Plastic Balls For Practice

Top Contributors
I see you've cherry-picked your quotes again to give the false impression that they support your idiotic theory that huge turn is everything and accuracy is irrelevant. Swann actually goes onto say that whilst spinning the ball is important, huge turn is not necessary - its possible to bowl a great spell purely through relentless accuracy and drift.

Direct quote from the link above:

"Trying to spin the ball and actually turning it can be two quite different things, as hard pitches will often preclude a finger spinner from extracting much life. It is for this reason Swann rates his spell to Michael Clarke at the MCG during the fourth Ashes Test as the best of his career.

"That's the best I bowled for England, I hardly bowled a bad ball," he said. "It wasn't turning at all but I still managed to get a lot of drift and maintain pressure for the seamers at the other end. I regard that as my finest performance with the ball.

"My role turned into very much a holding role, allowing the seamers to build up pressure at the other end. All I did was try and bowl dot balls"



I'm sure many of the actual spin bowlers on this site (ie excluding trolls like boogiespinner) will be able to tell stories of similar performances. One of my personal favourite 5-fers was on a damp green track that didn't turn an inch - but through a combination of accuracy, drift, well thought-out field placings, and subtle changes of pace and angle, I picked up 5-23, with 3 bowled through the gate, 1 lbw and a caught behind of a thin edge.
 
Or Richie Benaud, who is unequivocal on the matter:

Tony Lewis: And a lot of tutors have been known to say, get a length first, and then spin the ball, but you are actually saying, spin is the priority?

Richie Benaud: Forget about the length. You have lots of bowlers, who are... just 'rollers'. They just put the ball there, and that suits them, particularly if they get a pitch that may have been prepared to help them, and they can then return good figures. But that is no good. It's like trying to teach a medium pacer to become a great fast bowler, you can't do it, he's got to have the pace first. And in this case, the legspinner must have the fierce spin, and then learn to control it, and that is going to take him, mind you, four years, before he can control it.

 
Last edited:
boogiespinner said:
Or Ritchie Benaud, who is unequivocal on the matter:

Tony Lewis: And a lot of tutors have been known to say, get a length first, and then spin the ball, but you are actually saying, spin is the priority?

Ritchie Benaud: Forget about the length. You have lots of bowlers, who are... just 'rollers'. They just put the ball there, and that suits them, particularly if they get a pitch that may have been prepared to help them, and they can then return good figures. But that is no good. It's like trying to teach a medium pacer to become a great fast bowler, you can't do it, he's got to have the pace first. And in this case, the legspinner must have the fierce spin, and then learn to control it, and that is going to take him, mind you, four years, before he can control it.

Click to expand...


Yeah, that's nonsense. But then Richie was never a coach, so it's not surprising he got some things wrong.

If I was you I'd listen to all the tutors that Tony Lewis references, who probably had a lot more experience of coaching spin bowling than good old Richie, who went straight from playing to commentary.
 
SLA said:
Yeah, that's nonsense. But then Richie was never a coach, so it's not surprising he got some things wrong.
Click to expand...
Yes why should I listen to Richie? Or Peter Philpott, or Peter Such, or Shane Warne, or Terry Jenner, or Graeme Swann - YOU are the master bowler and guru!

Then maybe one day if I really practiced diligently I might achieve the absolute zenith of spin bowling, taking 5 wickets in an amateur game in which no ball turned whatsoever
 
Last edited:
boogiespinner said:
Yes why should I listen to Richie? Or Peter Philpott, or Peter Such, or Shane Warne, or Terry Jenner, or Graeme Swann - YOU are the master bowler and guru!

Then maybe one day if I really practiced diligently I might achieve the absolute zenith of spin bowling, taking 5 wickets in an amateur game in which no ball turned whatsoever
Click to expand...

Better then being a 40 year old still bowling into the side netting mate.

Listen to people who know what they're talking about. Coaches. I've met most of those people and talked spin bowling with them. What have you got? An old video you dredged up off YouTube? Pathetic
 
SLA said:
Better then being a 40 year old still bowling into the side netting mate.

Listen to people who know what they're talking about. Coaches. I've met most of those people and talked spin bowling with them. What have you got? An old video you dredged up off YouTube? Pathetic
Click to expand...
oh man, you have talked to coaches! That settles it. :)

"He who can, does.
He who cannot, teaches"
George Bernard Shaw, "Maxims for Revolutionists"

No wonder Graeme Swann has such a bugbear about this.
 
Last edited:
"The basics of the game will always remain the same, but the most important thing you can do as a spin bowler is to spin the ball as hard as you can. That will get you the drop and drift in the air you need to get the break and bounce off the pitch, so no matter what you’re doing you need to spin the ball hard. It then comes down to the different sort of skills and attributes that you need to be effective in the three different formats. But, whatever the format, the basics are the same so with any young spin bowler you must encourage them to spin the ball hard and then if they can put that into a bowling action that is repeatable, they will get the consistency that they need and then you can build things from there."

Peter Such
ECB Lead Spin Bowling Coach

source
 
boogiespinner said:
"The basics of the game will always remain the same, but the most important thing you can do as a spin bowler is to spin the ball as hard as you can. That will get you the drop and drift in the air you need to get the break and bounce off the pitch, so no matter what you’re doing you need to spin the ball hard. It then comes down to the different sort of skills and attributes that you need to be effective in the three different formats. But, whatever the format, the basics are the same so with any young spin bowler you must encourage them to spin the ball hard and then if they can put that into a bowling action that is repeatable, they will get the consistency that they need and then you can build things from there."

Peter Such
ECB Lead Spin Bowling Coach

source
Click to expand...

More strawmen arguments.
This is becoming a serious problem. You're either chronically stupid or you're taking the piss. Either way, it's not contributing to this forum in any way. Please stop.
 
TBH, this idea that there is a "most important" thing to spin bowling is fundamentally idiotic. Asking "which is more important in spin bowling, spin or accuracy?", is like asking "which is more important in safe driving, keeping your eyes open or keeping your hands on the wheel?" Both are equally important.

If you don't spin the ball, you're not a spin bowler. If you can't land the ball on the cut strip, you're not any kind of bowler at all. Its not a choice.

Its also completely obvious to anyone who isn't a troll that you can't teach someone to bowl spin if they can't already at least do a basic bowling action. Its like trying to teach a toddler to base jump.
 
SLA said:
TBH, this idea that there is a "most important" thing to spin bowling is fundamentally idiotic. Asking "which is more important in spin bowling, spin or accuracy?", is like asking "which is more important in safe driving, keeping your eyes open or keeping your hands on the wheel?" Both are equally important.
Click to expand...
It's more like, what's more important, building foundations to a house, or building the upper stories?

Both are important but there is a logical ordering to the development.

Developing a fiercely-spun legbreak requires the freedom to lose accuracy as you do so. Once you decide to be nothing but accurate, you are settling for the spin you have so far achieved.
 
In my experience I was always more accurate the more I tried to spin the ball.
This was the case up to the point where technique would be sacrificed in order to try and generate more spin, which would of course generate less spin because technique is compromised.
But to put real effort into putting revs on the ball always made me concentrate that much harder which improved pace, spin and accuracy as well.
The best spin bowlers are all evidence of the fact that spinning the ball harder is no excuse for inaccuracy. In fact, the best spinners of the ball have often been the most accurate bowlers. If you only try to be accurate you won't be nearly as accurate or efficient as a bowler that has to use real effort and concentration in order to produce a spinning delivery and pitch it on the ideal line and length, and the more spin the ball has the bigger the margin for error will be anyway, leading to the illusion of more "accurate" bowling.
 
That is interesting

I can't claim to have mastered accuracy particularly with variations. I am sure of this though. if you are doing it well, the pace generating movements are absolutely integrated with the spinning action. They are not separate. So, bowling with more pace means more spin, not less, and the idea is to push this as far as is technically possible. The only proviso I have found is that one can 'choke' the ball at the release point to convert pace into spin and when I have been getting that in practice, that is when people start looking from the other nets to wonder what on earth is going on
 
boogiespinner said:
It's more like, what's more important, building foundations to a house, or building the upper stories?

Both are important but there is a logical ordering to the development.

Developing a fiercely-spun legbreak requires the freedom to lose accuracy as you do so. Once you decide to be nothing but accurate, you are settling for the spin you have so far achieved.
Click to expand...


Yes, but, speaking as someone who has taught hundred of kids how to bowl, and many of them to become decent spin bowlers, I assure you, the "foundations" of any successful spin bowler are a solid bowling action, and then the additional stuff, like spin, pace, swing, etc, are the upper stories.

You don't take a group of 10 year olds and say "right - you're a legspinner, you're an offspinner, you're a swing bowler, you're a pace bowler". You teach them all to bowl, well enough to bowl in matches against other 10 year olds, and then encourage them to have a go at swinging the ball, spinning the ball, bowling fast, and see a) what they find interesting and b) what they show a natural aptitude for.

and then - really important point here - you DON'T make them choose. You encourage them to keep trying different types of bowling until they're maybe 14 or 15. I have a few juniors I am training right now who are 14/15 who could still go either way and become either good spinners or good fast bowlers. Having the foundation of a solid, repeatable bowling action allows them that choice.
 
Had a couple of days off so I'm a little lost where this thread has gone to. Can I just check I'm following it correctly?

S SLA is making statements along the following lines:
-Make practice as close to match conditions as possible.
-Hockey balls are the best substitutes he is aware of if you are in a situation where you can't practice on grass
-Putting revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is only one of the weapons of a spin bowler, drift/dip/pace/bounce being amongst the others
-Learning to bowl straight (accurately?) well enough is a key skill as it gives you more opportunities for practice/game time and should be a priority for all bowlers - an equivalent to the 'Don't run before you can walk' metaphor?

B boogiespinner is making statements along the following lines:
-Revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is the most observable way of checking how much spin you are imparting (and therefore a good training tool?)
-Overload/Underload training (Post-Activation Potentiation - also hilariously abbreviated to PAP) popularised by Steffan Jones is a cricket training technique that has merit for fast bowlers and therefore shouldn't be ignored just because you are training for spin.
-It feels more rewarding to bowl knowing your technique for imparting revs on the balls is working and then refine the technique to bring accuracy in later knowing your practising a correct technique.

Have I understood this about right?

It feels as though the nugget of the discussion is around the steps to mastery (in a (massively) simplified way - 'bowl straight where you want it then add spin' vs 'bowl spin then learn to put it where you want it').
 
MagicDave said:
Had a couple of days off so I'm a little lost where this thread has gone to. Can I just check I'm following it correctly?

S SLA is making statements along the following lines:
-Make practice as close to match conditions as possible.
-Hockey balls are the best substitutes he is aware of if you are in a situation where you can't practice on grass
-Putting revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is only one of the weapons of a spin bowler, drift/dip/pace/bounce being amongst the others
-Learning to bowl straight (accurately?) well enough is a key skill as it gives you more opportunities for practice/game time and should be a priority for all bowlers - an equivalent to the 'Don't run before you can walk' metaphor?

B boogiespinner is making statements along the following lines:
-Revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is the most observable way of checking how much spin you are imparting (and therefore a good training tool?)
-Overload/Underload training (Post-Activation Potentiation - also hilariously abbreviated to PAP) popularised by Steffan Jones is a cricket training technique that has merit for fast bowlers and therefore shouldn't be ignored just because you are training for spin.
-It feels more rewarding to bowl knowing your technique for imparting revs on the balls is working and then refine the technique to bring accuracy in later knowing your practising a correct technique.

Have I understood this about right?

It feels as though the nugget of the discussion is around the steps to mastery (in a (massively) simplified way - 'bowl straight where you want it then add spin' vs 'bowl spin then learn to put it where you want it').
Click to expand...
M MagicDave thanks for the synopsis! I'll try to speak for myself here:
"Revolutions on the ball is key" - YES, and this should be the primary aim of spinning practice
"Turn is the most observable way of checking how much spin you are imparting" - um not quite. turn is a desirable end product once you are spinning the ball hard. To turn the ball hard you need to have a hard spinning ball rotating about a suitable seam angle. So if you are getting big turn great, but it's not necessary to seek that in a practice session unless that's your aim. I actually like practicing topspinners, and I can judge how much they are spinning by the flight of the ball, the pace off the pitch, and if you are getting fizz through the air, you know you are spinning it hard
"Overload / Underload training"... this wasn't really about the particular merits of weighted / unweighted ball training, it's quoted as evidence against the philosophy that one should seek to emulate match conditions in practice. I believe in changing those conditions, in particular practising off one pace for simplicity and access to higher volumes of deliveries, practicing off shortened distances, and practicing mostly without batsmen (they just get in the way, and prevent you experimenting for fear of bowling inaccurately)
"-It feels more rewarding to bowl knowing your technique for imparting revs on the balls is working and then refine the technique to bring accuracy in later knowing your practising a correct technique." Absolutely

"It feels as though the nugget of the discussion is around the steps to mastery (in a (massively) simplified way - 'bowl straight where you want it then add spin' vs 'bowl spin then learn to put it where you want it'). YES, also pace too, I say practice for maximum spin, and let the pace develop naturally with your spinning action.

The other main contention is over altering practice conditions as previously mentioned.

SEAM UP - I absolutely approve of seam up practice, I think it's important, perhaps even crucial that spin bowlers should be able to bowl a respectable seam up, and the faster the better. if someone decided, oh I can't bowl seam up so I'll bowl spin, they are missing the point: much of the the engine that generates pace in seam up is also crucial to generating pace and spin when bowling spin. I believe it is no coincidence that many great spin bowlers started out as seam bowlers. However, I don't think spin bowling should be viewed as seam up with added spin, it is more complex, and the route to spin mastery is not 'bowl seam up and then increase the amount of spin'. It is 'spin it as hard as possible and then find more spin with pace and then control it'

One criticism of my philosophy made by SLA which I take fairly is that one might spend years never controlling the ball and being a useful match bowler at amateur level. I say, so be it: it is the practice of the art that interests me for its own sake.
 
MagicDave said:
Had a couple of days off so I'm a little lost where this thread has gone to. Can I just check I'm following it correctly?

S SLA is making statements along the following lines:
-Make practice as close to match conditions as possible.
-Hockey balls are the best substitutes he is aware of if you are in a situation where you can't practice on grass
-Putting revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is only one of the weapons of a spin bowler, drift/dip/pace/bounce being amongst the others
-Learning to bowl straight (accurately?) well enough is a key skill as it gives you more opportunities for practice/game time and should be a priority for all bowlers - an equivalent to the 'Don't run before you can walk' metaphor?

B boogiespinner is making statements along the following lines:
-Revs on the ball is key.
-Turn is the most observable way of checking how much spin you are imparting (and therefore a good training tool?)
-Overload/Underload training (Post-Activation Potentiation - also hilariously abbreviated to PAP) popularised by Steffan Jones is a cricket training technique that has merit for fast bowlers and therefore shouldn't be ignored just because you are training for spin.
-It feels more rewarding to bowl knowing your technique for imparting revs on the balls is working and then refine the technique to bring accuracy in later knowing your practising a correct technique.

Have I understood this about right?

It feels as though the nugget of the discussion is around the steps to mastery (in a (massively) simplified way - 'bowl straight where you want it then add spin' vs 'bowl spin then learn to put it where you want it').
Click to expand...


Yes, mostly correct. Although I have never said that you should learn perfect accuracy before learning to spin the ball, that would be ridiculous. I've said that once you've mastered a basic bowling action (one that allows you to consistently get the ball to the batsman roughly straight, on one bounce), you can then begin to experiment with different types of bowling, and then practice your spin/swing/pace simultaneously with continuing to improve your accuracy, and that you should then continue to focus on spin, pace and accuracy throughout your career. I would never recommend that a spinner loses confidence in his bowling to an extent that he cowardly switches to bowling seam-up in games. That's an awful idea. You learn nothing, and If anything, mediocre seam bowling is more likely than mediocre spin bowling to get slapped around.


Overload/underload training is a perfectly viable means of attempting to increase pace in either baseball pitching or fast bowling. If adding additional pace is a specific aim, then it should be used as a short-term complement to "normal" practice. I've never heard of a spin bowler attempting to use it - because spin bowlers generally aren't pushing at the frontier of their physical ability to generate pace anyway, so its largely irrelevant. The concept of "practice as you play" is pretty much the fundamental rule of all sports coaching, and you'll struggle to find a single coach in any discipline who disagrees with it.

Boogiespinner is currently experimenting with some unorthodox and inadvisable practice methods, against the advice of several professional coaches. As a result, he is suffering from shoulder injuries and showing extremely slow progress (if any) in terms of his development. Make of that what you will.


There is, sadly, a tendency amongst some amateur leg-spinners to develop a superiority complex over other bowlers, even other spin bowlers. Its a kind of way of massaging their own ego. They console themselves that even though they are ineffective bowlers, what they and they alone are doing is an "art", that they are the most "pure" spinners, and they don't even need to work on improving their bowling through worrying about things like boring things like accuracy and practicing bowling to a batsman, because to do so would be to stray from the "one true path" of legspin, which they see as simply spinning the ball as hard as possible. They'd rather bowl a long hop that turns 2 foot before getting hit for six, than a perfectly bowled delivery that turns 6 inches and hits off stump. For them, showing off how big they can turn the ball is the sole reason for bowling. Its a childish circus trick, a form of willy-waving. The other things that normally motivate bowlers - the chance to engage in a battle of wits with the batsmen, or to contribute to their team's success, is of no interest to them. They occasionally claim that some professional bowler or other has the same childish philosophy as them, and occasionally misquote people like Warne to try and back this up. It is, of course, completely laughable, as anyone who has ever attended any of Warne's coaching seminars will confirm.

Boogiespinner probably has the worst case of this that I have ever encountered.



The other thing I think I mentioned, was that from a batsman's point of view, because of the nuances of the lbw rule, its actually easier to bat against a spinner turning the ball two feet than it is to bat against one spinning the ball 6 inches, and therefore there is actually very little reason to ever try to turn the ball that far other than as an occasional surprise delivery. This is well understood by most established spinners, but its still a reasonably advanced level of discussion and its no surprise that this claim promoted anger/confusion amongst some of the less experienced spinners here.
 
The concept of "practice as you play" is pretty much the fundamental rule of all sports coaching, and you'll struggle to find a single coach in any discipline who disagrees with it.
Click to expand...
Yet again, you quote this as fact with no evidence or even reasoning, in the face of evidence to the contrary.

Boogiespinner is currently experimenting with some unorthodox and inadvisable practice methods, against the advice of several professional coaches. As a result, he is suffering from shoulder injuries and showing extremely slow progress (if any) in terms of his development. Make of that what you will.
Click to expand...
There is little radical about practicing off one pace, and practicing off shortened distances, and practicing without a batsman, except in your coaching manual! And these are the things that you seem to most object to.

It's somewhat bizarre that you consider yourself in a position to comment on my progress or the health of my shoulder, you are really in no position to know about these.
 
SLA said:
The other thing I think I mentioned, was that from a batsman's point of view, because of the nuances of the lbw rule, its actually easier to bat against a spinner turning the ball two feet than it is to bat against one spinning the ball 6 inches, and therefore there is actually very little reason to ever try to turn the ball that far other than as an occasional surprise delivery. This is well understood by most established spinners, but its still a reasonably advanced level of discussion and its no surprise that this claim promoted anger/confusion amongst some of the less experienced spinners here.
Click to expand...
This is basically just pure and indeed obvious bullcrap.

Like all your other posts I suggest it is a rationalisation for your decision to give up attempting to actually spin the ball.

Let's note that you persist in using distance as a totally inappropriate measure of turn as it is length dependent.
 
boogiespinner said:
This is basically just pure and indeed obvious bullcrap.

Like all your other posts I suggest it is a rationalisation for your decision to give up attempting to actually spin the ball.

Let's note that you persist in using distance as a totally inappropriate measure of turn as it is length dependent.
Click to expand...

Childish, unnecessarily personal drivel that I have responded to several times already, but you seem to think that repeating the same crap as before somehow constitutes an argument.

At no point have I ever given up attempting to spin the ball. I guarantee I put significantly more revs on the ball than you do, and will ever be able to.

The difference is, I understand that spinning the ball hard is a means to an end, rather than an end in itself, and without combining hard spin with pinpoint accuracy, brisk pace, and strategic cunning, you're never going to be a successful bowler at any level.

Unfortunately, despite the attempts of myself and others on this site to help you, you will never be a successful bowler. You will never even be a competent bowler. You will never learn, and never improve. You're wasting your time. You're simply too stupid and too arrogant.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top