Fielding, the ART

What are the essential constituents in a game of Cricket? They certainly aren’t just batting and bowling.

PREAMBLE

Cricket, a team game of 11 players each side, involving a bat, ball and three sticks roughly 800mm in length commonly referred to as stumps plus an infinitesimal quantity of statistics.

Unfortunately in Park (Club) Cricket an established hierarchy exist.

Well out the front of the pack is BATTING.

Is simple – bowler bowls the ball to the batsman whose aim is to hit the ball for as many runs possible before he/she gets out. On occasion to bat and not be out.

Second is BOWLING.

Aim is to bowl the ball at the batsman to get them out asap. If they don’t get out asap, then the bowler settles into an afternoon grind aimed at getting batsmen out.

Some argue that Bowling has equal importance to Batting, but in harsh reality only bowlers support this argument. Having bowled with a shiny, new red ball, I concur with my brethren bowlers.

Third and to some (not me) a long way last is FIELDING.

Ten players are spaced around the playing arena with the aim to field or catch the ball to prevent possible runs from the batsman and to get the batsman out from catching the hit ball. Getting a runout is icing on the cake for a good day’s fielding.

SPEECH!

“How much do we love batting!?!

We Fu£%*ng love it!”

So starts the pre-game Gee up speech by the Captain of our Seconds team in the first Semi Final in the early 2000’s (04/05?).

Tuart Hill Cricket Club (Now North Perth CC) in Perth playing WASTCA competition. During the season we played two day games over consecutive Saturdays with finals on the Saturday and Sunday weekend.

We are sitting in the Club team room at our Home ground of Charles Veryard Reserve with the game commencing in 20 minutes. Here I am, promoted from 8th Grade for this one game as 12th man (the spare person) Selection was apparently due to my fielding prowess in the lower grades.

The Captain continues and not satisfied with the mumbled team response he repeated – we effing love batting line to a slightly more rousing reception.

His speech takes a savage twist’ “… and you know how much we Fu7%^ng HATE Fielding!?!?!” Spittle almost flying across the room in the process. “So what are we gonna do? We are gonna bat those Ba%£@rds into submission, done it all season boys, just more of the same eh, and F%@K the Fielding!!!!”

The GAME

So endeth the sermon from Captain’s Mount. Two opening batsmen finish their preparation and head out.

Unfortunately the Captains exhortations to bat em into submission were ignored and we were all out about thirty minutes after Tea with a sub par score. Ten minutes later we were bowling and unfortunately (for the Captain) fielding for about an hour till close of play.

Four balls into the opening over, one of the fielders grimaces and clutched the back of his thigh to end up hobbling off the ground.

I’m instructed to get the arse into gear and go fielding as a substitute for the hobbled player. Ended up at mid-off with the Captain yelling for all to hear – “You better be as bloody good as they tell me”! An “or else” inference hanging off the end of open lips like a dangling fish hook.

What was his aim? To instil fear in me? It didn’t work. Maybe he was extremely mortified that he was out there doing the dreaded and despised Fielding?

Whatever his displeasure, it added to my increasing dislike of this ‘Captain’. After all he had demeaned one off my favourite things to do in cricket – you know Fielding.

Apart from recently promoted fast bowler (Beau B), who loved his fielding almost as much me, the rest of team acted as if the game was already lost and were seriously lethargic in the field.

Here we were one game away from playing for the Grand Final trophy, and it appeared that Beau and I were the only two fielders out there. So many runs leaked for ones and fours that should have been cut off completely, restricted to two or even one. Simple catches dropped or not even attempted.

Game was almost over that night. I did note the ‘hobbled’ player that I had replaced was happily playing pool without a grimace as I headed to the bar for a beverage. Was plain to see that I was a replacement for faked injury.

Opposition won the game after an hour of play the next morning. I felt sad for my beloved Club as success up the Grades had not been our strong suit for some years. In many ways I was happy the Opposition won so convincingly as a severe lesson to a Captain who firmly believed he only had to do one thing (Bat) and win a game.

REFLECTION

I had played in one of the worst performing teams ever, who on masse reckoned that fielding sucked! For them it sucked because they never put any effort into it. I was horrified the Fielding sucks mantra even existed.

Reflection was towards my teammates down the Grades being a mix of cricket tragics (like me) who had come late to cricket, and some seriously good ex high grade cricketers whose bodies betrayed their still burning passion and knowledge for the game.

Some of us reasonably fit and athletic (like me), others with stuffed rotator cuffs, dodgy knees, wrists, elbows, and hammys, ex punk rockers, couch potatoes carrying many more kilos than required. The one thing that bound us were the combined efforts by all in the fielding no matter their personal inability.

Collectively we were far superior in the field than those in the malingering second team and my eternal hope was to keep playing with my liquorice all sorts mates down the grades.

FIELDING, the ART

Early days (at the ripe old age of 40) in the transition from cricket tragic to playing at the club I recalled the wise words of fielding maestro Ricky Ponting (also pretty handy with the bat) from an interview years earlier discussing the importance of fielding.

He reinforced the need to make sure the batsman knows you are there, that you are between him and making runs and that you will do anything possible to make his batting life miserable.

Ways to do so?

• Be loud in your fielding position so they know exactly where you are. Do a judges rating on a missed drive or a quality leave, suggest they could hit the ball a bit higher to assist the fielder in catching the ball. (Had success with that one recently)
• Watch carefully the batters stance. Feet positioned along the pitch and generally they will drive a bit straighter, so if in cover or mid off move a bit straighter as well. Conversely the opposite happens for an open stance batter.
• Closely watch the direction the bat starts moving towards hitting the ball. 95% of the time the direction of the hit ball can be anticipated and the fielder be on the move in that direction as the ball is hit. Am only talking fractions of seconds, but they certainly matter.
• Be on the move towards the batter before the bowler delivers the ball. Is far quicker and easier to accelerate or change direction to cut off a single or maybe a catch if already on the move. You will stop that cheeky single attempt.
• Back yourself to have a go at stopping the hard hit ball and with the body rather than the hands if necessary. You will get the praise of your team mates and a memorial bruise to reminisce over.
• Have a red hot go at catching the ball. It is only 5 1/2 ounces of hard red leather ball. If caught they never hurt. If missed? No comment.
• Make sure you shout out your intention to catch the ball. We don’t want to see or deal with the ugly consequences of two fielders colliding in their catching efforts. Is most inconvenient for the rest of the team to be two fielders down. Remember, play has to be stopped, medical aid applied, maybe an ambulance called. All that for what? Because you didn’t shout “MINE”!

Fielding ain’t some superfluous thing we do just to fill in time when not batting. A run saved not long after the start of play could be the difference in winning or losing.

It is not without risk of damage. At the time of writing. Am sporting a bruised and grazed right knee and am recovering from a jarred shoulder, with both injuries from a hard landing after taking a pretty good catch last Sunday.

The fleshy bit of the palm below the thumb on both hands has soreness. Have broken the little finger on the left hand twice, split the right hand index finger webbing and done the obligatory hammy.

That is the thing with most sports – “No gain without the Pain”. It makes the wins all the more much sweeter.

Stuff the Hierarchy

Now in Hobart Tasmania with the Thylacines Cricket team – Thylacines you ask? For the non-Tasmanian it is the sadly extinct Tasmanian Tiger (Google it).

Our motto? “Almost Extinct” Why? Because we are all veterans with me being at the younger end of the spectrum being 67.

I love this team, no matter what age or wear and tear driven restriction, the whole team puts in when fielding and right to the last ball of the game. Tough we are even if in many aspects sometimes we are age delusional.

Gotta love the enthusiasm!

Fielding is the great team glue in cricket being something that Captains should never forget.

When the Captain is doing post-game summary and praising batsmen for their 50’s or bowlers for their 3 for’s, take a small moment to mention Number 3 on the Hierarchy and extend your praise there as well.

You never know, the enthusiasm levels for that dreaded and despised fielding might just jump up a few notches in the next game and be the difference between winning and losing.

Stuff the hierarchy and elevate Fielding to its rightful position as part of the trinity. Cricket is equal parts Fielding, Bowling and Batting. Now repeat a 100 times …….