|
Post by PeterB on Jan 12, 2011 8:24:11 GMT -4
Thanks for all the insight. No worries. I bet that's the case with most sports. There was a game I used to play as a kid which basically involved a group of us throwing a tennis ball against a wall and catching it, but we managed to come up with quite a complicated set of rules. Made perfect sense to us, though. That's the thing. Firstly, watching a game illustrates so much of the rules that otherwise are dry words on a page. Secondly, going to the cricket is a great social activity - dad takes the kids, groups of young men and women socialising, blokes chucking a sickie, retired folks - and everyone has something different to do between balls, whether it's reading a book, ogling the opposite sex, listening to the commentary on the radio, chucking a beach ball around, or just having a beer.
|
|
|
Post by echnaton on Jan 12, 2011 10:23:52 GMT -4
Thanks PW that was a great explanation. It really gives the flavor of the game and I feel like I could watch and understand the action now without bothering everyone. Luke, your post was great too in broadening it out. Now if I could find a place to actually watch a game. I somehow think it would not be much fun to see on TV unless you already had stake in the game to keep your attention. I try to keep visualizing it out in relationship to baseball. The similarities are there and the differences are becoming clearer. I suppose baseball is a derivative of the precursor to modern cricket much as the various flavors of modern football are decedents from old forms of English football. You certainly do come from the land down under. I listen to the Dr Karl podcasts from the ABC and BBC and get to hear these wonderful Aussie phrases regularly.
|
|
|
Post by lukepemberton on Jan 13, 2011 0:31:11 GMT -4
Luke, your post was great too in broadening it out. No worries. Watch the first wicket in this video. You can see the ball drift in the air, and then spin back in. This is spin bowling. www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Izmfr3-204&feature=relatedThere are many types of spin bowling, and I'm not even going to attempt to cover them. Some bowlers get the ball to spin the other way so can bowl a batsmen behind his legs. Spin bowling is known as slow bowling, and it is more about guile and thinking than raw pace. It is a very tactical art and very much a battle between the bowler and batsmen. Part of the art of the spin bowler is disguise the ball so batsman has to come to the pitch of the ball to negate the spin, or play the ball late. The link below is an example of fast bowling from the greatest quick bowler to pick a cricket ball up - Glen McGrath. www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYoTLYl484kThere are different types of fast bowling as well, and again it is highly skilled. It relies on pace and guile.
|
|
|
Post by echnaton on Jan 13, 2011 8:53:07 GMT -4
A short web search turned up 17 cricket clubs in Houston. Not so amazing really considering the number of Houstonians from India and Pakistan.
|
|
|
Post by PeterB on Jan 14, 2011 10:09:02 GMT -4
A short web search turned up 17 cricket clubs in Houston. Not so amazing really considering the number of Houstonians from India and Pakistan. When I was in Houston in 2004 I stayed at a motel near the Johnson Space Center. In the morning that I headed out to JSC, the guy on the front counter was a Sri Lankan studying at one of the local unis. We had a good 10 minute chat about cricket - I think he was excited to have someone he could talk to about it.
|
|
|
Post by captain swoop on Jan 15, 2011 21:12:44 GMT -4
Mornington crescent.
|
|
Al Johnston
"Cheer up!" they said, "It could be worse!" So I did, and it was.
Posts: 1,453
|
Post by Al Johnston on Jan 16, 2011 18:47:23 GMT -4
Aren't you in Spoon?
|
|