Cricket Techniques

Batting

• Above all else, a batter's technique is determined by the situation. When the batting team is not in danger of running out of opportunities to score or has a good opportunity, the batter will focus on hitting the ball. However, if the batting team is running out of outs or is in a poor or non-vital batting situation, batters will take a more conservative approach, focusing on plays that prevent fielders from getting the ball in their hands or the wicket.

  Fielding position can also play into a batter's technique. A batter can aim towards nearly any part of the field and almost all of the fielders can position themselves nearly anywhere on the field, so a major goal of the batter is to place the ball where the fielders are not: tapping the ball when fielders play far away from the wickets, clobbering it when they play near them, and hitting it to one side when the fielders are clustered on the other. Generally the fielding team spreads out throughout the field to prevent an easy target, but a good batter can still find a gap to place the ball in play.

  The batter must also avoid placing his body in the path of the ball on its way to the wicket and instead place their bat between the ball and the wicket in situations where out prevention supersedes scoring.

Bowlers

• Bowlers control the tempo of the game and are responsible for disrupting the rhythm of the batter. There are two main methods for doing this, known as fast bowling and slow bowling.

  The fast bowler's goal is to throw the ball as quickly as possible when bowling past the batter toward the wicket. Slow bowlers use spinning the ball and varying speeds to put the ball past the batter.

  Both types of bowlers generally share the same mechanics for their approach, but mechanics can vary among bowlers, even among bowlers of the same type.

Fielding

• As previously mentioned, the fielder's goal is to be where the batter hits the ball in order to either catch it or throw it at a wicket not protected by a batter.

  Only wicket keepers can wear protection for their hands, so the expected force of the hit can be a factor in order to prevent injury. When fielders cannot make an out, one of their primary goals is to prevent the ball from reaching the boundary of the field, which can result in four or six automatic runs for the batter.