Get yourself a good Practice Ball!

It is essential to have a good swinging cricket ball in your hands for your practice sessions. Here are some good packages for your Practice sessions. Choose a good one.

Choosing Correct Footwear

Cricket shoes are equipped with spikes or rubber studs to provide players with the best grip possible. When selecting your footwear, the most important factor is finding a pair of shoes that is comfortable. Batsman and bowlers commonly wear different types of shoes; however, manufacturers also produce multi-purpose shoes. Batting shoes tend to have spikes at the front of the shoe with fewer at the back, while bowling shoes have spikes all over the sole to provide extra traction. Bowlers' footwear is also designed to offer more ankle support and heel cushioning to help cope with the stress that their feet are subjected to. Below is my recommendation.

Fast Bowling Legend: Imran Khan

Imran Khan Niazi (Seraiki Pathan, Urdu: عمران خان نیازی; (in Hindi - इमरान ख़ान नियाज़ी) born 25 November, 1952) is a Pakistani politician and former Pakistanicricketer, playing international cricket for two decades in the late twentieth century. After retiring, he entered politics. Currently, besides his political activism, Khan is also a philanthropist, cricket commentator and Chancellor of the University of Bradford and Founder and Chairman Board of Governors of Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital & Research Centre.

Khan played for the Pakistani cricket team from 1971 to 1992 and served as its captain intermittently throughout 1982-1992. After retiring from cricket at the end of the 1987 World Cup, he was called back to join the team in 1988. At 39, Khan led his teammates to Pakistan's first and only World Cup victory in 1992. He has a record of 3807 runs and 362 wickets in Test cricket, making him one of eight world cricketers to have achieved an 'All-rounder's Triple' in Test matches. On 14 July 2010, Khan was inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.

In April 1996, Khan founded and became the chairman of a political party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (Movement for Justice). He represented Mianwali as a member of the National Assembly from November 2002 to October 2007.

Bowling Action

At the end of the run-up the bowler will bring his or her lead foot down on the pitch with the knee as straight as possible. This aids in generating speed but can be dangerous due to the pressure placed on the joint by this action. Knee injuries are not uncommon amongst fast bowlers: for example the English pace bowler David Lawrence was sidelined for many months after splitting his kneecap in two. The pressure on the leading foot is such that some fast bowlers cut the front off their shoes to stop their toes from being injured as they are repeatedly pressed against the inside of the shoe. The bowler will then bring their bowling arm up over their head and release the ball at the height appropriate to where they want the ball to pitch. 

             Again, the arm must be straight although this is a stipulation of the laws of cricket rather than an aid to speed. Bending the elbow and "chucking" the ball would make it too easy for the bowler to aim accurately at the batsman's wicket and get them out. Fast bowlers tend to have an action which leaves them either side-on or chest-on at the end of the run up. A chest on bowler has chest and hips aligned towards the batsman at the instant of back foot contact, while a side on bowler has chest and hips aligned at ninety degrees to the batsman at the instant of back foot contact. West Indian bowler Malcolm Marshall was a classic example of a chest on bowler, while Australian pace bowler Dennis Lillee used a side on technique to great effect.

How is a Rich Red Test Cricket Ball Made?

Run-Up

The term "run-up" is a cricketing term which refers to the approach a bowler makes when preparing to deliver the ball. The ball must be delivered from behind a bowling crease, but preparation to bowl the ball can be done any way the bowler wishes. Every different bowler approaches the wicket in a personal way, and so there can be many and varied "run-ups".

However, as a general rule the different types of bowlers use similar approaches to each other. For example, Spin bowlers tend to have very short run-ups, some even approach the bowling crease at a walking pace. Medium bowlers tend to run up off a short run-up of about 10 paces or so. Fast bowlers tend to have long, rhythmical run-ups to allow them to develop momentum which adds to their ability to bowl the ball at high speeds.

Basic Fast Bowling Deliveries

There are many different types of delivery that a bowler can bowl. These deliveries vary by; technique, the hand the bowler bowls with, use of the fingers, use of the seam, how the ball is positioned in the hand, where the ball is pitched on the wicket, the speed of the ball, and the tactical intent of the bowler.

• Bouncer
• Inswinger
• Reverse swing
• Leg cutter
• Off cutter
• Outswinger
• Yorker

Basic Fast Bowling Grip

The normal cricket ball grip for fast or seam bowlers is to have your fore fingers and index fingers on either side of the seam. The inside of the thumb will lie on the underside of the seam, below the first two fingers. Be sure to relax when gripping a cricket ball  - grip the ball loosely. This will allow the ball to leave your hand easily. Conversely gripping it too tightly will result in a greater chance of spraying the ball, and also dragging the ball down and bowling too short. Bowlers tend to grip the ball too tightly at the start of their spell when they are nervous – so just remember to relax.  Another useful hint is to cover the ball with your non-bowling hand as you run in. This will conceal your grip and make the batsman wonder what you’re up to. 

Making of the Cricket ball

A cricket ball is a hard, solid leather ball used to play cricket. Constructed of cork and leather, a cricket ball is heavily regulated by cricket law at first class level. The manipulation of a cricket ball, through employment of its various physical properties, is the staple component of bowling and dismissing batsmen – movement in the air, and off the ground, is influenced by the condition of the ball and the efforts of the bowler, while working on the cricket ball to obtain an optimum condition is a key role of the fielding side. The cricket ball is the principal manner through which the batsman scores runs, by manipulating the ball into a position where it would be safe to take a run, or by directing the ball through the boundary.

In Test cricket and most domestic games that spread over a multitude of days, the cricket ball is traditionally coloured red. In many one day cricket matches, the ball is coloured white. Training balls of white, red and pink are also common, and wind balls and tennis balls in a cricket motif can be used for training or unofficial cricket matches. During cricket matches, the quality of the ball changes to a point where it is no longer usable, and during this decline its properties alter and thus influence the match. Altering the state of the cricket ball outside the permitted manners designated in the rules of cricket is prohibited during a match, and 'ball tampering' has resulted in numerous controversies.

Cricket balls, weighing between 155.9 and 163.0 grams, are known for their hardness and for the risk of injury involved when using them. The danger of cricket balls was a key motivator for the introduction of protective equipment. Injuries are often recorded in cricket matches due to the ball, and a small number of fatalities have been recorded or attributed to cricket balls.

Categorisation of fast bowling

It is possible for a bowler to concentrate solely on speed, especially when young, but as fast bowlers mature they pick up new skills and tend to rely more on swing bowling or seam bowling techniques. Most fast bowlers will specialise in one of these two areas and will sometimes be categorised as swing or seam bowler. However, this classification is not satisfactory because the categories are not mutually exclusive and a skilled bowler will usually bowl a mixture of fast, swinging, seaming and also cutting balls, even if he or she prefers one style to the others. Instead, it is more common to subdivide fast bowlers according to the average speed of their deliveries, as follows.

• Fast - Naturally refers to bowlers who can bowl the quickest. The cut-off point is generally an average delivery speed in the late 80s, but many quicks exceed that on a consistent basis.
• Fast medium - Sometimes used interchangeably with medium fast, this refers to bowlers between 80 and 87 miles per hour on average.
• Medium fast - Slower still, this is for bowlers who check in at between 70 and 79 miles per hour on average.
• Medium - Blurring the distinction between spinners and quicks by relying on their guile to take wickets, medium pacers are often part-time bowlers or batting all-rounders coming in at around 60 and 69 miles per hour on average.

Pace Bowling - The Definition

Pace bowling, sometimes known as Fast bowling, is one of the two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket. The other is spin bowling. Practitioners are usually known as fast bowlers, fastmen, pace bowlers, or pacemen, although sometimes the label used refers to the specific fast bowling technique the bowler prefers, such as swing bowler or seam bowler.

The main aim of fast bowling is to bowl the hard cricket ball at high speed and to induce it to bounce off the pitch in an erratic fashion or move sideways through the air, factors which make it difficult for thebatsman to hit the ball cleanly. A typical fast delivery has a speed in the range of 136 to 150 km/h (85 to 95 mph). The fastest delivery officially recorded was clocked at 161.38 km/h (100.3 mph) and was bowled by Shoaib Akhtar of Pakistan during a match against England in the 2003 World Cup. The batsman facing the delivery was Nick Knight, who guided it into the leg side.

In most cricketing countries, fast bowlers are considered to be the mainstay of a team's bowling attack, with slower bowlers in support roles. In the subcontinent, especially India and Sri Lanka, the reverse is often true, with fast bowlers serving mainly to soften the ball up for the spinners. This is largely due to the condition of the pitches used in those countries which gives more help to spinners than to fast bowlers, but at international level it is also a reflection of the outstanding skills of their spinners compared to their pace bowlers. By way of contrast, the other major subcontinental country, Pakistan, has produced several generations of feared pacemen mainly due to that nation's mastery of reverse swing and having pitches that provide relatively more assistance to fast bowlers.