Wrist Spin Bowling (part Five)

[Cleanprophet]

Haha. I'm 38. But I only took up wrist spin just before I turned 37. I am about 18 months into it and about to start my second season. I never thought I'd get this far with it, to be honest. One night I was messing about at the end of a net session and tried to bowl some leg breaks. One of the batsmen said I should drop my seam and bowl spin. So I did some google searches that night and found Dave's blog. I found it all fascinating. The part which really appealed to me is that you have to be obsessive about it to be any good. That suits me down to the ground, it's one of my defining characteristics. But I didn't think I'd be able to bowl it (some might say I still can't) and now find myself in the first team for my club.

In short, young in wrist spinning terms but old in real life terms.

Ahhh, it's hard to tell from the vids. If it's anyway flattering, you look about 20yo from 25 yards away and on low res video

Anyway, you should have no problems getting through the crease with real conviction if you're not a young 'un and you've been bowling seam previously. Sounds promising that you are in your club's first team after only 18 months. The opinion of the batter you are bowling to can be very important and if a batter, who knows his stuff, suggested your leg spin was decent 18 months ago, then you clearly had a bit of a natural feel for it. Plus, if you are in the first team, I wouldn't bother messing around too much with your action - unless you are having problems landing the ball on a consistent line.

 

[Darth Spin]

I won't be doing anything too drastic before the season starts. Just practicing more and working on timing.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

I won't be doing anything too drastic before the season starts. Just practicing more and working on timing.

I've just had my first bowl outside today. First session was a disaster, came back thought about it did one of those Gibbs reflective practice things on my blog, got my thoughts together and a plan and then went back an hour or so later and was a lot better - massive improvement. A lot of it down to SLA - he made the point last year that my arm action is high as opposed to low and round and suggested this may be the reason I don't get the ball to drift? He then said as I recall - don't think of it as being a problem - work with what you've got, have a stock ball that turns a bit and then have a variation where you bowl with more over-spin, the additional over-spin will give you more dip and not turn as much and will give you options. So that's what I'm doing and it's starting to come together already and I've been bowling my flippers which have in-swinging attributes, so a fairly good start today, just need to work on my all round fitness.

 

[SLA]

I've just had my first bowl outside today. First session was a disaster, came back thought about it did one of those Gibbs reflective practice things on my blog, got my thoughts together and a plan and then went back an hour or so later and was a lot better - massive improvement. A lot of it down to SLA - he made the point last year that my arm action is high as opposed to low and round and suggested this may be the reason I don't get the ball to drift? He then said as I recall - don't think of it as being a problem - work with what you've got, have a stock ball that turns a bit and then have a variation where you bowl with more over-spin, the additional over-spin will give you more dip and not turn as much and will give you options. So that's what I'm doing and it's starting to come together already and I've been bowling my flippers which have in-swinging attributes, so a fairly good start today, just need to work on my all round fitness.

You have all the tools to bowl great legspin Dave, you just need go out there and figure out the best way to turn good deliveries into wickets.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

You have all the tools to bowl great legspin Dave, you just need go out there and figure out the best way to turn good deliveries into wickets.

Cheers SLA, I think it's as you say, work with what you've got. I've been bogged down for the last few years chasing after something that I just can't do. Hopefully this season will be better and I'll bowl with more confidence using a far simpler approach?

 

[Darth Spin]

I think that's good advice even if I don't follow it myself. I have a thirst to find out more, bowl leggies, tops, wrong uns, flippers as I feel confident I can do it all in the long run. But I realise it's important to have my natural stock ball as the priority. Richie Benaud always says "bowl the fiercly spinning leg break 90 percent of the time", I like to knock that down to 80% of the time and experiment a touch more but not too much.

 

[Cleanprophet]

I think that's good advice even if I don't follow it myself. I have a thirst to find out more, bowl leggies, tops, wrong uns, flippers as I feel confident I can do it all in the long run. But I realise it's important to have my natural stock ball as the priority. Richie Benaud always says "bowl the fiercly spinning leg break 90 percent of the time", I like to knock that down to 80% of the time and experiment a touch more but not too much.

That's the thing to always remember. Spin the ball as hard as you can. The instinct, quite naturally, is to try and put the ball there. But the aim should be to spin the ball as hard as you possibly can and work on controlling that. When you're doing that, you will get the ball to drop onto a length. You should get some drift and dip if you have big spin on the ball and that's what it's all about.

I mentioned this earlier, but it may be of use to Dave and his search for drift. Imagine, as you hit the crease, that there is a wall at your side. Aim to be in contact with that wall with your bowling hand from the moment your arm comes past your thigh and then right up to the point of delivery. That way, your arm creates an arc that is completely upright. You may be doing that already. I wasn't. My hand used to come past my thigh and then behind me (quite a few leggies do this), before back across and in line just as my arm comes up past shoulder height and into the delivery position. Watching Warne, I noticed how he created this perfect arc and so I followed suit. I was getting a little bit of drift anyway, but once I made this change I was getting 2 or 3 times the amount of drift. Looking at footage from before I made this change, I saw my arm position was the same at the point of release. The only change was my arm position at the bottom of the arm movement.

 

[SLA]

I think that's good advice even if I don't follow it myself. I have a thirst to find out more, bowl leggies, tops, wrong uns, flippers as I feel confident I can do it all in the long run. But I realise it's important to have my natural stock ball as the priority. Richie Benaud always says "bowl the fiercly spinning leg break 90 percent of the time", I like to knock that down to 80% of the time and experiment a touch more but not too much.

That's a worthwhile objective in its own right, I spent probably 10 years just doing that, and it was always fun to see how many different deliveries you could bowl.

It was only when I became a senior player in my club and realised we needed a decent spin bowler otherwise we would lose matches that I started to take bowling seriously and junked 90% of my (many, many) variations.

 

[macca]

I mentioned this earlier, but it may be of use to Dave and his search for drift. Imagine, as you hit the crease, that there is a wall at your side. Aim to be in contact with that wall with your bowling hand from the moment your arm comes past your thigh and then right up to the point of delivery. That way, your arm creates an arc that is completely upright. You may be doing that already. I wasn't...............

Holy Hell, we are trying to keep it simple for Dave.

 

[macca]

That's a worthwhile objective in its own right, I spent probably 10 years just doing that, and it was always fun to see how many different deliveries you could bowl.

It was only when I became a senior player in my club and realised we needed a decent spin bowler otherwise we would lose matches that I started to take bowling seriously and junked 90% of my (many, many) variations.

Let this be a lesson for all young spinners. Maybe as the result of poor coaching, or more likely self coaching, young SLA got it completely arse-about and tried to learn all the variations before he mastered a stock delivery. Big mistake.

 

[SLA]

Let this be a lesson for all young spinners. Maybe as the result of poor coaching, or more likely self coaching, young SLA got it completely arse-about and tried to learn all the variations before he mastered a stock delivery. Big mistake.

Yes, a complete lack of professional coaching in my case! My dad taught me to bowl in the back garden but he wasn't a qualified coach or anything.

 

[Cleanprophet]

Holy Hell, we are trying to keep it simple for Dave.

That's the trouble of trying to explain it rather than demonstrate it. It sounds far more complicated that it is.

Let this be a lesson for all young spinners. Maybe as the result of poor coaching, or more likely self coaching, young SLA got it completely arse-about and tried to learn all the variations before he mastered a stock delivery. Big mistake.

Very true. Every young/new bowler should work on mastering the one stock delivery before trying anything new. Not easy to do that when the temptation to bowl a ball that goes the other way is there. I'd say it's reasonable enough to try the wrong un once you have a solid leg-spinner rather than a superb leg spinner. But no leg spinner should be thinking about a 3rd and 4th variation until the leg spinner and wrong un are dependable.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Guess what happened today? Yesterday I had a bit of an epiphany - I'd got to that place where I was comfortable with writing off the idea of ever getting drift, high arm action - good for small leg breaks, top-spinners and flippers, but no good for drift and I can live with that. I'll just work with what I've got. So today I'm having a bowl in the paddock with my 12 year old son and it's not going too well. "Dad, your bowling action through the crease is crap, you're not getting side on, you're not getting up on your toes and you're bowling front on... and your bound is crap". So I say "Okay I'll try and get side on and up on the toes then and see how it goes"? I do a few run-ins without a ball and it feels weird and wrong. I persevere and it still feels wrong, but what's supposed to be happening is happening. I get a ball and try with a ball. The ball is released and lo and behold it looks like it drifts. Joe's at the other end...
"Did that drift"?
"Yeah loads" And it turned off the crease loads. Next ball up - same thing and again and again. For the next 40 or so balls 80% of them drifted with masses of turn off the wicket!

I can only think that it's the side on and getting up on the toes aspect and the fact that someone was there watching and telling me that I was doing it wrong - even though he is only 12 years old!!!

Can't say that I believe it'll happen again tomorrow, but in theory if it's the side on and up on the toes that makes the difference, then I'm going to have to work with it - although it feels awkward and difficult.

 

[Spin Lizard]

...although it feels awkward and difficult.

for about two weeks until you are used to it, then you wonder why you did it the 'old' way at all.

good stuff.

 

[Darth Spin]

Interesting stuff... I wonder who wrote this:-

...in addition to swinging around the pivoting foot as a part of your body being swung round by the forward motion and your arms facilitating the pivot, you add to the pivot/rotation by twisting on the ball of your foot from the hips.

So it's this subtle addition...that could be the key to you producing your leg break with far more spin, dip and drift. The simple addition of ensuring that you get up tall onto the ball of your foot and twisting on the ball of the foot from the hips.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Interesting stuff... I wonder who wrote this:-

...in addition to swinging around the pivoting foot as a part of your body being swung round by the forward motion and your arms facilitating the pivot, you add to the pivot/rotation by twisting on the ball of your foot from the hips.

So it's this subtle addition...that could be the key to you producing your leg break with far more spin, dip and drift. The simple addition of ensuring that you get up tall onto the ball of your foot and twisting on the ball of the foot from the hips.

It's stuff that I've been reading about for years, Tony M and Liz Ward have both said to do it, Liz has given me drills in the past to help with it, but it's never been implemented, no-one was ever there to say "That's crap" and point out that I wasn't doing what I thought I was doing. Plus (Including today) it always felt like I was bowling like Paul Adams!! As Spin Wizard has said I've just got to keep at it now and do it so that it becomes the way I bowl. I'll have to see how it goes tomorrow.

 

[Darth Spin]

I know what you mean I have trouble doing it consistently myself. Sounds so simple but difficult to pull off on a regular basis with rhythm.

 

[Cleanprophet]

I get side-on quite naturally. So much so, that when I tried the Grimmett suggestion of bowling front-on to produce a ball with fewer revs on it I found it very odd. I suspect that anyone who doesn't get fully side-on will find it equally odd to get fully side-on. I'd agree with Spin Lizard that a week or two will be all it takes for a this odd feeling to fade.

Everytime I bowl now I video it and watch it back and I will often film my action from various angles. It's well worth doing because most bowlers will not have a good idea of how their action looks without it. For sure, getting side-on is huge. If you are side-on, the pivot should naturally follow and that movement of the hip and upperbody really does add plenty to the delivery.

I'll be interested to see how you go tomorrow Dave. Well worth videoing it, if you can. Directly from behind is the best angle (in my opinion) because you see the action perfectly and you will see any drift too.

 

[Billywhizz]

I mentioned this earlier, but it may be of use to Dave and his search for drift. Imagine, as you hit the crease, that there is a wall at your side. Aim to be in contact with that wall with your bowling hand from the moment your arm comes past your thigh and then right up to the point of delivery. That way, your arm creates an arc that is completely upright. You may be doing that already. I wasn't. My hand used to come past my thigh and then behind me (quite a few leggies do this), before back across and in line just as my arm comes up past shoulder height and into the delivery position. Watching Warne, I noticed how he created this perfect arc and so I followed suit. I was getting a little bit of drift anyway, but once I made this change I was getting 2 or 3 times the amount of drift. Looking at footage from before I made this change, I saw my arm position was the same at the point of release. The only change was my arm position at the bottom of the arm movement.

Whoa!! I've just realised after watching myself bowl I've been bowling the toppie, backspinner, and faster legbreak with the straight arc, but my standard legbreak (which is far less accurate) is almost a diagonal arc going from way behind my back. Eureka!!! I cant believe I didnt spot this earlier. Thanks prophet.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

I get side-on quite naturally. So much so, that when I tried the Grimmett suggestion of bowling front-on to produce a ball with fewer revs on it I found it very odd. I suspect that anyone who doesn't get fully side-on will find it equally odd to get fully side-on. I'd agree with Spin Lizard that a week or two will be all it takes for a this odd feeling to fade.

Everytime I bowl now I video it and watch it back and I will often film my action from various angles. It's well worth doing because most bowlers will not have a good idea of how their action looks without it. For sure, getting side-on is huge. If you are side-on, the pivot should naturally follow and that movement of the hip and upperbody really does add plenty to the delivery.

I'll be interested to see how you go tomorrow Dave. Well worth videoing it, if you can. Directly from behind is the best angle (in my opinion) because you see the action perfectly and you will see any drift too.

I might do that.