Wrist Spin Bowling

[The Edge Of Willow]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

i wonder if anyone can offer me any advice...

im a novice leg spinner, ive been spinning a ball between my hands for years, i used to mess around with friends and family playing with a tennis ball in the garden and i always bowled leg spin. but ive only just started practicing with a real cricket ball in the nets. so my wrist and finger action is pretty good, but the rest of my technique is well below par. but practice makes perfect right?

anyway, my issue (well, the biggest one) is that the nets i practice at use a slab of concrete covered in green carpet type stuff as the wicket. its super hard and generates almost no turn and exaggerates the bounce. bowling a stock leg break tends to result in almost no lateral movement at all, and my brother who is a fairly sub standard batsman (he doesnt play for a team, neither do i, yet) who only plays slog shots, hits me miles just about every time. occasionally i can get a ball to rip, but my biggest leg break will only move around a foot off the pitch.

ive tried bowling a few balls on the grass wicket, i dont like to because its not my pitch to use and i dont want to do any damage, and the ball generates a lot more turn with a more sensible amount of bounce. which makes me think that my bowling might be going somewhere. but when i can only practice on a concrete slab im not learning anything about my game.

i was just wondering if anyone has any advice on how i can improve the usefulness of my practicing, and get a better idea of whether my leg breaks are actually working? im trying my best to avoid the temptation of bowling variations, but ive been bowling flippers, sliders and toppers for years with a tennis ball on grass so they come quite naturally in terms of the bowling action (accuracy is another story however lol). the occasional topper or flipper i throw in will spin a lot more off the pitch, i can generate more lateral movement on a slightly sideways spun topper (maybe 10-20 degrees off straight) than i can on a leg break, even when i get a leg break with loads of spin and a perfect 90 degree seam. which makes me wonder if maybe i should stop trying to bowl the leg breaks so big, and should go for maybe a 45-60 degree seam on concrete? i need to adjust my action so that i dont bowl so far down the leg side as well. youd think it would be as simple as aiming slightly differently, but i try that and my arm just seems to compensate and the ball still goes leg side.

im rambling a bit, i dont really have a lot of purpose to this post, other than to see how other people go about practicing on concrete i guess. im considering maybe trying an incrediball instead of a real cricket ball to see if that behaves more naturally off of a hard surface?

any guidance is greatly appreciated!!

Hmmm, I've never had a problem turning it on matting, at least when I get the release right.

I would definitely trying bowling with less side-spin. Sometimes a totally side-spun ball can have trouble gripping.

Another possible explanation could be that you are not reving the ball as much when you spin it s completely sideways.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

In reference to you leg spin guide, is it possible to incorprate the big leg break into your actual bowling

Kind Regards

ToeGuy4u

Yeah I definitely reckon so, it takes a lot of practice and there's a few blokes on here that'll testify to it (The Biggun). There's a lot of scepticism from people about bowling the ball back in towards yourself to get it to turn big, but the source of the idea is Peter Philpott 'The art of wrist spin bowling'. Some of the blokes that'll testify to it are on holiday at the minute and might not repsond in the short term but yes it's for real. Try and get hold of Philpotts books and read it. If you're Wrist Spinner you need to read it - it's the definitive guide to wrist spin bowling. Also try and read up on Clarrie Grimmett which is the original source of all this material he was the innovator of loads of obscure variations and possibly the greatest Wrist Spinner ever.

 

[shrek]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

do you mean top spinners by accident when im trying to spin leg breaks? id say no, i can see the seam as it goes down the wicket and its usually a perfect 90 degrees (e.g spinning totally sideways) or very close to it. occasionally it has some overspin as well but never much. i have control over my wrist to impart more or less overspin though, next time i practice this is something i am going to play with to see if more overspin works better on the hard surface. the matting has been 100% dry every time ive practiced so far (i only started a couple of weeks ago) as England has had a heatwave lately with no rain at all until the past couple of days.

if you meant am i top spinning by accident when im bowling toppers, then again no, i can consciously bowl top spinners and occasionally do. but im trying not to, i need to figure out leg breaks first. no point running before i can walk.

The perfect 90 degrees seam seems a little suspect to me. I always heard commentators claim that the seam should point towards the slips or third man.

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

The big leg break does exist. I am very round arm and not as elegant as you young guns. So, my delivery is very different to your normal leg spinner. You will notice it as the seam is at right angles to the flight of the ball/to the batsman. It turns more than the normal leg break, and seems to bounce less, possibly due to the absent topspin and full side spin.

Having said that it sometimes goes straight on, my theory being either that it does not hit the seam or that it has backspin, so turning into a sort of slider. If you get philpott book, you will understand it. He calls it going round the loop with the wrist as dave has on his excellent web site. It is difficult, I spent a couple of years trying, but when it turns it turns big, even though I do not consider myself a big ripper of the ball. If released with the wrist in the right position even without great revs it turns a lot. By the way this refers to bowling on concrete and not turf pitches.

 

[TheStraighter1]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

The perfect 90 degrees seam seems a little suspect to me. I always heard commentators claim that the seam should point towards the slips or third man.

90 degrees will be exceptionally good on a sticky turf wicket but on matting or a very hard and flat pitch, the ball will simply skid through as it will not grip. on matting, seam should be around 2nd and 3rd slip.

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

So bowling Leg Spin at lefties. What's the solution to that then anyone got any ideas?

Congrats old boy. Well done again!

Most left handers are strong on their legs. They will deal violently with anything that strays into their legs by bowling too much at the stumps.

He must be attacked wide of his offstump in the footmarks/region of. etc etc.

Quote from the bible p100


A couple of weeks back I had asked you whether you met any lefthanders.I also would show them a googly early(you have a good one, so less of a problem to you). I would also try a big leg break outside his offstump(would cross my fingers I get it were I intend to). Would then bowl normal legbreaks with different flight and speed. I would hope that at the back of his mind he is always worried by the possibility of the wrong one, and the big turning legbreak. Easier said than done, but that is what I would try.

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

ok thanks guys, lots of helpful information there for me to be going on with. just need more practice now. sounds as though the biggest reason behind the balls not turning is me trying to produce a "ball of the century" every time on a concrete wicket that has no turn lol. its worth noting also that the matting is incredibly "polished". polished isnt really the word, but its quite old and has obviously been walked up a down a lot of times and had a lot of balls bounced off of it. so its really smooth and slightly shiny. this obviously doesnt help either. i think if it was newer matting then it would be easier still.

as for places to practice, im outside of Basingstoke town by about 5 miles, but theres plenty of playing fields around me. the cricket ground i practice at is a 5 minute drive, but there is another cricket pitch (its also got a few football pitches) about 30 seconds drive (or a few minutes walking if im not being lazy lol) up the road that had a new pavillion built a few years back. i used to play football up there, but i havent been there since it got rebuilt. i really ought to in case they have brand new nets up there as well. the old nets were about the worse condition i think is actually possible without it just being a pile of poles and netting stacked up on the floor! theres plenty of places i could set up some stumps, so i just need to get myself some more cricket balls (so im not walking back and forth every 10 seconds) and go and practice that way. setting the stumps up 10 yards in front of a wall might not be a bad idea either to save balls running away.

thanks again for all the suggestions. il check back with progress later.

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Hey boys.

I went to the nets the other day, and was bowling this weird ball. As I bowled, my wrist would deliver the ball from the reverse of putting your hand out to gesture 'stop', so the back of my hand faced the batsman.

I would have all four fingers along the seam, with the seam being sideways. As I delivered the ball, I would flick my wrist towards the batsman from the position described above, and would run all of my fingers heavily down the ball. This created heaps of spin going straight, but towards the batsman.

I have a feeling that it may have been a slider or zooter, but it could just be a weird ball.

If you get my description, maybe you guys could try it out and see what you think?

Sounds like the mystery ball to me. A topspinner flicked out with part of the back of the hand facing the batsman. Or else I might have mid understood what you explained.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Is it just me - but there doesn't seem to be a lot of love going around for the Spinners in Australia at the minute. Looks like we're well up for spinners here in Blighty at the minute even to the point where we're talking about bringing Panesar back into the fold?

After Warne, the drought | Specials | Cricinfo Magazine | Cricinfo.com

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

hey guys went nets today recorded a few balls jus so you guys could take a look at my action,
could only video 3 balls lol because i used up all my memory on pictures but soon as i upload my pictures ill make a bettr vid!

YouTube - Leg spin bowling

thanks

p.s hope you like the audio haha, oh and friend kept having to move camera because he sat behind leg stump -.-

Very nice relaxed action, with nice rhythm. Iwould try to pitch it up a bit more on turf, even though on matting due to the greater bounce you can get away with it. Try to experiment with the wrist position now that you have everything in place. I get the impression they are small legbreaks. It is good to have these consistent in line and length as you seem to have succeeded in. Tell us how you are progressing with the change in wrist position, but be careful to keep the smaller leg break going as this will be your stock ball. Well done. How much do you practice, and were you ever coached. If so were you ever given drills? The idea of the planks of wood is good, lately I started taking a small hoola hoop as I not good enough to land it on a coin as others here do. Next time will try blindfolded as well.The bottom line is, if you are consistent with line and length, and you are giving it a good rip, all you will need is subtle variation in pace and flight. Having a googly/backspinner helps, but do not get too lost with these.
Take care of your mate. How much do you pay him for risking his life for the sake of the art?

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

right, i had a practice today for an hour or so. bowled at my brother again, but it was more productive this time. i started where i left off, just bowling a stock leg break but trying to put a bit more overspin on it. it had mixed results, i was struggling to generate spin out of the hand for some reason, couldnt get my fingers to do what i wanted them to. but the ball was turning a little anyway, so that was progress.

one delivery i, without thinking about it and more by accident, took a much larger final step into my delivery (and at the same time managed to get my fingers and wrist working properly). this resulted in a much more animated body action, more like a fast bowler than a spinner. i rotated more, had a much faster arm action and follow through, and generated about 2-3 feet of movement off the pitch with a fairly average leg break!!!! unfortunately i pitched it 2 feet outside leg stump and my brother still slogged it, but i carried on working on that large final step. ive noticed that Shane Warne has a similar approach, with a step and a planted front foot, as opposed to the hop step that some people prefer. Warne is much more relaxed in his method than i am, i tend to be a lot more tense and heavy in my step. but that will ease up when i get more comfortable with the technique. i am gradually decreasing the size of the step and seem to be able to maintain the follow through technique. so thats progress.

i think maybe my lack of spin was more about my body action and the follow through than anything else, as by the end of the session i am able to get 90 degree seam balls to move around quite well now too. i managed to bowl my brother a couple of times which ive not managed before, one of them pitched well outside leg stump. im struggling with line and length big time, but thats just a matter of practicing without a batsman i think.

and temptation is too hard to resist, so i threw in a flipper occasionally. its by far my best delivery, i find it incredibly easy (against all suggestions that its the hardest delivery to master. i think years of messing around with a tennis ball is to thank, i used to bowl flippers all the time because i wanted to be Shane Warne lol). i can generate tons of spin, my line and length is almost always perfect, and it has about a 75% wicket rate lol. if i ever start playing for a team i think the flipper could be VERY effective for taking wickets. its faster, it doesnt bounce that much, and it always comes back in at the stumps from inline with off stump. i think it will be especially useful in situations where a batsman is just expecting the leg break every delivery and is going after it, and then that incredibly different variation can just catch people totally off guard. thats exactly what my brother did. he played a slog across his pads and the ball stayed low, slowed up and went the other way and he missed it by miles.

altogether a very productive session, thanks mostly to the suggestions you guys made earlier! so thanks for that. i tried bowling some fast deliveries just to see what happened and because my brother wanted to pratice batting against some fast and straight balls. when i played cricket at school occasionally, probably 9-10 years ago now, i was always a medium pace bowler, affectionately known as "wide-ball" by my team mates and actually referred to as that to opposing batsmen by our coach. one time a batsman asked him for middle stump as he was umpiring as well, and he said "i wouldnt bother mate, we call him wide-ball for a reason". and i bowled him first ball haha. followed by several wides and an 11 ball over. but my fast bowling is now very accurate with a decent technique (i think) without ever practicing it, and i can bowl a decent line and length all day long and i think i even managed a small amount of inswing!! this can only be helpful to my spin bowling cause, i just need to nail a consistent approach and follow through technique for my spin bowling and line and length will surely follow. most bowlers at club level bowl medium-fast pace, so i figure leg spin is a better way to get into a team and to get wickets. plus its more fun and i love the intelligence involved. sizing up an opponent, getting under their skin, and beating them with mind games before you even bowl a delivery.

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

i made some great progress today! the surface in the nets had dried back out from the sun, and finally im getting my leg breaks to turn on concrete, some of them are turning BIG! my line and length is still poor, but improving all the time. ive done a load of work on my follow through, and my body is rotating a lot more powerfully now and im generating much more rip on the ball. leg breaks are turning anything from 6" upto about 4 feet. my big leg break (90 degree seam, even backwards of 90 degrees) is gripping! which it never was before. if i could control the pitch of the ball better then it wouldnt be out of the question for me to bowl someone behind their legs i think!! as it is i cant land the ball within 2 feet of my target on a consistent basis, let alone on a penny as id need to for a "ball of the century" delivery lol.

im massively pleased at the progress. ive also found, by accident when i released a ball badly out of the hand, that i can generate just as much turn with a gentle finger/wrist action (e.g. less revs on the ball from the hand) and a more precise action and follow through, than i can when i absolutely rip the ball out of the hand but get the body action wrong. this is making practice much easier as i can focus less on generating spin with my hand, adopt a nice relaxed grip (Shane Warne always says this is key anyway, as a relaxed grip means a more flowing action), and then focus more on my overall action. but at the same time the ball is still spinning lots off the pitch so i am able to play around with line and length whilst still seeing what the spin does.

another week or 2 of practice and progress like this and il have to try and get myself video'd so i can get some more suggestions and pointers i think

Great to see that you are enjoying and progressing. As regards the ball of the century there is also some help from the foot marks and massive revs on the ball. If you see the dismissal of Strauss round his legs, even in slow motion the ball looks like a top.

I think as others told you that practicing with a set of stumps helps without a batsman. You can experiment without fear of getting bashed, and also you can see how each ball behaves until it reaches the stumps. Occassionally you bowl to batsmen in the nets but this should not be your main focus in my humble opinion.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

The only thing I find with the Flipper is that it's the ball that is most like a fast bowlers ball as it's generally bowled without tossing up above the batsmans eye-line in a loop (Although you can do that). Because it's back-spinning it holds it's line through the air and I find batsman generally deal with it quite easily. The biggest advantage with it is the fact that I can bowl it so much faster than my other deliveries and the approach and movement initially coming into the crease doesn't give it away, but the bringing the arm down and over is increased massively in speed and whips the ball in so much faster and then the skid in low sometimes causes them problems.

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

wow, just had an incredible practice session. drove to the nets with a couple of cricket balls and no batsman!! thought it was time to practice with just me and some stumps so i could sort my line and length out. and ive ended up doing SO much more than just that.

first thing i did was to pace out the length of the wicket. i worked out how many paces i needed to take to ensure i was bowling from the right place. turns out that all of the other people that practice at the nets are bowling about 2-3 yards short!! as had i been. i tripled checked this against the measurements i got from the internet and also the wickets at the ground, and i was definitely now in the correct place. so i marked my spot, and this alone has made a MASSIVE improvement to my deliveries. i have to generate about 5-10% more power on the ball now to get it to go far enough. before i was struggling to ever bowl a good length, it was almost always short apart from the flipper. bowling from further away has for some reason encouraged me to flight the ball more and the results have been incredible. the ball is also 5-10mph faster and doesnt feel like its a really slow delivery anymore that could get whacked. it feels like it has a very good pace on it and that is a huge confidence boost.

so i started practicing leg breaks. lots of inconsistencies, lots of bad deliveries, very few good ones. so i started properly analysing my action. thinking about every aspect of what im doing, ignoring where the ball was bouncing and what it was doing. i started to get it more consistent. im trying to base it on Shane Warne as best i can, but with my only natural flow to it. i figure thats a good place to start. i have pretty much reinvented my action from scratch today!

so then once the ball was coming out consistently i worked on line and length. i put a couple of rocks in line with leg stump, one of them around 4 yards from the stumps, the other around 7 yards from the stumps. i actually took up a batting position and thought about where i would least want the ball to pitch if it was turning and worked from there.

so i worked on length at first. that got more consistent. then i worked on line. i planned to be there about an hour, but i started to get into a rhythm. so im bowling good line and length, getting average turn. probably 20-30% of the balls are what i would call acceptable. then all of a sudden i start to really hook it up, everything comes together.

so then i focussed more attention on my follow through. i wasnt rotating enough on my front foot or picking the trailing leg up enough. i really analysed this, and got it much improved. this yielded excellent results. accuracy was up to more like 40-50%.

then the single greatest improvement ive ever made to my game in this short time so far. i tried to bowl a top spinner! it came out wrong and had around 50% over spin with 50% side spin, but combined with the follow through being just right, and the wrist position that i adopted that i havent properly managed before, it pitched about 6 yards from the stumps, but as it got around 4 feet from the floor it drifted at least 8" from inline with off stump to pitch outside of leg. it then turned back and hit the back of the nets (about 2 feet behind the stumps) a good 12-18" outside off stump. without wanting to sound melodramatic, this delivery was literally Warne-esque, it looked like a good Shane Warne delivery on one of his "coaching" videos on YouTube. i was absolutely pumped.

so i set about recreating this, analysing every delivery. 2 hours later and im bowling a line between inline with leg stump and upto 12" outside, sometimes inline with middle stump if the mood takes me. it bowls faster than ive ever managed before, its hard to estimate such a thing, but id guess 45-50mph. the ball absolutely rips out of my hand because of my improved follow through, it drifts slightly in flight (its massively flighted, its an inch off hitting the bar at the front of the nets frame if i get it right!), then as it comes to drop down it dips heavily, drifts 12-18", pitches around leg to slightly outside, and absolutely rips back in with additional bounce and ends up going past the stumps about 12" outside off!!!

its absolutely magic to bowl like that, i must have bowled 150-200 balls minimum after i finally hooked it up, with around 30% perfect success and probably 80% were deliveries that i would be pleased to bowl in a match situation, and it just got better and better. i have very good control of line and length, i could land the ball on an A3 piece of paper i think now 70% of the time, im able to vary my line and length when i want to (i moved my rocks around to test myself). im just stunned at the progress and absolutely buzzing. apologies for writing such a long winded message, i just had to tell the world lol

ive also developed a different grip that i think has helped me hugely too. it came about by accident at my last practice session. it was a poor session and i really struggled. i find that i cant bowl 2 days in a row because im using muscles i havent used before and they are sore, and this stops me generating enough power and i have to try too hard and it just ends badly, and id bowled the day before. plus i had a batsman in there (my slogging brother, who was sledging me as well, REALLY not helpful. we were only there 20 mins because of this). but i found i couldnt grip the ball, so i placed my thumb on the ball for support, whereas before id have it as far from the ball as i could to keep it out the way. with the thumb on the ball the seam position has 99% stability, it almost always comes out straight, and is allowing me to rip the ball more. this in turn is obviously the major factor behind the drift and dip, as well as the large amount of turn.

this is all on a solid concrete pitch with a very low grip carpet surface on it. i wish i had a camera there to video it. im going to try and get a video later in the week though. i cant even imagine what it would do on a grass wicket with some footholes and rough.

now that im bowling from further away (the correct distance instead of the short distance) ive lost the flipper. i cant pitch it far enough with flight, so it ends up flat with hardly any spin and its just like a medium pace delivery. not that it wont catch some people out, its more like an arm ball now. the top spinner ive got working much better, and i tried a few wrong uns earlier on before i had really hooked up my action and got one to come back in slightly, it was more of a top spinner with a very slight amount of side spin on it. but that can be worked on later (much later!). once i hooked up the leg break i just didnt want to stop bowling it.

i left the nets 2.5 hours later feeling incredibly pleased with myself. im now sat at home aching like crazy! my neck aches as does my ring finger and my lower back. im sure il pay for it tomorrow, but i just dont care lol. as soon as the acheing is gone im going back down there again for some more!!!

i had to share that progress because im absolutely pumped. it is so incredibly satisfying to have a whole session where there is major progress from start to finish, and to come away feeling confident enough to want to play for a team straight away lol. im a little bummed there was no-one else arriving up there before i left who plays for the village side, as id quite like someone to see me bowling like that, they might even invite me along without me asking lol.

i need to get a video next. not that its of as much use with leg spin as it is with fast bowling. my action was undeniably working today as id want it to. i think i need to have maybe 3-4 individual sessions followed up by 1 batsman session. then repeat that cycle. just to verify the line and length against real shots. my brother only slogs, i think hes going to get a shock next time i bowl at him lol. those wild shots across the line of the ball are going to wind up as wickets. although i do struggle to hit the stumps because the overspin on the ball results in too much bounce lol

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

right, i had a practice today for an hour or so. bowled at my brother again, but it was more productive this time. i started where i left off, just bowling a stock leg break but trying to put a bit more overspin on it. it had mixed results, i was struggling to generate spin out of the hand for some reason, couldnt get my fingers to do what i wanted them to. but the ball was turning a little anyway, so that was progress.

one delivery i, without thinking about it and more by accident, took a much larger final step into my delivery (and at the same time managed to get my fingers and wrist working properly). this resulted in a much more animated body action, more like a fast bowler than a spinner. i rotated more, had a much faster arm action and follow through, and generated about 2-3 feet of movement off the pitch with a fairly average leg break!!!! unfortunately i pitched it 2 feet outside leg stump and my brother still slogged it, but i carried on working on that large final step. ive noticed that Shane Warne has a similar approach, with a step and a planted front foot, as opposed to the hop step that some people prefer. Warne is much more relaxed in his method than i am, i tend to be a lot more tense and heavy in my step. but that will ease up when i get more comfortable with the technique. i am gradually decreasing the size of the step and seem to be able to maintain the follow through technique. so thats progress.

i think maybe my lack of spin was more about my body action and the follow through than anything else, as by the end of the session i am able to get 90 degree seam balls to move around quite well now too. i managed to bowl my brother a couple of times which ive not managed before, one of them pitched well outside leg stump. im struggling with line and length big time, but thats just a matter of practicing without a batsman i think.

and temptation is too hard to resist, so i threw in a flipper occasionally. its by far my best delivery, i find it incredibly easy (against all suggestions that its the hardest delivery to master. i think years of messing around with a tennis ball is to thank, i used to bowl flippers all the time because i wanted to be Shane Warne lol). i can generate tons of spin, my line and length is almost always perfect, and it has about a 75% wicket rate lol. if i ever start playing for a team i think the flipper could be VERY effective for taking wickets. its faster, it doesnt bounce that much, and it always comes back in at the stumps from inline with off stump. i think it will be especially useful in situations where a batsman is just expecting the leg break every delivery and is going after it, and then that incredibly different variation can just catch people totally off guard. thats exactly what my brother did. he played a slog across his pads and the ball stayed low, slowed up and went the other way and he missed it by miles.

altogether a very productive session, thanks mostly to the suggestions you guys made earlier! so thanks for that. i tried bowling some fast deliveries just to see what happened and because my brother wanted to pratice batting against some fast and straight balls. when i played cricket at school occasionally, probably 9-10 years ago now, i was always a medium pace bowler, affectionately known as "wide-ball" by my team mates and actually referred to as that to opposing batsmen by our coach. one time a batsman asked him for middle stump as he was umpiring as well, and he said "i wouldnt bother mate, we call him wide-ball for a reason". and i bowled him first ball haha. followed by several wides and an 11 ball over. but my fast bowling is now very accurate with a decent technique (i think) without ever practicing it, and i can bowl a decent line and length all day long and i think i even managed a small amount of inswing!! this can only be helpful to my spin bowling cause, i just need to nail a consistent approach and follow through technique for my spin bowling and line and length will surely follow. most bowlers at club level bowl medium-fast pace, so i figure leg spin is a better way to get into a team and to get wickets. plus its more fun and i love the intelligence involved. sizing up an opponent, getting under their skin, and beating them with mind games before you even bowl a delivery.

I think I've said it before, that if your wrist spinning isn't working it might be an idea to revert to medium pace to reassure yourself that you can bowl in a straight line and length, but I've just thought about it again having read your entry here and realised that in taking that approach you'd be adopting a different run in technique and now I think that perhaps that may end up being a backwards step? You yourself here have said that you possibly have improved due to your rotation/follow through and what's going on with your feet and legs having improved. It is this kind of self analysis that leads to big improvements. I think Peter Philpott would be mortified if he was to hear that you finished up bowling seam up balls to end the session and Clarrie Grimmett must be turning in his grave. Grimmett would end his sessions only once he'd landed the ball on a hankerchief consecutively 5 times bowling wrist spin.

Keep it up, get yourself a bucket of balls 12 - 18 of them and set your stumps up on playing field or an outfield and just bowl back and forth focussing on getting one aspect of your bowling right. Work at it with real focus and conviction and you'll get there. Keep it basic - stick to your Leg Break get that right and bowl the odd flipper once every 6 balls or something to keep that going well.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Good work! Brilliant to hear that you're so pumped. but take it easy with the shoulder otherwise you'll end up with a bad rotator cuff. Despite the fact that you're right on one now I'd ease up a bit and give yourself a rest otherwise you may injure your shoulder. If you're going to practice like wrist spinner you need to do some exercises that'll build strength into your shoulders and you should look at doing "rotational press ups" and exercises using resistant bands - grab the ends of the bands and pull them apart around the back of your head smooth action not jerky and fast.

What do you reckon the key to all this was? I reckon it's the fact that you've practiced on your own and you've been able to focus on all the things that you've needed to look at - am I right?

But it's good to hear that you've done so well - well done, but you need to temper your excitement as you normally have periods when it doesn't come together as well, so be prepared for that to happen as well, but just ride it and keep plugging away at your leg break - line and length and getting it to turn.

 

[macca]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

right, i had a practice today for an hour or so. bowled at my brother again, but it was more productive this time. i started where i left off, just bowling a stock leg break but trying to put a bit more overspin on it. it had mixed results, i was struggling to generate spin out of the hand for some reason, couldnt get my fingers to do what i wanted them to. but the ball was turning a little anyway, so that was progress.

one delivery i, without thinking about it and more by accident, took a much larger final step into my delivery (and at the same time managed to get my fingers and wrist working properly). this resulted in a much more animated body action, more like a fast bowler than a spinner. i rotated more, had a much faster arm action and follow through, and generated about 2-3 feet of movement off the pitch with a fairly average leg break!!!! unfortunately i pitched it 2 feet outside leg stump and my brother still slogged it, but i carried on working on that large final step. ive noticed that Shane Warne has a similar approach, with a step and a planted front foot, as opposed to the hop step that some people prefer. Warne is much more relaxed in his method than i am, i tend to be a lot more tense and heavy in my step. but that will ease up when i get more comfortable with the technique. i am gradually decreasing the size of the step and seem to be able to maintain the follow through technique. so thats progress.

i think maybe my lack of spin was more about my body action and the follow through than anything else, as by the end of the session i am able to get 90 degree seam balls to move around quite well now too. i managed to bowl my brother a couple of times which ive not managed before, one of them pitched well outside leg stump. im struggling with line and length big time, but thats just a matter of practicing without a batsman i think.

and temptation is too hard to resist, so i threw in a flipper occasionally. its by far my best delivery, i find it incredibly easy (against all suggestions that its the hardest delivery to master. i think years of messing around with a tennis ball is to thank, i used to bowl flippers all the time because i wanted to be Shane Warne lol). i can generate tons of spin, my line and length is almost always perfect, and it has about a 75% wicket rate lol. if i ever start playing for a team i think the flipper could be VERY effective for taking wickets. its faster, it doesnt bounce that much, and it always comes back in at the stumps from inline with off stump. i think it will be especially useful in situations where a batsman is just expecting the leg break every delivery and is going after it, and then that incredibly different variation can just catch people totally off guard. thats exactly what my brother did. he played a slog across his pads and the ball stayed low, slowed up and went the other way and he missed it by miles.

altogether a very productive session, thanks mostly to the suggestions you guys made earlier! so thanks for that. i tried bowling some fast deliveries just to see what happened and because my brother wanted to pratice batting against some fast and straight balls. when i played cricket at school occasionally, probably 9-10 years ago now, i was always a medium pace bowler, affectionately known as "wide-ball" by my team mates and actually referred to as that to opposing batsmen by our coach. one time a batsman asked him for middle stump as he was umpiring as well, and he said "i wouldnt bother mate, we call him wide-ball for a reason". and i bowled him first ball haha. followed by several wides and an 11 ball over. but my fast bowling is now very accurate with a decent technique (i think) without ever practicing it, and i can bowl a decent line and length all day long and i think i even managed a small amount of inswing!! this can only be helpful to my spin bowling cause, i just need to nail a consistent approach and follow through technique for my spin bowling and line and length will surely follow. most bowlers at club level bowl medium-fast pace, so i figure leg spin is a better way to get into a team and to get wickets. plus its more fun and i love the intelligence involved. sizing up an opponent, getting under their skin, and beating them with mind games before you even bowl a delivery.

Grimmett and Warne both used a tennis ball to work on their flippers at the beginning. So if you have been using a tennis ball for a few years bowling it no wonder you can do it with a cricket ball so well.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Congrats old boy. Well done again!

Most left handers are strong on their legs. They will deal violently with anything that strays into their legs by bowling too much at the stumps.

He must be attacked wide of his offstump in the footmarks/region of. etc etc.

Quote from the bible p100


A couple of weeks back I had asked you whether you met any lefthanders.I also would show them a googly early(you have a good one, so less of a problem to you). I would also try a big leg break outside his offstump(would cross my fingers I get it were I intend to). Would then bowl normal legbreaks with different flight and speed. I would hope that at the back of his mind he is always worried by the possibility of the wrong one, and the big turning legbreak. Easier said than done, but that is what I would try.

Yeah - the Leftie had me totally flummoxed. I remembered him from last year and thought that he was going to be easy to bowl against forgetting that last year I bowled Wrong Un's at international level standard and would have caused him real problems turning the ball away from him.

So today on my new practice wicket I gave the wrong uns a go and they were ok, but they're definitely something that I need to work on a bit more, I'm thinking I'll chuck one up every 4 balls in between the Leg breaks and see how that works out. But I get to play him again in Sept so I'll be working with that in mind and next time I'll have the ******* back in the sheds first over! Did you see my figures till that ******* turned up at the crease! 2 wickets for one run off three overs and then he screwed up my fun. I wasn't impressed but thankfully my captain saw fit to protect me and took me off. I think there's an agenda with some of the players at my club, I think they're looking to protect my stats and ensure that I beat someone - possibly my captain?

Another thought on the captaincy front with regards bowlers in general and I kind of think that I may have read this in Grimmetts 'On taking wickets' book. Does it make sense that while you're bowling your spell you're given a fielding placement that allows you almost an opportunity to rest in between your overs because I found myself running and diving around in the manner that a 16 year old should be and yet I'm 49 in a couple of days time and by the time I took my place at the stumps again I was knackered and ended up bowling short to the Leftie as well - which probably didn't help?

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Macca, have you read Time of the Tiger, if so is it worth a read do you think?

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Good work! Brilliant to hear that you're so pumped. but take it easy with the shoulder otherwise you'll end up with a bad rotator cuff. Despite the fact that you're right on one now I'd ease up a bit and give yourself a rest otherwise you may injure your shoulder. If you're going to practice like wrist spinner you need to do some exercises that'll build strength into your shoulders and you should look at doing "rotational press ups" and exercises using resistant bands - grab the ends of the bands and pull them apart around the back of your head smooth action not jerky and fast.

What do you reckon the key to all this was? I reckon it's the fact that you've practiced on your own and you've been able to focus on all the things that you've needed to look at - am I right?

But it's good to hear that you've done so well - well done, but you need to temper your excitement as you normally have periods when it doesn't come together as well, so be prepared for that to happen as well, but just ride it and keep plugging away at your leg break - line and length and getting it to turn.

yeh, practicing without a batsman was extremely sound advice. just bowling delivery after delivery and being able to focus on exactly what im doing without losing concentration watching a batsman move around is much more useful. it was useful to practice with a batsman first though as it makes visualising their positioning, shots, etc much easier relative to what im doing. like i know that even though a ball that pitches well outside leg stump and comes back in to bounce over middle stump, it would be easy to play onto the leg side. it needs to be more to the off side than that to be a good ball. without a batsman there its easy to think that anything wide of off stump would just miss them completely. the bat tends to end up outside of off stump quite a lot though in reality. on the other hand, id guess once youve mastered line and length its very easy to vary it, so practicing without a batsman is easily the best way. i realise that now more than i did before.

the other things that made the progress so rapid today were just self realisations. ive obviously only been bowling for a VERY short amount of time, this was only my 4th ever proper practice session. i bowled more balls today alone than i have in all the other sessions put together. and being able to analyse your action and mime it and then pause mid action and think about where your feet are, what your arm is doing, etc makes it easy to make corrections. again though, with a batsman they are up the other end getting impatient just wanting deliveries bowled. more reason to practice alone!

ive been trying to have a play with the camcorder to record the ball spinning it between my hands. i drew a line on it with a marker pen and i was going to try and clock the revolutions. but the camera with a 30fps rate cant capture the line every revolution by the looks of it, its missing some out. so i guess that means its got at least 30 revs per second, which is pretty insane! i dont trust the camera though, its old and rubbish and the picture is fairly blurry, so i could be totally wrong. i need one of these new HD cameras with super slow motion capture on them. that would do it!

if i can get some video in the nets i should be able to, in theory, figure out how fast the ball is travelling as well, give or take a couple of mph. again though, im not sure the camera will be capable of doing it accurately enough. il have to see. just having some video to look at myself and show to you guys for some analysis will be useful though.

 

[macca]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Macca, have you read Time of the Tiger, if so is it worth a read do you think?

I think that is by whitington? I have not read it for a while. I remember there is some stuff about his bowling methods and field settings. He bowled mainly googlies at two short legs according to whitington i think.
I have to have a look at all whitingtons stuff, he was at first slip to Grimmett and Pepper and knew a little of what they were up to. More than Bradman, who was out of the loop. I am finding the first reports of the word flipper in whitington in 1950.

 

[Ripping-LegBreak]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

The big leg break does exist. I am very round arm and not as elegant as you young guns.

I'm Round arm too but I made one slight tweak to my bowling action. Before it wasn't really round arm ( though i thought it was) it was just that my bowling arm wasn't reaching to the top of the peak, ie i was flicking my wrist too early before my arm got into a decent height.

Anyways i was watching the likes of Mitchell Johnson, Fidel Edwards the fast slingers and I noticed one thing. To ensure the proper rotation of the arm in a directed way they flung their bowling arm behind and to the left side of their right hip ( for a right handed bowler) and this movement meant that the arm had to go around in a more natural directed movemen across the body. I've adopted this method and my legbreaks are coming out more naturally and effectively as the body,arm,pivot,wrist are all going *around* in the same direction.

The point of this post was to ask, do you have a similiar method when you bowl round arm?

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I think that is by whitington? I have not read it for a while. I remember there is some stuff about his bowling methods and field settings. He bowled mainly googlies at two short legs according to whitington i think.
I have to have a look at all whitingtons stuff, he was at first slip to Grimmett and Pepper and knew a little of what they were up to. More than Bradman, who was out of the loop. I am finding the first reports of the word flipper in whitington in 1950.

I might get that then as it'll probably have some stuff in there regarding The Fox

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I'm Round arm too but I made one slight tweak to my bowling action. Before it wasn't really round arm ( though i thought it was) it was just that my bowling arm wasn't reaching to the top of the peak, ie i was flicking my wrist too early before my arm got into a decent height.

Anyways i was watching the likes of Mitchell Johnson, Fidel Edwards the fast slingers and I noticed one thing. To ensure the proper rotation of the arm in a directed way they flung their bowling arm behind and to the left side of their right hip ( for a right handed bowler) and this movement meant that the arm had to go around in a more natural directed movemen across the body. I've adopted this method and my legbreaks are coming out more naturally and effectively as the body,arm,pivot,wrist are all going *around* in the same direction.

The point of this post was to ask, do you have a similiar method when you bowl round arm?

I agree, and as to the point of the right hand going to the left of the right hip. If you see Grimmett's video that is on dave's legspin site, he clearly does this. I think it also gives more momentum to the arm. I use this for the small leg break, for the big legbreak, I get the hand brushing my right hip, then flick it forward and the seam points at right angles to the batsman. Sometimes move my wrist too much and ends up as a slider/backspinner unintentionally.

 

[macca]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I might get that then as it'll probably have some stuff in there regarding The Fox

I will send you a photocopy of "tricking the batsman" by c v grimmett.1932. It might take a couple of weeks cause i am heading away on holidays.
That book has a lot of his tricks and theories on how to get batsmen out.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I'm Round arm too but I made one slight tweak to my bowling action. Before it wasn't really round arm ( though i thought it was) it was just that my bowling arm wasn't reaching to the top of the peak, ie i was flicking my wrist too early before my arm got into a decent height.

Anyways i was watching the likes of Mitchell Johnson, Fidel Edwards the fast slingers and I noticed one thing. To ensure the proper rotation of the arm in a directed way they flung their bowling arm behind and to the left side of their right hip ( for a right handed bowler) and this movement meant that the arm had to go around in a more natural directed movemen across the body. I've adopted this method and my legbreaks are coming out more naturally and effectively as the body,arm,pivot,wrist are all going *around* in the same direction.

The point of this post was to ask, do you have a similiar method when you bowl round arm?

I'm of the Richie Benaud school of very vertical arm position as far as I know - sometimes going past vertical I think, so I can't help with this. Round arm to me is an alien concept.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Nice one Macca. I just quoted you in my blog saying that at the minute I'm a bit lost as to what I should be doing with my bowling. I've kind of got a bit tied up in the looking at the Stats trap that you can get yourself into doing and found myself on Saturday worrying about losing my place in the stats wars at the club. Which I think is probably a really unhealthy thing to be doing if you're looking to bowl well? I'd rather not know about the stats and just go for getting wickets and as you said if you take that approach the stats just look after themselves. So I went back a week or so and found your quote and decided that this'll be my philosophy.....

"Mate, you are way ahead on those figures even without seeing the number of overs bowled. If you kept that up you could end up playing for Essex!
I wouldn't worry about runs per over, you have to get the other bastards out and back in the f****ing sheds. That is how you keep the runs down and win games.
Who wants to play or watch cricket when the scoring rate is below 4 runs an over"?

But back to the original point - For the last three years I've had clear objectives and goals and now I seem to have got to where I wanted to be and now I'm looking to push on and get better. Any suggestions as to what I should be doing?

Drift I suppose is the logical answer as that's something I don't recognise in my own bowling. So where do I start with drift?

 

[Ripping-LegBreak]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I'm of the Richie Benaud school of very vertical arm position as far as I know - sometimes going past vertical I think, so I can't help with this. Round arm to me is an alien concept.

Doesn't it feel weird when your bowling from a vertical arm, i mean if your flicking your wrist to the left for a standard legbreak then it's natural for the arm to go in the same direction. Having the arm in a vertical position will make it harder for the ball to be flicked out as the arm will follow it's initial straight path. Maybe that's why your finding it difficult to bowl a legbreak and easy to bowl googlies and topspinners. Having said that Abdul Qadir, Mushtaq Ahmed, Cameron White, Anil Kumble, Upul Chandana, county spinner Will Beer, and Shahid Afridi. All these players have high arm actions and some of them have been quite successfull.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I will send you a photocopy of "tricking the batsman" by c v grimmett.1932. It might take a couple of weeks cause i am heading away on holidays.
That book has a lot of his tricks and theories on how to get batsmen out.

Where you off to - you surfing at all?

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

No it don't feel weird as that's how I've always done it as far as I know. I'll have a look at a video of myself done recently and see how vertical it actually is but I'm pretty sure it's 12.00 o'clock straight.

Well 12.30 ish now I've looked but certainly not round armed.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

There's not a lot out there on 'Drift', I've not come across anything at all yet!

 

[sadspinner]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Doesn't it feel weird when your bowling from a vertical arm, i mean if your flicking your wrist to the left for a standard legbreak then it's natural for the arm to go in the same direction. Having the arm in a vertical position will make it harder for the ball to be flicked out as the arm will follow it's initial straight path. Maybe that's why your finding it difficult to bowl a legbreak and easy to bowl googlies and topspinners. Having said that Abdul Qadir, Mushtaq Ahmed, Cameron White, Anil Kumble, Upul Chandana, county spinner Will Beer, and Shahid Afridi. All these players have high arm actions and some of them have been quite successfull.

Yes, they did not turn it much bar Qadir. All vertical armed. The biggest turners funnily seemed to be rather round armed eg grimmett, MacGill and quite round arm warne, so what you say about round arm being more in the arc to help the big leg break makes a lot of sense to me. The down side is that the googly would probably suffer, only MacGill had a good wrong one of the round armers though Mr Grimmett might not agree. I, for one simply cannot get my arm vertical, possibly due to senility. Even bowling offbreaks with a vertical arm is nigh to impossible for me.

 

[Virendersingh.berthwal]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Jim,

If u could post a bowling video of yours...then it will be helpfull in understanding ur leg spin bowling and lot of us will be able to give u more feedback on the same.

Shoot it from the keeper's end...

Virender

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

and im back down to earth now. just had an hour session where nothing worked at all. my basic leg breaks were top spinners, my drifting leg breaks were googlies. no drift, minimal spin, poor line and length, just an all round awful session really.

the only positive is that i know what was going wrong. i could practice my action without a ball and it was spot on, the same as yesterday. put a ball in my hand and bowled and i was struggling for length, probably tiredness in the muscles from yesterday. so i was having to try too hard. i was overly tense, my wrist was doing something really odd and going in this stupid loop and i couldnt stop it, this was generating top spin and googly spin instead of leg spin, even when the rest of my action was spot on. i was so pleased with yesterdays progress though that i couldnt curb my enthusiasm. a lesson learned. next time i need to give myself at least a days recovery time until my muscles are used to the work they are doing.

on the plus side, i visited a local cricket shop that i found out about on the internet, figuring that they might know of some local sides that are looking for players. the guy who runs the shop said i should pop along to the side that he plays fors training session on Thursday evening. so looks like i might find myself somewhere to practice and maybe even play for once my bowling has some consistency

just to add something to the arm angle discussion. when i was bowling well yesterday my arm was coming around, much like Shane Warnes action, sort of at 45 degrees, maybe slightly higher. today my arm was much nearer to vertical, i think as a side product of struggling to produce length. my natural reaction was to bowl more like a seamer. this was generating plenty of top spin, my top spin deliveries (that were supposed to be leg breaks!!) were awesome lol, and i was bowling googlies for the first time, by accident. however when i did rarely manage a leg break, they were small. i think the round arm technique is quite important, and if it isnt an aspect of your game then it may at least be worth some experimentation.

P.S. i was watching Shane Warne videos on YouTube this morning for some extra inspiration. i watched his "ball of the century" delivery several times, that is literally the same delivery i was bowling 1 in every 5 balls by the end of my session yesterday. but i was getting more turn, the same amount of drift, a bit more over spin (mine zipped up and over the stumps, his stayed quite low), but off of a concrete pitch without the giant foot hole!! it may sound like im exaggerating, but im genuinely not. this may give an idea as to why i was so excited yesterday evening. i just cant beleive how good yesterday was. and how awful today was lol. the life and times of a rookie leg spinner...

 

[Jim2109]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Jim,

If u could post a bowling video of yours...then it will be helpfull in understanding ur leg spin bowling and lot of us will be able to give u more feedback on the same.

Shoot it from the keeper's end...

Virender

i think this is something for the future. at present my action has so many flaws and inconsistencies that id have to video about 20 deliveries just to show them all lol. i need to find a consistent action that does the same thing near enough every delivery, and then i can start to look for the small improvements here and there. right now there would be too wide a range of things to work on at once, i just need to put in practice time and bowl some deliveries

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Yeah hang in there mate and look after your shoulder, ease into this if you are going to practice intensively. Give yourself a couple of days off and go back to it and if you're bowling every day try not to do too many mammoth sessions maybe do 45 minutes at a time and two or three times a day once you've got the muscles. If your shoulder is sore I'd rest it if I was you. If you damage your rotator cuff muscles it'll take an operation to fix it if it's bad - you should check it out on the internet and see the potential for permanent damage.

 

[leggielaw]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

hey guys,

i watched ur rotation vid Dave and i thought i could give my opinion on what could improve,

As you release the ball your right leg is alredy mid-air therefore your releasing the ball on one leg which isnt really a steady basis in terms of balancing whilst thinking about ripping the ball etc..

I release the ball with both feet firmly on floor in a side on stance, after releasing the ball because of the rotation of your shoulder, hips etc this should make your right leg kick ur behind and you should complete the rotation.

i use to release the ball the same as i was rotating to early but now my bowlings heaps bettr in many ways so i hope this might work for you, but everyones different so if your bowling is going gd i dont see why you should have to change.

 

[Ripping-LegBreak]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

, for the big legbreak, I get the hand brushing my right hip, then flick it forward

So for the big legbreak your hand just comes up from behind the right hip rather than to side of it? I may give this a go.

Also to clarify my bowling action it isn't a big drawing back of the bowling arm, it is only slightly to the side of the right hip, if you draw it back alot you can end up bowling short theortically.

How much to the left do you draw back your bowling arm? Maybe if i want to bowl flatter i can draw it back more to the left for it to gain more momentum and more speed?

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I certainly wont ignore what you're saying, what I'll do now is go on youtube and just have a look to see how some of the pro's do it and see if it makes any sense with regards to what you're saying.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

The technicalities of where your arm ends up and starts off is way off my radar. Do you reckon these details make a big difference?