Wrist Spin Bowling (part Five)

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What I'm about to write relates to what you're saying, what I've been working on today I should have...

(1). Read about it and took it on board 8 years ago when I started.
(2). Been told by someone who's more experienced than me - mate, you need to do X and Y.

Instead 8 years down the line and only today I've realised I should have addressed it years and years ago and only now I've done it, and it seems to be making a significant difference already and the potential going forwards looks promising.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
What I'm about to write relates to what you're saying, what I've been working on today I should have...

(1). Read about it and took it on board 8 years ago when I started.
(2). Been told by someone who's more experienced than me - mate, you need to do X and Y.

Instead 8 years down the line and only today I've realised I should have addressed it years and years ago and only now I've done it, and it seems to be making a significant difference already and the potential going forwards looks promising.
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Yeah, that's about what I thought. All these things you see about leg spin (back foot side on, front foot across the body, body side on, front arm at the target, front arm pull down hard etc etc), they are repeated by everyone who talks about how to bowl legspin.
 
A couple of videos I wanted to show. The first is of Samuel Badree. You will notice that he hits the crease in that position where his front foot is directly in front of his back foot, leaving him not fully side on at the crease. Also, his arm movement is slightly towards the stumps and it means that he never bowls a genuine legspinner. He always bowls with lots of overspin (as you see around 2:12):



This second one show Devendra Bishoo. You can see how his front arm is directed down legside and nowhere near the target (I noticed Steve Smith got Cook recently and his front arm was way down the off-side, so it seems the direction of the arm is not vital. All that is important is that that front arm pulls down hard to get the right shoulder swinging around quickly):

 
someblokecalleddave said:
Instead 8 years down the line and only today I've realised I should have addressed it years and years ago and only now I've done it, and it seems to be making a significant difference already and the potential going forwards looks promising.
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I've been down to the nets again today and I discovered something I need to look at. I say "discovered" but it is something that is well known and something I knew about years ago. Just like you Dave, I opted not to copy everything I saw and read about the legspin action. In particular, the Stuart MacGill masterclass is the one I think is possibly the best because it details the importance of the front arm really pulling down hard. But it also details (something most other masterclasses don't bother with) the importance of what to do with the back leg. MacGill talks about imagining lifting your leg up over a box and how you must avoid dragging your back leg around.

I mention this because I think it is something I never really bothered with. My back leg didn't exactly drag around but it also didn't lift up at the knee and help push through with the rotation. There is no doubt that the problem I am having is that I am not getting my chest and my hips rotated towards the target and it is leaving my bowling hand short of the position it needs to be in for a legspinner. Today, I looked to do some standing start drills (standing with the left foot across the body and my chest side on) and to lift that back leg up to help rotate the hips through a bit quicker. If that right leg is not doing much work, then of course it is going to slow the rotation. In the past I have rotated properly and been front on at the point of release. I'm not sure if that was in spite of my lack of work from the right leg or whether I did actually use that right leg a little bit more than I do now (I think I did use the back leg a bit better than I currently do). Either way, I know that I have to work on bending the knee of the back leg and bringing it forward a little bit quicker to push that rotation through a bit quicker. At the moment, it is sort hanging behind me like a dead weight that is slowing my hips down enough to leave me short of position at the point of release.

The drills I did today, using that back leg more, were quite promising.
 
I have been discussing this on my blog, I found that if I lent towards my left after pulling my arm down I produced some good accurate leg spinners! My sister came to the match this week and likes to take action shots so I have chosen around 7 that shows my run up, position at the crease, the release point and follow through. Please enjoy them and let me know what you think of them either on here or on the blog! You will also the seam position at a good position, so I get spin and bounce. Foot isnt fully down, but it is something I am working on. Please ignore my face, its not pretty during my action, guess that shows an explosion though.
http://mylegspinjourney.blogspot.co.uk/

Thanks,
Tom.

someblokecalleddave someblokecalleddave
C Cleanprophet
B boogiespinner
L leftie600
 
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TomBowler97 said:
I have been discussing this on my blog, I found that if I lent towards my left after pulling my arm down I produced some good accurate leg spinners! My sister came to the match this week and likes to take action shots so I have chosen around 7 that shows my run up, position at the crease, the release point and follow through. Please enjoy them and let me know what you think of them either on here or on the blog! You will also the seam position at a good position, so I get spin and bounce. Foot isnt fully down, but it is something I am working on. Please ignore my face, its not pretty during my action, guess that shows an explosion though.
http://mylegspinjourney.blogspot.co.uk/

Thanks,
Tom.
Click to expand...

I saw some of your bowling on youtube (from a few weeks ago I think). Your batting too, which looked pretty good to me. The one thing that really stood out was how you jump up onto your toes as you are about to deliver the ball. That will send some of your momentum upwards rather than forwards. You are up on your toes whilst side on. Usually, your front foot would be flat and then push up on your toes as you start rotating. I don't know enough about how that sort of movement would effect your bowling. Sounds like you are doing well.

That thing about about pulling to your left is probably a case of you really opening your chest and hips at the point of release. This will get your hand into a position that produces a lot of sidespin and this is why you got more spin. The accuracy bit, I don't know. You have to be careful though. You don't want to pull to your left too much as you will start to lose your balance and lose your accuracy. Leaning to your left a little is probably as far as you want to go.

You hear a lot about legspinners wanting to be upright at the point of release with their head/eyes level. However, pretty much every legspinner will lean a little to their left. If you were very upright before, then a little lean to the left will probably be a helpful change to your action.
 
Cleanprophet said:
But it also details (something most other masterclasses don't bother with) the importance of what to do with the back leg. MacGill talks about imagining lifting your leg up over a box and how you must avoid dragging your back leg around..
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Yep - definitely - something that many people have said to me (Liz Ward, TonyM etc) and it's never mentioned or rarely mentioned and it makes a significant difference.
 
All fast bowlers will be leaning their heads to the left at the point of release.

That is a consequence of having the bowling arm in the same vertical plane as the front leg - which is highly desirable for a fast bowler and surely no bad thing for a slow one. For that to happen the body has to be tilted as the right armpit is directly above the left hip at release.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
Yep - definitely - something that many people have said to me (Liz Ward, TonyM etc) and it's never mentioned or rarely mentioned and it makes a significant difference.
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Almost all instructional videos on the net focus on grip and position at the crease. Very few bother with emphasising the importance of pulling down hard with that front arm and only that one from MacGill mentions the back leg. I think it is also very important to explain why you do certain things. I've seen a few that talk about getting side on and how that is important for rotation (same with the front leg and momentum moving towards the line of the stumps). Most don't mention the 'don't's', just the 'do's'. MacGill does say that you should totally avoid pulling the front arm to the offside (as he says "big mistake"). Although, as I said the other day, Steve Smith does that from time to time.

I've never seen anyone talk about what happens if you don't lift that back leg, bend the knee and bring it forward. Maybe it's fairly obvious and so nobody ever states it. But I think it would be very helpful to have a list of things you need to do and a list of things you must avoid. MacGill says you "definitely" don't want to drag that back leg around. He doesn't say why, but of course we know it is because it will slow your hip rotation and leave your short of that front on position at the point of release. That's with poor work with your back leg. Good work with your back leg will help push that hip around, speed up the rotation and help getting energy on the ball.

boogiespinner said:
All fast bowlers will be leaning their heads to the left at the point of release.

That is a consequence of having the bowling arm in the same vertical plane as the front leg - which is highly desirable for a fast bowler and surely no bad thing for a slow one. For that to happen the body has to be tilted as the right armpit is directly above the left hip at release.
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A lot of spinners have a very upright arm. As you say, you can't have an upright arm unless you do tilt to the left a bit. If you have a bit of an angle in your bowling as a spinner (like Warne does), then you will not have so much of a tilt. But even then, you will still lean a little to the left.
 
Cleanprophet said:
Almost all instructional videos on the net focus on grip and position at the crease. Very few bother with emphasising the importance of pulling down hard with that front arm and only that one from MacGill mentions the back leg. I think it is also very important to explain why you do certain things. I've seen a few that talk about getting side on and how that is important for rotation (same with the front leg and momentum moving towards the line of the stumps). Most don't mention the 'don't's', just the 'do's'. MacGill does say that you should totally avoid pulling the front arm to the offside (as he says "big mistake"). Although, as I said the other day, Steve Smith does that from time to time.

I've never seen anyone talk about what happens if you don't lift that back leg, bend the knee and bring it forward. Maybe it's fairly obvious and so nobody ever states it. But I think it would be very helpful to have a list of things you need to do and a list of things you must avoid. MacGill says you "definitely" don't want to drag that back leg around. He doesn't say why, but of course we know it is because it will slow your hip rotation and leave your short of that front on position at the point of release. That's with poor work with your back leg. Good work with your back leg will help push that hip around, speed up the rotation and help getting energy on the ball.



A lot of spinners have a very upright arm. As you say, you can't have an upright arm unless you do tilt to the left a bit. If you have a bit of an angle in your bowling as a spinner (like Warne does), then you will not have so much of a tilt. But even then, you will still lean a little to the left.
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With regards the back leg - Warne especially has his swing out and round very wide. I think a lot of people try and emulate that?
 
someblokecalleddave said:
With regards the back leg - Warne especially has his swing out and round very wide. I think a lot of people try and emulate that?
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Just a quick thought - an out-and-wide swing could help provide a rotational impulse, whereas a tighter, bent-knee drive will more aid the downward chest drive.

Leaning to the left might also aid rotation (imagine a hammer-thrower).
 
boogiespinner said:
Just a quick thought - an out-and-wide swing could help provide a rotational impulse, whereas a tighter, bent-knee drive will more aid the downward chest drive.

Leaning to the left might also aid rotation (imagine a hammer-thrower).
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I recall being advised that the swing out approach did nothing to aid accuracy and that the energy was diverted away from the all important forward motion towards the stumps.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
I recall being advised that the swing out approach did nothing to aid accuracy and that the energy was diverted away from the all important forward motion towards the stumps.
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That sounds logical. I suspect there are pros and cons to pushing the knee forward towards the target and swinging it around a bit more.

Interestingly, although MacGill spoke about swinging the leg around, his back leg was very much like Hogg's. Warne's leg does swing out a bit more, but I think the main thrust of the leg, via the bent knee, is down the wicket. I would think this is ideally what you want.

As for me, I now suspect that the back leg isn't the problem - as such. I've had various things that look a little wrong (chest/hips not front on at the point of release, back leg not where it should be and, of course, the hand position not being right at the point of release). I now suspect these are all issues that stem from the major problem. The major problem (and you can see this in the July slow motion video in particular) is my position as I hit the crease. I am too side-on, my weight is leaning back a fair bit and my chest is too open. In short, I'm trying to rotate from too far back and not getting around in time whilst not being balanced. This probably explains why my bowling arm has been falling behind me and why I started falling to my left in my follow through a few months back.

I need to lean forward a little as I jump into the crease and make sure my momentum, and not just my front leg, is towards the line of the stumps. I also need to have my chest/hips pointing between midwicket and square leg and not midwicket as it is. At the moment that my bowling arm is at shoulder height, I am still very side-on and leaning back a bit. Footage of MacGill shows his chest pointing more towards square leg by the time his bowling arm is shoulder height. And, of course, his weight is pushing slightly towards the line of the stumps.

I can sum it up much more succinctly by saying: I have get the balance of my weight corrected. There's a bit too much weight on the back foot (maybe 80%-90% and it should be more around 50%-60%). I just need to get a bit more onto the front foot and get that chest a little less side on. Back in March, I can see that my balance and weight is better. It's still not probably where it should be, but it is acceptable. By July, it is all wrong.
 
Net session last night and the ball was seemingly coming out quite well towards the end. My natural movement is still to lean back a little when I hit the crease (not back onto the back foot, but leaning away from the stumps a little - although I have seen some suggestions that this is not such a bad thing), so I'm having to think about that. I'm aiming to get my head over my front leg as much as possible. I also found that I was tending to push ahead of that front foot a bit too much, so towards the end I was focusing on trying to be as upright as I could be and it seemed to be working. I was getting the ball to turn away consistently. Not big turn, but the surface was a little wet in parts and so it's hard to know for sure by the turn alone (I don't video my bowling at nets, only when I'm up there on my own).

EDIT: did some more work yesterday. I was starting to think I had too much weight on the back foot, but I'm now starting to think that maybe I wasn't getting enough weight on the backfoot! I tried to lean back a little just as my back foot lands, so that I can push against that and get the rotation happening with more energy - getting me front on when I need to be.

The video footage was showing my hand position was still a little in the topspin position, yet the ball was turning a reasonable amount. May well be that I'm just getting more revs on the ball and this ball that is about 80% topspin and 20% sidepsin is turning more than it has in the past.

The frustrating thing is that when I do a step start, I get that hand spot on. As soon as I walk in or even run in, I lose that hand position. The difficult thing is, the hand is only slightly off. The difference in release position from a 20% sidespin to a 50% sidepsin is very small.

I'm possibly going to do back to my old position at the crease (with the front leg on the same line as the back leg). I was still getting side on and had no balance issues.

I've ordered a copy of Philpott's book because it does seem to be the best book out there. I'm wondering about the head position at the point of release. Some people have their heads above their bowling foot and others have their bowling hand on the same line as their front foot, with their head and shoulder tilted away to the left. I used to have my bowling hand above the line of my front foot and tilted away slightly. When I started having problems, that tilt away became more extreme and my follow through took me to the offside rather than at the target. Ultimately, it looks like I have to focus on getting my momentum/follow through down towards the target, try and stay more upright and get more chest on.
 
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TomBowler97 said:
I have been discussing this on my blog, I found that if I lent towards my left after pulling my arm down I produced some good accurate leg spinners! My sister came to the match this week and likes to take action shots so I have chosen around 7 that shows my run up, position at the crease, the release point and follow through. Please enjoy them and let me know what you think of them either on here or on the blog! You will also the seam position at a good position, so I get spin and bounce. Foot isnt fully down, but it is something I am working on. Please ignore my face, its not pretty during my action, guess that shows an explosion though.
http://mylegspinjourney.blogspot.co.uk/

Thanks,
Tom.
Click to expand...

Cleanprophet has already said most of it but basically by leaning over to the left your high bowling arm is 'cleared' to allow you to put more leg spin on the ball. This does have a downside in that some of your bowling energy is wasted but this isn't a problem unless it is really exaggerated.

Note that I am talking about your body and not just tilting your head to the left.

Leg spinners with lower bowling arms do not have to do this as obviously their head is not getting in the way! You will however see some such leg spinners do it as it works for them.
 
Just spent a few weeks in the sun and away from the NZ winter. Reflected on my mounting injuries and ageing body and have realised a few changes are in order.

I've noticed that my back leg 'gives' quite a lot which puts a lot of strain on my right knee, calf and quad while also meaning that my left calf and glute have to put in extra work. Come the preseason next week I'm going to be working on 'skipping' through my bowl stride kind of like Tahir does. This should mean my back leg bends less, both legs take less strain and it will be easier for me to get my torso over my front leg for the pivot.

I'll post about how the change goes.
 
leftie600 said:
I've noticed that my back leg 'gives' quite a lot which puts a lot of strain on my right knee, calf and quad while also meaning that my left calf and glute have to put in extra work. Come the preseason next week I'm going to be working on 'skipping' through my bowl stride kind of like Tahir does. This should mean my back leg bends less, both legs take less strain and it will be easier for me to get my torso over my front leg for the pivot.

I'll post about how the change goes.
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Would a shorter delivery stride help? Maybe a bit more pace in the run up and shorter delivery stride?
 
leftie600 said:
Just spent a few weeks in the sun and away from the NZ winter. Reflected on my mounting injuries and ageing body and have realised a few changes are in order.
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Actually, now that you're back. I'd be interested on your thoughts about my bowling problem. Here's my bowling back in March:



By July, it was like this:




In the first one, I am getting my hand over the ball and producing a legspinner. In the second one (difficult to see perfectly because the footage isn't the best quality), my hand isn't getting over the ball and so I'm producing mostly overspin (maybe about 10% or 15% sidespin and the rest is overspin).

In both, my front foot lands straight down the wicket and not across to the stumps and my front arm pushes out to the legside, not at the target. So both of those things are consistent, if not ideal.

I can't work out if there is anything majorly different or whether it is simply an issue of me not flicking my wrist in the appropriate manner (call it "googly syndrome" if you like). When I do stand starts and even one step starts I produce the legspinner. As soon as I run into the crease I tend to lose the legspinner.
 
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Been working on the new modified action and it's coming together nicely. For the first time in years - possibly ever, I now stand at the top of the crease in a specific place and know exactly what I'm about to do. I now take three paces and then go into the bound. The more I do it the more energetic and natural it's becoming. I videoed it today while I was up in Derbyshire at Nutbrook CC's nets and have just watched it back and noticed the more relaxed I became towards the end of the session (20 mins) the more fluid, faster, rhythmic and energetic it became and the last few balls looked to be promising. I've got a week to work on it some more and then give it a go in the last game of the season.

I may have also found myself an 'Away' club. On Saturday I practiced in the Nutbrook nets solidly for 3 hours while they were fielding and went home just before the game finished. I went over there again today for 20 mins to shoot the video footage and popped my head in the clubhouse and asked again if I could use the nets. They said something along the lines of...
"Mate you were in there 3 hours solid yesterday, you must be sore surely - how do you do that"?
"A lot of practice constantly".
"Well, if you're looking for a game - you can play Saturday next".
"Yeah - I'd play if I lived up this way, but I only get up here a few times a season".
"Yeah do it mate, sign up and when you're up here we'll see if we can get you a game"!

Turned out it's only £20 a year and they said whenever I'm up there seeing the 'Outlaws' bring my whites up and they'll see what they can do and then I can use the nets whenever I wanted. So I might follow that up!
 
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