How bowlers have adapted to newer challenges

Necessity is the mother of invention, and by extension of innovation as well. Innovation is the need of the hour in today’s fast-paced world. It can be found in all spheres of life, from corporate to cricket. The industrial revolutions changed the world and made people busier. Fast food replaced elaborate dine outs. Time became a currency, changing the mindset of people. This change found its way into several sports, including cricket.

Test cricket, the classical form of cricket, was losing its sheen in the 1970s. Fans and players alike showed more interest in fast-paced games like basketball and football rather than cricket stretched over five days. Shorter formats became essential to save the gentleman’s game. Thus, ODIs were born. ODIs were very successful initially, but as the world evolved at breakneck speed, ODIs too seemed a bit monotonous as opposed to the hugely successful Twenty-20 format. T20s have changed the way cricket is played today. The battle between bat and ball has become more fierce, with one trying to out-do the other. The fight for supremacy led to many innovations and cross-sport adaptations in both batting and bowling.

During the early days of cricket, all bowlers had to bowl underarm. This led to batsmen pulverizing bowlers. As bowlers looked around for inspiration in the 1780s, an idea struck Kent cricketer John Willes, who was facing his sister Christina’s bowling in their garden. Christina was wearing a long skirt, typical of contemporary fashion. The skirt impeded the movement of her arm and to counter that she decided to bowl round-arm. After observing this, John attempted bowling round-arm while playing his next match at Lord’s, but every time he did that, the umpires called a no-ball. An angry John then quit cricket for good and rode away on his horse. Round-arm was consequently banned. A few years later, in 1835, round-arm was legalized. Over-arm bowling was then invented in 1864, and thus, bowling became the action it is today.

Bowlers felt the need for similar inspiration in limited-overs cricket. A plethora of batsmen and friendly rule changes, coupled with bigger blades and smaller grounds, have tilted the tide in favor of the batsman. Bowlers have to keep innovating and reinventing to ensure that there is an equal contest between bat and ball. Here are some innovations and adaptations made by bowlers:

1. The Knuckleball: The concept of the knuckleball is borrowed from baseball. The ball is gripped using the knuckles of the middle and the index finger and flicked out. Thus, the ball arrives slower than expected, sometimes with a hint of swing. The earliest practitioners were South African pacer Charl Langeveldt and Zaheer Khan. Indians fondly remember Zaheer’s knuckleball which dismissed Mike Hussey in the 2011 World Cup quarterfinals. More recently, Andrew Tye, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Siddharth Kaul have picked up loads of wickets with the help of the knuckleball.

2. Slower bouncer: The death overs of a T20 game give bowlers little margin for error. The yorker, while being successful if bowled accurately, is a valuable weapon for bowlers. Even a slight mistake during execution can cause a yorker to end up becoming a full toss, which is fodder to batsmen. A slower bouncer does not possess the same risk factor for bowlers. It forces batsmen to change the direction of their bat-swing, meaning if the ball takes even a slight edge, it almost certainly ends up in the hands of a fielder. Shaun Pollock used the slower bouncer to significant effect. While it is not a recent invention, it has been used prolifically in T20s.

3. Carrom Ball: Spin plays a vital role in the middle overs of limited-over matches. Captains use spinners for the dual task of breaking partnerships and choking the flow of runs. These roles are tailor-made for leg-spinners, who take the ball away from right-handers and can bowl the googly to southpaws. On the other hand, off-spinners look to vary their lengths and pace, which can often be predictable. The carrom ball, invented by Victorian spinner Jack Iverson just after the Second World War, was a forgotten act until Ajanta Mendis reintroduced it, causing havoc among batsmen across the world. Indian spinner Ravichandran Ashwin learnt another version of it from a friend, called the ‘Sodukku ball’ while batting during a gully cricket game. The speciality of this delivery is that you can get the ball to turn both ways, depending on which finger you let go off while releasing the ball. The ball drifts as well, creating doubts in the batsman’s mind.

4. Wide Yorker: While conventional yorkers have the sole function of getting wickets, the wide yorker ensures that the batsman cannot reach the ball, thereby resulting in a dot ball. It is a challenging skill to master and is the trusted weapon for Trent Boult, Mitchell Starc and Jasprit Bumrah.