Wrist Spin Bowling

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Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

With regards top level Spinners and the like my observations are that they feel the necessity to bowl a lot faster 50mph and higher and that the speed is an essential aspect to thier game, but as we even know if you increase your speed the spin is negated hence the reason that they seem to be able to turn the ball less. I'm always impressed of what I see of Mendis as he seems to get wickets with very little turn off the crease - it's all a bit baffling to me!
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

i went to my clubs net session this evening. it was dead again, at least an adult batsman showed this time, a new guy who was actually very good! i bowled maybe 30 deliveries at him, they pretty much all sucked. i got one good length leg break in that barely turned but he could only defend it. probably 3 or 4 half decent ones, and one awesome attempted top spinner that ended up a wrong'un (apparently i can bowl them!! it only came back in about 6" though). i landed it right in the block hole and it was fractions away from finding the gate and bowling him, he inside edged it and was full of praise for the delivery. if only the other 2 dozen deliveries hadnt gone leg side...

so then him and the other guy who showed who was bowling went off for a pint in the bar, and i toiled away for another hour or so on my own. things werent working well, so i thought sod it, lets try running up again, since id gone back to my 2 step approach last week and it had been working ok, but not great. and this evening it just wasnt working at all, and i cant stop bowling leg side, no matter how much i adjust my angles.

so first ball i got it absolutely spot on, it came out leg side still but the ball zipped, drifted literally 2 feet in flight, landed 2-3 feet outside leg stump and span back over middle stump with a ton of bounce!!! so i figured there was some experimentation to be done there. ive got rid of the issues that caused my run up technique to not work before (instead of bouncing into the delivery i stay very flat, i almost drag my feet but without slowing down), but im still struggling for consistency. when i get it right its awesome. but more often than not the ball either isnt flighted and drops miles short, gets dragged down into the ground 10 feet in front of me, or flys away into the side of the nets on the leg side. i think 80% of my problem is gripping the ball though (it seems to slip out more easily given the additional arm momentum at the delivery point), and 20% not rotating over my front leg consistently enough. i was landing more deliveries on off stump than my 2-step technique, and when i was they were always a good length. the in between balls were pretty awful, but then so is delivering every ball 2-5 feet outside leg stump. its going to get called a wide either way, or get spanked for 4/6. so i think maybe i should just get my run-up working and stop trying to find a happy place in between. in the long term it makes no sense to perfect a flawed method just so i can try to get a game before the season ends and then spend the first 2 months of winter catching up (especially since practice time will be less easy to come by once it gets cold/wet/both).

2 things about running up that are encouraging me more than anything else are firstly that the ball turns at least the same amount, maybe more, but its at least 10mph faster in getting there (maybe more). even my brother, who is about as poor in technique as a "batsman" can get, has the time to wait on his back foot and pick my deliveries off the pitch. now that wont be possible.

secondly, the extra speed in flight is generating (what to me seem like) insane amounts of drift, even off of deliveries that dont come out of the hand that well and dont spin that much. so long as they are flighted, they move sideways.

ive been reading back through my posts in this thread lately to look at my progress, and its really quite useful to see what issues and solutions ive found on a given day and how ive ended up back at the exact same problem later lol. it seems like a big circle, but at least i know what i need to sort out first now. detailing every detail of every practice has its merits, even if i am rambling on most of the time lol.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

in twenty 20 matches it certainly seems that anything that ends up 6" wide of leg stump or about 2 feet wide of off stump is a wide, regardless of how it gets there. so spinners have to really restrict their turn, or pitch it well outside their normal line. since T20 is now one of the more dominant forms of the game, i definitely think that spin bowlers dumb themselves down to be more effective in such forms. one day matches are probably the most important form of county cricket since they play so many games now.

i think youve got...

county championship = 16 games for everyone

Natwest Pro 40 (40 overs) = 8 games for everyone plus i think there are then QF, SF and Final

Friends Provident Trophy (45 overs) = 8 games for everyone, plus QF, SF, Final

Twenty 20 Cup = 10 games for everyone, plus QF, SF, Final

so in all, counties play 16 proper cricket matches, and a minimum of 26 mickey mouse one day games, with a maximum of 35 if they reach the final in all competitions! proper 4-day matches play little part in the county season now. they were considering scrapping it altogether i believe because spectators dont turn out and thus it makes no money. fortunately common sense has prevailed and they are keeping it as a full 16 match format for at least the next 3 years. next year apparently they are getting shot of one of the one-day tournaments and replacing it with additional T20 games so that England can have its own version of the IPL, which is ridiculous.

when 60-70% of your overall games are limited overs games where anything more than a foot or 2 outside of the line of the stumps is a wide its no wonder spinners are fairly subtle now. id imagine they have the ability to really rip the ball, they just dont get the opportunity to do it. county cricket isnt televised afaik, all of the limited overs matches are on Sky Sports (not ALL of them obviously, but at least one match every day they are playing). so my only knowledge of bowlers and their capabilities is from 20, 40 and 45 over matches. and of course international test matches involving England (if England arent involved then it isnt televised).

with regards speed - MacGill bowled fast and it didnt seem to be a problem. i think bowling at a NATURAL speed is important. some people just have an action that propels the ball faster than others. Warne was quite slow (47-50mph springs to mind as his "optimum"?), MacGill is very quick for a leggie (not sure on speeds, ive heard as much as mid-60's though?). then youve got someone like Graeme Swann (off spinner i know) who can bowl as fast as 70mph and still turn the ball well, his stock delivery appears to be around 56-58mph. i think if it comes out fast, thats how you bowl. if it comes out slow, dont try to force it. at best you just wont turn the ball very much, at worse youll lose accuracy. i can bowl a lot faster if i increase the overspin, this is obviously what happens a lot at county level, since the leggies always have lots of bounce. they bowl top spinners with subtle leg spin, pitch it up nice and fast, and that restricts runs and gets them lots of catches in the deep. seems to be the way from my limited observations.

Ajantha Mendis is an odd bowler. sometimes he doesnt appear to turn the ball at all, some days i cant tell if hes an off spinner or a leg spinner because balls go everywhere at complete random! but he takes loads of wickets. my theory is that he has so many variations that its impossible to know which one is coming next, and they all do something different. he uses 3 or 4 different grips!!!! hes probably got 3 different top spinners, a couple of off breaks, a leg break and a backspinner or 2. and every one has a subtle difference to the next in terms of flight and reaction off the pitch. at least thats how it seems. now i know why they call him a "mystery bowler" lol
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Jim2109;360925 said:
i went to my clubs net session this evening. it was dead again, at least an adult batsman showed this time, a new guy who was actually very good! i bowled maybe 30 deliveries at him, they pretty much all sucked. i got one good length leg break in that barely turned but he could only defend it. probably 3 or 4 half decent ones, and one awesome attempted top spinner that ended up a wrong'un (apparently i can bowl them!! it only came back in about 6" though). i landed it right in the block hole and it was fractions away from finding the gate and bowling him, he inside edged it and was full of praise for the delivery. if only the other 2 dozen deliveries hadnt gone leg side...

so then him and the other guy who showed who was bowling went off for a pint in the bar, and i toiled away for another hour or so on my own. things werent working well, so i thought sod it, lets try running up again, since id gone back to my 2 step approach last week and it had been working ok, but not great. and this evening it just wasnt working at all, and i cant stop bowling leg side, no matter how much i adjust my angles.

so first ball i got it absolutely spot on, it came out leg side still but the ball zipped, drifted literally 2 feet in flight, landed 2-3 feet outside leg stump and span back over middle stump with a ton of bounce!!! so i figured there was some experimentation to be done there. ive got rid of the issues that caused my run up technique to not work before (instead of bouncing into the delivery i stay very flat, i almost drag my feet but without slowing down), but im still struggling for consistency. when i get it right its awesome. but more often than not the ball either isnt flighted and drops miles short, gets dragged down into the ground 10 feet in front of me, or flys away into the side of the nets on the leg side. i think 80% of my problem is gripping the ball though (it seems to slip out more easily given the additional arm momentum at the delivery point), and 20% not rotating over my front leg consistently enough. i was landing more deliveries on off stump than my 2-step technique, and when i was they were always a good length. the in between balls were pretty awful, but then so is delivering every ball 2-5 feet outside leg stump. its going to get called a wide either way, or get spanked for 4/6. so i think maybe i should just get my run-up working and stop trying to find a happy place in between. in the long term it makes no sense to perfect a flawed method just so i can try to get a game before the season ends and then spend the first 2 months of winter catching up (especially since practice time will be less easy to come by once it gets cold/wet/both).

2 things about running up that are encouraging me more than anything else are firstly that the ball turns at least the same amount, maybe more, but its at least 10mph faster in getting there (maybe more). even my brother, who is about as poor in technique as a "batsman" can get, has the time to wait on his back foot and pick my deliveries off the pitch. now that wont be possible.

secondly, the extra speed in flight is generating (what to me seem like) insane amounts of drift, even off of deliveries that dont come out of the hand that well and dont spin that much. so long as they are flighted, they move sideways.

ive been reading back through my posts in this thread lately to look at my progress, and its really quite useful to see what issues and solutions ive found on a given day and how ive ended up back at the exact same problem later lol. it seems like a big circle, but at least i know what i need to sort out first now. detailing every detail of every practice has its merits, even if i am rambling on most of the time lol.
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There you go Jim, that's the solution to your Wrong Un issues. Bowl your top Spinners, keep your arm vertical and then dip your shoulder and work on just getting the ball coming out of the up-turned wrist.

I found that as well, I kept going round in circles as such, trying things adding things and then finding that I'd come back round to the original problem, but I then found that generally there had been an improvement. I think one of the keys things you could do is video your bowling action and see how it looks.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360416 said:
No I think there's credibility in Philpotts instructions to try and spin the ball back into the body, I think that in doing so you're likely to get your wrist angle to the point that you're going to produce the 90 spinning ball with the potential to turn the most off of the wicket. It may be that you'll never spin the ball inwards, but in trying to do so what'll happen is you'll angle your wrist so much that you'll end up developing a your own variation of the Big Leg Break. Everyone acknowledges that it takes years and total focus to bowl Leg Breaks well and I reckon all that Philpott is doing is giving you ideas to work with and if you're committed some how you'll find your own way of bowling a Leg Break that satisfies you? He says in his book that details such as grip and action are not set in granite, it's a case of finding your own way and one that you're happy with -what do you reckon?
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I think I may have explained myself poorly there, I think philpots advice on the big leg break is spot on (for me anyway). if I were to follow the stand with arm out in front of you and flick the ball back at your chest instructions he gives in his book and freeze my wrist in that position (at the moment of release) then move my arm into the delivery position, that's what my big leg break looks like at the moment of release. same goes for the standard leg break and the flicking the ball from hand to hand.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360926 said:
There you go Jim, that's the solution to your Wrong Un issues. Bowl your top Spinners, keep your arm vertical and then dip your shoulder and work on just getting the ball coming out of the up-turned wrist.
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id pretty much already figured that the top spinner was the way for me to go. i think i identified it as a future avenue in a post earlier in the week. i expected it to take a long time before the top spinner would become an off spinner though, but it seems to be coming together more quickly than i expected.

im still going to work on the flipper version though, it has so many added benefits over a conventional wrong'un.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360415 said:
Your explanation suggest that if you were to pitch the ball down the middle on one of the stumps and then it was to turn that'd be a wide? That can't be surely?
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Indoor was a bit like that. My son spun his team to victory in the final and he finished his season with a hat-trick with his last three balls of the comp.
But he has had to bowl with a lot of topspin all season and try and stop from spinning too much . If he really gave it a rip he could turn it almost square on the carpet.
That is the only problem with legspin and the indoor wide rule, some great deliveries are deemed wide whereas outdoor they would be considered perfect.
I might have to get my young bloke (jimmy) to post here and tell how he does it because he is a better bowler than I was.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Maybe another idea could be to simplyfy your whole approach. Maybe just in the short term try a technique whereby the key issue isn't how much it spins? Maybe adopt my 3rd finger only approach which still produces a small leg break, but then allows you to look at other aspects of your bowling and this might free you up to examine your line and length issues and forget for the minute all the more complex issues such as drift, spin and flight?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Jim, you make loads of good points in your previous 2 posts, and others with which I do not agree. Can you try to give them in smaller amounts as my attention span has become worse than a young boy with ADHD. I do not mean to be rude, rather it is so that the good points you make do not go unnoticed as they deserve thought and comment.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

ive thought about it. but it kinda goes against everything ive ever heard from every leg spinner and coach lol. they always say that spin comes first, the rest will follow. i dont have too much of a problem identifying issues, my problem is more in resolving them. also, my finger action has become quite an important part of my length. because im using more overspin this is helping my length. once i find my length and rhythm i can then turn my hand to all of the other angles and things just slot into place.

im not too disheartened by pitching the ball off line. i know that just bowling lots of deliveries eventually should correct that. so long as the length is good and the ball is spinning im fairly happy there. also, if i bowl in an open space as opposed to the nets i find that my line improves a LOT. i think having the nets there throws my co-ordination off.

the thing that bothers me is when my consistency isnt there (like tonight) and i cant even replicate the same line and length outside leg stump every ball, but nothing has changed from my last session to this one (literally 24 hours ago), and i just cant recapture the same form. also it bothers me when the ball doesnt turn off of the wicket in a similar manner every delivery, even if im pitching the ball in the same area with the same seam angle and spin (generally when i get my action working, the turn is consistent).

again though, i think time will fix that. i tend to find that my first ball of the day is always a really good one. then things slowly go downhill for the next hour. then i bowl a couple of good ones out of nowhere, find a rhythm, and things get really good. and then il bowl well until i get too tired to bowl anymore (these are the sessions where i end up excited and make long posts on here). i need to find some way of removing that hour in the middle though, and just getting straight down to the good stuff :D i kinda make a point about never finishing a session until ive bowled a few good balls in a row so that my confidence is always high when i leave, and my enthusiasm to get back practicing again is strong. if i went home after an hour of awful bowling then im less eager to get back out there. some days i leave feeling pretty sore because its taken 2 hours of hard work, with some anger thrown in during the middle to bowl anything decent. tonight was a little like that, but the end result was good.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360417 said:
With regards top level Spinners and the like my observations are that they feel the necessity to bowl a lot faster 50mph and higher and that the speed is an essential aspect to thier game, but as we even know if you increase your speed the spin is negated hence the reason that they seem to be able to turn the ball less. I'm always impressed of what I see of Mendis as he seems to get wickets with very little turn off the crease - it's all a bit baffling to me!
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Mendis' strength I think is his accuracy and the fact that he bowls incredibly straight. I do not know about his statistics but assume he has an inordinate amount of LBWs. He also seems to have a very nice googly, even though it does not turn anywhere as much as yours my old friend.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

But it's not like you don't understand the principles of how to spin the ball, you know the drills and stuff and it strikes me that if you were go back to a really basic approach and iron out all your bowling fundamentals, it would then be easier to bring back the spin. It's like you need to create a good solid basis on which to build on all of the details. A naff analogy would be to compare building a lovely house onto a sand dune rather than a granite base (It's late that's the best I can come up with)! But I'm not a coach, so maybe it's best to stick with them?

Or perhaps ease up on the bowling for a couple or few days and go back to it, I find that helps quite a bit sometimes?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360415 said:
if you were to pitch the ball down the middle on one of the stumps and then it was to turn that'd be a wide? That can't be surely?
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From what I see, anything just outside legstump and not hitting any part of the batsman is called a wide in international limited overs cricket.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I've been told that when you're bowling well you should count the rhythm of your run up and delivery (like dance steps) and when things go wrong try and get back to that rhythm. Rhythm is something that is hugely overlooked when people are trying to learn wrist spin (or any form of bowling) as gaining the muscle memory needed to get a repetitive action (or at least parts of it) can be helped hugely by memorizing a simple rhythm rather than thinking about the detail of the action. I definitely guilty of the this myself though

I'm unsure of what do regarding sorting out your basics to be honest. I've heard coaches say sort out your basic action first (sometimes just bowling medium pace) and others say always spin it hard because if you learn everything always spinning it hard it will never be an issue for you. I think the answer is time and patients which ever way you choose though. I know one thing for sure is that a good set of basics is the key to success.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;360427 said:
I might have to get my young bloke (jimmy) to post here and tell how he does it because he is a better bowler than I was.
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That would be very nice, and him bowling the big legbreaks would be really nice. I know you had a video on Youtube. Always nice to see different leg spinners especially when young and talented.

Today saw 2 pom leg spinners: Waller for somerset and Beer for sussex. They seem to roll the ball rather than spin it viciously. I thought they may have been tutored by jenner as they looked quite similar in delivery. It could be as you said above that the lack of rip might be due to the strict rules on limited overs.

Anything new unearthed about grimmet. I read a book by peables and apparently he lost the leg break as well. He got the don with a googly in an ashes test match. Could this have been one of the dons weaknesses. Grimmet got him out at least once with it, peables ditto and hollies in the last test match.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Have you tried bowling at a target on a good line and length jim? Start with a biggish target and try to keep your head steady on delivery. It helps getting visual fixation, and your body sort of gets a feel for line and length.

Something else you may try is bowling off a shorter distance at first, when you get a better line and length move to a longer distance.

These two tricks helped me bowl better line and length, even though about 5% of my deliveries would be considered wide. The other thing is as paulinho said, count the steps loudly to learn to get into a rhythm.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I got side-tracked studying o'reillys works for any grimmett stuff. The first thing you will notice in o reillys writings is; he was not a legspinner, and he does not " believe" in the things legspinners do.

Drop, according to Bill O Reilly, does not exist and is just a figment of our imagination! Same goes for everything else we think we have going for us.

He described himself more as a pace bowler would.

O Reilly wrote that just as Bradman was the greatest batsman he ever witnessed, Clarrie Grimmett was the greatest bowler he saw play cricket.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

When I first started bowling leg spin in school I would bowl with a hula hoop on the wicket about 9ft down. it was a great place to start. The teacher said that later we would introduce cones or something like that to bowl over to learn flight but we never got arounds to it.

years later I had a coaching session at old trafford and the coach put a disk about the size of a CD again about 9ft down on line or just outside leg stump. I hit it first time and hit off stump, the bloke thought I was a genius. The followinig 60 balls or so convinced him that I was not :).
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;360433 said:
I got side-tracked studying o'reillys works for any grimmett stuff. The first thing you will notice in o reillys writings is; he was not a legspinner, and he does not " believe" in the things legspinners do.

Drop, according to Bill O Reilly, does not exist and is just a figment of our imagination! Same goes for everything else we think we have going for us.

He described himself more as a pace bowler would.

O Reilly wrote that just as Bradman was the greatest batsman he ever witnessed, Clarrie Grimmett was the greatest bowler he saw play cricket.
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But he used to bowl a googly didn't he . Or did he call it an offcutter. Read a book on SF barnes who seemed to be in the same category as O'Reilly. In fact he played little county cricket and played for long years in the lancaster league, which I presume was not as good as county cricket, even though in test matches he had very good figures.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

i often put down a target. usually its just a branch thats fallen off of a tree nearby lol, or a piece of wood, whatever is lying around, sometimes i use rocks. il put the target inline with leg stump, and have it so it points towards the stumps, and position it so that the length is about 3 feet either side of what id regard as optimal.

then il aim to bowl the ball inside of the stick/wood/rocks at any point along its length. the length is never an issue, its always the line. il usually find myself bowling 6-12" leg side of the target instead of the other way around. ive been meaning to try the hula hoop method for ages, it makes the most sense.

i often start off bowling from a shorter distance to find a little rhythm, then move backwards slowly. i thought i had accurately measured the wicket length, but last week i discovered ive been practicing from about 8 feet further back than i should have been!! that yielded an instant improvement in my length and accuracy.

i started trying the counting thing yesterday on my run up. its hard to know if it worked or not.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Sadspinner, those british pathe films you unearthed could be critical. The first ashes test 1930. The players have black arm bands. Grimmett declared he was going to bowl his new invention in that test. He demonstrated his mystery ball to the press a week before. Mailley, a great legspinner himself, saw the demo and said Grimmett had discovered a new way to bowl spin.

Grimmett gets 3 wickets in 4 balls using his new ball. The footage shows Woolley bamboozled by a grimmett mystery ball, Hendren was bowled and the veteran batsman declared the ball that dismissed him was "a new one to me".

The events caused a sensation and you can read some of the press reports online. This was ten years before he first bowled the backspinning flipper. That was first bowled in 1940, but I have plenty of evidence he was bowling other "flippers" as early as 1930.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Jim2109;361030 said:
i often put down a target. usually its just a branch thats fallen off of a tree nearby lol, or a piece of wood, whatever is lying around, sometimes i use rocks. il put the target inline with leg stump, and have it so it points towards the stumps, and position it so that the length is about 3 feet either side of what id regard as optimal.

then il aim to bowl the ball inside of the stick/wood/rocks at any point along its length. the length is never an issue, its always the line. il usually find myself bowling 6-12" leg side of the target instead of the other way around. ive been meaning to try the hula hoop method for ages, it makes the most sense.

i often start off bowling from a shorter distance to find a little rhythm, then move backwards slowly. i thought i had accurately measured the wicket length, but last week i discovered ive been practicing from about 8 feet further back than i should have been!! that yielded an instant improvement in my length and accuracy.

i started trying the counting thing yesterday on my run up. its hard to know if it worked or not.
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Again I have to say that if your line is so variable it doesn't seem to make sense to bowl leg-side if you've got an off-side field or do you set your field in accordance to your bowling that side. I'd say with that much variation in your line you'd be far better off bowling off-side to force catches and even pick up the odd wicket hitting the stumps?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

sadspinner;360434 said:
But he used to bowl a googly didn't he . Or did he call it an offcutter. Read a book on SF barnes who seemed to be in the same category as O'Reilly. In fact he played little county cricket and played for long years in the lancaster league, which I presume was not as good as county cricket, even though in test matches he had very good figures.
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O Reilly, from his writings, seemed as if his main method was lots of fast bouncing wronguns with two short legs waiting.
He reckoned he was given the new ball a lot, even in tests, and was expected to bowl as a swing/seamer almost.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

im trying NOT to bowl leg side, thats the whole problem!!! i just cant drag it inside leg stump, no matter what i do. occasionally il get one to work, generally i always end up back outside leg stump. if every batsman in the world was a leftie id be fine lol. having only played one match, field placings havent yet been an issue. the field was pretty much the same all game regardless of the bowler, and there were zero catching opportunities all game, everything got hit along the floor.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

sadspinner;360430 said:
Mendis' strength I think is his accuracy and the fact that he bowls incredibly straight. I do not know about his statistics but assume he has an inordinate amount of LBWs. He also seems to have a very nice googly, even though it does not turn anywhere as much as yours my old friend.
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Yeah watching him and others too I'm kind of baffled by their success rates as you say Mendis is on the stumps and when it turns it's what you'd describe as 'Okay' for want of a better description, not having access to sky and being able to see a spell unfold and get a real sense of what's happening it kind of looks a bit bizarre that the worlds best batsmen are all un-done by a little bit of spin? But needless to say it's pressure and it's the fact that it might spin and it might not, up, down, backwards, left, right, faster, slower with or without drift there's an inevitability about it!
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Ahhh now I see and I suppose you've tried bowling your delivery with your foot pointing straight down the wicket or to the off-side or where-ever it's needed to theoretically correct it and you've tried the 'stand start' a la' Beau Casson in the David Freedman clips? I take it you use your leading arm to point in the direction you want the ball to go as well?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;360435 said:
Sadspinner, those british pathe films you unearthed could be critical. The first ashes test 1930. The players have black arm bands. Grimmett declared he was going to bowl his new invention in that test. He demonstrated his mystery ball to the press a week before. Mailley, a great legspinner himself, saw the demo and said Grimmett had discovered a new way to bowl spin.

Grimmett gets 3 wickets in 4 balls using his new ball. The footage shows Woolley bamboozled by a grimmett mystery ball, Hendren was bowled and the veteran batsman declared the ball that dismissed him was "a new one to me".

The events caused a sensation and you can read some of the press reports online. This was ten years before he first bowled the backspinning flipper. That was first bowled in 1940, but I have plenty of evidence he was bowling other "flippers" as early as 1930.
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I don't know whether we've discussed this before, but what you're saying is that Grimmett developed his Top-Spinning Flipper prior to the back-spinning Flipper?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

I haven't been to the nets with my son for a while because he has been playing enough cricket with his mates.
We have a net session organised for today with a couple of good batsmen.
It is getting that time of the year to start keeping it simple and basic. For the player and the coach.
My young bloke has been working on a slder, a flipper and this less obvious wrongun he has that spins just a little. I dont want him to bowl his flipper at all but he bowls it at school and gets wickets with it so it is hard to stop him.
The biggest improvement he made in the off season is he can now dart a faster flatter ball at the batsman without dropping short.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;361125 said:
I haven't been to the nets with my son for a while because he has been playing enough cricket with his mates.
We have a net session organised for today with a couple of good batsmen.
It is getting that time of the year to start keeping it simple and basic. For the player and the coach.
My young bloke has been working on a slder, a flipper and this less obvious wrongun he has that spins just a little. I dont want him to bowl his flipper at all but he bowls it at school and gets wickets with it so it is hard to stop him.
The biggest improvement he made in the off season is he can now dart a faster flatter ball at the batsman without dropping short.
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The faster flatter ball as that still his leg break?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

someblokecalleddave;360441 said:
I don't know whether we've discussed this before, but what you're saying is that Grimmett developed his Top-Spinning Flipper prior to the back-spinning Flipper?
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Yeah that is right. The "off-spinning flipper" was his first way to use the finger clicking flipper spin. The topspinner was his preferred way, and the backspinner was a rare variation that Dooland and Benaud took up.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

Paulinho;361015 said:
When I first started bowling leg spin in school I would bowl with a hula hoop on the wicket about 9ft down. it was a great place to start. The teacher said that later we would introduce cones or something like that to bowl over to learn flight but we never got arounds to it.

years later I had a coaching session at old trafford and the coach put a disk about the size of a CD again about 9ft down on line or just outside leg stump. I hit it first time and hit off stump, the bloke thought I was a genius. The followinig 60 balls or so convinced him that I was not :).
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Hula hoop is a good size for a target. Not only is it more realistic than Benauds coin-sized target, it also shows how big the landing zone can be for a wristspinner who can spin the ball well.
Grimmett used big targets for coaching kids. His own target was usually a 10 inch square piece of material that he could hit blindfolded.
He always ended his training session by hitting the target 6 times in a row before going home!
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;361130 said:
Still a legbreak. just less flight and faster.
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So his main ball is a more loopy bigger turning leg break? Does he pitch it up outside leg or on the off-stump and is good enough to have a look at the bat with regards whether they're good off the legs or off-side and then does he bowl to the bats weakness?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;360443 said:
Yeah that is right. The "off-spinning flipper" was his first way to use the finger clicking flipper spin. The topspinner was his preferred way, and the backspinner was a rare variation that Dooland and Benaud took up.
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I think that was the impression I was getting backed up by the image of the grip in the 1930's book 'Taking Wickets'.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

macca;361130 said:
Still a legbreak. just less flight and faster.
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Is it done by releasing the balll later, or by trying to use the spinning finger less, or does he accellerate the run up marginally more, or use a faster arm action? I presume he tries to get it straight to get more lbw's? I find the straight ball to be the toughest of all to get right . Even the mystery ball or flipper end up as offspinners.
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

is this "off-spinning flipper" the same as your gipper? do you get much success with it and doesn't if hurt like hell to bowl. it looks like it should?
 
Re: Wrist Spin Bowling

sadspinner;361137 said:
Is it done by releasing the balllater, or by trying to use the spinning finger less, or does he accellerate the run up marginally more, or use a faster arm action? I presume he tries to get it straight to get more lbw's? I find the straight ball to be the toughest of all to get right . Even the mystery ball or flipper end up as offspinners.
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Personally I've got a ball like this and I just have it higher in the fingers and whip the front arm down a lot faster. My mystery ball spins away like a little off-spinner, but I quite like the fact that it does that.
 
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