Leg Spin Bowling - The Basics - What is a Leg Break?

Wrist-spin bowling 'The Leg-Break'

The Leg-Break, known to most as Leg-Spin. This is the Wrist Spinners main ball, this is the ball most of us bowl 95% of the time and therefore is known as our "Stock Ball". Having said that there are sub variations, but we'll come to that later in the post. If you're totally new to Wrist Spinning and you want to get some sense of what it's all about you should check out some of the videos linked at the end of this post.

1. Basics; As mentioned in the paragraph above your 'Leg Break' is known as your 'Stock Ball'. This basically means this is the delivery you use most of the time and therefore have to be totally in control of, as Terry Jenner would say... "This is your go to ball, the one that will get you overs and the one that will get you wickets or dry up the runs".

This is the ball that you practice the most, this is the ball that you have to be able to spin hard and land in a relatively small area of your choice, again quoting Jenner... "Your bread and butter ball".

On the point of being the ball you practice the most, you have to realise that this is the most difficult of all cricket disciplines, this is recognised by everyone that plays cricket even though they have never tried it, they simply know though having seen and read about Wrist-Spinners at all levels... this is not easy. Most reckon that it'll take you four years of constant practice and if you're looking to do it at a high level you might be looking at 10 years! Needless to say there are those that have natural ability and the basics may come quickly.

Described as Slow Bowling, the approach to the crease is generally off of a short run up and the speed at which you would bowl if playing professionally is around the 45-55mph speed. Primarily you would bowl over the stumps landing the ball 4-5 metres in front of the stumps attacking the stumps (The impression from the batsman's perspective is that the ball will go on to hit the stumps line B) if left forcing the batsman to play the ball. The ball on pitching 'Breaks' (C) towards the off-side of the pitch looking strike the edge of the batsman's bat producing a catching chance for the keeper or slips fielder. (D - red dotted line is the line that the ball would be perceived to travel along if left and not deviated off of the pitch). The ball in this illustration is angled at 45 degrees - this has elements of both side and top-spin.

Grip  Most people use pretty much the same orthodox grip, often described as the two up two down grip the ball sits in the palm of the hand as below (Wrist-spinners grip #1). The thumb for the most part plays very little part, only perhaps supporting the ball in some vague way. The two 'Up' fingers are secondary to the two 'Down' fingers, especially the 3rd finger (Your ring finger). The 3rd finger which is the one which is resting on the seam of the ball in this image is where all the action is happening, this is the finger that puts the revs on the ball, accompanied by the flick of the wrist. Watch the first few seconds of the video here and see the role the 3rd finger plays.

This next image here (below)  illustrates the grip further by viewing it from above. Again see the 3rd finger position - snug against the seam of the ball.

The image above (Basic Wrist-spin grip) shows the grip from another angle. Dependent on how big or small your hand is it should look similar to this. With regards to the grip Peter Philpott writes...

You may like to experiment with the way you hold the ball - the grip. I have seen so many leg-spinners grip the ball differently, yet still bowl the it effectively, the most important factor is that the grip is comfortable and suits you.
       Even so, it is always sensible to understand the orthodox method. For 'the orthodox' simply means the way that suits most people. Whether you eventually choose to use the orthodox method or not, you should understand it, and experiment with it.

Peter Philpott, page 21, The Art of Wrist-Spin Bowling.

Grip it hard or soft? Again different people say different things, Warne for one says to grip it softly and Richie Benuad differs in that he suggests that you grip the ball quite firmly. Have a look at the clip here at 2:40 where he describes his grip and the firmness of the grip.

Benaud's grip is slightly different to that of Warne's, but having tried it, I'd say that it's worth experimenting with as your fingers might wrap around the ball in a different way and it may just feel like a far better method for you? Inevitably it'll probably be the case that you'll try and number of different ways before you settle on the one that works for you, but it's impossible to say to someone... "Hold it loose" simply because your idea of loose is probably very different to mine. It then means you're going to have to try this basic aspect of your bowling in numerous ways before you establish a way that suits you. I still have to say to myself when I'm bowing "Ridiculously loose, ridiculously loose", over and over again to force myself to bowl with an exceptionally loose grip, as through recent experimentation I've noted that the exceptionally loose grip works so much better for me. Having said that and also having looked at the Warne description of his grip here, I've noted that they both have their fingers either side of the middle finger spread very wide, so I myself may have a go at this in the nets in the coming months and see if it creates any significant difference in my bowling. It's this trial and re-trial process that a lot of us will have to go through over a period of a few years before we feel as though we're at a level that we're happy with.

Boogie Spinner has just said...

"Just reading your blog Dave, I'm reminded of some early commentary on Warne from Benaud. I couldn't possibly say exactly when but I distinctly remember Benaud exclaiming that Warne would 'spin it on glass' and more importantly that he wished he'd known about Warne's loose grip on the ball when he was bowling, because he gripped the ball tightly simply through a belief that it was preferable at the time".Again further reinforcement of the need to work through the various methods to establish what will work for you. Warne himself says...

"The actual pressure of the grip is something you have to feel comfortable with. What I do... and what I do is not necessarily right for you, but it is right for me, remember it's got to be right for you, as long as you're getting the basics right. A lot of people are taught to grip the ball really tight, really squeeze it and spread these fingers out. (The 2 up fingers). The reason I don't like that is that, already everything is tight and tense when you come to the wicket, you're already tense and everything is getting hard. I don't like that, I want to come to the wicket feeling relaxed, if I feel relaxed, I feel like I'm going to be able to do what I want with the ball.

 So I have a loose grip, fingers are probably a little bit close together... but that works for me, the fingers are loose - two fingers up, two fingers down and the thumb just resting on the ball, that works for me".https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kM4ASXrv5ic Shane Warne talking to Mark Nicholas.



Flickers or Rollers? The Wrist-Spinners bowling action is a whole body affair, from the tip of the toes to the tip of the fingers. Getting up on the toes, bracing the leg, pivoting on the toes, rotating the shoulders over one another, rotating the body 180 degrees, high release, 45 degree release, low release, the point at which the ball is released, the flick of the wrist and fingers all combine to send the ball down the wicket in a particular way. At each stage something can go awry that will effect the outcome and one of the key stages is the final stage - what happens with the hand...

One of the conundrums you'll be faced with, especially if you've learned the basics of bowling previously is the one of accuracy over spin. Intuitively you may feel or have learned from your previous bowling experiences that accuracy is an important aspect of your approach and that both accuracy and spinning the ball should be learned side by side with equal importance attached to them. Everyone without exception advocates that first and foremost the thing you need to do above all else is spin the ball really hard. Not hard, but really hard, so hard, that at the start it will mean that you've got to practice so much on your own you're going to wonder why the hell you started. Reason why - you're not going to be able to land the ball on the cut strip all of the time because of the effort you're going to be putting into spinning the ball!

In his book "The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling" Peter Philpott at the start of the chapters where he explains in detail the "Eight Stages of Spin" one of the first ground rules he sets is the Spin it hard rule. He discusses orthodoxy and variations in grip and actions and says that there should be some flexibility in approaching how people bowl. Coaches shouldn't interfere too much unless of course there's some cause for real concern and even then after much observation. But when it comes to the spinning mantra he says...

But if there is one factor in spin bowling which all spinners should accept if they wish to perform to their optimum, it is the concept that the ball should be spun hard.

    Not rolled, not gently turned, but flicked, ripped, fizzed. If young bowlers learn to spin hard from the start and then enough spinning it hard, they can achieve accuracy.
Peter Philpott, page 19, The Art of Wrist-Spin Bowling.


One of the difficulties that you're going to face whether young or older, is the fact that if you go for this 'Spinning it hard' approach which you should, you are going to have to be really thick skinned if you're learning your craft in match situations. In the first few years, you're probably going to be carted all over the shop in matches and other days you'll get a bag full of wickets. There's a mantra that says S**t bowling gets wickets, so in between the days when you see ball after ball go down the legside and the umpire stretching his arms out and shouting "Wide Ball", there will be days when you come away with wickets and some success. A lot of it will be through luck and not design, but you have to grasp these moments and stick in there knowing that in a few years you'll be able to get the ball down the off-side a lot more often than not. But it does take a lot of determination and being very thick skinned, because you will be coming away feeling it was you that lost the team the match.

It helps therefore if you have a supportive captain and it may be an idea to play Sunday cricket or friendly matches as opposed to league cricket where the outcome of the game is subject to different dynamics within the club. I learned under the tuition of a bloke called Neil Samwell who was an exceptionally good Offie for Grays & Chadwell cricket club in Essex. At the time I played under him as captain he held the record for the most wickets taken at the club. But more than that, this bloke gave me a chance, he gave me overs, knowing that the chances were I'd get a ball or two down the legs-ide, so wide they'd be off the cut strip, or I'd bowl 4 wides down the leg-side before getting the ball on the stumps. I went through stages of having the yips almost and still he'd give me 4 or 5 overs and when I was successful, he celebrated my success in a way that enabled me to hang in there and not walk away from my desire to be a wrist spinner, he seemed genuinely interested in my long term goals and I'm extremely grateful for his input and support during my years at Grays and Chadwell.

I think if you have someone at your club that supports you in this manner and you don't feel totally isolated, the chances are in the longer term you'll get there, you'll be able to turn up at games and put the ball in areas that you design to do so and spin the ball and get it to turn off the wicket. How do you get to that place though?

Leg Spin Bowling - Variations and Sub Variations

Wrist Spin Bowling - Top-Spinner

The Top-Spinner.(updated 1st April 2015)

The Top-Spinner or 'Over-Spinner' is one of the variations bowled by Wrist Spinners. The ball is flicked out of the hand using a combination of wrist and fingers to impart the spin, the seam of the ball is released so that it's upright, as per the diagram below seen from above.

 

The grip is the exactly the *same as the Leg Break ...2 fingers up, 2 fingers down as described by both Jenner and Warne the view that the batsman would see would be as in the image below (fig 1). This I would describe as an orthodox wrist spinners grip with the ball cupped in the hand and the 3rd finger (ring finger) rested on the seam.

The thumb plays little or no part in the release generally, the 3rd finger is rested on the seam highlighted here below in fig 4. This finger on the seam is the means by which the spin is imparted, combined with the flick of the wrist.

 

 

 Characteristics

Delivered as nears as possible in the same way as your stock ball, the wrist position is changed so that the side spin on the ball is negated, the seam rotates over itself aimed directly down the wicket. The harder the ball is spun, the more the ball will be effected by the Magnus Force making the ball dip as it reaches the batsman. The impression from the batsman's perspective would be that the ball is going to be a lot fuller, landing a lot close to his position in the crease. With the top-spin, the ball would then dip late in its trajectory dropping short, the result is that often the batsman would play the shot timing it incorrectly resulting in the ball spooning up in the air.

The flight of the ball would appear based on its release height and speed to be a much fuller ball (Indicated by the white line), but with the top-spin the ball would suddenly drop short as indicated by the red line. One of the better descriptions of the Top-Spinner can be found on Pencil Crickets blog, he writes...

Wrist-spin Applications #1: The Top-spinnerI've started with the top-spinner rather than the stock legbreak as this is by far the easier delivery to describe, so it's a good starting point. I'm assuming it's a "pure" top-spinner, i.e. that the seam is vertically upright and pointing down the wicket.

Essentially, all you have to do to work out what the Magnus effect will do with this ball is take the golf ball and turn it upside down, so that instead of pushing the ball up it pulls it down instead.

Now here, for once, I have to take issue with Peter Philpott. In his otherwise flawless book "The Art of Wrist-Spin Bowling" he describes the effect of top-spin (he calls it overspin) saying that "overspin increases the effect of gravity", a bit of sloppy science that will have all the physics teachers rolling their eyes. The effect of gravity is unchanged throughout - what top-spin does is add an additional effect which accelerates the ball in the same direction. So the ball has the downward acceleration due to gravity AND some more downward acceleration due to the Magnus effect on top of that.

So as the batsman sees the ball come out of the bowler's hand, he will judge the speed and angle and intuitively estimate where the ball will pitch based on downward acceleration due to gravity alone. Thereafter the Magnus effect will make the ball dip faster in the air, and bounce further away from the batsman than he originally thought it would. That's not all, however. Because the ball has dipped it will now hit the ground at a steeper angle, and therefore it will bounce higher.

Now anyone who has ever spun a ball onto the floor in front of them will find this last part counter-intuitive. If you gently chuck a top-spinning ball onto the floor in front of you the traction as it lands will accelerate it away from you, making the angle it bounces up at shallower. Likewise a back-spun ball will seem to sit up, and if you give it a really good rip you can even get it to bounce right back towards you despite its original momentum. However - and spinners need to get their heads round this - at any significant speed the Magnus effect's ability to make the ball hit the ground at a steeper angle and thus bounce harder and higher far outweighs this effect. It's not that the effect doesn't exist, after all it's the same force that makes a leg-break turn, it's just that it is dwarfed by a counter-acting force in this situation.

So the Magnus effect will make a top-spun ball dip more during flight, meaning it will pitch shorter than anticipated, and hit the ground at a steeper angle, making it bounce higher.

http://pencilcricket.blogspot.co.uk/p/magnus-effect-in-leg-spin-bowling.html

Relatively easy to bowl if you have a high arm action as opposed to a low action. A lower 'Round Arm' action requires a potentially more difficult wrist position if you're looking to bowl the delivery making it indistinguishable from your stock Leg Break.

How to use it? I've seen it used in a variety of ways, especially effectively by older bowlers who've got very good control over their line, length and speed. If you've got that kind of accuracy and you're bowling against tail-enders or someone who's desperate to stay in for whatever reason, this ball can tie an end down, dry up runs and put pressure on the other batsman.

But generally you can vary it with the afore-mentioned aspects - line, length, flight/speed, more or less spin. Mixed in with your Leg-Breaks - to suddenly bowl one, when the batsman is looking to play the break off the wicket, the fact that it's straight will potentially cause problems and with the extra bounce the ball may come off the gloves, bat handle or the shoulder of the bat to be caught behind.

New Batsman in.  On SKY during a break in a test match in 2012/13 Warne did a piece where he discussed his initial approach to bowling to a new batsman using the crease. (See the link above). This is kind of reliant on your ability to bowl a decent line and length, but he advised to bowl from different positions on the crease, either side of the stumps for the most part attacking the stumps. There are further thing you have to consider, field placement for one. Because it's a new batsman you have to consider when you've been brought on and how you faired in the previous over if you've already been bowling. But if you've done okay in the previous overs, this'll be your licence to go on the attack. Bring the field up and right from the outset give the impression something is going to happen.

Warne's exact order or approach I've not revisited or replicated here, but I've adapted it for my own use, but it was pretty simple, something along the lines of...

1. Over the wicket, Stock Ball, off-stump line coming off of a normal position on the popping crease, close to the stumps. The ball is delivered attacking an off-stump line (C), with the expectation that the ball will break off the wicket (B). In the first over your tactic could be to hold back the Top-Spinner which would take the red dotted line route (D) hitting middle and off.

2. Over the wicket, Stock Ball, off-stump line, but go wider on the wicket further from the stumps. Again your targeting the stumps forcing the batsman to play a shot, all the time creating chances with your leg break turning it away from the edge of the bat.

3. Over the wicket, Stock Ball, but wide of the stumps on the off-side, going back to the close to the stumps delivery approach. This is useful to see how much the batsman moves his feet, giving some indication as to how confident they are. Again all of these balls are reliant on the consistency of your stock ball, if your moving around on the crease, but bowling a regular pace and flight, there'll be a growing confidence in some aspect of the batsman own perception of what is happening. He maybe thinking at this stage "Right... this bloke is moving his position on the crease, but the flight and pace are pretty much consistent"... Which is pretty much what you want him to be doing?
If he's not that good, he may not move his feet at all and may swing at the ball, or lean out to hit it, again all potentially clues to how well he's going to play the ball once you get going.

4. Over the stumps, Stock Ball, wide on the crease, but a leg stump line. This is where you'll start to see if the batsman is strong off his legs. I find this a riskier line along with the final two approaches which see me go around the wicket attacking the leg-stump.

5. Around the stumps, Stock Ball, close to the stumps, leg-stump line. Now really mess with his head and your team mates if you don't rearrange your field! Go around the stumps attacking the leg-stump, again don't forget you're still bowling your stock ball leg break, so you're turning it into the batsman, but forcing them to play the ball because you're attacking the stumps. I find this the riskier of all the tactics so far, as often the batsman will come after you if they've got any real confidence with the bat, but alternatively, you might find that bowling around is a loophole that you can definitely look to exploit? But set your field accordingly - again how you do this either supports your own sense of confidence or indicates some concern, so again I go with giving the impression that something is going to happen for me, rather than giving the impression that the batsman is going to smack you over the boundary. Maybe bring blokes over from the off-side and have close in fielders, I have a bloke in my team who loves fielding at silly midwicket, so he'd be brought in to that position and be right under the batsman's nose.

6. Around the stumps, Stock Ball, wide of the stumps, wide of leg stump. Again change your line go wide on the crease away from the stumps, if you have just been hit over the boundary, take this line but do something additional - you've already bowled 5 stock deliveries - maybe change the pace as well as the angle? Or stick with what you've been doing ready to deliver the sucker punch in the next over?

Having now bowled a whole over of Stock Ball leg breaks and seen the response, go back to the approach that looked the most promising, chuck a couple up and see what happens and then bring in the Top-Spinner. Hopefully the delivery will be so different with extra dip and bounce, added to the fact that you've discovered the best line of attack, the Top-Spinner might be the ball that gets you the wicket?

The amount of variations that can be bowled, simply by moving around on the crease and bowling different lines, lengths, pace gives the batsman something to think about. I think Warne also suggests supporting this probing approach with also tweaking the field settings, moving a bloke a few paces here and there, again to give the impression that you know what you're up to and you're putting a plan together. Again with the field settings added to the fact that you're attacking from different positions on the crease, this all adds up to adding potential pressure to the batsman.

This idea of moving around so much on the crease is that (1). It has the potential to not allow the batsman to feel as though he's in control. (2). You're exploring real options, one of these approaches might give some indication early on that there's a weakness that you can exploit in the batsman's technique. Once you've had a look and there does seem to be a particular approach that looks as to be an attacking option that might bring a wicket, in your next over explore that option and vary your stock ball and then bung in the Top-Spinner as a variation?

The ball is generally used sparingly amongst the stock leg-break with the intention that the characteristics of the delivery catch the batsman out.

Other Factors None of this is easy, but one thing you do need to have in place before you're able to put these plans into place is a good degree of control over your leg break. First and foremost almost everyone will tell you, you have to master the leg break before moving on with any conviction with the variations. If you can try and get your coach or club to lend you a copy of the ECB's video 'Wings to Fly' and have a listen to Warne's coach Terry Jenner. Similarly check out all of the videos on-line that feature Jenner talking about wrist/leg spin bowling.

Pitch Conditions - These have to be considered in relation to how and what you bowl, but this comes with experience. If the wicket is bouncy or has irregular bounce your away and this should produce successful outcomes. If the wicket is a batting wicket and there's no variation in it and the bounce is true and consistent, you might have to look to another plan.

Stage of the game - I tend to come on after about 20 - 25 overs, if the openers are still there, they're generally well set and seeing the ball well. In which case a different approach might be needed? The ideal situation is to bowl to the new batsman and you need to work with your team to get the new bloke on strike, set the field and bowl your stock delivery to allow the 'Set' batsman to run a single, getting the new bloke on strike. But, there is the caveat that if your 'Set' batsman looks to be struggling, then implement your bowling plan against him as well as the new bloke.

Sub Variations - Having posted this blog entry and discussing variations on-line here, one of the forum contributors posted this Youtube video of Warne's releases/deliveries recorded in slow motion. Included amongst the deliveries is one that is particularly interesting in that it features a Top-Spinner that is released with a slightly scrambled seam. Watch the video, it's in two sections, the latter footage is slower than the initial footage. At 1.39 seconds the Top-Spinner is released and you can see that the seam doesn't rotate perfectly and there's an element of the seam being scrambled. In the latter stage of the drop at about 1.49 seconds the ball 'Drifts' dramatically towards the leg-side and then hits the ground and goes on as a Top-Spinner should.

As a diagram it would look something like this.

For me as someone that doesn't get the ball to drift that much, I've been led to believe that in order that the ball drifts there has to be a combination of over-spin (Top-spin) and side spin. I've always assumed that the side spin needs to be 'Clean' as opposed to scrambled, so this video footage is a bit of a revelation, meaning that this coming season I'll be looking at trying out Top-Spinners with a scrambled seam looking for the Holy Grail that is 'Drift'.

 

*Grip Variations - One of the things that Philpott warns against in his book The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling Is the notion that the grip has to be one way or another. I've introduced the idea that the images above represent an orthodox approach to gripping the ball to produce the Top-Spinner, it maybe the case that for most of us this works fine? I've found that, no matter how hard I try and get my wrist so that it produces a perfect top - spinner, the 'Orthodox' approach as described above still breaks a little towards the off-side.

 

Recently looking to get the ball to bounce straight with no break and increased dip, I experimented with a slightly different grip. I've developed a release that looks pretty much the same as the grip in the image (Figure 1) when bowled.

 

But when looked at more closely (Image A) you'll see that the ball doesn't sit so deep and cupped in the hand as in the case of the orthodox grip. This approach feels a lot more "fingery" and uses the middle finger as opposed to the 3rd (ring) finger to impart the spin (see below)...

The flick of the wrist is imparted in a slightly different way to the leg break because the wrist has to maintain the 'straightness' aspect to get the ball to over-spin. Instead of the wrist being cocked down and inwards, I cock my wrist backwards and the wrist flick as in the diagram here below is as indicated by the arrow, and this combined with the finger action helps to put the spin on the ball. It does require a certain level of dexterity and suppleness of the wrist.

The finger action is also very different to the orthodox method and uses all of the fingers to put the spin on the ball.

You can see the thumb has a big role to play in this method, the thumb and fingers combined with the flick of the wrist twists the ball; the thumb rolls under the ball and all four fingers roll around the ball over the top imparting the top spin. It'll probably feel ridiculously hard to do this initially but with practice it'll come. This is a classic case of requiring the approach that Philpott advocates - spin anything, any where at any time... Sitting watching the television? Pick up an apple and rip the apple from hand to hand using this method and bit by bit you'll feel it coming together and you'll soon see that you're able to impart a fair bit of spin on the ball using this technique.

 

I'm writing this pre-season and I've used this method in its early stages of development against a number of different batsmen in the nets with very promising results. I'm hoping that going forwards with more practice this is going to be a very useful ball, I've also noticed that with a little angling of the wrist, I can also get it to come in to the right handed batsman for a little Googly, which is potentially very useful too.

 

Bibliography

The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling - Peter Philpott, The Crowood Press, 2006
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM9UpUV3fHM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfZgFi9Q9gc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFwhAsoax7w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFwhAsoax7w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFfcCsQyqpw

Leg Spin Bowling - Using Reflective Practice

Remedial Work - When things start going wrong.

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It's going to be the case that you'll have your ups and downs, one week you'll bowl okay and the following week you'll bowl really badly. It's happened to me many times before and this week I've had a shocker going for 7 an over and not taking any wickets, although having said that I dropped a dolly off of my own bowling which was short of tragic as the bloke was on 40 odd and went on to score over a 100!. So what can you do when this happens?

In a lot of professions and possibly within sport at much higher levels, their may be the option of reflecting on the reason you've done so badly using a professional tool - "Reflection practice models" such as the Gibbs method which you may have seen on the blog elsewhere. Basically it's a list of prompts that you can use to be brutally honest about what the problem is.

So in the instance of my recent performance, I would start at the top and work round the cycle in a clockwise direction...

Description (what happened). I bowled really badly, primarily not able to bowl the ball on a good enough line and length. It was getting turn off the wicket, so was spinning the ball well enough and my run-up was a disaster - stuttering and varying the length during the overs.

Feelings (What were you thinking and feeling)? I need to stop bowling as the team is suffering here, but then the next over, there'd be an improvement and occasionally I'd beat the bat or find the edge only for it to go into a gap. Also afterwards I was thinking I've got to look at making some fundamental changes to what I do - primarily my run up.

Evaluation (what was good and bad)?  As mentioned there were a few good overs where the ball did land where it was supposed to and spun and caused problems. Bad - wides, too short, too full - generally inaccurate.

Analysis (What else can you make of the situation)? Earlier in the season I'd bowled really well off a fairly fast approach to the crease off of a short run up combined with a fairly side-on delivery out of a conventional bound. This all ended with an Achilles injury, that I've still not 100% recovered from. Given my age 55 (Just a few weeks ago) I then reconsidered my approach to the crease looking at the way that Terry Jenner bowls in his demo's that are on-line. This is a lot slower, but I've seen plenty of old blokes my age bowl very slow finger spin and yet take wickets and be very economic too.

Since then I have tried this and this was the approach I used in the game, but I did notice and have noticed previously that I seem to be too "Chest-on".

Conclusion (What else could I have done). Given the situation, there wasn't a lot I could have done other than gave up earlier, any remedial work or changes needed to be done in a practice environment. I did try bowling flippers and Top-Spinners, but they were equally poor.

Action Plan (What am I going to do now to rectify the situation)? I've looked at other bowlers who have a fairly short and measured approach to the crease including Beau Casson and then noticed again his action through the crease and the necessity to get side-on, in particular... so side-on that you look over the outside of your arm. I then realised that this isn't something I've been aware that I've been doing recently - certainly not since the Achilles injury.

So this evening I bowled as I have been and sprayed it around all over the place. I then focused on landing with my foot at a right angle to the direction I'm bowling and looking to get my body shape so that I look over my shoulder when my leading arm is up just prior to pulling down. The affect was immediate - much better accuracy 70% improvement and far better length again 70% improvement if not more and it seemed to be spinning more and turning off the wicket more.

Continue with the same practice - looking to groove this action through the crease over the coming 6 days leading up to next Saturday.

*******

In conclusion, if things do go awry and you're not sure about what it is that is going wrong you could adopt the use of the Gibbs reflective practice model to work through the problem and identify the issue? If you've got video capabilities - try and get a mate or use a tripod (Make sure it's steady) to record a few examples of your bowling action and look at the footage to try and identify the problem. If you can't see the problem, upload it to Youtube and join the big cricket spin bowling forum here and get the blokes on there to have a look.

Some of the simple things that you can do or look at include...

Over - rotation.
Failing to get side-on out of your bound.
Failing to get up on your toes during your pivot.
Not following through

Remedial action and methods to 'Re-align' yourself include the use of video as mentioned above or a really simple process is to re-calibrate your bowling by using the stand-start technique advocated in the Beau Casson/David Freedman video here

Check out my main Blog here http://www.mpafirsteleven.blogspot.co.uk/


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRalbzmKIEM  (Stuart MacGill).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsE_emWTP4Q (Stuart MacGill & Shane Warne).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFfcCsQyqpw (Shane Warne tactics and strategies).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7YC7SF71Q (Terry Jenner).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM9UpUV3fHM (Terry Jenner 5 x grips)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFwhAsoax7w (Shane Warne slo-mo release)
The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling, (Peter Philpott, Crowood Press, Marlborough, 1988).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW1fRPqsa-A - (Richie Benuad grip & hardness).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyHX7GsrMlo - (Shane Warne Grip)
http://www.pitchvision.com/how-to-coach-more-spin-into-spinners#comment-2778800 - (Mark Garraway - Hip rotation).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uC5aElnH4Zk (Shane Warne explaining stuff + slo mo footage of release).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMOzzBgwlNk (Simon Hughes analysing Warne's bowling 2005 ashes test + slow mo footage of top-spinner and leg break).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhnPiWob0QI (Beau Casson guidance).
http://www.britishpathe.com/video/camera-interviews-tich-freeman (Titch Freeman's bowling action.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqxbF4dvQpE - Starters tutorial
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8BwlY9Umdg - Ball by ball Shane Warne Gabba 1994. Worth watching again and again to see how he goes about his work.
http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/22/daniel-goleman-focus-10000-hours-myth/ - training - how long is this going to take aspects.
http://www.bigcricket.com/community/threads/wrist-spin-bowling-part-two.41774/page-10 - (Big Cricket forum). 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFfcCsQyqpw  - SKY TV master class with Shane Warne talking tactics. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGTCtd0ZSLU Big Warnie - psychology
http://adsoftheworld.com/sites/default/files/styles/media_retina/public/images/bigwarnie.jpg?itok=MkUMt972 - Big Warnie adverts/media
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhnPiWob0QI Beau Casson bowling and guidance/tutorial.
http://www.espncricinfo.com/county-cricket-2015/content/story/917767.html - English spinners don't practice enough - Jeetan Patel.

Leg Break bowling

Blimey this is blog page that I wrote years ago and I've just seen how many page view it gets so I think I'm going to start writing some new content! 23rd Sept 2015.

http://spinbowling-wrongun.blogspot.com/
http://spinbowling-flipper.blogspot.com/

Update - Been working on my rotation and action through the delivery to make it a little more energetic looking for some more turn off the wicket and it seems to have worked. You'll read that I don't advocate bowling a Leg-Stump line, but this new improved bowling action has seemingly produced better turn with no real loss of accuracy. Have a look at this bowling drill that I'm currently using which tests you for turn and accuracy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aM9lHQ1yi2A

This particular blog is dedicated solely to The Leg Break as this is the primary weapon in the Wrist Spinners armoury as such. This is the ball that gets me 90% of my wickets and is the ball that I bowl 90% of the time if not more. Of all the different variations that you can bowl as a Wrist Spinner this is the one that you need to be best at and as such is known as your Stock Ball this simply means it's the ball you use the most and it's the one you rely on to take your wickets.

Before you read any further let's just establish who I am. I'm not an expert by any stretch of the imagination but, I'm an enthusiast who plays club cricket who specialises in Wrist Spinning. I'm quite obesessive about the subject and as such feel the need to pass on what I know and have learned in order that this particular specialism continues to survive in the game at club level. My own experience over the last few years has made me realise that there is very little information on this subject that is easily accessed via the internet. There are a handful of excellent books that people either can't get hold of or find too dry/detailed/technical to read. Other than that there's a handful of video clips on youtube featuring Shane Warne and Terry Jenner which rush through the subject in a way that could be detrimental to anyone trying to get to grips with the subject. Hopefully this blog and it's associated blogs in conjunction with the forum at Big Cricket might go some way in helping anyone that is trying to learn the Art of Wrist Spin Bowling.

The Leg-Break





When the Leg Break is described we're talking about a ball that is being bowled by a right-armed bowler. As you bowl the ball towards the batsman it spins in such a way that when it hits the surface of the wicket you see it deviate off it's line of direction (trajectory) away to the left as you look down the wicket. Again for standardisation I'll always write in terms of bowling to a Right Handed (RH) batsman. This is described as spinning away towards the Off-side. From the batsmans point of view he sees the bowl coming towards him and as it bounces it spins off it's trajectory to his right making it difficult to play. This is the Leg-Break described in it's most basic form.

Spinning the Ball

At the start of his book 'The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling" Peter Philpott makes the point that the key issue with bowling the Leg Break and all of the other Wrist Spin actions is to get the ball to spin.

What makes spin bowling different from other forms of bowling is, so obviously the spin. And spin and the spinning ball are the core of the matter. But apparently, it is not. For too often, discussion of spin bowling focuses on the grip, accuracy, delivery, field placement, tactics, but says very little about spin itself. Peter Philpott. The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling; Crowood Press, England, 2006; Page 16.

Philpotts book then goes through 8 stages where he gradually lays out what you'll need to do in order to become the complete Wrist Spinner. The book is essential reading if you're aiming to be wrist spinner and I'd advise anyone with this as a goal to buy the book. Some people report that it's a bit heavy going, but then this is a difficult subject and it's dealt with in depth.

Philpott advocates that when you're learning to bowl wrist spin you should do so as often as possible to the point where what ever you pick up you spin it - oranges, apples, golf balls, tennis balls, if it fits in your hand give it a big flick and get it to spin. Do this all the time every day and this will become an action you end up doing with ease. You muscles will develop and your wrist joints will become more and more flexible and supple and the flick that you develop will be produce the spin that you need to get the ball to spin off the wicket.

One final comment on spinning the ball. Again on bigcricket.com in the wrist spin thread there's been much discussion on the grip and spinning the ball. In response to this in my main blog I've written a piece questioning how much spin does Philpott mean, when he says to spin it hard? http://mpafirsteleven.blogspot.com/2009/08/biggun-2.html I've kind of concluded that one mans Spinning it hard is possibly very different to anothers and that potentially the interpretation of Philpotts instructions (As with all instructions) are open to misinterpretation. Needless to say, the more you are able to spin the ball the better, but it seems that there are many different ways to impart the spin and experimentation/trial and error are the way forward.

Here's a good link that looks at the dynamics of the spinning ball - http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~cross/cricket.html

The Grip

Being the primary action of the Wrist Spin style of bowling the position of the wrist and how you use the wrist is essential with regards the direction the ball rotates/spins when released. The grip used on the ball has a basic configuration described as two fingers up, two fingers down with the thumb playing very little part in the grip other than perhaps steadying the ball. At this point in order that you can start spinning the ball you need to start to use the standard grip.


As you can see in Diagram A the index finger and the middle finger (Up Fingers) go across the seam. The ring finger which is the finger which produces the spin sits along the seam and the little finger tucks in behind it. It has to be pointed out that this is a starting point and you should look around at other resources and the way other people grip the ball, but the basic idea is the two fingers up go across the seam and the 3rd finger rests along the seam and produces the spin. At the time of writing I was experimenting with my own grip and as a result it looks as though I'll probably use a slightly different grip to the image above. The new grip which still gives me good accuracy with regards to line and length has been described by Paulinho on the Bigcricket wrist spin forum as - holding the ball like you would eating an apple. Which I think is an excellent description. With this grip the 3rd finger is place purposefully along the seam, but the rest of the hand almost gently holds the ball in the palm. For me it's producing masses of spin with seamingly very little effort. What it goes to show is that you have to play around with your grip and modify it and experiment with it until you find something that suits you or the specific delivery you're trying to produce.
With regards the wrist, the image here (A) shows the view that the batsman would see of your wrist/hand as it comes over in a vertical position during the delivery action. As you release the ball, the ball from this view would leave the hand rotating clockwise.
The next bit relies partly on seeing this action (See video below) in order that I can explain the wrist/flick action that I wrote about earlier. But basically you stand with hands out in front of you. In your right hand using the grip or something similar that suits you, hold the ball so that the back of your hand faces you and spin the ball from your right hand to your left giving it a big flick spinning it hard. Philpott again. Not only observe the flick here - but listen to the sound of the ball being ripped off my fingers http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8wAzBKmgYM
If there is one factor in spin bowling which all spinners should accept if they wish to perform to their optimum, it is the concept that the ball should be spun hard. Not rolled, not gently turned, but flicked, ripped, fizzed. If young bowlers learn to spin hard from the start, then bowl enough spinning it hard, they can acheive accuracy. Give the ball a flick is never an excuse for inaccuracy. Peter Philpott. The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling; Crowood Press, England, 2006; Page 19.

Flick it from your right hand to your left spinning the ball by rolling your fingers and wrist over the top of the ball, propelling it across the body. This is the basis of developing the Leg Break. You'll need to do it for a while (Hours) and you'll get a feel for it gradually increasing the speed of the rotation. You'll need to use your fingers, your wrist and eventually your elbow and shoulders as a series of levers to impart the leverage you'll need to give the ball a really big flick. In time you'll begin to get a feel for the role that the 3rd finger plays in creating purchase on the ball to make it rotate.

As you get used to this sensation of flicking the ball you'll probably develop your own grip. The grip differs from one person to another due to technique, feel and the size of your hand, but as long as you're more or less using the 2 up - 2 down approach you wont be going too far wrong.
Then just keep flicking using anything that you can get you hands round, at school, at home, at work even, in your breaks, while you're watching the tele, walking from the car to the shops at any moment that you can have a ball and flick it. You might feel like an idiot doing this, but it might be the difference between choosing to be an average dibbly dobbly bowler to being a Wrist Spinner that takes wickets.
To be continued.............

The Big Leg Break
This is the Leg Break that most wrist spinners wish to have in their armoury. All the way through this blog I've been advocating bowling on an Off-Stump line looking to beat the edge of the bat "No ball bowled is as difficult as one which leaves the bat and goes towards the slips. The really good leg-break beats them all.” - Sir Donald Bradman which coming fron Don Bradman seems a sound approach. But probably like the rest of you I would love to be able to pitch the ball wide of Leg Stump getting the ball to turn in across the face of the bat or round the back of the legs in the manner that Shane Warne does. This ball bowled in amongst a sequence of attacking off-stump balls is a dream delivery that I've yet to master.
In order to bowl the Biggun you need to be able to release the ball with the seam spinning at right angles to the pitch almost, most of the deliveries I bowl have the seam of the ball somewhere in the 45 degrees region as it's released, the seam spinning pointing towards point. The Biggun needs a different approach using Philpotts 'Round the Loop'. The wrist is rotated further clockwise so that the sensation is that you're spinning the ball back in towards yourself. Philpott clearly describes this and uses and image to support the description. The same technique is used for the Slider - a back-spinning variation that is released out of the back of the hand. The Biggun isn't one of the balls that I bowl and it's something I'm still working on, using this technique of spinning the ball back into my body http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zob1Md0HVqs using this technique I've got as far as being able to bowl a Slider and on the odd ocassion it'll go slightly wrong and it will produce a Biggun, but it's not something I'm good at. Have a look and give it a go - this might be the little input of advice/information you need to get your own Big Leg Break going - good luck!
http://www.bigcricket.com/forum/t73938-48/#post393887

Updated 6th April

Today I think I've had a break through, I've been getting the synchronisation of the upper body elements together over a distance of about 12 yards using hockey balls on concrete/tarmac bowling at a thin bit of brick-work between two garages outside my house (About 45cms wide) and I've been able to land the ball very wide of the bricks getting the ball to turn back in and hit the bricks. With the improvement in weather of late, today I was able to get out into the paddock where I practice during the season and try this delivery over a longer length 15-16 yards. It worked and furthermore my accuracy was good enough to use in a match situation! But in addition to the accuracy was the consistency, the ball was coming out of the hand after a few dodgy ones at the start, perfectly 95% of the time, so 2 key elements seemed to come together today over a much longer distance - line and length and the ability to repeat the action again and again. I'm just hoping now that when I try it again - I'll be able to repeat the action and continue with the Line and length success. If that happens - I'll work on extending the distance. It now looks promising and as though if the weather holds out I may get this sussed before the season?

Approaches to Leg Break Bowling

My own experience of watching, playing and speaking to Wrist Spinners at club level is that they're not very well versed in the more complex attributes of Wrist Spinning and for most part ignorant of it's history and the legacy of the likes of Clarrie Grimmett. So it therefore follows that whenever you speak to Leg Spinners they're not conversant with the array of variations that are at the disposal of the Wrist Spinner. This doesn't surprise me when you think that when Lasith Malinga bowled his four consecutive wickets in the world cup in 2007 he was oblivious of the fact that he was the only bloke ever to do so in first class cricket. If he'd have known that he was about to go into the record books for the achievement this may have had a massive bearing on his psychological state at the time?
In club cricket you'll more often not find that the Leg Spinner in the club has at best two variations, the Leg Break and possibly a Top Spinner. I've yet to come across another Wrist Spinner who bowls the Wrong Un and the Leg Break with equal skill. A lot of this is partly down to the fact that Wrist Spinning is indeed an obscure and secretive art that has over the last 50 years gone through phases where it has almost disappeared into the abyss of by-gone history. It still even now hangs in there by a thin thread despite the Warne Years. In fact Warne is responsible for it's re-emergence to some extent (Including me) but also on an international level may be responsible to some extent to it's possible demise. Currently the world including Australia is looking for the next Shane Warne and we know that this is not likely because the bloke was a freak of nature never to be repeated again ever? Bob Woolmer in his book The Art & Science of Cricket points out that in recent surveys in both the UK and South Africa school kids of today when compared like for like with school kids 10 years ago cannot perform 10 pull-ups on a parrallel bar because of the sedentary life-styles and the lack of Physical Education in schools. 10 years ago kids from both countries could for the most part perform the 10 pull ups whereas these days you'd be lucky to find one kid that could from a class of 20. Woolmer then goes on to speculate that this situation is so prevalent in todays society that the game will have to adapt to accomodate the new lifestyles of young people that take up the game. Therefore the possibilty of there ever being another Shane Warne becomes increasingly unlikely.
One of the key aspects to Warnes bowling was his ability to really Rip the ball. Philpott in his book The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling mentions this in his book saying that very few Wrist Spinners turn the hand over the ball in their action to impart the spin. Warnes bowling was notorious for the amount of revolutions he could impart on the ball, this not only gave him his ability to get the ball to break off it's trajectory massively (See ball of the century) but rotation of the ball through the air created Drift meaning that the ball moves off it's initial trajectory whilst in the air spinning from Off to Leg.
My own experience demonstrates whilst this may be a goal that you may want to achieve one day you shouldn't get too hung up on the fact that you can't get your ball to Drift when bowling the Leg-Break. The other feature of some of the great Wrist Spinners is the fact that the ball fizzes audibly as it flies through the air because of the amount of spin imparted on the ball. Again I would suggest to not get hung up on the fact that you can't make the ball Fizz as it moves through the air. Be realistic and look to a point in your mid 20's to mid 30's when you're at your physical best that on the odd occasion that this may be an attribute of your bowling. If you do get it to fizz and Drift good luck to you - you should be taking wickets and making my figures look mediocre!
So, what do mere mortals like you and me do if we can spin the ball but cant make it drift at will and fizz through the air? Well, there's a bunch of things we can do as far as I'm concerned........
Wrist Spinning isn't easy by any stretch of the imagination and the whole thing is made worse by the fact that the whole game has a bias centred around the batsman. It seems that anyone writing about cricket does so via a batting bias. Bowlers in general are viewed as second rate citizens and it's only the freaks like Grimmett and Warne that rise to any level of fame that befits their effort. People do not understand the amount of effort that is required to bowl long spells in first class cricket and the psychology that is involved in playing the game at 1st class level. At club level in 40 over matches some of this can be adopted and put into practice.
Practice seriously all of the time;
The obvious thing to me if you are serious about your Wrist Spinning is to adopt a serious approach to your bowling. Philpott throughout his book which is aimed primarily at youths brings this up several times and the same advice is echoed by the likes of Richie Benaud in Woolmers book and several places on line. To be good at this requires a lot of effort, focus and practice. Philpott says that if you're not going to practice with 100% conviction, with no distractions you're almost certainly wasting your time. Say for instance if you're kid in the school holidays I'd kind of imagine that like me you'd be doing about 2 or 3 hours a day almost every day (In 1 hour stints) on your own. Yes, it's that hard! But this kind of practice and focus brings rewards.


Have a couple of variations

Have a couple of variations. The variations are covered in depth in the other associated blogs. But one of the other key aspects of this game is to have confidence in your abilities to dominate the batsman and not let him get the upper-hand in the psychological war. One of the ways in which you can do this and gain control over a batsman is to show him that you are the real thing. You're not a Leg-Spinner that just bowls a nice Leg-Break, you're a Wrist Spinner with the ability to flick your wrist just slightly differently and the ball will go the other way or spin over the top of itself (Wrong Un & Top-Spinner). With just the 3 basic Wrist Spin variations played around your stock ball you can regain control over a situation that is threatening to go away from you.
Leg Break variations; Your stock ball itself is your key weapon and through practice you should aim to be able to bowl it not only accurately at the Off-Stump for instance, but with varying speed, flight, length, bounce and spin. Generally I don't have to resort to Wrong Uns and Top-Spinners I simply bowl my Leg Break attacking the Off-Stump and using the different approaches to unsettle and control the batsman. But if they do get cocky I then bowl a ball that then turns into them or bounces high and goes straight. I then find that they'll look back at you with a bit of respect thinking 'Strewth - this bloke knows what he's doing'. They've usually read about and seen Wrong Un's but it's rare that they'll ever have one bowled at them with accuracy amidst a series of accurate 'On the off-stump' Leg Breaks.
Psychology The emotional and behavioral characteristics of an individual, group, or activity: the psychology of cricket.
Confidence and temprament. This is definitely the key to your success and hinged around the practice aspect of your training. In your practice you will get to the point where you'll be able to bowl the ball at a specified point on the wicket or a specific stump. You then just transfer that skill and control to the pitch and the game. You have to have the self belief that you can do it in a game situation and when you're thrown the ball by your captain he too must believe that you're going to come up with the goods along with all your team mates. It gets to a point where if you are successful the confidence builds and becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, when you're thrown the ball there's an atmosphere of expectancy, your team mates know it's going to happen, you know it's going to happen and the pressure is transferred to the batsman. I make them aware that something is going to happen, I talk to the bloke off strike waiting at my end. I ask him 'What way does he like his spin - this bloke. Left, Right, backwards or forwards'? Whilst all the time I'm flicking the ball showing how much I can and will be spinning it right under his nose. Then I come up with the goods all based around hours and hours of practice using a target and 6 balls.
On the flip side there's going to be days when it doesn't come together or you simply face a batsman that has the experience and skill to deal with you. It's then that your temprament is tested and you have the tools to deal with the situation. If you find that you are in this situation and you feel that you don't have any solutions one of the things that you can do is to talk to your captain and cease your spell in a damage limitation exercise. If do fancy the challenge though, you need to control your emotions and adopt a poker face strategy irrespective of whether you're being hit for 4's and 6's. Don't show any emotions that hint that you're under the cosh, try and give the impression that being hit for 4 or 6 is all a part of your plan. Fortunately because of our shorter run up we're able to turn and walk back to our starting point with our backs to the batsman as he watches the ball sailing over the boundary. Stay calm and think through what's just happened analyse it and adapt your plan and execute it. Don't get flustered and panicked keep things simple and bowl your next ball in accordance to your plan.
This kind of approach and the ability to keep the lid on things comes with age and maturity. It's very difficult to keep this clam when you're younger, you'll hear people on your side saying things and you'll at least be imagining that they're at least thinking negative things. With age you'll learn how to be thick skinned and with age people will be more respectful of you too and be less inclined to be vocal about how bad they think your bowling is. But another key area here is your own self belief and your own self evaluation. To walk back to your run-in position knowing that you are a good bowler and that you have put the hours in despite what has happened will then allow you to bowl the next ball that will reverse the situation.


Analyse the Batsman

Analyse the batsman. This is something I am learning myself and currently I'm finding that I'm doing it primarily during my spell which I think leads to a degrading of my figures. Ideally I'd have some sense of when I'll be bowling, so I could probably ask my captain to give me as much fore-warning prior to the start of my spell so I could then have a look at the bloke I'll be bowling at. In an ideal world if you were given some kind of idea that your spell was coming up you'd watch the batsman and try and figure out what his strengths and weaknesses are. To some extent this is a seperate skill in itself that requires a great deal of cricket knowledge - for instance there are players (Like myself) who bat leaving a gaping great hole between their bat and pads giving you options to bowl a straight ball or a wrong un between that gap and it's this ability to recognise these nuances of the batsmans game that give you an extra edge. At the stage of my own game, the thing I look for is whether the batsman is strong or weak off his legs. At club level it strikes me that batsmen are often deficient in one of these areas or conversely - good off the legs in which case I bowl to the off-side.


Attack!

Attack! It's a 40 overs match and unlike Shane Warne or any other Test bowler you haven't got too much time to spin a web of cunning and guile. You've probably got 5 or 6 overs or, if you're lucky maybe more? Remember the rest of the world has been brain-washed into believing that the key means to attack the batsmen are the fast bowlers. Personally I completely disagree with that but I'll address that eslewhere. You've got six overs and you've been put on to do your stuff. The thing you want to do more than anything else is 'Send the B******s back to the sheds'. A lot of people stress over their figures and statistics and can get overly concerned at how they're doing and how many they're being hit for, but as my mate Macca suggests the sooner you can get them back in the sheds the less runs they'll be able to make. So the key is to attack, make every ball count, ensure that every ball is heading for the stumps - preferably the off-stump.

Why the Off-Stump?

Again I have to reiterate that I'm not an expert and to some degree I rely on working with my captain on things like field placings. Recently the field placings that have been allocated to me when I bowl have had an Off-side bias. As previously mentioned I target the Off-Stump and advocate this as a strategy if you can turn the ball towards the off-side with a little spin. This then demands that the majority of your fielders be placed in off-side fielding positions waiting for catching opportunities. A Slips, Gully and Point being the fielders clustered fairly close to the bat with Cover and Mid Off looking to take the ball on more adventurous attempts at playing strokes. The Deep mid comes up with a result quite frequently for me as too the Deep Square Leg, but these normally are only required if my bowling gets a bit wayward and ends up on the legs or wide of the legs.


Given more confidence next year possibly I may be in a position to modify the field placements myself. I've noted in recent games a high proportion of the runs that I've conceded have been as a result of byes down the Leg-Side when I've attempted to bowl the batsman round his legs when trying to figure out whether he's weak on his leg-side. Given the confidence I might remove the Deep Mid on fielder and put him behind the keeper in a Long Stop position near the boundary. This may have the additional benefit of the batsman then trying to drive the spinning ball straight down the wicket and give him encouragement to start coming out of his crease leaving him extremely vulnerable to a stumping out of his ground.
So with this fielding set up in place I bowl the ball at the Off-stump tempting the batsman to hit the ball to the off-side when it's loaded with fielders looking to take the catch. I pitch the ball well and truly up the wicket flighting it in above the eyes in order that they have difficulty in establishing the point at which it's going to bounce. The flight trajectory is changed, the speed is changed with very small differences in the length, the ball landing typically 1-2 meters in front of the bat right under his nose. With the flight and speed variation, very quickly within the first over most batsman that I've encountered go from a psychological state of 'Whoa - a Leg-spinner, I'm going to fill my boots here'! To, someone that suddenly finds themself looking like a rabbit in the headlights of a car trying to play defensive shots fending the ball away from the stumps and in doing so chancing every single time the ball finding the edge of the bat and it glancing away to one of the fielders adjacent to or behind the bat.


This approach is wholly reliant on you being able to put the ball on the same line again and again at the same length and this is where the hours and hours of practice come in to ensure this is what you do with great ease. Needless to say, with the match being 40 overs and there being a necessity for the batsman to make runs and also this stupid belief that Wrist Spinners are easy to play. The batsman falls for the easiest of traps and lets his pride and misguided belief that he can dominate clutter his mind and all too soon he starts trying to play shots. But this isn't a ball that is going in straight lines, at predictable speeds with regular bounce it's spin bowling, so within a matter of balls he's on his way back to the proverbial Sheds. It's not rocket science, everyone knows that the most successful bowlers ever are Spinners.
So my advice is ignore all the videos of Shane Warne bowling people round the back of their legs and his 'Ball of the century'. Stick to keeping it simple when you're starting off. Just get really accurate and make the ball spin a bit.
Here's some good advice via David Hinchcliffes Micoach website. This is a radio style broadcast (Podcast) and about 6 or 7 minutes in they start discussing Spin bowling and strategies. http://www.pitchvision.com/files/miCricketCoach%20-%20PitchVision%20miCricketCoach%20Show%20041.mp3 it's well worth a listen with some good advice.

All said and done though I would say that if you can get a proper Leg Break bowling coach to teach you this stuff in the nets or on a wicket that is the way to go.

Drift and the Leg Break
Drift, this is a magical and complex aero-dynamic characteristic of Leg-Break bowling. Where the ball, when released spinning from the hand, on what initially looks like a trajectory heading for your off-stump, changes direction late in its flight path as it approaches the batsman. Drift when executed well, will see the ball veer from heading for the off-stump to heading suddenly at a very late stage in the flight to the Leg Stump. Furthermore, this trajectory takes the ball into a right-handed batsman’s blind spot, (See http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/blindspot1.html ) further compounding the devastating position the batsman now finds himself facing. The ball then pitches on a difficult length to play, with the batsman not knowing whether to play forward or back and then it does what all good Leg-Breaks should do – it breaks towards the top of off-stump.

If you look for articles on drift on the internet, there’s not a great many available. The same is true of books on spinning - it gets mentioned, but no-one seems to tackle it with the kind of detail and enthusiasm that you’d expect.

If you are a Wrist Spinner, and you’ve got the kind of inquisitive mind that Peter Philpott would appreciate in pursuit of your goals, you soon discover that you are a part of a very small band of brothers. So small that Danish Kaneria once said in an interview in Aug 2007 for ‘Spin’ magazine “Leg-Spin is an art. Not everybody has that art. Only two or three people in the world can do what I do.”

But, yes, there are few of us and we’re the outsiders of cricket, the blokes without a coach or mentor. Yeah we might be lucky and there might be one bloke who bowls a Leg Break and Top-Spinner if he’s really ‘Good’, but whether that one bloke is interested enough to give us the time to pass on his knowledge is another matter. With Off-Spinners it’s different, they’re two a penny. Every club has two, three or more ‘Offies’, but Wrist Spinners, they’re as rare as Rocking Horse Pooh.

So where do we turn for our in-depth analysis of Wrist Spin and more specifically – Drift? What with the Art of Wrist Spin being so obscure and shrouded in mystery, you’re probably not going to be surprised to hear that in all the years of cricket history, there may only be 3 or 4 books that focus on the subject of Wrist Spin and therefore have specific and well informed sections on drift? Two of the books were written by the man that can be virtually credited with writing the book of wrist spin back in the 1930’s - Clarrie Grimmetts wrist spin bible ‘Getting Wickets’. There’s another book that is so obscure that I’m not going to even mention its name because I still haven’t got a copy of it and again that was written back in the 1930’s. Jump forward to the 1990’s and Peter Philpott publishes ‘The Art of Wrist Spin Bowling’ using Grimmetts work as the back-bone of his own book. Jump forward again to 2009 and we see the next serious attempt to look at wrist-spinning and Drift this time a large section within Bob Woolmers cricket bible – “The Art & Science of Cricket”.

But the question remains – do any of these books examine drift in real depth? As soon as you start looking at the spinning ball seriously, you have to start to delve into physics in order to comprehend what’s happening to the ball to make it swerve/swing/drift. You soon realise that if you’re looking at smooth balls the physics is relatively simple, but then when you start to factor in rough and smooth sides of the ball it complicates the physics further. Then if you factor in the seam of a cricket ball, it gets potentially more complex and finally if you start talking in terms of horizontal axis versus tilted forward or backward axis, it’s moving into the realms of PHD Physics.

So, I went looking to see if I could find the answer and come up with something that the layman like me could get his teeth into and start to spin the ball in a way that might allow me to…………

1. Drift the ball at will
2. Drift the ball with differing degrees of drift

Just two objectives, and this is what I found……….

Grimmet on Drift

The ball or sphere which is perfectly round, and has no seam, swerves because it is affected by the pressure of the atmosphere. This is dependent on the way that the ball is spinning. Take, for instance, a ball spinning in a horizontal plane from right to left. That is, if you were to put a chalk mark round a sphere, similar to the seam on a cricket ball it would be spinning round at right angles to the line of flight, parallel with the ground. The ball would then be traveling much faster on the right side than on the left, because it is spinning forward. On the left side, the ball is spinning back, and, consequently, not going so fast as on the other side. Hence, the different sides of the ball are differentially affected by the air pressure.

It is therefore, easy to see that the ball must tend to travel or swerve to the side on which there is the most resistance. In this case, the most resistance is on the left because the ball has a spinning motion backwards, and is traveling forward. Consequently, it swerves to the left; and, if the spin is reversed, it will swerve to the right. Similarly, top and backspin operate the same way in their respective directions.

A cricket ball introduces something different again by reason of the fact that it has a seam raised above the main surface of the ball. Through the fact that the seam is in such contrast to the smooth, shiny surface – this varying as the ball becomes worn – it necessarily follows it offers more resistance to the atmosphere than the shiny part. Consequently, it swerves according to the way in which the seam is spinning.

Bowl a ball spinning over towards the slips as for the leg break, the seam being gripped so that it touches the first two fingers and thumb. The seam would be then pointing in the direction of the slips, and, with the atmosphere striking it in this position it would act as a rudder, steering the ball towards the slips – an out-swerve. Now grip the ball with the seam exactly opposite, spin it the same way, and it will swerve towards fine leg – an in-swinger.

It is possible, however, for the seam to spin in such a way that, in the prevailing conditions it does not act as a rudder, and the ball swerves simply because it is traveling faster in one place than in the other, as for instance, the ball spinning on a horizontal plane.

In the case of a ball bowled as for a leg break, a previously described, with the seam spinning like a hoop towards the slips, the top part of the ball is traveling faster than the lower part, and causes the ball to drop quickly. Hence the curving, deceptive flight of a ball from a slow bowler.

In baseball, they use for practice purposes a ball with the seam raised about an eighth of an inch, the idea being to enable learners to get the impression of swerve more easily by means of the contrast between the raised seam and the ball itself. This suggestion could be applied to cricket. Bowlers anxious to solve the mysteries of swerve could have a cricket ball made to order with the seam so raised, and would thus more clearly be able to note the effect of swerve.

Much useful experience can be gained by noting, particularly with the raised seam ball, the effect of the wind. Young bowlers should also watch carefully to see how the swerve varies according to the way they grip the ball.

In swerve bowling, like other branches of the art, it must be the bowler’s object so to regulate his swerve that the ball will hit the wicket. A new ball swerves much more than the old one, and it is vitally important that this advantage should not be wasted.

It is always advisable for a slow bowler to work against the breeze, which causes the ball to dip and swerve, together with other peculiarities of flight impossible to obtain while bowling with the wind.

Philpott on Drift……..

Philpott points us to looking at Tennis and baseball for clues as to the way that a ball spins and we as Wrist Spinners need to be aware of the potential for applying drift to our game. I can’t quote Philpott direct as the book is still in circulation and therefore subject to copyright laws. But Philpott makes the point using a left-handed serve in tennis to illustrate the dynamics of drift. Pointing out that the LH player slices down on the Left Handed side of the ball, thus creating anti-clockwise spin as with a Leg-Break. In tennis because of the furry nature of the ball this Leg Break type spin sees the ball drift from Left to Right – it drifts ‘In’, noting that the drift occurs in the opposite direction of the turn after bouncing.

In Philpotts book – that’s it, apart from a diagram that illustrates a ball that is spinning with its seam 90 degrees to the direction of flight. There’s no mention of whether the seam is fully upright or slanted backwards or forwards. The illustration suggests that the ball is delivered with the rotation 90 degrees and perfectly up-right.

Woolmer on Drift

Woolmer, on the other hand attempts to take a very in depth look at Drift in his book. Page 301 through to 307 he writes several thousand words illustrated with some good diagrams explaining the Magnus affect. If you want explanations of the magnus affect, youtube is particularly good if you search using links to Baseball. There seems to be far more information relating to the physics of spinning balls in conjunction with Baseball as a sport than cricket. One of the links I looked at trying to get my head round the Magnus effect was http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oph9BP4lKjs . Woolmers illustrations and explanations get fairly complex and are recommended as additional reading, but for me it still didn’t fully explain the drift aspects that I was looking for.

Having tackled the subject of the Magnus effect he then moves on to the ball of the Century from Warne to Mike Gatting http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeLn8sEAKfE&NR=1
Woolmer then spends a few pages with diagrams proposing what may have happened incorporating the physics provided from what’s known about the Magnus Effect in conjunction with this amazing dismissal.

There’s a couple of interesting points that Woolmer makes that are in opposition to the existing explanations and theories regarding drift. But for me, one key point stands out as being the most important of all the things that I’ve looked at and read and it contradicts Philpotts diagram of the ball with the perfectly presented up-right seam spinning at 90 degrees to its flight path. Woolmer concludes that a ball presented in this manner will not drift. He then goes on to explain in great detail Warnes Ball of the century which has a great deal of drift, but as he gets into it and starts to explain the theory he then notes “In order for the delivery to drift towards leg, the wake of the ball must be disturbed upwards towards the off-side. How this happens is not yet well described in scientific literature. Thus, some speculation is warranted – and illustrated in Figure 5.23”. (Which is the diagram used to explain the ball of the century).

The key revelation within the text is the speculation that in order that the ball does drift in the manner illustrated in the video link, it was probably tilted slightly backwards from vertical (When seen from above). For me personally, this line alone from everything I’ve read strikes me as being the most significant of all my findings and therefore definitely worth looking into.

Additionally another resource that is available to everyone on the internet and is exceptionally comprehensive is fellow bigcricket forum contributor ‘Spiderlounge’s blog that looks at the subject - http://pencilcricket.blogspot.com/p/magnus-effect-in-leg-spin-bowling.html
I can follow what he’s saying up to a point but then I get a bit lost but within his explanation. But I’ve noticed too, that he looks at the possibility that big drift occurs when the seam moves off the perfectly upright (Viewed from above) position and slants one way or the other.

Some of the information relating to spinning balls is easy to grasp and the Magnus force when it relates to some types of balls makes sense. But, with regards to wrist spinning and the fact that it in itself is a relatively unexplored and unexplained, with very few people prepared to put their hand up and say that they are experts in the field either as protagonists or researchers, it seems that the fact that it is such a dark art amongst all of the cricket specialities that the information is for now, still very scant. The fact that not many people bowl wrist spin means that the scope to explore the physics using players is limited and even if the players had the time and the inclination to get involved with the research, it might then be the case that the ‘Sports Scientists’ with PHD’s in Physics might not be available. Furthermore such an approach to R&D in an obscure facet of cricket possibly wouldn’t justify the money from over-arching bodies such as the ECB?

If you search hard there is evidence out there, that the subject is being taken very seriously as you can see from this link http://journals.pepublishing.com/content/675676m761367588/ but the information isn’t being disseminated to mere mortals like you and I. I’m also aware that ECB cricket coaches have access to training videos that they can buy readily that may look at aspects such as drift…. http://www.devoncricket.co.uk/page.asp?p=wings2fly
But my own teams coaches have access to these videos and they’re aware of how obsessed I am with the subject and the impression I get is, that there’s nothing in these videos that I wouldn’t already know?

So, having looked at as much as I can at the information that is readily available, it all ends up being pretty inconclusive with just that one point with regards to the tilting axis of the ball as it spins its way towards the batsman. On the Bigcricket Forum http://www.bigcricket.com/forum/t73938-48/#post393887 as I discussed this with the others we all more or less came to the same conclusions……..

· It is a very complex theory to understand and apply to your actual bowling.
· If you spin the ball hard with your Leg Breaks you will produce drift and if you notice it, or someone else notices it - keep it in mind and try and work with it.
· Don’t get hung up on it though, because it may be similar to situation that seamers find themselves in e.g. you can swing the ball some days and not other days – it may be the same kind of thing with drift?

Woolmer winds down his section on Wrist Spinning holding Warne up as an amazing bowler with an exceptional degree of technical mastery and that the Ball of the century was probably a ball in a million. He finishes the chapter though quite fittingly as I have at the start of this section on Drift transcribing Grimmetts original work from 1930’s and saying it was Grimmett who literally wrote the book on spin. We all need to acknowledge the legacy of Clarrie Grimmett, the man was a true genius.

Sources/Bibliography
Getting Wickets by C.V. Grimmett. Hodder & Stoughton Ltd, London 1930 (Out of print)
The Art of Wrist-Spin Bowling by Peter Philpott. Crowford Press, Marlborough 2006.
Clarrie Grimmett by Ashley Mallett. University of Queensland Press 1993.
Art & Science of Cricket by Bob Woolmer. New Holland. London 2009.

Credit has also got to be given to the people that have encouraged me over the last few years either directly via my cricket club Grays & Chadwell Cricket Club or on-line via internet forums, especially this particular one http://www.bigcricket.com/forum/t58854/ so cheers to Neil Samwell, Macca, Sad Spinner, EOW, Gundalf, Ripping Leg Break, Simbaz, Virender Singh Berthwal, Mas Cambios and David Hinchcliffe.
I've become a fan of Adil Rashid and I'll bung some links in here relating to him -
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/8154783.stm

The other blogs in this series that are complete to date include this one which covers The Flipper in more depth than most - http://spinbowling-flipper.blogspot.com/ check out the video clips.

http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~cross/cricket.html

Here's an article about Stevie Smith, Nathan Hauritz's Leg Spinning under-study as such. The word on the street is this is the bloke who'll take over from Hauritz. In the meantime this article is about Smith being coached by Warne and there's some good pointers from Warne that are worth a look at and consider if you're having trouble with your bowling.
http://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/is-that-your-real-heir-warnie-20091227-lg8x.html
Shane Warne high quality footage bowling in the IPL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JT1HhHntF2o

Here's some footage of Titch Freeman suggested by Sadspinner over on the Big Cricket forum. I like Freemans approach as it includes an idiosyncratic foot shuffle that is very much like my approach as I go into my delivery http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=49504

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Anyone who is looking to make comments re this blog, the videos on Youtube or just wants to discuss Wrist Spinning we'd appreciate any input especially if you've got some experience and can add to what's here and on the internet. Alternatively if you feel you've got less experience and just want to ask questions do the same thing - join in the discussions and questions at http://www.bigcricket.com/forum/t70231-53/#post375092 which as far as we know is the biggest wrist spin forum on the internet.

Personal Development and updates

11th Jan 2009 and the club I play for has started winter nets in preparation for the new season. Unfortnuately for me the season hasn't started off well as it seems I've got a condition called Plantar Faciitis which feels like a badly bruised heel and is in fac damage to the ligaments in the foot. I've got to monitor it over the next couple of weeks and see how it goes but may have to stop playing any sport for a couple of months or more if it continues. I'll have to see how it goes.

Anyway at the first session it didn't go too bad. I seemed to have the right-handers either playing defensive shots or trying to attack me and then eventually making a mistake whereby they'd be stumped or caught by slips or gully, so I was pleased with that. Then came the Left Hander. Admittedly he's probably the best player in our team but I was hoping to do better than I did. I managed to get the ball past him twice out of about 20 balls. The 18 were hit for 2's, 4's and sixes I reckon - mostly fours. I've discussed it on the forum http://www.bigcricket.com/forum/t70231-95/#post384104 and some of the blokes have made some useful suggestions. Last night I didn't have a strategy and was just trying a variety of approaches using this years variations (Leg Break, Wrong Un, top and back-spinning Flippers) and pitching the ball on the line that I'm most confident with - which is his Leg Stump, so he was having a field day.
I've since had a look at what Philpott recommends and he says to pitch the ball wide of the Lefties off-stump using your Leg Break turning the ball back into the stumps. It then makes sense that if you have a straight ball and a Wrong un you'd use these as variations. Philpott says not to stray in closer to the legs as the batsman will work the ball to the on-side. So without getting too technical I'll be looking to use the leg break in this way and see what the lefties come up with. I'm not going to over-complicate it initially as I've got 12 weeks to work out what to do I reckon. So, Leg Breaks down his off-side pitched up maybe using width of the crease to bowl over and around the wicket and varying the speed, trajectory and spin and see how I get on. I'll be watching to see what strokes he plays and let you know.

Link to an old MCC coaching manual from 1952 legspin

http://s1044.photobucket.com/albums/b444/TopSpinCricket/MCC%20Coaching%20Manual%201952%20Leg%20Spin%20Section/


Link to Richie Benuad Leg-Spin master class

http://topspincricket.blogspot.com/2010/06/mcc-masterclass-leg-spin-with-richie.html

18th Jan 2010 follow link for bowling against Lefties
http://mpafirsteleven.blogspot.com/2010/01/leftie-watch.html