Wrist Spin Bowling (part Five)

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someblokecalleddave said:
Cleanprophet, you credit me with far too much skill, I think if anything I'm an over-spinner/small leg break bowler if left naturally, I really have to focus and try hard to get the ball coming out with the seam at 90 degrees and the idea that I could get the ball spinning backwards using the conventional wrist spinners action to produce an Orthodox back-spinner is pure madness! Going on what you've said at the end here, it's probably the reason I don't get that much drift!
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Ahh, fair enough. So you naturally bowl with over-spin. I get a good amount of drift quite naturally, but it means really spinning the ball hard and concentrating on getting over the ball because of my propensity to have the ball slide out the front of the hand. If I get over the ball and give it a good old rip, I get plenty of drift. As I say, that drift will only come if the seam is reasonably upright and unscrambled and, of course, it is spun very hard. One thing I do without problem is get the seam presented cleanly almost every time. As a result, I have been able to work on getting that drift. Ultimately, I confirmed to myself that drift only happens if you spin the ball as hard as you can - which is hard work. I have plenty of respect for Shane Warne because he made it look easy, but spinning the ball hard enough to get big drift requires a hell of a lot of effort and upper body strength.

Drift, for me, is the biggie for a leg spinner. Stuart MacGill spun the ball plenty and maybe more than Warne (I think Ian Healy said as much). The big difference between the two was that Warne drifted the ball a good amount consistenly. MacGill didn't drift the ball much at all. The only reason for this disparity is seam position. Warne presented the seam immaculately, he really did. Every modern wrist spinner I have seen fails to present the seam as Warne did. I wondered if this was intentional as decent batters will look for the seam position, so maybe modern T20 type leggies deliberately scramble the seam? The thing is, I can't imagine why any leg spinner who could present the seam nicely and drift the ball would choose not to. If you can get the ball to drift and dip, it doesn't matter if the batter knows it is coming (as every batter whoever faced Shane Warne did), it is still a formidable thing to cope with - nevermind score big off. My only conclusion is that very few leg spinners are able to spin the ball hard and keep the seam position perfect.
 
Wayne Shorne said:
Well after lots of hours in the nets I've improved my leg spinner to the point where i'm bowling a decent turning leg spinner on a decent length about 30-40% of the time from a runup. BUT the frustrating part is I can bowl huge legspinners on a good length 90% of the time from almost a stationary position on the crease -one step bowl. sometimes after hitting the "good" line & length they will spin that much they will spin off the pitch (just before reaching the keeper). Should I continue trying to find that delivery in my normal action or look like a fool and take up bowling from a stationary spot? Any suggestions please?
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I'd suggest you keep working on a run up. My approach to the crease is not a run up at all really. Very much like Warne's approach. More of an amble up than a run up! It works for me and it certainly worked for Warne. The key thing is to ensure that whether you run or amble, you increase your speed so that you carry momentum into the crease, having a braced front leg (or reasonably well braced), get that right hip rotating around and get some body momentum. It does add 5%-10% power/pace to your action. It is possible to have all the pace and power you need in your action without a run up, but that requires a lot of shoulder work. The drawback on that is that it is difficult to bowl the ball around 50mph with accuracy. Using that momentum into the crease allows you to bowl the ball at a good pace and with lots of spin whilst having good control.

I understand the problems you are having with the run up. Personally, I have tried to run up like MacGill did and I find it very tricky. My suggestion would be to carry on working on an approach to the crease rather than using a standing start, but maybe try a slower Warne-like amble up to the crease rather than a run up.
 
Cleanprophet said:
I'd suggest you keep working on a run up. My approach to the crease is not a run up at all really. Very much like Warne's approach. More of an amble up than a run up! It works for me and it certainly worked for Warne. The key thing is to ensure that whether you run or amble, you increase your speed so that you carry momentum into the crease, having a braced front leg (or reasonably well braced), get that right hip rotating around and get some body momentum. It does add 5%-10% power/pace to your action. It is possible to have all the pace and power you need in your action without a run up, but that requires a lot of shoulder work. The drawback on that is that it is difficult to bowl the ball around 50mph with accuracy. Using that momentum into the crease allows you to bowl the ball at a good pace and with lots of spin whilst having good control.

I understand the problems you are having with the run up. Personally, I have tried to run up like MacGill did and I find it very tricky. My suggestion would be to carry on working on an approach to the crease rather than using a standing start, but maybe try a slower Warne-like amble up to the crease rather than a run up.
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Ok thanks for the tips, I wil try and slow it down a bit to the point where I can release the ball at a similar balanced position as I do at a stationary position.
 
Wayne Shorne said:
Ok thanks for the tips, I wil try and slow it down a bit to the point where I can release the ball at a similar balanced position as I do at a stationary position.
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That's the way to do it. Try a few different things until you find something that works.

When I bowl, I try to spin the ball as hard as I can and get the ball through at a good rate. I've done a bit of work with a decent pro at my club and I've spoken with people who played with and against good quality pro leg-spinners (Pravin Tambe comes to mind - a player who's been bowling very well in the CL T20 comp currently going on, including bowling some impressive flippers). The one thing that strikes you about their bowling is just how much energy and effort they put into every delivery - more so the leg spinners than the finger spinners, but even the finger spinners really burst through the crease.

That's the thing to remember and it's the thing Warne spoke about a lot. That explosion at the crease or, as I described it, bursting through the crease. I've seen plenty of club leggies who have limited rotation. Their right foot finishes with them front onto the batter. When I bowl I can sometimes over rotate because of the effort I'm putting into the delivery. Better that than under rotating. Remember, your best bet is to focus on spinning ball hard and then work on accuracy. If you want to bowl leg spin well, you really have to spin the ball hard.

This is why a standing start is so tricky. To bowl good quality leg spin from a standing start would require a huge amount of upper body/shoulder strength. You see some finger spinners, like Ashwin, stop at the crease and then bowl. So there's no reason why it can't be done. But, I think a leggie would find it tougher to do that because of the need to really rip the ball. As I said earlier, that approach to the crease just gives you that 5%-10% extra momentum and that's 5%-10% you don't have find from your shoulder.
 
Cleanprophet said:
This is why a standing start is so tricky. To bowl good quality leg spin from a standing start would require a huge amount of upper body/shoulder strength. You see some finger spinners, like Ashwin, stop at the crease and then bowl. So there's no reason why it can't be done. But, I think a leggie would find it tougher to do that because of the need to really rip the ball. As I said earlier, that approach to the crease just gives you that 5%-10% extra momentum and that's 5%-10% you don't have find from your shoulder.
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This is one of the reasons I am so bewildered by the number of coaches who advocate standing start drills for anyone over the age of 11 or 12 years old. Its physically impossible to recreate the energy and exertion required to bowl a decent leg break or off break from a standing start. You're willfully coaching lazy and slow mechanics into the bowler; given the amount of work it would take to undo something like that, you'd be better off not coaching them at all.

You don't teach high jumpers the fosbury flop by standing them next to the bar and saying "jump". The runup is a huge part of the action, you can't just skip it.
 
SLA said:
This is one of the reasons I am so bewildered by the number of coaches who advocate standing start drills for anyone over the age of 11 or 12 years old. Its physically impossible to recreate the energy and exertion required to bowl a decent leg break or off break from a standing start. You're willfully coaching lazy and slow mechanics into the bowler; given the amount of work it would take to undo something like that, you'd be better off not coaching them at all.

You don't teach high jumpers the fosbury flop by standing them next to the bar and saying "jump". The runup is a huge part of the action, you can't just skip it.
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I can bowl a nice paced big spinning leggie from a stand start or one step with ease. Just lose my way when I add a run up. The pace difference is very slight if anything. The run up is something I just tack on for cosmetic looks. When I bowl from the crease everything just works together perfectly and the result is a well paced good pitched big turning leggie 90% of the time. At training or mucking around with mates I sometimes do this for a couple of balls to limber up and I've had comments how much more difficult they are to face. I just hope I can mirror it to a "full" delivery one day
 
Wayne Shorne said:
I can bowl a nice paced big spinning leggie from a stand start or one step with ease. Just lose my way when I add a run up. The pace difference is very slight if anything. The run up is something I just tack on for cosmetic looks. When I bowl from the crease everything just works together perfectly and the result is a well paced good pitched big turning leggie 90% of the time. At training or mucking around with mates I sometimes do this for a couple of balls to limber up and I've had comments how much more difficult they are to face. I just hope I can mirror it to a "full" delivery one day
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Well why don't you just bowl like that full time then?
 
SLA said:
Not when you get five wickets!
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Very true. Obviously, we can't see you bowl, so we can't really comment about how you are actually able to bowl from a standing start. As I said earlier, Ashwin sometimes stops at the crease and then bowls the ball. Effectively, a standing start delivery. He still bowls very effectively when he does this. Speaking to a pro left arm finger spinner, he mentioned to me that I could pause a little in my run-up just as I jump into the crease. He says that would help me get better rotation. It's certainly something that he does and the likes of Ajmal pause in a quite a pronounced fashion. How applicable it is to a leg spinner, I don't know. I've watched lots of leggies and they don't have that little slow in momentum as they jump into the crease. Having tried it, I find it hugely off-putting and it is something I may overlook completely.

But, the point is, there may well be something in being able to bowl from a standing start. I know I wouldn't be able to try it out in the nets because it would go terribly. I've tried standing start drills in the past and found them very tricky. I find it difficult to imagine someone bowling very good leg spin from a standing start simply because I could never do it and I've never seen anyone else do it. But if you can do it and, as SLA says, you pick up wickets, then do it. I wouldn't worry in the least about how you look. Not one bit.
 
Thanks for your help guys, I will continue to work on my "full" delivery as it's not as hard on the body. The stationary ball, even though I can do it with ease and works better, it will probably lead to shoulder problems down the track. It's great that we have a group like this to help each other with an art that is very difficult. I will try and post here more often once I feel my contributions have merit.
 
Wayne Shorne said:
Thanks for your help guys, I will continue to work on my "full" delivery as it's not as hard on the body. The stationary ball, even though I can do it with ease and works better, it will probably lead to shoulder problems down the track. It's great that we have a group like this to help each other with an art that is very difficult. I will try and post here more often once I feel my contributions have merit.
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Effectively, we are all coaching ourselves, so it is good to have a fourm like this to get other people's opinions.

I tried the standing start yesterday in the nets and found it really difficult. I just couldn't bowl with full pace and power. But, I am finding that the slider is improving nicely for me. It's a delivery I see all modern T20 leggies using and it is very effective against attacking batters (which is most batters when a leg spinners is bowling!). It's crucial to get that arm through as quick as possible. Really, the ball is more of a seam bowler's leg cutter than anything else and you want it coming out at 55mph-60mph or quicker.

It's similar with the flipper. Nice quick arm and good hard snap of the fingers on the release. I found I tended to push the ball down the off side too often. The slider and the flipper really need to be on the stumps, so anything down the off or leg side is not much good. I realised I was allowing my arm to drop a little into a more round arm sort of action.
 
Cleanprophet said:
Ahh, fair enough. So you naturally bowl with over-spin. I get a good amount of drift quite naturally, but it means really spinning the ball hard and concentrating on getting over the ball because of my propensity to have the ball slide out the front of the hand. If I get over the ball and give it a good old rip, I get plenty of drift. As I say, that drift will only come if the seam is reasonably upright and unscrambled and, of course, it is spun very hard. One thing I do without problem is get the seam presented cleanly almost every time. As a result, I have been able to work on getting that drift. Ultimately, I confirmed to myself that drift only happens if you spin the ball as hard as you can - which is hard work. I have plenty of respect for Shane Warne because he made it look easy, but spinning the ball hard enough to get big drift requires a hell of a lot of effort and upper body strength.

Drift, for me, is the biggie for a leg spinner. Stuart MacGill spun the ball plenty and maybe more than Warne (I think Ian Healy said as much). The big difference between the two was that Warne drifted the ball a good amount consistenly. MacGill didn't drift the ball much at all. The only reason for this disparity is seam position. Warne presented the seam immaculately, he really did. Every modern wrist spinner I have seen fails to present the seam as Warne did. I wondered if this was intentional as decent batters will look for the seam position, so maybe modern T20 type leggies deliberately scramble the seam? The thing is, I can't imagine why any leg spinner who could present the seam nicely and drift the ball would choose not to. If you can get the ball to drift and dip, it doesn't matter if the batter knows it is coming (as every batter whoever faced Shane Warne did), it is still a formidable thing to cope with - nevermind score big off. My only conclusion is that very few leg spinners are able to spin the ball hard and keep the seam position perfect.
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See I'm not entirely convinced that it's upper body strength that is wholly responsible for good drift. I'm sure it's a factor, but the kid I mentor at my club is a young-un who's only 12 and I've been helping him with his bowling since he was 10 I supposed and he gets a good amount of drift now and when he was younger. He's just a scrawny little twelve year old who would be challenged with exercises like planks and press-ups I'm pretty sure. Whereas upper body strength I'm probably reasonably good at - I surf, do press -ups, hand-stands, planks etc, but rarely get drift.

With regards drift and Macgill, I've asked him this directly as to whether he could clearly define what it was that made the ball drift. As with most people he couldn't say why exactly and said that sometimes it simply did and other times it didn't Menno Gazendum the on-line expert says pretty much the same thing and both of them allude to the fact that the random aspect of drift is in fact beneficial. I ask everyone I can the same question - can you turn the dift on and off, e.g. If me and you were to go out onto a field and I said "Drift 3 balls and then not drift the 4th and 5th and drift the 6th, most people then admit that they can't do that and they then generally start to come round to the same story as Macgill and Gazendum.

The point you make about your own ability to present the seam accurately is interesting too. In Woolmers book the Art and Science of cricket he has a bunch of people assist him in trying to explain the 'Ball of the century' and their conclusion includes a suggestion (And it is only a suggestion because it's seemingly impossible to prove) that ball is tilted forwards with seam rotating at 90 degrees to the flight. As a straight perpendicular seam at 90 degrees wont drift? Do you know whether you tilt the ball forwards when it's released?
 
Wayne Shornes conundrum of bowling better off of a stand start is something I've experienced myself. I could easily revert to bowling off of a stand-start and so many of the fundamentals would fall into place very neatly. like him I've been tempted to do it in a match and see how it would pan out, I've done it in the nets and it's been effective to some extent. I just think that it looks vulnerable and batsman would go after you. I've seen recently and a couple years ago older blokes than me bowl off of stand starts and get shed loads of wickets and go for nothing runs, just by bowling on a tricky length, so there is possibly some merit in the idea.

But in the longer term, if you're young, you've got to bowl with some form of a run-up, the additional pace that SLA talks about generated by the run up makes a big difference to the way the ball moves through the air, if you get everything working in unison it'll make the ball do magic things - dip and drift and more rotations on the ball. But, it is a case of years and years of practice and one day it will come together and you'll find your method, be it off of a couple of steps, a Warne-esque walk and explode or a Macgill run in at speed approach. It just takes a lot of bowling and practice over years.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
Do you know whether you tilt the ball forwards when it's released?
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Not sure I get you fully. I get that you're saying there is a suggestion that having the ball bolt upright maybe isn't the best position for drift, but when you say "tilt the ball forwards" do you mean that the seam is tilted slightly to the right? What I would say is, that I have to focus on cocking the wrist because I tend to open the wrist a little too early. The end result is that some balls tilt slightly to the left.

But, I use a two-coloured ball so that I can work hard on getting the seam upright as much as possible. I've found that I get drift almost all the time and mostly it drifts a small but significant amount. However, I do get a ball to drift more than a yard time to time. In my experience, the ball drifts when the ball is fully upright more so than when it is tilted. I've found that it drifts more when I get plenty of over spin on the ball (maybe 70% over spin and 30% side spin), which seems counter-intuitive.

Other than drift, I get plenty of dip on the ball. If you've spoken to Stuart MacGill and he doesn't know, I think it's safe to say that it is and possibly always be a mystery. As you say, if a 12yo kid can get it to drift, then it most likely isn't about spinning the ball lots. Thinking about it, I remember messing about in the nets and bowling some off-spin. I got the ball to drift away plenty and that was possibly a quarter of the revs I can get on my leg spin. What those off spinners and my leg spinners had in common was a cleanly presented seam. That's the only conclusion I can come to. I've watched Warne bowling the ball and getting drift and the seam is clean and upright. And I mean not wobbling the seam at all.
 
someblokecalleddave said:
I've seen recently and a couple years ago older blokes than me bowl off of stand starts and get shed loads of wickets and go for nothing runs, just by bowling on a tricky length, so there is possibly some merit in the idea.
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There's a lot to be said for accuracy. If you can get decent revs on the ball and land it on a nice driving length almost everytime, you will get wickets. The question is how much you want to improve and what level you want to get to. If you want to get to a decent club level where you will be bowling to pro batters, then I can't imagine it is possible to get there with a standing start. I might be wrong as that is purely based on how I bowl and there's no way I can bowl 55mph with big revs and accuracy from a standing start. If you can, then stick with it. That's the one thing I would always say: if you're getting results, do not change a thing.
 
Hi,
I am a wrist spinner playing for a club in western australia. Can you please check the below video and see if my action/follow through etc is okay?
I get very little drift through the air. What can be done to get more drift?



Kind Regards,
Vignesh.
 
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