Wrist Spin Bowling (part Five)

[shrek]

So what you are looking for is the full big picture. It occurs with the front knee hitting the floor and its relationship to the bowling arm coming up. When your knee just touches the ground your bowling arm should be around shoulder height and straight back. So between 1 and 2 the straightening of the knee happens to get through the crease -- or between 3 and 4 give or take for Curtley.

I think what you are talking about the bounding up and the upsetting of the rest of the rhythm comes from too early use of the bowling hand. I had a discussion with Chippyben last year about using the bowling arm later. It could also be able getting enough power through your back leg to get through the crease so you are not going up -- but through. This is something of using the centre of your back foot.

If you are having trouble then it is probably because of one of these two -- however it's probably difficult to know without looking at the action. Something of a lesson for me probably -- to post up images properly hehe.

Wow! you hit the nail on its head. I was just discussing with a fast bowler in our club about the bracing of the knee and when he couldn't understand what it meant, I tried to show it to him. In that process, I realized that the front knee is braced only if your delivery stride is long enough to be pushing off from your back foot - ( A parallel that batsmen might understand would be a front foot cover drive - bent front knee to lean into the drive, fully extended back knee to get as far down the pitch as possible). And I was just about to share my discovery here when I see that you have already diagnosed the problem.

But now that we have got to the root of the problem, I feel that I'd rather not change the length of the delivery stride and the way I go through the crease all at once. I have to admit it feels like letting go of my security blanket - a short delivery stride might not get me as much power into the action, but it allows me to pivot around the front leg which I feel is central to getting enough revs on the ball.

 

[chippyben]

I've uploaded some new vids of my pre-season practice sessions if anyone's interested in having a look.

This one where I'm working with the new flick out of the hand which I find a lot easier to get the 90 degree seam presentation and as you'll see it gets results. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c30z93LzTLQ if you look at our wicket in the paddock you might notice that it's angled downwards from left to right, so with the leg breaks you have to spin against the slope!

This one from a new angle looking over the fence gives a better sense of the turn I manage to get when it comes out right and you'll see I'm beginning to integrate the bound back into my deliveries as my knee get slowly better. There's a couple of wrong uns at the end with the white balls. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m6wBvuqntA

Some good leg breaks there in the second video, do you bowl from around the wicket a lot? I like the wrong uns, they look like they will be top spinners, definately be hard to pick.
I think you were being a bit lazy in those stand start drills. If you look at the ball that ends about 8 seconds you have spun around on your front leg. Compare that with the last delivery and you have powered forward a lot more.
Totally understandable though if you are just concentrating on the release. Or is it because of the knee.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Some good leg breaks there in the second video, do you bowl from around the wicket a lot? I like the wrong uns, they look like they will be top spinners, definately be hard to pick.
I think you were being a bit lazy in those stand start drills. If you look at the ball that ends about 8 seconds you have spun around on your front leg. Compare that with the last delivery and you have powered forward a lot more.
Totally understandable though if you are just concentrating on the release. Or is it because of the knee.

Combination of a few things I reckon, still a bit tentative with the knee, core strength isn't that good - remember I'm 50 and a teacher so don't do a great deal of physical stuff per se and at this stage just not settled with how I'll be bowling. There was a fair bit of rubbish in between the balls you see in the vids as well. Going round the wicket is something I started to do at the end of last season. I think in a game situation I'd go over in order to negate the straight balls that don't spin. If I was to go round I'd be looking to pitch on the stumps in a match and not outside in order to not give runs away with the balls that don't spin.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

I wanted to share with you guys the news of my election as the club captain for this season. (We gave a talk each and then had a Q/A session with the club members and then they voted me in.) At first glance, that means a lot more bowling for me and the fields that I want.

Nice one, you should do what my old captain did, he would let almost everyone else bowl first up and then if the game was going well or even it was he'd bring himslef on for the last 4 or 5 and virtually guarantee himself a bagful of cheap wickets. By the time he was 27 he held the record for most wicket ever at the club and the most wickets in a single season.

 

[chippyben]

Combination of a few things I reckon, still a bit tentative with the knee, core strength isn't that good - remember I'm 50 and a teacher so don't do a great deal of physical stuff per se and at this stage just not settled with how I'll be bowling. There was a fair bit of rubbish in between the balls you see in the vids as well. Going round the wicket is something I started to do at the end of last season. I think in a game situation I'd go over in order to negate the straight balls that don't spin. If I was to go round I'd be looking to pitch on the stumps in a match and not outside in order to not give runs away with the balls that don't spin.

Its a real shame you injured your knee because the old videos with your "new" action looked great I thought. The energy you were getting through those stand start drills was brilliant. (Even for an old bloke).
It took me a long time to get my confidence back with the knee. Even now when I overdo it a bit and feel a twinge, it can ruin a practice session because I won't get back to what I should be doing in my follow through. I find then that I am practicing a lazy follow through for the rest of the session because of my wariness to really push through.
It should just be a case of mind over matter making yourself do what you want to do but I think there must be something instinctive in us that subconciously protects our injured body parts(knee) and doesnt allow us to push through properly.
I must say I have hardly ever practiced going around the wicket, its something I should do more of. I never bowled round the wicket bowling pace so it does feel odd to me.

 

[chippyben]

Nice one, you should do what my old captain did, he would let almost everyone else bowl first up and then if the game was going well or even it was he'd bring himslef on for the last 4 or 5 and virtually guarantee himself a bagful of cheap wickets. By the time he was 27 he held the record for most wicket ever at the club and the most wickets in a single season.

Or just bowl yourself for 14 overs straight at the start of every game like the captain of the grade below us at our club does!!

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Its a real shame you injured your knee because the old videos with your "new" action looked great I thought. The energy you were getting through those stand start drills was brilliant. (Even for an old bloke).
It took me a long time to get my confidence back with the knee. Even now when I overdo it a bit and feel a twinge, it can ruin a practice session because I won't get back to what I should be doing in my follow through. I find then that I am practicing a lazy follow through for the rest of the session because of my wariness to really push through.
It should just be a case of mind over matter making yourself do what you want to do but I think there must be something instinctive in us that subconciously protects our injured body parts(knee) and doesnt allow us to push through properly.
I must say I have hardly ever practiced going around the wicket, its something I should do more of. I never bowled round the wicket bowling pace so it does feel odd to me.

Yeah when I started out I only ever bowled over, but just learning more about the game and beginning to understand that different batsmen have weaknesses that can be exploited got me bowling round straight into the legs. I think this may have coincided with seeing a video of Warne where he was explaining that you should use the crease, to 'Open up' the batsman and generally unsettle him, so I adopted a tactic of, if I get played with ease through the offside I then go round just to see how it pans out. It's definitely worth pursuing, especially if you bowl as wide as you can into the legs and have a bloke out at deep square leg.

The knee; Everyday it improves, today we went for a long walk through the woods with the kids across rough terrain and downhill - going downhill has been the activity that i'm least as ease with and I've done okay today. In comparison with a 2 weeks ago at the start of the Easter Holiday there has been an enormous improvement from what was probably a 80% deficiency to what feels like a 30% deficiency at the moment. I can bowl with the bound and probably be as dynamic as the March vids, but I don't want to over do it, so I'm still taking an approach where I'm easing back into it. The only bummer is the other leg has now developed a soreness at the top of the calf almost behind the knee. It's not noticeable when I'm walking around, but if I crouch flat footed on the ground, it feels as though something is swollen inside, but there's no bruising. Just the process of getting old I suppose and still acting like your 40 odd!!

 

[shrek]

Or just bowl yourself for 14 overs straight at the start of every game like the captain of the grade below us at our club does!!

Hahaha! good ones! Dave and Ben. But, I find tailenders difficult to remove - I keep missing the edge because of the amount of turn I get and on concrete pitches, I can never get an lbw or a bowled with a topspinner ( don't have a match-ready flipper yet).

That said, I feel a lot more confident about my bowling this year (despite my ongoing rotator cuff rehab) and I think I will try to show our our opponents how we should attack with spinners. My vice captain is an aggressive off-spinner who has a deadly top-spinner and in the pre-season has worked on a carrom ball. And both of us can get in to the team as batsmen alone - that means we can make use of the three left-arm orthodox spinners, two off-spinner and possibly two more spinners(one leggie, one offie) in the squad. Genuine seam options are limited to three, so it should be a lot of fun, trying to attack with spinners even in powerplay.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

Hahaha! good ones! Dave and Ben. But, I find tailenders difficult to remove - I keep missing the edge because of the amount of turn I get and on concrete pitches, I can never get an lbw or a bowled with a topspinner ( don't have a match-ready flipper yet).

That said, I feel a lot more confident about my bowling this year (despite my ongoing rotator cuff rehab) and I think I will try to show our our opponents how we should attack with spinners. My vice captain is an aggressive off-spinner who has a deadly top-spinner and in the pre-season has worked on a carrom ball. And both of us can get in to the team as batsmen alone - that means we can make use of the three left-arm orthodox spinners, two off-spinner and possibly two more spinners(one leggie, one offie) in the squad. Genuine seam options are limited to three, so it should be a lot of fun, trying to attack with spinners even in powerplay.

Ah mate rotator cuff! Been there, seen that, got all the badges! You'll have to rest that for a few weeks other-wise that's an op job and I don't think it ever fully recovers. As I recall it's like an over-stretched elastic band situation, if you over-do it, the op consists of them taking a section out of the middle of the over-stretched muscle, sewing it back together again, so that its taut and you can use the muscle again. Having taken that big chuck out though then means the potential to really damage it is massivly increased and in the meantime its never as good as a full size and looked after rotator cuff. Did you do it bowling Wrong uns?

 

[Jim2109]

played my first game of the season today. there were loads of kids in the side and captain decided to give them all a go. cant say I really agreed with it, but I'm playing tomorrow as well so I think that featured in deciding to only bowl me for 4 overs right at the end. they had only lost 1 wicket prior to that, but their 2 openers had retired to give others a go.

I bowled reasonably well. 4-0-24-1 were my figures, which are thoroughly respectable. a little expensive as they only scored at 4.3 for the innings, but I got a wicket which were hard to come by, and on another day I might have had 5.

the wicket was really hard and cracked on top, but still very soft underneath, so it had no bounce, was pretty uneven at times, and the ball was just sitting up. an awful surface for batsmen and fast bowlers (which is why I think I warranted bowling earlier), and I thought it would be really nice for spin. but not really, the ball wasnt spitting off it like I thought it would, but I got it turning decently enough.

first 2 overs I was hit and miss. the odd drag down, not many wides and they werent bad ones. but I was overpitching, underpitching, overpitching, underpitching. not really finding a nice rhythm, but a few good deliveries in the mix. I got my wicket LBW hitting the batsman on the full around leg stump. I appeal most things, I only half heartedly appealed this one because I was fairly sure it was not out, but it got given anyway!! it all clicked in the 3rd over though. 3 balls beat the bat all ends up and missed the stumps by millimetres. the best ball I bowled all day got tonked for a 6 though! it was a beauty but the batsman just got hold of it, not a lot you can do about that really. didnt get the 2nd wicket though even though I easily deserved it. then last over I tried a bit too hard, had an LBW shout that was way better than the one I took my wicket with but it got turned down for some reason.

either way, promising start to the season. I was bowling much closer to full effort than I normally manage in pressure situations. when I got it right it was really good, but consistency was similar to nets. definitely making huge improvements and I should get to where I want to get at this rate.

batted at number 8, we required about 40 runs off of 13 overs when I went in I think. easy target, but the better batsman retired on 49 leaving me to get the job done with kids and non-batsmen. I didnt get my eye in very quickly, but once I did I hit a couple of nice boundaries off their "fast" bowler. to be fair he was only 16 and very very quick for his age, and I dont think he liked my unorthodox flat bat slap method down the ground haha. got me some runs. wickets dropped at the other end, we were down to our last batsman as the retired bat wasnt interested in coming back in at the end, and when trying to run a fast single he twisted his knee and couldnt run. so I tried to smash boundaries (got 1), but then got caught trying a big shot. we were about 8 runs shy I think, but I think it got called a draw in the end. I scored 11, so not a great start, but strange circumstances. my fielding was spot on apart from 2 or 3 half mistakes where I dived for balls that I didnt reach when maybe I should have forgot about stopping 1 and just accepted it was beating me and chased it down to stop 2/boundaries.

I wore a ball on the inside of my left knee midway through the innings that stiffened it up bigtime, I could hardly run for a while. that didnt help my bowling, I was really feeling it when I braced my leg! hopefully it doesnt tighten up for tomorrow.

 

[someblokecalleddave]

played my first game of the season today. there were loads of kids in the side and captain decided to give them all a go. cant say I really agreed with it, but I'm playing tomorrow as well so I think that featured in deciding to only bowl me for 4 overs right at the end. they had only lost 1 wicket prior to that, but their 2 openers had retired to give others a go.

I bowled reasonably well. 4-0-24-1 were my figures, which are thoroughly respectable. a little expensive as they only scored at 4.3 for the innings, but I got a wicket which were hard to come by, and on another day I might have had 5.

the wicket was really hard and cracked on top, but still very soft underneath, so it had no bounce, was pretty uneven at times, and the ball was just sitting up. an awful surface for batsmen and fast bowlers (which is why I think I warranted bowling earlier), and I thought it would be really nice for spin. but not really, the ball wasnt spitting off it like I thought it would, but I got it turning decently enough.

first 2 overs I was hit and miss. the odd drag down, not many wides and they werent bad ones. but I was overpitching, underpitching, overpitching, underpitching. not really finding a nice rhythm, but a few good deliveries in the mix. I got my wicket LBW hitting the batsman on the full around leg stump. I appeal most things, I only half heartedly appealed this one because I was fairly sure it was not out, but it got given anyway!! it all clicked in the 3rd over though. 3 balls beat the bat all ends up and missed the stumps by millimetres. the best ball I bowled all day got tonked for a 6 though! it was a beauty but the batsman just got hold of it, not a lot you can do about that really. didnt get the 2nd wicket though even though I easily deserved it. then last over I tried a bit too hard, had an LBW shout that was way better than the one I took my wicket with but it got turned down for some reason.

either way, promising start to the season. I was bowling much closer to full effort than I normally manage in pressure situations. when I got it right it was really good, but consistency was similar to nets. definitely making huge improvements and I should get to where I want to get at this rate.

batted at number 8, we required about 40 runs off of 13 overs when I went in I think. easy target, but the better batsman retired on 49 leaving me to get the job done with kids and non-batsmen. I didnt get my eye in very quickly, but once I did I hit a couple of nice boundaries off their "fast" bowler. to be fair he was only 16 and very very quick for his age, and I dont think he liked my unorthodox flat bat slap method down the ground haha. got me some runs. wickets dropped at the other end, we were down to our last batsman as the retired bat wasnt interested in coming back in at the end, and when trying to run a fast single he twisted his knee and couldnt run. so I tried to smash boundaries (got 1), but then got caught trying a big shot. we were about 8 runs shy I think, but I think it got called a draw in the end. I scored 11, so not a great start, but strange circumstances. my fielding was spot on apart from 2 or 3 half mistakes where I dived for balls that I didnt reach when maybe I should have forgot about stopping 1 and just accepted it was beating me and chased it down to stop 2/boundaries.

I wore a ball on the inside of my left knee midway through the innings that stiffened it up bigtime, I could hardly run for a while. that didnt help my bowling, I was really feeling it when I braced my leg! hopefully it doesnt tighten up for tomorrow.

Get some ice on the leg for 10 - 15 mins - bag of peas or something, it'll speed up the process of recovery.

 

[shrek]

Ah mate rotator cuff! Been there, seen that, got all the badges! You'll have to rest that for a few weeks other-wise that's an op job and I don't think it ever fully recovers. As I recall it's like an over-stretched elastic band situation, if you over-do it, the op consists of them taking a section out of the middle of the over-stretched muscle, sewing it back together again, so that its taut and you can use the muscle again. Having taken that big chuck out though then means the potential to really damage it is massivly increased and in the meantime its never as good as a full size and looked after rotator cuff. Did you do it bowling Wrong uns?

Well, rehab is a bit too much. All I'm doing is some physical therapy. I was told it is one of the cuff muscles that was strained. Last season, in a quarterfinal - I started fielding at the boundary from over 1. Had to fire in at least two throws each over. And finally on one throw I got a run out, but suddenly lost feeling in my fingers- knew something was wrong straight away and i just rested it for 5 months before starting on the physical therapy. About it never fully recovering - that is also what the PT told me.

Bowled a while today perhaps 10-12 overs- enough to scrape some skin off my spinning finger even when I bowled with really old ones with practically no seam. My shoulder is a little sore, but no great pain- Plan to rest, give it the hot and cold treatment and continue on my PT and ease it into the season slowly.
After the discovery yesterday, I feel like I'm driving through the crease better but I also found that I started bowling a little flatter. Perhaps with time I will be able to add enough dip to ensure that I can bowl at that pace and still flight it.

 

[Jim2109]

Get some ice on the leg for 10 - 15 mins - bag of peas or something, it'll speed up the process of recovery.

the knee is fine today the weather is very overcast though, theres an occasional stiff breeze. the forecast is still completely dry, starting cloudy with the sun emerging around lunchtime and then clear skies all afternoon. 21 degs, so a fair bit cooler than yesterday which was 24-25 degs throughout the entire game, and hopefully a bit less humid. so as long as it doesn't rain at all then its perfect cricket conditions

 

[shrek]

So what you are looking for is the full big picture. It occurs with the front knee hitting the floor and its relationship to the bowling arm coming up. When your knee just touches the ground your bowling arm should be around shoulder height and straight back. So between 1 and 2 the straightening of the knee happens to get through the crease -- or between 3 and 4 give or take for Curtley.

I think what you are talking about the bounding up and the upsetting of the rest of the rhythm comes from too early use of the bowling hand. I had a discussion with Chippyben last year about using the bowling arm later. It could also be able getting enough power through your back leg to get through the crease so you are not going up -- but through. This is something of using the centre of your back foot.

If you are having trouble then it is probably because of one of these two -- however it's probably difficult to know without looking at the action. Something of a lesson for me probably -- to post up images properly hehe.

Dr. Tran - Here are snapshots of my action from last year- Obviously not the best of videos (taken from an iphone) but might serve as a starting point. As you've guessed my bowling stride is very small and I don't really push off my back foot- but if there is anything else you can find out from this action, I'd be very thankful to work on it.

The video is the same as that I posted last year - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf68jOWBB_Q I don't think my action has changed much as I hardly bowled in the interim.

 

[doctortran]

Hahaha! good ones! Dave and Ben. But, I find tailenders difficult to remove - I keep missing the edge because of the amount of turn I get and on concrete pitches, I can never get an lbw or a bowled with a topspinner ( don't have a match-ready flipper yet).

That said, I feel a lot more confident about my bowling this year (despite my ongoing rotator cuff rehab) and I think I will try to show our our opponents how we should attack with spinners. My vice captain is an aggressive off-spinner who has a deadly top-spinner and in the pre-season has worked on a carrom ball. And both of us can get in to the team as batsmen alone - that means we can make use of the three left-arm orthodox spinners, two off-spinner and possibly two more spinners(one leggie, one offie) in the squad. Genuine seam options are limited to three, so it should be a lot of fun, trying to attack with spinners even in powerplay.

If I can just give you some advice about being a captain without intruding on your privacy? You need to do two things. You need to create a strong core of players. 4 or 5 really established players who know each other well who are also vocal in the field. There is nothing worse than a fielding team who actually wouldn't be misplaced being in a morgue. Being part of a cricket club this should be no problem!

The other thing is to make sure you have a set of players with unique backgrounds, different ideas, and with real variety. The real difference between teams of quality and the next tier is depth. I mean just look at England in the recent ashes. In the fast bowling ranks Tremlett, Sidebottom, Broad, Anderson, Mahmood, Plunkett, Bresnan, and Finn -- all of these guys capable of playing for England and at least floating around the England camp. For batting, Cook, Strauss, Pietersen, Swann, Trott, Morgan, Prior, Davies, Yardy, Bopara. Collingwood, Yardy, Bell, Wright,and Bresnan. Depth breeds competition, but it also brings in new ideas from different places, it brings different personalities, and variety for different situations.

And I think it doesn't really matter what sort of quality you have in the team either. They did a study and applied it to Broadway musicals. It didn't matter how good the people in the cast were, but if everyone had worked with each other before then the show was a flop. If no one had worked together before it was a flop. Only when a core nucleus of people had worked with each other and a larger set of people from outside the network was added did success get achieved.

Build friendships, and create new ones -- that is man management.

P.S consider touring parties of old: Atherton, Trescothick, Ramprakash, Vaughan, Butcher, Crawley, Stewart, Hussain, Thorpe. That's all there was for seven or eight years. I might've just rotated second tier players or even play old guys like Barnett, and Robin Smith just to get rid of the staleness of the old English top order.

 

[doctortran]

Shrek.

I just saw your image upload. If at all you think your rotator cuff injury came from your bowling -- it think I can see why.

You bowl with a quick action. Everything happens very quickly. However because you do have such a short step you shoulder applies a lot of force over small distance in short amount of time. The impulse of the force on your shoulder could theoretically by quite serious. Moreover this could be exacerbated by lack of specialised stretching.

The simple method of mixing everything -- getting more power so you don't have to get through the action so quickly (quickness is good btw), bowling through a larger displacement extending the force over a longer distance and adding to the power, and finally distributing the force over a distance to reduce injury.... taking even just a slightly longer step is probably the most efficient and effective course. But of course it's up to you.

 

[shrek]

If I can just give you some advice about being a captain without intruding on your privacy? You need to do two things. You need to create a strong core of players. 4 or 5 really established players who know each other well who are also vocal in the field. There is nothing worse than a fielding team who actually wouldn't be misplaced being in a morgue. Being part of a cricket club this should be no problem!

The other thing is to make sure you have a set of players with unique backgrounds, different ideas, and with real variety. The real difference between teams of quality and the next tier is depth. I mean just look at England in the recent ashes. In the fast bowling ranks Tremlett, Sidebottom, Broad, Anderson, Mahmood, Plunkett, Bresnan, and Finn -- all of these guys capable of playing for England and at least floating around the England camp. For batting, Cook, Strauss, Pietersen, Swann, Trott, Morgan, Prior, Davies, Yardy, Bopara. Collingwood, Yardy, Bell, Wright,and Bresnan. Depth breeds competition, but it also brings in new ideas from different places, it brings different personalities, and variety for different situations.

And I think it doesn't really matter what sort of quality you have in the team either. They did a study and applied it to Broadway musicals. It didn't matter how good the people in the cast were, but if everyone had worked with each other before then the show was a flop. If no one had worked together before it was a flop. Only when a core nucleus of people had worked with each other and a larger set of people from outside the network was added did success get achieved.

Build friendships, and create new ones -- that is man management.

P.S consider touring parties of old: Atherton, Trescothick, Ramprakash, Vaughan, Butcher, Crawley, Stewart, Hussain, Thorpe. That's all there was for seven or eight years. I might've just rotated second tier players or even play old guys like Barnett, and Robin Smith just to get rid of the staleness of the old English top order.

Thanks a lot for the tips Dr.Tran. Thankfully, being a college team, I have inherited a tradition of a lot of banter on field and also a core of 4 players who have played in the last two seasons. A couple of players on the bench last year are expected to step in to the team this year. The call-out went really well and we are going to have more than 10 new members in the team from various backgrounds. So, the diversity aspect is covered as well.We also have a very open feedback system that was set in place last seasons - where everyone is strongly encouraged to give his views on what went on in the field. This is done at the end of every match. Based on the personality of the team so far, I feel that I should just try to let everyone enjoy the game instead of getting caught up in winning.

The bit about Broadway musicals is very encouraging and I will be sure to cite it in my talk in the first practice of our season. Funny though, that I feel my vice-captain is actually a better captain than I and I voted for him as the captain whereas he voted for me to be the captain.

 

[shrek]

Shrek.

I just saw your image upload. If at all you think your rotator cuff injury came from your bowling -- it think I can see why.

You bowl with a quick action. Everything happens very quickly. However because you do have such a short step you shoulder applies a lot of force over small distance in short amount of time. The impulse of the force on your shoulder could theoretically by quite serious. Moreover this could be exacerbated by lack of specialised stretching.

The simple method of mixing everything -- getting more power so you don't have to get through the action so quickly (quickness is good btw), bowling through a larger displacement extending the force over a longer distance and adding to the power, and finally distributing the force over a distance to reduce injury.... taking even just a slightly longer step is probably the most efficient and effective course. But of course it's up to you.

I have been working on a longer stride in the last two practice sessions we had yesterday and I think that is adding to my pace. But I don't feel that my bowling has caused the rotator cuff problem - I keep going back to that match when I threw a lot of balls in from the boundary and my muscles must've been fatigued (as it was also the end of last season). We do make sure that everyone in the team warms up before the session and we do some light stretching, unfortunately I don't know the names of these exercises. Still, if you can let me know a core a set of stretches that are important, that would be fantastic - it might help our faster bowlers too.

And do you see anything in this action that pertains to the topics we were talking about earlier - the shoulder-hip-trunk alignment or if I am using the bowling arm too early in the action?

 

[someblokecalleddave]

I have been working on a longer stride in the last two practice sessions we had yesterday and I think that is adding to my pace. But I don't feel that my bowling has caused the rotator cuff problem - I keep going back to that match when I threw a lot of balls in from the boundary and my muscles must've been fatigued (as it was also the end of last season). We do make sure that everyone in the team warms up before the session and we do some light stretching, unfortunately I don't know the names of these exercises. Still, if you can let me know a core a set of stretches that are important, that would be fantastic - it might help our faster bowlers too.

And do you see anything in this action that pertains to the topics we were talking about earlier - the shoulder-hip-trunk alignment or if I am using the bowling arm too early in the action?

For your stretches and warm ups you should contact David Hinchcliffe or Liz ward on here. or visit David Hinchcliffes website http://www.pitchvision.com/node/4798 somewhere in there, there are videos of warm ups and stuff, but I find it a horrificly difficult website to navigate and use. Also because it's a commercial venture, there's a limit to what he allows free access to, but if you persevere there is some good stuff on there.

 

[chippyben]

I went up the nets and tried getting my weight back further(viewed from side on) when my back foot lands and then rocking forward onto my front foot like Warne does. It came to me surprisingly easy and the best thing was that it got my arms and most importantly my bowling arm working in unison with my body and not racing ahead as is my constant problem. The other thing it did was get me up on the toes of my front foot with ease because of the added momentum as my weight transferred from back to forward. It feels fantastic and like all the parts of my action are working together and all the energy is going into the delivery and not being wasted.