Cancelled Cricket games

No-one likes to see a cricket game cancelled because of the lack of players, but it happens and seemingly more frequently these days in the area where I live. I was looking forward to the game this weekend in the 3rd XI and then the night before the other team Orsett and Thurrock contacted the club to say they couldn't get a team together.

Instead of moping around and being disappointed I said to myself -  If this weekend is anything like most of the weekends this year and last for the team I play in, somewhere out there at 12.30 there's going to be a game starting with one of the teams short of at least 1 bloke, if not 2 or 3! 

When you play in games like that the lack of that 1 player has a significant impact on the game, to the point that it must leave players thinking - Why do I do this every weekend losing game after game? It may also lead to people giving the game up or people looking at their clubs team-sheets and thinking -  so and so isn't playing I'm not going to bother either and so there's a domino effect.

So if we assume that our team had all 11 players ready for a game Orsett and Thurrock may have had 6 or 7 blokes also ready too. Surely if those people really want to play like me, they could potentially do a bit of searching and find a team at short notice that they could make up the numbers for? There's so many games being played at the weekend with a player missing, potentially all of those blokes could have been accommodated?

I went over to my nearest ground... The Rec where Grays CC were playing Bow Green CC (From London) and found a team of West Indians (The Bow Green boys) already there at 11.45 and asked if they had a full team. They said they were fairly certain that they'd be a man short and said, come back at 12.30 ready to play and I reckon you'll get a game. I went home got my gear ready and drove back over at 12.30 and sure enough I was in. I reckon any team will be more than happy to have an extra player if they're short.

If these lads hadn't been short I could have driven to numerous grounds in the area and probably would have found a game in that hour between 11.30 and 12.30. I reckon you'd be guaranteed a game if you were prepared to drive a few miles for instance to Fairlop Waters and walk around these pitches below...

Everywhere I look I find articles about how much of a state cricket is in because of falling numbers. Maybe it's time for the administrators within cricket at District level to come up with some kind of a hotline or website that can match players with teams that are short when there's either (a). A match cancelled as in the case of my scenario this last weekend or (b). Your clubs got so many players that they fill the team every weekend and blokes get left out on a regular basis.

Surely if you want to play cricket there's a game somewhere you can slot into?

To the game...

Bow Green won the toss and decided to bat much to the dismay of some of their players. The Captain Bernard asked me where I normally batted and I said 10 or 11. There was some discussion with some of the other senior players and I was put in at No.5.

Wickets fell quickly at the start with Grays CC pace attack, but Bow Green were initially scoring at 5 an over. I found myself in quite quickly with a young bloke Rayon Younge he was pretty good. I did okay with the pace attack, but then they brought in the Spin bowlers and I was all at sea. I managed to fend off the leg-spinner, but a 2nd spinner who appeared to be bowling finger spin suddenly began turning the ball both ways. Grays set a very obvious trap that I fell for - a field with virtually no-one on the leg-side and I changed from playing with a straight bat to trying to swing across the line to strike the ball down the slope on the leg-side at The Rec. I was out straight away. Bow Green posted a total of 140.

Bernard even gave me a few overs that were quite expensive, but I bought them a wicket. Bernard cam on and took two crucial wickets at the very end of the game and almost got them home, but Grays got the winning runs with 2 wickets to spare.

It was hot and sunny and a lovely day for a game of cricket, so I was so glad to have been able to play and it was a very different game to ours. Bow Green are a very vocal team with a lot of differing opinions among the senior players!

What was good to see though was the fact that where Grays and Chadwell CC seemingly fizzled out for some reason having become Thurrock CC and then eventually merging with Orsett to become Orsett and Thurrock; Into that void has come Grays CC primarily made up of Asian players of probably Pakistan family origins. So within just a few years where seemingly a club associated with a town and area has disappeared, a whole new club has emerged which is brilliant to see especially when you hear so much bad news around cricket and its future.

Weirdly I'd just watched this video the day or so before (Click on image).

the essence of which is the fact that crickets future lies to some extent in the hands of South Asian players. The other point in this video is the demise of West Indian cricket clubs, so it was good to see a club that in this instance that was primarily West Indian players. I had a chat with some of them at the end and asked about whether they had young players coming through and unfortunately it was pretty much the same story at that depicted in the video above. 

At the end of the day I exchanged numbers with Bernard and said that if in the future I was scratching around for a game I'd give him a call and see if he was short.

Hutton 4th XI game

Working on this now 30/7/18

I've not been on here much of late having had my little toe broken by a young fast bowler in a game against Chelmsford about 6 weeks ago. It's been sore for the whole time and the thought of getting another ball on it while it's been healing doesn't bare thinking about! Anyway, it's pretty much healed - still swollen it seems and it's healed in the wrong position - about 45 degrees facing the wrong way, so my nail isn't on the top of my toe any more, it now faces diagonally outwards. I reckon it may cause issues later in life.

Loads of other things have been happening - especially at our club. All season right from the outset we've struggled to get all 4 teams out because of the massive exodus over the winter of a lot of 1st and 2nd XI players. As mentioned previously everyone has had to move up a level, so I've been playing 3rd and 2nd XI games along with the rest of the 4th XI regulars. As a result a number of the 4th XI games have been cancelled and in the end the league expelled the 4th XI team. Thankfully the teams that we were due to play have said they'll still honor the games for the rest of the season if we can get a team out and play Friendly games. To be honest though given the fact that when I turned up today for the game Holy Cross it looked liked even with only three teams to fill we were still a man short!

So this was the first game this season at Holy Cross for me having played primarily away games for the 3rd and 2nd team. So I was happy to be at home for once and playing on this ground which I prefer to our main ground Mopsies, these wickets generally are more conducive to spin.

With a man down at this stage the assessment of the wicket was that it was going to crumble and that if we won the toss we should opt to bat, which kind of makes sense in my opinion if you had some semblance of a chance of winning. But by virtue of the lack of players and looking around and only seeing primarily 4th XI players, the chance of us posting 100 + was looking slim. I'd rather opt to bowl and give the bowlers a chance of getting some practice in at least. That way the game would last a few hours and we'd get our £15 worth. The toss was won and the consensus was that we'd bat.

As predicted it didn't go that well other than Brian Waterman and Cole Murdoch's innings. Brian's the oldest player at the club and Cole's the youngest in the 4th XI only just able to be in the team by virtue of his age. The rest of us fell by the wayside as per usual. I was gutted, my last innings with Brian was one of my better scoring nearly 30. This time I was out 3rd ball, the ball coming in a bit and coming off the inside edge onto the stumps - Hills the bowler.

Sechak bowled well for them with 5 wickets for next to nothing.

I was really looking forward to having a bat, having just come back from a holiday where for much of the time we've been playing cricket using a narrow bat and doing well with it. So I was gutted to be out 3rd ball - inside edged onto the stumps with Brian at the other on a good score. Brian's shown some faith in my batting recently, so a shame to let him down.


Tea was had without any actual tea which was a shambles, the cups had been left last summer and were all moldy and at the start of the season and thrown away. No-one in the meantime has seen fit to replace them. If I remember I'll take a few in next time.

So, to the bowling... I'm not 100% sure of how many overs the game was 40 or 45, one of those games with a new set of rules this season relating to maximum spells per bowler - I think it's 8 which is crap. Looking around, it was obvious that we didn't have any seam up bowlers except for Cole Murdoch who's about 13 and primarily there for his batting as far as I was aware. Cole opened from the Estate end with the wind (see below) bowling at their opener Clive Franklin

Cole was taken to the cleaners by Franklin in the 2nd over and pulled out of the attack and replaced by Wily bowler Alistair Hayton, who was our 11th player who turned up just before the start of the game. From the Graveyard end bowling slow left arm orthodox was Michael Wilson he did okay. Hayton bowled from the Estate end, but with injuries wasn't his usual self and I was given that end having asked for it.

Unfortunately I hadn't looked at my previous analysis of the Franklin who'd smacked me and the others around the ground when we played them with 8 players some weeks back. But I'd been watching him and with a full team he didn't look quite so special (See updated analysis of Franklin here ). I got him this time with my 2nd ball LBW. The simple analysis is just bowl on or about the off-stumps or outside and fill your field on the off-side with decent fielders. Stray leg-side and he'll be sweeping you (See the link above).

Suchak was up next and we quickly saw that he was pretty much a one trick pony - swinging across the line at anything that was on or around the leg-stump. He was batting alongside Astles who was a different prospect. Suchak didn't last that long and I got him LBW, he may have got me away once through the leg-side for 4 before he was replaced by Holloway a younger bloke about 18-20 years old.

Holloway was one of those Left-Handers who I usually go round the wicket to and it normally doesn't go that well, but with the wind assisting me coming over my shoulder I continued to bowl over the wicket at or about his off-stump on a full-ish line. Initially when he came to the crease he played cautiously and I got the 2nd wicket maiden (5th over). My 6th over I bowled against Mike Astles who looked organised. Again he looked to be intent on putting away anything on the Leg-side and I'd seen him hit a couple of fours through there. He was happy and confident enough to come out of his wicket to me, but for the most part bowling to my field I had him covered. One ball did stray leg-side and that was hit for 6 over deep mid-wicket. I did beat the bat with a nice ball A la Adil Rashid v Virat Kholi  - that pitched on leg and only just missed his off-stump by literally a millimeter or two. At the end of the game he was decent enough to compliment me on my bowling saying "I've seen loads of spinners this summer Offies and Leggies, but that was something else.

The 7th over was against the left-hander Holloway, who having watched from the other end seemed intent to show me who was boss in this over. I stayed over the wicket targeting the off-stump bowling a Flipper or two, he looked like he was attempting to hit the ball back at me with straight drives, but with the ball turning off the wicket he kept inside edging it to fielders on the leg-side. Maiden off him. Mike Astle scored the last 4 off of me - again straying slightly leg-side he put it away through the gap between fine-leg and square leg.

For more analysis and bowling plans for some of these batsmen have a look at the link here

To be honest having bowled so little this season I was very pleased with how I'd done. I was slightly disappointed with myself in that I hadn't had a look at the plans for Franklin before coming out, but I'd read him whilst fielding and realised a basic plan of keeping the ball away from the Leg-side would do the trick. The only other thing to mention is that I've been considering changing my approach by going round the wicket and pitching the ball on the leg-side with the idea that (1). I know that they're going to then hit some of the balls with relative ease, so the field would be leg-side dominant and (2) use this approach on the basis that if they miss it, I'm going to hit the stumps so it's probably a more aggressive/attacking approach? I didn't implement it at all today and for me it seems like an approach that might require the potential to bowl more overs and work the batsman out, but with only 8 overs to work with, I may have to put this on hold for a while.

Light readings in cricket

I've just been watching the West Indies and Sri-Lanka match on SKY (June 2018) and the game's just been stopped because of poor light. The 3rd umpire came out with a light meter and measured the light and the on-field umpires called a halt to the game.

As a photographer who knows a lot about light and characteristics of light I was interested in knowing what the light reading might be in terms of the EV (Exposure value). From what you can see when the reading is taken, it looks like a bog standard light meter using an incident reading e.g. the meter reads the light that falls on the meter measured through a translucent dome.

Doing a little research I found a few articles and they offered nothing. In fact the whole thing sounds a bit wishy washy, when in fact in terms of the light which can be measured exceptionally accurately with a basic light meter costing in the region of about £150 it should be a really basic and rigid set of parameters. 

Light, having traveled 93,000,000 miles or so from the sun is amazingly even right across the globe because of some basic physics - 'Inverse square law'. There's a basic premise in photography based around this physics aspect generally known as the Kodak Rule . The light having traveled so far hardly differs in EV terms from The Arctic to the equator and if the sun is out and you have a blue sky the Exposure value is F16 at 1/125 at 100 iso. Anyone who's ever taken pictures and taken it a step or two from point and shoot will recognise these values. The thing to take from this is that irrespective or whether you're at Headingly or Newlands the light in those conditions is the same.

It gets more complicated once there is cloud cover and then more so once the sun dips in the sky. As the sun dips in the sky and the atmosphere cools, the air becomes saturated with moisture (Dew) and the sunlight increasingly has to pass through this now dense moisture laden atmosphere. This makes the light diffuse and so softens and reduces the lights intensity giving a lower EV reading (less light). Furthermore, the lower atmosphere is also laden with pollution particles and the combination of both dew and the pollution enables us to be able to stare at the sun in it sets and is rendered warm and orange by all these atmospheric factors. 

The thing that bamboozles most people is the fact that unlike light meters and photographic equipment, our eyes have more than 65,000,000 years of development behind them. This means they're pretty well equipped to work in a massive range of light levels before we start to recognise that it's pretty dark. Given that we want to see a Test match out to the very end, our eyes would be looking at the light levels in many of these scenarios and concluding that it's still light enough to play. Needless to say this form of measurement is very subjective and differs from one person to another dependent on how good your eyesight is and how well your cones work. 

What I was hoping to find on the web was an EV value that most of us could make sense of. If you shoot a lot of pictures and try to do so at high quality you'd be using light sensitive capture mediums that are working at 100 iso. In which case you'd probably know that in the poor light scenario it starts to get sketchy at a point when you're having to shoot at F2.8 at 1/60 at 100 iso. But to the human eye this still looks pretty bright. 

Looking at this article here  this paragraph kind of indicates how daft this law is...

"Instead, the instrument only indicates whether the light conditions have improved or worsened, and it is the prerogative of the umpires to make the judgement on whether play can go on or not in the given conditions. What the light meters do offer is the option to the umpires to back up their subjective assessment of the playing conditions with the light meter readings as their justification". 

Given that it comes down to the subjective opinion of the umpire, the game is then subject to age of the umpire and the condition of the cones in his eyes. If he's an older umpire his cones are going to be potentially shot and he'll be calling the game off in potentially moderately poor light that a young person would still easily be able to play in.

But, if it came down to a precise reading from a light meter, you're then subject to the vagaries of the light and the fact that it is massively affected by the atmospherics, primarily cloud cover and movement. The light over a matter of minutes in the middle of the day can go from a exceptionally good value to a very poor value and back again. The question would be - do you stop the game as soon as the light dips below the 'Official meter reading' if one existed, or do you rely on the umpires judgement? 

Death of a cricket club

I believe I'm seeing the demise of our cricket club. For the 2nd week in succession I'm playing in the 2nd XI as are a number of other 4th and 3rd XI players. The 4th XI game has been cancelled and the remaining 4th XI players are in the 3rd XI, you know the score if you play cricket. 

Last year both the 1st and 2nd XI had bad seasons and over the winter a lot of the  players have chosen to stop playing or play far fewer games citing reasons such as work and family commitments. To be fair, they are all of that age - late 20's early 30's with possibly young families and Brexit breathing down their necks threatening screw everything up. It seems to be triggering a domino effect, as players leave others are saying things like... "Well if my mates are not playing, the games no longer the same, It's no longer a laugh". 

But it gets worse...

So tomorrow, the team I'm in, which is probably devoid of regular 2nd XI players will come up against a team more than likely full of 20 and 30 year old's, with perhaps an odd older bloke in his 40's and young kid being bloodied who has potential for the future. We've got three of the 'Young Kid' types, including my son Joe, but the rest of us are 4th and 3rd XI players and the likelihood is that it's going to be tough.

I'm up for it, I'll pay my £15 and a fiver for Joe. I'll have invested £20 in the match, plus any other costs incurred, this week it's not a lot, as it at home. But what I don't want to hear is the same crap that I heard last week...

"If we win the toss, we'll bat and get it over and done with and be home before tea, no-one wants to be chasing leather all day".

Er, I think you'll find some people do. I haven't paid £20 + to purposely play a truncated game where the captain and other key players in the team have given up before a ball is bowled and want to get it over and done with. I want my £20 worth. I want the opportunity to bowl against good batsmen and try and figure a way of getting them out. Yeah it may be a disaster and I might go for a lot of runs, but then again me or one of the bowlers might pull off a miracle? Perhaps the batsmen can see it as a challenge to try and chase or maybe even play for a draw?

If this is going to be the pattern for the whole summer, with this attitude and the same strategy of getting the game over and done with, I don't want to be playing and I'll probably go looking for another team along with Joe. I don't understand why if you like cricket and want to play the game, you would look to curtail the game and not look to face up to the challenge of fielding for the full innings against good players or as a batsman look to pull off a miracle with the bat in a miracle chase?

More practice in the paddock

Off the back of the 2nd XI game and the fact that I beat the batsman with my solitary Flipper, I've been further enthused. The bloke I bowled at and beat said last year he'd been playing both 1st and 2nd XI league cricket and he came in at No.5, so I'm assuming he's half decent. I've bowled in the nets at one of our best batsman Liam Rouse and he said my Flipper nearly got him and that I should bowl it more and finally last year against Thundersley I bowled against another bloke and nearly had him with the Flipper too.

So after years of not using it, I'm now very enthusiastic about it and working with it constantly. Currently in practice I bowl alternate balls... Leg Breaks and Flippers. The issue use to be that I always felt that the Flipper would work best if suddenly used out of nowhere and that always meant that it was pretty much a high risk ball in that it would probably be wayward and sure enough it was. I'm now looking at my use of leg-breaks in isolation and thinking that I need a variation. I can't and don't want to bowl Wrong-uns because of previously mentioned outcomes related to that. I've tried to bowl finger spin with a minimal amount of success and that looks as though it'll take absolutely weeks to develop. My Top-Spinner is a bit sketchy - too loopy and comes out as a small leg-break,but the Flipper I currently feel has some potential.

The plan is to roll it out in the next game this coming weekend and see how it works. How to use it is the next issue, do I try and bowl it alternately and see if that causes any problems or mix it in sporadically, or lure the batsman into thinking there's a pattern to the bowling and then change it up?

I'll try and get some video footage of me bowling it and post it up.

Basildon & Pitsea 2nd XI v Walthmstow 2nd XI

I have to make it clear this wasn't the usual 2nd XI. For me to be in the 2nd XI means something is up! Apparently 6 blokes in the 1st XI weren't available, so everyone had to shift up a grade or two with me moving up from my usual place in the 4th XI. Also from the 4's... Lee Dutton, Al McIver, Mitchell Robinson.

The only 2nd XI players were Mike and Charlie Blerkom, the rest of the team were 3rd XI players. As a result the 4th XI game was called off for lack of players as far as I can make out. I won't bother with any analysis because the likely-hood of me coming up against these players again is minimal. For a short while I did think there might be some hope because this team were skittled in their last game of the season last year - all out of 14, with one bloke taking 9 wickets in that game against Billericay. 

Before the game was started I was disappointed to hear our blokes saying that they wanted to win the toss and bat, because they had already conceded defeat and just wanted to get it over and done with. What about the bowlers? Why not bowl first and see how we get on and at least have half a game if the batsmen are not up to it. Thankfully they won the toss and put us in which was the same scenario, but at least it wasn't orchestrated by us to the detriment of the bowlers. 

The game commenced in very light rain - spitting and the whole game was played in rain of varying degrees and not once did we come off. As expected it didn't go that well with only Mike Blerkom the captain putting up any resistance. We  were all out for 54 after about 23 overs or so. I survived facing about 5 balls batting with Lee Dutton. I was out bowled by a good off-cutter, Dutton said it was a good delivery.

We made a reasonable start getting two early wickets. Joe (My son) got their captain caught at fine leg and then Joe took a catch off of Alistair Hayton's off-breaks while he was at Fine Leg. Chris Debond took a wicket, but from then on a really good batsman came out and took the game away from us. I got the last over and went for 10 off of 5 balls it, in the middle of the over I bowled a flipper and beat the bat just wide of the off-stump much to Sean Healey's appreciation in the slips. 

The details are here on Play Cricket.

Tea was nice and we came home about 4.30 in the rain. I was very pleased to have played a full match albeit short and in constant light rain, most of the other matches in the area were probably called off because of the rain and we even got a bowling point for the league table.

I also managed to get a picture of their Pavilion for my pavilion project here which was a result. I'll be adding more pictures to that blog page as the season goes on and it remember to do so.

Game this weekend

Here in the UK we've just had the hottest May Day bank holiday on record. Unfortunately it was pre-season and a week after a pre-season game that was cancelled because the pitch was too wet.

Since the weather above it's gradually got cooler and this weekend with the first league match of the season there's a chance of rain. 

At the moment it's shaping up well as I've been promoted to the 3rd XI along with Lee Dutton the 4th XI captain, which means we join my younger son Joe who's one of the best bowlers at the club. Although what with it being the tail end of the football season, it seems that a lot of people would prefer to either play football or watch it rather than have a game of cricket and some of the teams look a bit bereft of players meaning there will be the inevitable shifting around of players at the last minute. 

I've just looked at the forecast on XC Weather and it's not looking too clever...

Building up to this I've been practicing over at the Paddock and that's been going okay. I've been doing a lot of work on my Flipper and I reckon I'm confident enough to use in the game tomorrow. What I've been doing is bowling alternate balls - Leg Breaks and Flippers. I've been looking for something comes into the RH bat and one of the Flippers which is intended to do that occasionally does. But, more than anything just the fact that it's straight, faster and relatively accurate which I'm hoping will prove to be an asset. 

 The paddock where I practice May 6th

 Below, I've even painted the wide lines this year.

Tonight I did something different. I bowled combinations of the Leg-Breaks and Flippers from both sides of the wicket, just to see how it would pan out if I was able to go from one side to the other after a couple of balls and it went well. So, again dependent on what happens I might try that out as a part of my plan?

Hopefully the SLH side have the same players. This team last year won the league winning almost every game they played. We came close with me and Joe nearly getting us over the line in what looked like a lost cause. So with Joe in the match Saturday I'm looking forward to the challenge especially that of bowling at Robert Pearne their captain...

This is my analysis of his batting strengths. The legside shots are the ones I need to negate although he was strong through the off-side too and he also has some nice deft shots down to 3rd man. The question is - do I load up the off-side with players and just look to bowl accurately? The boundaries are average if the strip is in the middle towards the R/H side there's slight slope advantage at their ground which may need to be considered? Or do I come round the wicket and look to bowl to his strengths and load up the leg-side and try and get him caught off a big shot looking for a six. I guess it's going to depend on how much bounce I can extract from the wicket, how much I can get the ball to turn and how well the Flipper comes out and how wet the conditions will be?