gundalf's cricket blog - Page 4

gundalf7 · 3 Dec 2008, 16:39

there "should" be about 40 of us split between the 1st and 2nd team with about 13/14 selected for the main 1st team training. I'm guessing that most people just haven't been up for training so far from the season as the first few weeks we had 25-30 people for the main nets, indoor/fielding pratice is always low numbers

someblokecalleddave · 3 Dec 2008, 18:13

That's not so bad then? That might mean you could easily become the star of the 2nd XI if the other bloke gets the place on the 1st team? Then if you were to prove yourself to be affective in the 2nd XI you might get the call up later in the season? I think I'd rather be a big fish in a smaller pond than a small fish in a big pond?

gundalf7 · 4 Dec 2008, 06:09

To be fair I don't mind playing for the 2nds so much its just the difference in level as the 1sts will be playing at a fairly high level as last year they played oxford and loughborough whereas the 2nds will be pretty similar to club cricket. The season is only april- end of may for university cricket anyway. Hopefully i'll be playing club cricket at the same time to for the start of the season.

gundalf7 · 10 Jan 2009, 18:13

wow its been a whole month since I last updated this. Not much to tell though been practicing about an hour a week when i've got the chance. Every time i've practiced though its all been good the ball has been coimng out better than it ever has, can even hear the ball ripping from my hand. Started to see a bit of drift for some reason as well which must mean i'm getting the seam straighter. Looks like my normal bowling is only around 80-85% of how much spin I can put on the leg break as well as I seem to be able to up it to a level i've never done before. Looking at my action on video it looks like its changed a bit as well which maybe part of the reason for the extra bit. Will have to see if I can film myself close up again. Seem to have dropped off slightly this week after not bowling for 12 days or so and my accuracy isn't looking as good though the spin is still there. I think i'm falling over to my left to much sometimes and this makes the ball drop short or spear down leg.

someblokecalleddave · 11 Jan 2009, 14:50

Gundalf post some new vidz and I'll point you in the direction of some free software that you can get on-line and you have slow motion footage.

**Virendersingh.berthwal** · 17 Jan 2009, 09:48

Dave,

I have couple of my batting videos in the nets.
Can they be also modify in slow motion...or is there any software or procedure to edit the videos in terms of length...
One video is 682mb and the other one is close to 1gb.

I tried to upload in Youtube so then it can be attached in our cricketing forum but with no success.

Virender

someblokecalleddave · 18 Jan 2009, 15:38

Yeah

Get VirtualDub. Welcome to virtualdub.org! - virtualdub.org

Download it to your computer and save it somewhere that's easy to access. Click on the icon that's titled 'Virtual dub' and then follow the instructions. I'm rubbish at this kind of stuff but got it sussed in just a few minutes. If you have problems let me know. It allows you to edit the files into smaller chunks which still take ages to upload - I know the clips I've uploaded onto youtube are only a few seconds long but they're massive files 90MB kind of size.

Open your video file in virtualdub. Click on audio. Click no audio (this is needed, since if the video plays in slow motion, the duration of the audio won’t match). Then click video. Click direct stream copy (so the conversion is lossless). Then click video. Click frame rate. Under 'source rate adjustment' select the 'change to [blank] frames per second' bullet and type in a frame rate (smaller than the one on the line above it, obviously). Then click file, save as avi, and you’re done.

gundalf7 · 19 Jan 2009, 17:12

Not been a great week for me as a whole, ball hasn't come out right except for one session and have had alot of trouble with accuracy.

practiced wednesday and thursday afternoons for an hour or so but ball was barely coming out my hand right and the accuracy is the worst i've had for as long as I can remember, did video myself, looks a bit average , i've uploaded to youtube to see the difference from my old action, links are at the bottom of this post.

Friday- first indoor practice of the year doing a bit of indoor cricket and some fielding and fitness drills. Had a bat and looked a little better than I have for a while, though everything was off the back foot and mainly cross batted. Discovered the problem in my bowling my left foot hadn't been landing straight and was causing me to be off balance and causing the inaccuracy. Bowled well the ball came out beuatifully and the accuracy was really good got some good turn and even drift, picked up a couple of wickets in my second over. The bad side was during one of the drills practicing running between the wickets and slipped slightly and it looks like I may have pulled a muscle in my groin.

Sunday- First net of the year, batted at the start of the session for 15-20 mins and didn't get out once, tried to play with a straight bat off the front foot for once and watch the ball and it seemed to work though was a bit too focussed on the on side. Bowling was absolutely awful looks like I was having trouble gripping the cricket ball after bowling with a windball for so long was having trouble with the seam being pronunced. After the first ball at a decent pace I felt my groin go again and I seem to have aggravated it a good bit because its quite painful, didn't bowl properly after that just bowling off a pace with no body rotation.

Looks like I may need to rest for a while to heal.
Anyway the links to the vids of my bowling
YouTube - leg spin bowling
this has some slow-mos at the end but i've put a seperate slow-mo one up as well link below
YouTube - leg spin slowmo

and the old action to compare with
YouTube - my leg spin bowling action(old)

anyway thanks dave that virtualdub is really good much easier to adjust to what you want.

someblokecalleddave · 20 Jan 2009, 15:16

Drift - that's the Holy Grail that I'm after. Once or twice I've had people say - There was a nice bit of drift there Dave, but why and how it happens I haven't got a scoobies!

Gundalf I reckon you should rest up mate otherwise you'll be going into the new season Kerry Packered! That programs good, glad it was of some use to you.

I had a look at your new Vids. Man that is so much better - it looks like you've been checking out the Beau Casson clips!?

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=AaXEw9...e=channel_page

What do you reckon yourself - can you see the improvement in your technique? I love also the shots in the dark, but it looks like the balls turning massively even though you can't see B*****r all!

gundalf7 · 21 Jan 2009, 09:23

yeah i'm taking it easy this week probablly won't attempt to bowl again till sunday. The uni team have some indoor games comig up starting some time in the next few weeks though so I don't want to be out of action for too long.

Yeah I can see the improvement in my action especially with more energy through the crease and the trailing leg coming round much better. Main thing is looking at it a bit more closely it looks like I may be approaching a bit too quickly which causes me to be a little off balance even compared to the ones in the dark.

Unfortunately those shots in the dark were the only recent ones i'd got of me bowling actually showing it from the stumps. You can just about see it though if you put it on full screen, lol.

The drift I know is caused by the sidespin, but you have to seem to have the seam of the cricket ball close to horizontal with a lot of spin and more importantly the seam being perfectly steady. The problem I have is keeping the seam steady as it being slightly scrambled seems to stop the drift as bowlers like macgill and murali bowled scrambled seam and don't get much drift but when you watch warne the seam is nearly always perfect which is why you see things like the gatting ball.