from the 1930/40's.

He doesn't think grimmett or anyone else could bowl the overspinner flipper. That is exactly what Jenner and Mallett told me as well. But Wilkins says himself he only tried for a couple of hours compared to Grimmetts 12 years.

Wilkins would seem to have a lot of scientific answers to your questions on drift Dave.
 
macca said:
He is writing in 1991 and i found when i did my research on the flipper a couple of years back most of the sources he uses but I have discovered a fair few more as well. Plus a lot of newspaper reports of grimmett and his mystery ball from the 1930/40's.

He doesn't think grimmett or anyone else could bowl the overspinner flipper. That is exactly what Jenner and Mallett told me as well. But Wilkins says himself he only tried for a couple of hours compared to Grimmetts 12 years.

Wilkins would seem to have a lot of scientific answers to your questions on drift Dave.
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To be honest at the start he says that he sets out to write about the drift and stuff in a way that people can grasp. I reckon I've got to be a bit dim when it comes to Physics, because right away from the outset when he starts explaining it, I got lost! I'll persevere with it though as I have got a lot on my mind at the minute what with Joe and his leg. With regards the fact that he wrote this in 1991, the other blokes work (Vaughan Roberts) - Here albeit only a smallish section is from 2007, credits Wilkins as being pretty comprehensive, saying that there's not much in the way of experimental data on 'Spin/swerve' other than Wilkins. As for Vaughan Roberts credentials, I've not been able to establish whether he's a cricket player or just a mathematician/physicist, whereas Wilkins is a cricket player.

With regards the Flippers, yeah you're right Wilkins admits that he didn't give any of the variations the time and effort with which they're due. Possibly without new information coming to light it almost does seem that the most useful info on the net with regards the Flipper variations could easily be my experiments! At least I put in 2 or 3 years messing around with them including cracking the Over-Spun (Top-Spinning) Flipper a la' Grimmetts mystery ball.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
Possibly without new information coming to light it almost does seem that the most useful info on the net with regards the Flipper variations could easily be my experiments! At least I put in 2 or 3 years messing around with them including cracking the Over-Spun (Top-Spinning) Flipper a la' Grimmetts mystery ball.
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Well this is right . If Wilkins was researching theses days he would probably have found your vids and seen it was possible to bowl an overspun flipper.

At least Wilkins worked out from the Grimmet "mystery ball" photo that it was an overspinner. He just doubts Grimmett or anyone could bowl it. But why would Grimmett describe the ball and photograph it as well as describe how he bowled it and how successful it proved to be ?
 
It's a good book, isn't it? I picked it up for 50p from a charity bookshop about 5 years ago and was relieved to find another actual scientist who was interested in cricket and spin bowling as much as I did.

It was interesting that I felt he covered movement in the air to such an extent that it was a shame he didn't go into similar depth about movement off the pitch - there are still a lot of unanswered questions there, particularly about the effects of backspin and topspin mixed in with sidespin and the explanation of the effects of different pitch conditions on spin and seam.
 
SLA said:
It's a good book, isn't it? I picked it up for 50p from a charity bookshop about 5 years ago and was relieved to find another actual scientist who was interested in cricket and spin bowling as much as I did.

It was interesting that I felt he covered movement in the air to such an extent that it was a shame he didn't go into similar depth about movement off the pitch - there are still a lot of unanswered questions there, particularly about the effects of backspin and topspin mixed in with sidespin and the explanation of the effects of different pitch conditions on spin and seam.
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I think you're just a very clever bloke SLA! I reckon I'm going to struggle with it...
 
SLA said:
It's a good book, isn't it? I picked it up for 50p from a charity bookshop about 5 years ago and was relieved to find another actual scientist who was interested in cricket and spin bowling as much as I did.

It was interesting that I felt he covered movement in the air to such an extent that it was a shame he didn't go into similar depth about movement off the pitch - there are still a lot of unanswered questions there, particularly about the effects of backspin and topspin mixed in with sidespin and the explanation of the effects of different pitch conditions on spin and seam.
Click to expand...
I've had the book for a while, always worth going back to. What I found weird is the writers inability to comprehend how hard it is to be both a legspinner and an offspinner, it seems biomechanics appear to be on the backburner as the writer indulges himself with aerodynamics.
 
Yeah, I'm finding it fairly heavy going, at the minute I'm just dipping in here and there and reading bits that are catching my attention. There's definitely very interesting bits in it, I've just read about the fact that he doesn't recognise the distinctions between wrist spinning and finger spinning, they both use elements of both and wrist spinning with such a massive inference that it's the wrist that does the majority of the work as such - he says basically is nonesense.
 
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