Dictionary of Cricket

The Wisden
Dictionary
of
Cricket
Third edition
The Wisden
Dictionary
of
Cricket
Third edition
Michael Rundell
A & C Black 앫 London

www.acblack.com
First edition published 1985 by George Allen & Unwin Publishers Ltd
Second edition published 1995 by Oxford University Press
Third edition published 2006 by A & C Black Publishers Ltd
A & C Black Publishers Ltd

38 Soho Square, London W1D 3HB
© Michael Rundell 2006

Photographs © Patrick Eagar (www.patrickeagar.com)
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

in any form or by any means without the permission of the publishers
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN-10: 0 7136 7915 8

ISBN-13: 978 0 7136 7915 1
eISBN-13: 978-1-4081-0161-2
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Foreword
Can any sport have a richer vocabulary than cricket? Equestrianism must
be a contender (there are more than 50 different types of bit you can stick
in a horse's mouth) and maybe motor racing - but surely no other ball
game?
Even baseball has only three or four ways of actually hitting the ball,
whereas cricket has a couple of dozen at least, and new ones keep being
invented. For the definition of ramp and flamingo, look within. And the
differences between many of these strokes is a matter of arguable nuance. I
remember once spending an afternoon at a rather dull county match
discussing how to describe the precise difference between a pull and a
hook.
In addition to all its other arbiters, cricket obviously needs a kind of fifth
umpire: a professional lexicographer. And in Michael Rundell it has found
the man. Twenty-one years ago, when his Dictionary of Cricket first
appeared, he took us on a journey of extraordinary erudition from ACB to
yorker.
This new edition, published under the Wisden umbrella, still starts from
ACB, although these days the initials have only historical significance, but
our new destination is zooter, a word that only came into common parlance
with the advent of Shane Warne.
There are a great many points of interest for anyone who enjoys cricket to
stop off en route and linger a while. Rundell's dictionary works both for the
tyro follower of the game (perhaps a bit confused by commentators'
terminology) and the supposed expert. There can be hardly anyone alive
who has not read Rundell and is aware that middle-wicket is not remotely
the same as mid-wicket. The explanation is here: the book is peppered
with potted histories of the game's terms that will fascinate anyone who
relishes cricket in all its richness.
When I was asked to write this foreword, I became very enthusiastic - as a

fan of the first edition - and anxious to make a few contributions from my
years in the press-box. For instance:
dot-job n (usually effing dot-job) A cricket match so close that even the
journalists present have to start making a note of every delivery, including the dot
balls.
He got very sniffy, did Rundell, and told me there was a big difference
between language and in-group jargon. Most new cricketing terms seem to
emanate from professional cricketers themselves, then spread from the
dressing room via the media to the stands and the village green. Dot-job
has not made this journey.
I was also keen to add my tuppence-worth to cricketing etymology. The J

section of this edition has been expanded to include both jaffa and jag
back which did not make the earlier version. Rundell's first sighting of
jaffa is from 1994. Yet I am sure I used the word in its present cricketing
meaning in The Guardian a good ten years earlier, in connection with a fast
bowler of the time, now a famous commentator and a good friend.
Infuriatingly, I can't find the reference in my own files. And The Guardian
has not yet digitised its archives for the early 1980s, which would make it
possible to do a word-check of this nature in seconds.
There is a further complication. Though jaffa is a compliment to a bowler,

the context on that occasion was less favourable. I think I said something
about finding the odd jaffa in a bowl of rotting golden delicious. Human
nature being what it is, you can be certain that the bloke concerned would
remember the (quite unjust) insult in every detail.
I am too much of a coward to ask him. But some day fully computerised
news archives will add even greater scientific exactitude to the next edition
of this already awesome book. Do read, and enjoy.
Matthew Engel Herefordshire, September 2006

Acknowledgements
It’s a privilege to have my dictionary published under the Wisden colours,

and I am grateful to Christopher Lane (Wisden’s publisher) for making this
possible. But it’s a big responsibility, too. Luckily for me, Matthew Engel
has read the whole text, and his many insightful comments and suggestions
– made with patience and good humour – have helped to make this a much
better book, and one that is, I hope, worthy of the Wisden name. I’m
grateful, too, to Andrew Delahunty for his witty and entertaining essay on
cricketing nicknames. Special thanks are due to my three favourite
cricket-watching companions, from whom I’ve learned so much over the
years: my friends Tony Jeffryes and Tony Skillen and my son Raphael (all,
unlike me, proper cricketers). Finally, it has been my good fortune to work
with the publishing team at A&C Black, and it’s a pleasure to thank
everyone there who has contributed to the book in one way or another,
especially Heather Bateman, Robert Foss, Kathy Rooney, Lauren Simpson,
Nicky Thompson, Edmund Wright, and the brilliant Katy McAdam.
MR
Cricket.fm Page 1 Tuesday, September 19, 2006 9:27 AM
A
ACB
ACB abbr Australian Cricket Board, the former name of Cricket Australia (qv)
ACCA
ACCA abbr Anglo-Corfiot Cricket Association

account
account n —open one’s account to score the first run or runs of one’s innings; get off
the mark:
‘Each batsman opened his account with a single in Sharma’s next over’ (Berry 1982, p
145).
across
across adv, prep 1. (of the ball) moving away from the batsman at a considerable angle
to the line of the wickets:
‘Gooch and Gatting had both played against him [Whitney], and they reported that he
… only slanted the ball across; they had not seen him swing it in’ (Brearley 1982, p 113).
Compare AWAY, BACK adv 2
2. (of a batsman) striking or attempting to strike the ball with the bat held horizontally
or at an angle, so that the bat intersects the ball’s line of flight:
‘Ganguly …fell immediately after tea to Razzaq, playing across to a delivery that held
its line to be trapped in front’ (S. Dinakar, The Hindu 2 February 2006).
See CROSS BAT
ACS
ACS abbr Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians

action
action n the manner in which a bowler delivers the ball, especially with regard to such
features as the height of the arm and the ‘fairness’ of the delivery:
‘By the time I left school … I could bowl fast-medium with a high action, swing the ball
late from leg and break it with shoulder-and-finger action from the off’ (James 1963, p
43).
‘That winter Lock worked on his action, and from then onwards it was only his occa-
sional faster ball which offended’ (Frith 1984, p 131).
‘His [McGrath’s] chest-on action has preserved his back and his easy run has saved his
knees and feet’ (Haigh 2005, p 194).
action-break
action-break n break imparted to the ball by a fast or medium-pace bowler, either as a

‘natural’ product of the bowling action or by means of ‘cut’ produced by drawing the
hand rapidly across the seam. This distinguishes action-break from break produced by
finger-spin or wrist-spin. (old):
‘There are two kinds of break, known as “finger-break” and “action break”’
(Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 75).
As Ranjitsinhji explains, at the point of delivery a right-arm bowler ‘flings his body,
right arm, shoulder, and leg forward, but rather across towards the left. This action
gives the hand a sweep across the ball, making it spin in its flight outwards from left to
right’.
ACU
ACU abbr Association of Cricket Umpires and Scorers, an organisation representing

umpires and scorers worldwide
adjacent
adjacent adj directly in front of the wicket when hit on the pads, and therefore liable to
be given out lbw. This cricketing use of ‘adjacent’ – first popularised by Tony Grieg in
his TV commentaries – is a somewhat counter-intuitive extension of its more normal
meaning of ‘next to’ or ‘adjoining’.
adjudge 2
adjudge
adjudge vb (of the umpire) to determine whether a batsman is out or not out in response
to an appeal by the fielding side:
‘Dravid … edged the ball soon after, but in what was the first of several umpiring blun-
ders, was adjudged out off a no-ball’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July
2006, p 72).
In general English, the word is entirely neutral, synonymous with words like ‘judge’ or
‘pronounce’. Among cricket writers, however, expressions like ‘adjudged lbw’ and
‘adjudged caught’ carry the coded message ‘but he shouldn’t have been given out’. For
this reason, there is an embargo on its use in Wisden.
aerial
aerial adj —go aerial to hit the ball high in the air, typically in an attempt to score a six:
‘Collingwood put down a significant marker in only his sixth Test appearance when, the
ball after lofting his third six off Harbhajan Singh, he went aerial again to clear the
infield.’ (Richard Gibson, SportingLife.com, March 2006).
afini palla
afini palla Corfu lit ‘to leave the bat’: used to indicate that an innings has been declared
closed
agricultural
agricultural adj denotes a robust and unsophisticated batting stroke or style of batting, in
which the ball is hit very hard across the line to the leg-side, with a wild swing of the bat:
‘Keith … took an agricultural swing at Wardle and was bowled’ (Times 25 July 1955).
There is a well-established notion that the ‘rustic’ style of cricket is untainted by the
classical straight-bat orthodoxy of the coaching manuals. This is reflected in terms like
COWSHOT (qv), and the language evokes a rather sentimental picture of village cricket
played by ‘lusty yeomen’.
aim
aim vb to execute a particular batting stroke, without necessarily making contact with the
ball:
‘Dooland in time passed on to Richie Benaud the secrets of the back-spun, skidding ball
which foxed so many batsmen as they aimed pull-strokes well above the line’ (Frith 1984,
p 124).
air
air n —give the ball air (of a slow bowler) to deliver the ball with a relatively high curving
trajectory, with the aim of deceiving the batsman as to its line, length, and pace; flight
the ball:
‘He [Gifford] gives the ball air in a deceptive manner for it seems to come at the batsman
slower than his bustling approach suggests and they play too soon’ (Henry Blofeld,
Guardian 9 August 1983).
‘Left-arm spinner 34-year-old Lesley Johnson, who was not afraid to give the ball plenty
of air, had a dream debut taking 7–24 off 13.2 overs’ (Cashman &Weaver 1991, p135).
Compare PUSH THROUGH
air-break
air-break n movement of the ball in the air; swing (old):

‘“Swerve” or “air-break” … is valuable to fast and medium-paced bowlers if combined
with length’ (E. R. Wilson in Badminton Library, Cricket (1920 edition) p 58).
air-shot
air-shot n a batting stroke in which the bat fails to make contact with the ball:
‘Five sixes off Willis, interspersed with several air-shots … enabled West Indies to turn
a probable deficit into an invaluable lead of 32’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer
September 1984).
The term is borrowed from the vocabulary of golf.
alley
alley n = CORRIDOR
all out
all out adv used in recording the score to show that a side’s innings has been brought to
an end through the dismissal of its batsmen by the bowling side. In a literal sense, the
term is inaccurate, since a side is ‘all out’ once ten of its eleven batsmen have been
dismissed or have retired.
all-rounder
all-rounder n a player skilled in both batting and bowling or in both batting and wicket-
keeping. Neville Cardus argued that the test for a great all-rounder (leaving aside wicket-
keepers) was: ‘Would he be picked to play in a Test match for his batting only, or for his
bowling only?’ (Cardus 1978, p 138). But these are rigorous criteria; in practice, many
of the great all-round performers of the past (such as Grace, Rhodes, Benaud, or Imran
3 angle
Khan) are remembered primarily for their skill in one or other department of the game.
Few are consistently successful with both bat and ball, the most notable exceptions being
Botham (in his heyday) and of course Sobers, who ‘could, and often did, swing the
course of a match with his batting, his bowling and his fielding’ (Manley 1988, p 214).
In principle, a wide range of permutations is possible, such as the stroke-playing number
three batsman who also bowls spinners, or the specialist slow bowler who can also bat a
bit, lower down the order. But it is a striking feature of contemporary cricket that the all-
rounder is most often a front-line fast or fast-medium bowler who is also an aggressive
hitter batting at around six or seven in the order – Andrew Flintoff being the outstanding
current example. The wicket-keeping all-rounder – generally referred to as a
‘wicketkeeper-batsman’ – often played an anchor role in the past, but players like
Gilchrist and Dhoni have reinvented the genre with their destructive batsmanship.
See also BITS-AND-PIECES PLAYER
amateur
amateur n a person who plays cricket as a pastime rather than as a profession;

specifically, in the context of first-class cricket in Britain, a player who held amateur
status. Amateurs ‘were addressed by professionals as Sir or Mr at all times. Omitting this
courtesy could result in a fine or dismissal. The amateurs, in turn, addressed the
professionals by their surnames alone’ (Marqusee 1994, p 75). According to an MCC
ruling, amateurs received no remuneration but were entitled to reimbursement of all their
expenses. Amateur status was finally abolished after the 1962 cricket season.
See also GENTLEMAN
analysis
analysis n the record of a bowler’s performance in an innings or match, or sometimes

over a longer period such as a Test series or even a whole career:
‘Hadlee topped and tailed the innings with four wickets for 14 runs, bringing the New
Zealand fast bowler’s match analysis to eight for 22’ (Cyril Chapman, Guardian 1 May
1984).
The minimum information supplied in an analysis will be the number of wickets taken
and the number of runs scored off the bowler (in that order) – thus: ‘England 373
(Warne 6 for 122)’. A slightly more detailed version shows the number of overs
(including, after a decimal point, the number of balls bowled in any uncompleted over),
the number of maidens, the runs scored, and the wickets taken (in that order) – thus:
Warne 37.3–5–122–6’. The most complete form of analysis, as found in the traditional
scorebook, is based on data that is entered as each ball is actually delivered. It thus
includes information about every ball – whether it was a no-ball or wide, whether runs
were scored off it (and how many), and whether a wicket was taken. Traditionally, the
figure in an analysis for the runs scored off a bowler took no account of any extras
accruing to the batting side in the course of his spell. But the current convention, first
introduced at Test level in 1983, is that no-balls and wides are debited to the bowler’s
analysis. More recently, a bowler’s analysis may also include figures showing his
ECONOMY (qv) – the average number of runs scored of each over bowled – and his
STRIKE RATE (qv) – the number of balls bowled for each wicket taken.
Compare FIGURES
anchor
anchor n a batsman who plays fairly defensively (often while partnering an aggressive
hitter), and accumulates runs slowly but steadily, giving an element of stability to the
team’s innings. A player batting in this style is also said to ‘drop anchor’:
‘Vandort opted for the anchor role in a knock which lasted almost four hours and
included 10 fours.’ (BBC Sport website, 1 May 2006).
‘It was decided that he would go for the runs while Vengsarkar … would drop anchor
and pick ones and twos.’ (Purandare 2005, p 114).
쐽 vb to play a long steady innings that forms the backbone of one’s team’s score:
‘“I’m thrilled to bits to have done it”, said Langer afterwards, having anchored
Somerset’s vast first-innings total with an epic 342’ (Andrew Miller, Guardian 21 July
2006).
angle
angle vb 1. to deliver the ball in such a way that it either comes into or goes away from
the striker at a considerable angle to the line of the wickets, the effect being typically
angled bat 4
achieved by means of swing or cut, and/or a bowling position relatively wide of the
wicket:
‘Frank Tyson … says it is clear that the pace bowlers have to go round the wicket, bowl
just short of a length, and angle the ball in at the left-hander’s stumps’ (Scyld Berry,
Observer 2 January 1983).
2. (of the ball) to move into or away from the striker at a considerable angle to the line
of the wickets:
‘He has been deceived into assuming an inswinger which proved to be a leg-cutter … or
one which angled the other way off a “green” pitch’ (Arlott 1983, p 38).
3. to deflect the ball off the bat, usually into the area behind the wicket, with the face of
the bat held at an angle to the ball’s line of flight:
‘Atherton, looking for the single that would have given him his half century, angled a
delivery from Fanie de Villiers off the face of the bat towards third man’ (Mike Selvey,
angled bat
angled bat n a straight bat held in such a way that the face is at an angle to the line of the
ball. The ball is then either deflected to either side of the wicket or pushed defensively
into the ground:
‘We have all seen a striker play forward to a spin bowler with a steeply angled bat’
(Oslear &Mosey 1993, p 171).
apo podi
apo podi Corfu lit ‘from the foot’: used to indicate that a batsman is out lbw
apo psila
apo psila Corfu lit ‘from high’: used to indicate that a batsman is out caught
apo xyla
apo xyla Corfu lit ‘from the wood’: used to indicate that a batsman is out bowled
appeal
appeal vb to make a request to the umpire for his decision on any of various matters;
especially, to request a decision as to whether a batsman is out:
‘On no account ought he to appeal unnecessarily. It is bad form, of which no cricketer
should be guilty’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 142).
쐽 n an act of appealing to the umpire:
5 around the corner

‘From the time he [Ramadhin] took Richardson’s wicket early on the fourth day, he had
no further success in the match. Yet, during this period, he must have had at least fifty
appeals turned down for lbw.’ (Manley 1988, p 115).
‘Warne cannot clear his throat these days without it coming out as ‘’owzat?’, and his
appeals sometimes seem to be addressed to everyone except the umpire.’ (Haigh 2005,
p 156).
The fielding side appeals to the umpire by shouting ‘How’s that?’ (or any
phonologically similar expletive) and it has been enshrined in the rules of the game
since the earliest times that the umpires ‘are not to order any Man out, unless appealed
to by one of the Players’ (Laws 1744; Law 27 §1 is the modern equivalent). In practice,
however, appeals are most significant in cases where the issue may be open to dispute,
as when a batsman appears to be lbw, stumped, narrowly run out, or caught off a fine
deflection. Concern is periodically expressed about the tactic of pressurising umpires,
by sheer weight of appeals, into giving a favourable decision. One measure that has
been floated would entail a restriction on the right of appeal to those fielders best
qualified to judge a particular case – for example the bowler and wicket-keeper in the
case of an lbw appeal, or the bowler and catcher in the case of a possible catch. For the
time being, however, the obvious difficulties of enforcing such restrictions have
deterred the game’s legislators from making any change in the Laws. A proposal to trial
a system of allowing either captain to refer up to three decisions per innings to the third
umpire was rejected by the ICC in 2006.
Appeals for an umpire’s decision can also be made in the case of a ball becoming unfit
for play, or in the event of a deterioration of the light: ‘After deciding to play in
unsuitable light, the captain of the batting side may appeal against the light to the
umpires’ (Laws 3 §9 (c)).
approach
approach n the way the bowler runs towards the wicket prior to delivering the ball; RUN-
UP:
‘He was back, with a beautifully-controlled nineteen pace approach’ (David Frith, The
Fast Men, p 201).
approach-shot
approach-shot n an unorthodox attacking stroke played with a full swing of the bat (the
term is borrowed from the vocabulary of golf):
‘He really scarcely made a fine stroke throughout, and he indulged in an extraordinary
variety of approach-shots and mishits all over the field’ (Headlam 1903, p 43).
arm
arm n —with the arm (of a ball) maintaining, after pitching, the direction imparted by the
swing of the bowler’s arm; continuing in its original line of flight without any deviation:
‘He [Laker] could appear to spin the ball hard, only for it to float on with the arm for a
catch to slip or the wicketkeeper’ (Arlott 1983, p 44).
‘Valentine … was a conventional left-arm, leg-break bowler with the capacity to spin the
ball, and a well-disguised delivery that “came with the arm”’ (Manley 1988, p79).
Like the googly, the ball that goes ‘with the arm’ is unsettling (and frequently deadly)
because it does the unexpected. The effect is most marked in the case of an off-break
bowler coming round the wicket, so that the ball goes away from the batsman at a
considerable angle. The term tends nowadays to be restricted to spin-bowling contexts,
but was formerly used to describe any type of bowling. The basic principle is that
‘unless the ball be very loosely held, it is practically impossible to bowl a ball which,
after pitching, goes on in exactly the same straight line’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 75).
Hence ‘the ball that “goes with the arm” … is very deadly’ (ibid, p 106).
arm ball
arm ball n a ball that goes on ‘with the arm’, especially a slightly quicker ball bowled by
an off-spinner that holds its line and therefore moves away from the right-handed
batsman or into the left-hander:
‘The“arm ball” … is usually pushed through a bit more quickly than other deliveries and
will not hold, or turn, as it pitches’ (Oslear &Mosey 1993, p 180).
‘The pitch conditions come into it. If there is no spin, the use of the arm-ball or floater
is a useful weapon’ (John Emburey, Cricketer August 1994).
around the corner
around the corner phrase See CORNER

around the wicket 6

around the wicket
around the wicket adv = ROUND THE WICKET

Ashes, the
Ashes, the n 1. the competition between the national cricket teams of Australia and
England, or the title held by the current champions in this competition. The Ashes are
regularly contested in Test series played in both countries, and change hands only if the
current holders lose a series. The Ashes do also exist as a physical entity (see below) but
these are permanently housed at Lord’s irrespective of which country currently ‘holds the
Ashes’. The name originates from a mock obituary published shortly after England’s
first-ever defeat by Australia on English soil, when magnificent bowling by Spofforth
(who took 14 for 90) carried Australia to a dramatic 7-run victory:
‘In Affectionate Remembrance of ENGLISH CRICKET, which died at the Oval on 29th
August, 1882. Deeply lamented by a large circle of Sorrowing Friends and Acquaint-
ances, R.I.P. N.B. — The body will be cremated, and the Ashes taken to Australia’
(Sporting Times 2 September 1882).
In the winter of the same year an English team led by the Hon Ivo Bligh went to
Australia and ‘regained the Ashes’ by beating the Australians in a three-match series.
For this achievement Bligh was presented by some English ladies with a small urn
containing the ashes of a set of bails they had burned. The urn was kept by Bligh until
his death in 1927, when it was bequeathed to the MCC.
See also URN
2. the competition between the women’s cricket teams of Australia and England, or the
title held by the current champions in this competition. Although the first Test series
involving these teams was played in 1934, the competition became officially known as
the Ashes only in 1998:
‘Mollie Dive, who led the Australians, had the distinction of wresting the Ashes from the
English team for the first time’ (Cashman &Weaver 1991, p 104).
asking rate
asking rate n the exact number of runs per over that a batting side needs to score in order
to win a match. The asking rate is expressed to one or two decimal points (eg 5.33 runs
per over) and, while occasionally used in first-class cricket, is mainly a feature of the
limited-overs game:
‘The asking-rate was less than three when Pietersen dragged a Yuvraj Singh delivery
down to deep midwicket’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 78).
asterisk
asterisk n a batsman’s innings that has been completed without the batsman being
dismissed, so called because an asterisk is conventionally used in reporting the score to
indicate a not-out figure – thus: England 358 (Botham 149*):
‘Another asterisk next day — 41 not out in the NatWest triumph at Southampton —
undoubtedly influenced his nomination for the England squad’ (Doug Ibbotson, WCM
September 1984).
at
at prep used following an aggregate number of wickets or runs, to indicate a player’s

bowling or batting average in an innings, game, series, or career:
‘In any other summer, Shane Warne’s 40 wickets at 19 and 255 runs at 27 would have
guaranteed some individual award.’ (Haigh 2005, p 224).
attack
attack n the bowling resources available to a side; the bowlers considered collectively:
‘The Leewards … have a pace attack, consisting of five Antiguans, that is surely the most
formidable since the Barbadian quartet of Joel Garner, Malcolm Marshall, Wayne
Daniel and Sylvester Clarke of the 1980s’ (Caribbean Cricket Quarterly Jan-March
1994).
‘McGrath’s grunts of pain were still fresh in his ears when he [Ponting] inserted
England, perhaps partly as a vote of confidence in the rest of his attack’ (Haigh 2005, p
71).
attacking field
attacking field n any arrangement of fielders that is intended to maximise the likelihood
of batsmen being caught out, rather than to prevent them from scoring runs:
‘Both bowlers had a full attacking field, as in the first innings, dispensing with the run-
saving positions for a start’ (Peebles 1959, p 80).
An attacking field is appropriate in any situation in which the bowling side has the
initiative, or wishes to seize it, as when bowling with the new ball or to a newly-arrived
7 away-swinger
batsman, or when the wicket is taking a lot of spin. It may also be employed against a
side batting last when the bowling side has plenty of runs to play with but needs to bowl
the opposition out in order to win. An attacking field is characterised by a cordon of
close fielders whose job is to take catches, tie the batsmen down by preventing quick
singles, and generally to exert psychological pressure. A typical attacking field for a
fast bowler would include three or four slips, a gully, a forward short leg, and perhaps
a silly point or short extra cover; run-saving positions like third man and long leg will
usually be dispensed with, so that any ball that penetrates the inner ring of fielders has
a good chance of reaching the boundary.
Compare DEFENSIVE FIELD
average
average n 1. (also batting average) the arithmetic mean of a batsman’s scores during a
given period (such as a season or an entire career) and at a given level (such as first-class,
Test, or one-day games), calculated by dividing the total number of runs he has scored
by the number of times he has been dismissed. Thus, Sir Donald Bradman’s career
batting average in Test cricket is 99.94, arrived at by dividing his aggregate score (6996
runs) by the number of times he was out (70). This is conventionally shown in tabular
form, thus:
M I NO R HS A
(matches) (innings) (times not out) (runs) (highest score) (average)
52 80 10 6996 334 99.4
Additional information is often supplied, such as the batsman’s STRIKE RATE (qv) or the
number of hundreds and fifties he has scored.
2. (also bowling average) the mean number of runs that have been scored off a
bowler’s bowling for each wicket he has taken during a given period and at a given level,
calculated by dividing the total number of runs scored off his bowling by the total
number of wickets he has taken. Thus, Sir Richard Hadlee’s career bowling average in
Test cricket is 22.29, arrived at by dividing the number of runs scored off him (9611) by
the number of wickets he took (431). This is conventionally shown in tabular form with
figures for matches played, overs or balls bowled, maidens bowled, runs scored, and
wickets taken. Additional information is often supplied, such as the bowler’s STRIKE
RATE (qv) and ECONOMY (qv) or the number of times he has taken five wickets in an
innings.
away
away adv moving towards the off-side from a line closer to leg or middle stump, so as to
go off in the direction of slip:
‘Worrell … had only made 52 before his stumps were shattered by one of those unplay-
able Bedser deliveries, the ball that moves away from the right-handed batsman and then
breaks back’ (Manley 1988, p 87).
‘Fred Titmus … was never easy to hit, his control of length and line was brilliant, and of
course he mastered that away-drifter better than anyone’ (Jim Laker, WCM December
1983).
away-swing n = OUTSWING
away-swing
away-swinger
away-swinger n = OUTSWINGER
B
b
b abbr BOWLED; used in the scorebook, following the name of a batsman and preceding the
name of a bowler, to indicate the bowler responsible for or involved in the batsman’s
dismissal. On its own b signifies that the batsman has been bowled out or has played on;
other types of dismissal are signified by additional information, such as ‘lbw b McGrath’
or ‘c Gilchrist b McGrath’.
back
back adv 1. striking or attempting to strike the ball from a position relatively close to the
wicket, with most of the weight of the body resting on the BACK FOOT (qv):
‘In playing back to a fast bowler, the thing to remember is, that there is very little time
to make the stroke, the margin of error being exceedingly small’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p
169).
‘The short fast ball of ordinary height he could get back to for a slash behind point’
(James 1963, p 90).
Compare FRONT FOOT
2. moving in towards the batsman from a line initially closer to off stump:
‘On a sticky wicket a right-handed bowler who is making the ball break back will often
have six men on the on-side’ (Warner 1934, pp 18–19).
‘Favell was beaten and bowled by a very good ball, which Statham fetched back some
way off the pitch’ (Peebles 1959, p 153).
Compare AWAY
3. in a defensive fielding position, some distance from the wicket:
‘The greatest leg spinner of all time began to Harmison with four men back and no bat
pad fielder’ (Haigh 2005, p 206).
쐽 adj (of a stroke or style of play) made by or characterised by the batsman playing back:
‘The hallmark of good back play is the use the batsman makes of the ground between the
creases’ (MCC 1952, p 86).
‘When the score had reached 219 Hughes seemed to lose concentration and was caught
behind playing a loose back stroke to Azeem’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 10 December
1983).
Compare FORWARD
back-cut
back-cut (old) n a LATE CUT (qv) or any cut stroke that sends the ball into the area well
behind square:
‘Foster got 2 for a back-cut off Trumper, which curved away from Hopkins at third man’
(Melbourne Argus 15 December 1903).
쐽 vb to hit the ball when making a back-cut:
‘Noble back-cut Arnold high to the boundary through the slips, perilously near to both
Foster and Bosanquet’ (Melbourne Argus 12 December 1903).
back foot
back foot n the foot that is closer to the stumps when a batsman is standing at the crease;
the right foot in the case of a right-handed batsman or the left foot in the case of a left-
handed batsman. A ‘back’ stroke, in which most of the batsman’s weight rests on the foot
closer to the stumps, is said to be played ‘off the back foot’. Playing off the back foot
gives the batsman more time to see the ball and adjust to any movement in the air or off
the pitch. Conversely, it is more difficult to put real power into a shot off the back foot.
See also BACK adv 1. Compare FRONT FOOT
9 backward
back-foot
back-foot, back-footed adj played, or tending to play, off the back foot:
‘No great batsman is solely a back-foot or a front-foot player’ (Arlott 1983, p 61).
‘Here in Bridgetown in particular he [Stewart] has found, for the first time, a pitch whose
pace and bounce has made his back-foot game a less hazardous occupation’ (Mike
Selvey, Guardian 12 April 1994).
‘The score was 21 when Phillips … played a wild back-footed drive at a ball from Azeem
… and was caught behind’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 10 December 1983).
backlift
backlift n the movement by which the bat is brought backwards and upwards before being
swung forward again as the batsman plays a stroke, especially an attacking stroke off the
front foot:
‘Lindwall … bowled the outswinger, the ball that gets the good players out; his yorker,
which he reserved for batsmen with a high backlift, completed his range of deliveries’
(Sir Len Hutton, Observer 8 July 1984).
‘Even Lara has made some concessions to age by reducing and straightening his back-
lift and by taking a longer look at the bowling’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricinfo Magazine May
2006, p 56).
back spin
back spin n a reverse spin imparted to the ball, making it lose pace significantly after
pitching, with little or no lateral deviation. The ball is said to ‘hang’, as it comes on to
the bat much more slowly than would have been predicted from its speed in the air. (old ):
‘Back spin is undercut applied to the back half of the ball, and is more easily put on with
a low action’ (E.R. Wilson, Badminton Library Cricket (1920 edn), p 84).
back-spinner
back-spinner n a ball delivered with back spin; like the top-spinner, it is ‘very likely to
cause a mistimed stroke, because the ball comes off the pitch at a pace different from that
of its flight’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 81) (old )
back-stop
back-stop n a fielding position (or the player occupying it) directly behind the wicket-
keeper:
‘New South Wales started off very quietly … and were not awakened to a sense of rash-
ness until a fast ball from Miss Rattigan whizzed past the wicket-keeper, under the skirts
of the back-stop, and out of the reach of the second back-stop’ (Sydney Mail 6 April
1910).
The back-stop – now an obsolete position except in the lowest reaches of the game –
was at one time an almost indispensable run-saving fielder.
See LONG STOP
back up
back up vb 1. (of the non-striker) to begin to move down the pitch as the bowler delivers
the ball in order to maximise the chances of taking a run should the striker hit the ball:
‘Evans was nearly caught wide on the leg side by Langley … then poor Bailey was run
out backing up to Evans’ (Cardus 1978, p 209).
On the complicated legal and ethical issues arising when the bowler attempts to run out
a backing up non-striker before the ball is delivered, see now MANKAD. To avoid
problems, players are advised always to begin their advance down the wicket ‘as the
bowler delivers the ball but not before’ (MCC 1952, p 102).
2. (of a fielder) to move into a position behind another fielder in order to cover him in
case he misses the ball; the term is applied especially to a fielder covering either the
wicket-keeper or the bowler at the non-striker’s end when a ball is thrown in from the
outfield:
‘The man who ought to be abused when an overthrow occurs is not the fieldsman who
throws the ball but the men who should be backing up and are not’ (Badminton 1888, p
250).
backward
backward adj, adv indicating the area somewhat behind the line of the batsman’s wicket.
The term may be used on its own (‘standing a little backward of square’) or in
combination to indicate a modified fielding position that would normally be squarer on
to the wicket, such as point or short leg:
‘The day started with a cool breeze blowing from backward square-leg’ (Brearley 1982,
p 60).
bad light 10
‘Yuvraj cover drives to the fence. Kaif pulls backward of square for four’ (Bhattacharya
2006, p 11).
Compare FORWARD. See FIELDING POSITIONS
bad light
bad light See LIGHT

bag
bag n the number of wickets a bowler takes in a given period, as in a match or series; HAUL:
‘Tayfield was nursing a knee injury; but his bag for the series, 37 wickets, was a South
African record’ (Frith 1984, p 145).
쐽 vb —bag a brace See BRACE
In both senses, the word is borrowed from the vocabulary of shooting.
baggy green
baggy green n the loose-fitting dark green cap worn by players in the Australian national
team; hence, a symbol of the team itself and of Australian cricket:
‘When Ponting tossed Warne the ball for the seventh over of the innings, was it a case of
“let’s do it for the baggy green”, or “if you’re so clever you bloody win it for us”’ (Haigh
2005, p 116).
bail
bail n either of the two pieces of turned wood that are laid across the top of a set of stumps
to form a wicket. Each bail is 4 3/8 inches long and should not project more than half an
inch above the stumps. The wicket is ‘down’ if either of the bails is dislodged from the
stumps by the ball or by the batsman (with his bat, body, or clothing). If the wind is
exceptionally strong, the two captains may agree, with the umpires’ consent, to dispense
with the bails altogether.
‘Bail’ is an old word of French origin meaning a crossbar or crosspiece, and it had
entered the English language by the 16th century. It was used (among other things) to
describe the movable horizontal part of the little gate, or ‘wicket’, that served as the
entrance to a sheep pen – and it was of course this wicket that, in an early version of
the game, was used as a target for bowling at. The earliest (1744) code of Laws
specifies a bail of six inches, and ever since then the length of the bails has been
governed by developments in the size of the wickets (See WICKET). The most important
change, however, was the adoption of two bails instead of one, which followed (though
not immediately) the introduction of a third stump in about 1775. The first reference to
a second bail appears in an ‘unofficial’ edition of the Laws published in Maidstone in
1786, though the earliest MCC code (1788) still refers to a single bail. By the beginning
of the 19th century, however, the modern two-bail wicket was firmly established.
bail ball
bail ball, bailer n a good-length ball that rises to the height of the bails, especially one
that dislodges the bails without disturbing the stumps (obsolete):
‘A more moderate pace resulted from the new discovery of a well-pitched bail ball’
(Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 151).
‘A bailer bowled Mr A. C. Lucas at 65’ (Wisden 1878, p 185).
Balista
Balista n a type of bowling machine invented in the mid-19th century and used for
providing batting practice. The Balista was a smaller, lighter, and apparently more
sophisticated version of the older Catapulta:
‘The principle of the new comer resembled very closely that of its prototype, and notwith-
standing its comparative lightness, answered all the purposes for which it was
constructed’ (Box 1868, p 76).
See also CATAPULTA, BOWLING MACHINE
ball
ball n 1. the hard leather-covered ball with which the bowler attacks the batsman’s wicket
in cricket.
See also DUKE BALL, KOOKABURRA BALL, SG BALL
2. a delivery of the ball by the bowler:
‘Hogan, the difficult nightwatchman, hooked the day’s second ball to mid-wicket’ (Tony
Cozier, Cricketer January 1984).
‘Malcolm blasted out three South Africans in his first two overs … Then, in 10 balls
interrupted by the tea interval, he fired out three more batsmen before mopping up the
tail’ (Vic Marks, Observer 21 August 1994).
11 ball-tampering
‘After that, he cut loose and scored fifty-nine more in thirty balls, with nine fours and two
sixes’ (Purandare 2005, p 113).
3. a particular type of delivery, especially one that forms a standard part of a bowler’s
repertoire:
‘I have always been impressed with Marshall, although it is a pity he bowls so many
short-pitched balls’ (Sir Len Hutton, Observer 1 July 1984).
‘The leg-break delivered with a slight round-arm action became his stock ball to the
right-hander, and there was a faster ball which went with the arm’ (Bose 1990, p 121).
‘The only casualty of the extra period was Clarke, bamboozled by Harmison’s rare
slower ball’ (Steven Lynch, Wisden 2006 p 104).
4. —with the ball in one’s capacity as bowler:
‘He took a pair of spectacles at Lahore, but he had his revenge with the ball … and took
altogether nine wickets for 46 runs’ (Headlam 1903, p 162).
‘The foundation of these balls is a cube of cork’ (Box 1868, p 106), around which twine
is wound to produce a spherical shape, which is in turn covered with two hemispheres
of red leather (white if the ball is to be used in floodlit cricket). The leather pieces are
stitched together to leave a raised seam, typically having six rows of stitching. The
manufacturing process and the materials used have scarcely changed in almost 300
years. The dimensions of the ball have also remained remarkably constant. Established
as ‘between Five and Six Ounces’ in the original (1744) code of Laws, its weight was
fixed in 1774 at between 5½ and 5¾ ounces, and remains the same today. The size of
the ball was first specified in 1838 (a circumference of 9 to 9¼ inches) and was slightly
altered in 1927 to its present size of 8 13/16 to 9 inches. (A ball of slightly smaller
dimensions is specified for women’s cricket: see Law 5 §6 (i).) A new ball is used for
each innings of a match, and the ball may also be changed during the course of an
innings under certain circumstances: See NEW BALL, REPLACEMENT BALL.
ball-doctoring
ball-doctoring See BALL-TAMPERING

Ball of the Century, the
Ball of the Century, the n the ball with which Shane Warne dismissed Mike Gatting
in the 1st Test of the 1993 Ashes series, at Old Trafford on 4 June 1993. The ball pitched
outside leg, and turned sharply to hit off stump. Gatting’s expression said it all. This was
Warne’s first delivery in an Ashes game, and it immediately achieved almost mythical
status:
‘In 1993, Old Trafford was the scene of his defining hour, the Ball of the Century that
bamboozled Mike Gatting and put a hex on an entire generation of English batsmen’
(Andrew Miller, Cricinfo 10 August 2005).
balloon
balloon vb to hit the ball high in the air but without sufficient force for it to carry a great
distance, typically by playing a mistimed shot; the ball ‘floats’ upwards like a balloon
and usually presents the fielding side with an easy catch:
‘They had England’s sixth wicket record for the taking when Botham … ballooned
Cairns into the covers after they had added 232’ (John Thicknesse, Cricketer March
1984).
‘A miscued sweep ballooned to slip from his boot and a video deliberation was necessary
to determine whether it had touched the ground’ (Haigh 2005, p 145).
ball-tampering
ball-tampering, ball-doctoring n the practice of deliberately and illegally altering the

condition of the ball in order to gain competitive advantage:
‘There were disputes, a rumbling sequence of them, as allegations were made of ball-
tampering by Pakistan’s fast bowlers and of partiality by England’s umpires’ (Scyld
Berry, Wisden 1994, p 263).
‘Ball-doctoring accusations have been going on for decades – ever since Denis Compton
wore Brylcream 50 years ago – and I am sure most of them are true’ (Barry Richards,
Sunday Mail [Brisbane] 17 November 1991).
‘Sky television, which had more than two dozen cameras following play, failed to
uncover any evidence of ball-tampering’ (Lawrence Booth, Guardian 21 August 2006).
Ball-tampering takes a wide variety of forms, which include: lifting or picking the
seam; roughening one side of the ball by scuffing it with the fingernails or gouging
banana 12
small pieces out; or making one side of the ball heavier than the other (thus giving it a
‘bias’) through the application of saliva, sweat, or artificial substances such as lip-balm
or sun-block. Whatever the method, the objective of ball-tampering is to enhance the
ball’s potential for movement in the air, making it more likely to swing into or away
from the batsman.
The practice has been around for a long time. Umpire Don Oslear says that ‘there were
reports of ball-tampering as early as 1920’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 209), and the 1947
code of Laws included specific bans on lifting the seam and on the use of ‘resin, wax,
etc’. (Law 46, note 4 (iii)). Playing conditions in England in the late 1980s – flat,
benign wickets, low seams, and soft balls – were, arguably, biased too far in the
batsman’s favour, and bowlers ‘tried to level the odds by doing things to the ball.
Lifting the seam and scuffing the surface became commonplace’ (Marqusee 1994, p
176). But in 1992, the whole subject acquired a much higher profile, when accusations
of cheating were made in the press by England cricketer Allan Lamb against the
Pakistani touring team. Lamb’s allegations were prompted by a series of spectacular
England batting collapses: in the Headingley Test, for example, England were all out
for 320 after reaching 270 for 1, while at the Oval they plummeted from 182 for 3 to
207 all out. The main wicket-takers were Pakistan’s brilliant fast-bowling pair, Waqar
Younis and Wasim Akram, and in most cases the England batsmen were undone by
balls that swung very late. But – and this is what gave rise to suspicion in some quarters
– the damage was done not with the new ball but with a ball at least 50 overs old. The
subsequent libel case, brought against Lamb by the Pakistan management, ended
inconclusively, with both sides claiming a moral victory. But it is difficult to disagree
with Jack Bannister’s conclusion, in his excellent Wisden piece on the affair, that
‘Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis won the series for Pakistan on superior ability’
(Wisden 1993, p 18).
Ball-tampering was kept in the headlines in 1994 when Imran Khan revealed, in a much
publicised biography, that he had once used a metal bottle-cap to doctor the ball. When
interviewed, Imran expressed regret over this incident, but also claimed that less
‘advanced’ forms of ball-tampering were, and always had been, a widespread feature
of the first-class game. Later the same summer, the notorious ‘dirt-in-the-pocket’
incident at Lord’s (when England captain Michael Atherton appeared to transfer some
earth from his pocket and apply it to the ball) kept the issue on the boil. It simmered
away for the next decade, with several high-profile players being disciplined for
‘changing the condition of the ball’ in various ways. The ubiquitous presence of
cameras, especially at international fixtures, might have prompted the notion that
players would become increasingly wary of doing anything untoward. But ball-
tampering spectacularly hit the headlines once again in 2006, when the Fourth Test
between England and Pakistan was awarded to the home team following allegations
that Pakistan had tampered with the ball. The consensus among professionals
(especially bowlers) used to be that a moderate amount of ball-tampering – a little
scuffing of the ball or picking of the seam, for example – was an acceptable form of
gamesmanship. But the disputes of the late 1990s changed the culture somewhat. The
real problems arise with the use of artificial aids – such as Vaseline for making one side
of the ball heavier, or a bottle top for lifting the seam – and there will always be players
who bend the rules to gain an advantage. In the current (2000) Code of Laws, the
relevant section specifies in some detail what is and is not allowable, and requires that
‘The umpires shall make frequent and irregular inspections of the ball’ (Law 42 §3(c)).
Deliberately changing the condition of the ball is a ‘Level 2’ offence (see LEVEL 1
OFFENCE) in the ICC Code of Conduct.
See also REVERSE SWING
banana
banana n a ball that moves substantially in the air, describing a wide ‘banana-shaped’ arc
as it swings into or away from the batsman:
‘He [Dilley] played for England early last June in two one-day internationals against
India … and bowled medium-paced bananas, which brought him the axe’ (Scyld Berry,
Observer 22 May 1983).
13 bat
Despite the considerable lateral movement, the banana has a regular and predictable
trajectory, and so poses much less threat to the batsman than the ball that swings in or
away late.
See SWING
bang
bang vb (of a fast bowler) to pitch the ball rather short of a length, with a pronounced
follow-through, in order to extract the maximum possible bounce, especially if the
wicket is slow or lifeless:
‘The onslaught of Lindwall and Miller had been vehement but not always technically
exacting. Too much short stuff to the off was banged down’ (Cardus 1978, p 173).
‘Imran’s spell was fascinating because instead of banging the ball in on this lifeless
wicket, he swung the ball and moved it off the seam’ (Z. H. Syed, Cricketer March 1983).
barndoor
barndoor n 1. ‘a player that blocks every ball’ (OED) (obsolete)

2. —the barndoor game cautious, totally defensive batting; stonewalling (obsolete):
‘It was almost painful to watch a giant of six feet and a half playing the barndoor game
when we knew that if he chose … he could pulverize the bowling’ (G. Giffen, With Bat
and Ball 1898, p 64).
3. —the Barndoor Match the Gentlemen v Players fixture of 1837. In 1837 it was de-
cided that, since the Gentlemen had not won this fixture since 1822, their chances might
be improved if the Players had to defend outsize wickets:
‘The Gentlemen’s wickets were 27 in. by 8; the Players’ 36 in. by 12 in. This was called
the Barn-Door Match’ (Box 1868, p 91).
The name implies a target that is so large that it cannot possibly be missed. Despite these
precautions, the Gentlemen somehow contrived to lose by an innings. (obsolete)
barrack
barrack vb to shout sarcastic or abusive comments about the performance of a team of

player:
‘The disappointed spectators at Sydney “barracked” at the Australian cricketers for the
feeble stand they were making against MacLaren’s eleven’ (Daily News 18 December
1901).
Barracking was at one time an exclusively Australian phenomenon, described by
Harold Larwood in the thirties as ‘this growth on the body of Australian cricket’
(Larwood 1933, p 87). And although the word is now fully absorbed into general world
English, the practice is still associated with the denizens of ‘the Hill’ in Sydney and the
notorious ‘Bay 13’ at the MCG. But in Australia, the word can in fact have the more
positive connotation of shouting in support of one’s own team: ‘Australians do not
barrack against their opponent, generally they barrack for their team, providing a form
of participation in the game’ (John O’Hara, Oxford Companion to Australian Sport, p
51). The origins of the term are disputed. Connections have been made with the
Aboriginal pidgin expression ‘poke borak at’, meaning to ridicule or heap scorn on. A
more likely derivation is the use of ‘barrack’ in Northern Irish dialect, defined (in T.P.
Dolan’s Dictionary of Hiberno-English) as ‘to brag, to be boastful of one’s fighting
powers’.
bat
bat n 1. the implement with which the batsman strikes the ball and defends his wicket,
consisting of a hitting part (the ‘blade’) with a flat ‘face’ and a convex back, attached to
a long cylindrical handle. The blade of the bat is made of willow and ‘shall not exceed
4¼ inches/10.8cm. at the widest part’ (Law 6). The handle of the bat is designed to
deaden the shock waves transmitted from the blade by the impact of the ball. It consists
of pieces of cane with thin strips of rubber in between, held together by a binding of
twine and a rubber grip. The wedge-shaped bottom end of the handle (the ‘splice’) fits
into a corresponding mortise in the blade, and the total length of the bat must not exceed
38 inches/96.5 centimetres. As Henry, one of the protagonists in Tom Stoppard’s play
The Real Thing, observes, the bat ‘is actually several pieces of particular wood cunningly
put together in a certain way so that the whole thing is sprung, like a dance floor’. There
is no statutory limit to the weight of the bat, but the average weight of a full-size bat is
about 2 pounds 4 ounces, while big hitters will use bats weighing as much as 2 pounds
12 ounces and occasionally even more. Remarkably, the Laws had nothing to say about
bat 14
the composition of the bat until a clause stating that ‘the blade of the bat shall be made
of wood’ was introduced in the 1980 code, following Dennis Lillee’s experiments with
an aluminium bat in the 1979–80 Ashes series. This Law has been invoked more recently
to outlaw bats that have exploited new technology, such as Ricky Ponting’s ‘Kahuna’, a
bat reinforced by a strip of graphite running down its spine. For the purpose of
adjudicating catches, the word ‘bat’ encompasses the bat itself, the hand holding the bat,
and any part of the glove worn on the hand holding the bat (Law 6§3).
‘Bat’ is an Old English word meaning a stick or club, and the earliest types of cricket
bat were long, heavy clubs that curved outwards towards the bottom, somewhat like a
hockey stick. The shape was determined by the style of bowling then prevalent – fast
underarm ‘grubs’ rolled along the ground. As John Nyren remarks, ‘with such a bat,
the system must have been all for hitting: it would have been barely possible to block’
(Nyren 1833 in HM, p 85). But the development of more sophisticated bowling
techniques in the late 18th century (See BOWLING) ‘gave the bowler so great an
advantage in the game, it became absolutely necessary to change the form of the bat …
It was therefore made straight in the pod’ (Nyren ibid). The original (1744) code of
Laws had prescribed no limit to the size of the bat, and – as batsmen paid less attention
to slogging and more to defence – this loophole was soon exploited, when in 1771 a
certain Mr ‘Shock’ White went in to bat against Hambledon with a bat wider than the
wicket itself. Within two days the Hambledon committee had drafted an amendment to
the Laws in a minute worded as follows: ‘In view of the performance of one White of
Ryegate on September 23rd, that four and a quarter inches shall be the breadth
forthwith. This 25th day of September 1771’ (reproduced in R. S. Rait-Kerr, The Laws
of Cricket 1950, p 33). The amendment was incorporated in the next revision of the
code (1774) and the width of the bat has remained the same ever since; the limitation
on the length of the bat – a less crucial dimension – was introduced in May 1835. Down
to about the middle of the 19th century bats were made all in one piece: the introduction
then of the sprung cane handle marks another important stage in the evolution of the
bat. As in many other sports (such as tennis and golf), modern technology has led to a
significant increase in the power of the hitting implement:
‘England’s 276 runs in boundaries yesterday was a triumph not just for attacking
batting, but for the power of the unpressed modern bat, from which the ball rebounds
with a sweetness unknown even ten years ago’ (Haigh 2005, p 73).
2. a batsman:
‘By the time I left school at the age of eighteen I was a good defensive bat’ (James 1963,
p 43).
3. —off/from one’s own bat from one’s own scoring strokes:
‘Tom Walker got five runs from his own bat more than the whole XXXIII of Norfolk’ (Bat
1851, p 70).
Though no longer used in cricket contexts this phrase has – in its extended meaning –
passed into the general language.
4. —with the bat in one’s capacity as a batsman or batting side:
‘Miss Gregory, captain of the Siroccos, made several very smart catches in the field,
besides performing well with the bat’ (Town and Country Journal [Sydney] 13 March
1886).
‘Their recent improvement with the bat did not continue in Sydney and, without Imran,
their bowling was again shown to be much too weak’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer March
1984).
5. —behind the bat in the position of wicket-keeper (obsolete):
‘According to good judges of the game present, the English cricketers played remarkably
well, and Lockyer’s playing “behind the bat” could not have been surpassed’ (Lilly-
white 1860, p53).
쐽 vb 1. to play as a batsman, especially in the way described:
‘He [May] batted superbly throughout the tour, failing only in the last Test Match’
(Peebles 1959, p 203).
15 batsman
‘He batted defiantly and assertively along with Ganguly and tackled every bowler confi-
dently’ (Purandare 2005, p 285).
2. to play as a batsman at the specified position in the batting order:
‘In that match, the first time the Indians were playing at Lord’s, Limbdi had captained,
batting no. 8 and making 11’ (Bose 1990, p 71).
3. to have one’s innings, either as an individual or a team:
‘In blazing heat, and in front of a rapt crowd, India won the toss in the first game, batted,
and were bowled out for 197 on a sluggish pitch.’ (Jamie Alter, Cricinfo Magazine May
2006, p 79).
See also BAT OUT
bat-and-pad
bat-and-pad See BAT-PAD

bat gauge
bat gauge n a device used for checking the width of a player’s bat, apparently common
in the period following the introduction of a regulation width for the bat (See BAT). The
first bat gauge was ‘an iron frame, of the statute width … constructed for and kept by the
Hambledon Club; through which any bat of suspected dimensions was passed’ (Nyren
1833 in HM, p 87).
bat out
bat out vb to continue batting and remain undismissed for a specified length of time or
number of overs, especially in order to avoid defeat:
‘West Indies began the final day of an absorbing Test at 47 for two, requiring a further
399 to win but more realistically needing to bat out the day’s minimum of 90 overs’
(Mike Selvey, Guardian 14 April 1994).
bat-pad
bat-pad, bat-and-pad adj, n (relating to) a close fielding position in front of the wicket,
especially on the leg-side, where a fielder is stationed in order to snap up catches from
balls coming off the edge of the striker’s bat and deflected by his pads:
‘At “bat-pad” Mike Gatting dived far away to his right and could not cling on to it’
(Berry 1982, p 131).
‘Despite this he spun one out of the rough from around the wicket well enough for his
bat/pad man to snap up Wessels’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
‘Silly points are also looking for little bat-pad catches as the batsman pushes forward
(usually to spinners)’ (Simon Hughes, Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket
2002, p 123).
With the advent of the helmet (even for fielders) the bat-pad fieldsman is an
increasingly common sight, and the noun is now routinely used as a synonym for the
more traditional forward short leg or silly point.
쐽 adv as a result of a bat-pad catch:
‘Downton reached a heroic half-century in the 60th over and eventually fell bat-pad off
Harper’ (David Frith, WCM August 1984).
쐽 vb to dismiss a batsman by means of a bat-pad catch:
‘After … Mudassar had been bat-padded by Cook’s arm ball, Saleem and Zaheer paid
due care and attention and the innings settled down’ (John Thicknesse, Cricketer May
1984).
bat’s end
bat’s end n = POINT, so called because the fielder stood a few yards from the striker in the
direction of the end of his bat (obsolete):
‘Col. Lennox … took the post of difficulty and danger, off at the bat’s end, where he also
acquitted himself with singular activity and address’ (Kentish Gazette 1791).
batsman
batsman n 1. (also formerly batt man) either of the two players currently at the wicket;
the striker or non-striker:
‘14th: The Batt Men for every One they count are to touch the Umpires Stick’ (Articles
of Agreement for a match between the Duke of Richmond and Mr Brodrick, 11 July
1727).
‘The dresses of the “batsmen” appeared to be less “in the way” of the ball than might
be supposed; and the gentlemen who acted as umpires were never once placed in the
delicate position of having to give an lbw decision’ (account of a ‘Ladies’ Match’ in
Town and Country Journal [Sydney] 13 March 1886).
batswoman 16
When necessary, the Laws make a distinction between ‘the batsmen’ on the one hand
and the striker or non-striker on the other, as shown for example in the law on
Obstructing the Field: ‘The striker is out should wilful obstruction or distraction by
either batsman prevent a catch being made’ (Law 37 §3).
2. a player who specialises in batting:
‘Merchant had arrived on the tour bearing the badge “the soundest batsman in India”,
pinned on him at the end of the 1933–34 tour by Douglas Jardine’ (Bose 1990, p 111).
‘Once more the frailty of the West Indian lower order was exposed…. Chief selector
David Holford admitted it was “a bit of a worry” and advised all bowlers aspiring to
West Indian selection to also regard themselves as batsmen’ (Tony Cozier, Caribbean
Cricket Quarterly Jan/March 1994).
batswoman
batswoman n a female batsman (old):

‘At practice Miss Trott, the roundarm trundler, bowled well. But when at play the ball
sometimes pitched half-way up to the wicket, and rolled to the batswoman, at times only
dropped a few feet away from the bowler’ (The Australasian, 23 March 1895).
See also BATTER
batter
batter n a batsman:
‘Upon coming to the old batters of our club, the name of JOHN SMALL, the elder, shines
among them’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 46).
‘An orthodox batter, she [Lyn Fullston] performed well in this tournament’ (Cashman &
Weaver 1991, p 154).
Batter was formerly the more common term, but by the mid-19th century it had been
largely superseded by ‘batsman’. (In baseball, the opposite is true: the earlier term
‘batsman’ was replaced by ‘batter’ in the late 19th century.) Batter is still used
occasionally in reference to male cricketers and quite frequently in reference to women
players, who prefer this term (as well as the equally gender-neutral ‘bat’) to either
batsman or the rather awkward ‘batswoman’.
batting
batting n the performance or ability of an individual batsman or of the batsmen in a team

considered collectively:
‘The Australian batting looked the more extensive on paper, with two batsmen of the
calibre of Benaud and Davidson as low as seven and eight’ (Peebles 1959, p 68).
‘I suppose the difference between my batting in 1989 and 1993 was that I converted 50s
and 60s into hundreds in ’93’ (David Boon, Wisden 1994, p 18).
‘Patient batting helped the pair of Tendulkar and Vengsarkar put up a fifth-wicket part-
nership of 118’ (Purandare 2005, p 71).
batting average
batting average See AVERAGE

batting crease
batting crease = POPPING CREASE

batting order
batting order See ORDER

batting points
batting points See BONUS POINTS

BCB
BCB abbr Bangladesh Cricket Board: the governing body for cricket in Bangladesh, a Full
Member of the ICC (qv) since 2000
BCCI
BCCI abbr Board of Control for Cricket in India: the governing body for cricket in India,
a Full Member of the ICC (qv) since 1926
BCCP
BCCP abbr Board of Control for Cricket in Pakistan, the former name of the PCB
BCCSL
BCCSL abbr Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka, the former name of the ruling
body for cricket in Sri Lanka. It is now known as ‘Sri Lanka Cricket’, and has been a Full
Member of the ICC (qv) since 1981.
beamer
beamer n a fast, high full toss aimed at the batsman’s head:

‘The beamer has been universally condemned by cricketers as an unfair delivery since
the best batsmen have been unable to pick it up even in bright sunshine when well set’
(Brearley 1982, p 73).
Bowling ‘fast high full pitches’ (now defined, following a change to the Laws in 1993,
as ‘a ball that passes, or would have passed, on the full above waist height of a batsman
17 bite
standing upright’) constitutes ‘unfair play’ under Law 42, and the bowler is liable to
the same disciplinary procedures as those governing fast short-pitched balls.
See BOUNCER. See diagram at LENGTH
bean ball
bean ball n a ball aimed at the batsman’s head (or ‘bean’); a BEAMER (slang)
beat
beat vb 1. to break through a batsman’s defence, though without necessarily dismissing

him:
‘Charlie Griffith did not take a wicket, but … he beat the bat repeatedly and at times
looked the most dangerous of them all’ (Manley 1988, p 165).
‘Then Madan Lal dismissed both within three balls, Heron touching a simple catch to
Kirmani and Paterson beaten by one which kept low’ (Tony Pawson, Observer 12 June
1983).
2. —beat for pace to beat the batsman, often dismissing him, with a fast ball that allows
him no time to organise his defence:
‘When the second Indian innings began and Holding beat Gavaskar for sheer pace … it
was for all practical purposes 2 runs for 4 wickets’ (Manley 1988, p240).
bend
bend vb to change direction after pitching; break (old):

‘I had just made 14 off four balls from Lee, who was bowling off-turners that did not
always bend much’ (Larwood 1933, p 156).
beneficiary
beneficiary n a player who has been awarded a benefit by his county:

‘The size of a benefit depended far more upon the county than the beneficiary’s value in
terms of cricket to both his club and his country’ (Trevor Bailey, Cricketer March 1984).
benefit
benefit n a system, used in the UK, of providing a one-off lump sum of money to a
professional cricketer in recognition of long service. Benefits were formerly awarded to
players who were on the verge of retirement after a long career with their county, and the
bulk of the money they received came from the proceeds of a single home county match
of their own choosing (the benefit match). Since World War Two, however, it has
become common practice for players to be given a benefit ten years after being capped
by their counties, and in rare cases a player may have two benefits in the course of a
career. The significance of the benefit match itself as a source of income has steadily
declined as county gates have fallen, and the emphasis has switched to modern,
professional fund-raising methods spread over the whole of a player’s benefit season,
such as raffles, special games against local clubs, social events, merchandising, and even
celebrity golf matches.
Following an historic ruling by the House of Lords in 1927, the proceeds of a benefit
are not subject to tax, but in order to maintain this advantage benefits cannot be
explicitly guaranteed in players’ contracts: they are simply understood to be part of the
conditions of service.
bias
bias (obsolete) n the ‘break’ put on the ball by a spin bowler:

‘It is almost impossible for the umpire, standing where he does, to say that a ball wide-
pitched will have the right bias to hit the wicket’ (Box 1868, pp 135–6).
쐽 adv with break on the ball:
‘It mattered not to him [Beldham] who bowled, or how he bowled, fast or slow, high or
low, straight or bias’ (Mitford 1833 in HM, p 125).
biomechanics
biomechanics n the mechanics of living organisms; especially (in a cricketing context),

the application of the laws of mechanics to coaching bowlers and correcting suspect
bowling actions:
‘His [Troy Cooley’s] strengths are his knowledge of biomechanics and an ability to
communicate complex ideas to players who are often among the least cerebral members
of the team.’ (John Stern, Cricinfo, 14 December 2005).
See also THROW
bite
bite vb (of the ball) to make firm contact with the ground on pitching, typically on a damp
or ‘green’ wicket, enabling the bowler to produce substantial turn or movement off the
pitch:
bits-and-pieces player 18
‘The amount of break that can be effected depends much upon how far the ground is in
a state receptive of the spin — how much, that is, it allows the ball to “bite”’
‘De Silva … got his leg-breaks to bite enough to dismiss Edgar and Coney to diving
short-leg catches’ (Christopher Wordsworth, Observer 19 June 1983).
bits-and-pieces player
bits-and-pieces player n a player who is neither a specialist batsman nor a specialist

bowler, and whose ability in each of these departments does not entitle him to be
considered a true all-rounder:
‘The one-day game encourages the all-round bits-and-pieces players – and thus gives
the unsung county regulars a rare chance to shine in the public eye’ (Marqusee 1994, p
130).
‘The key to this … is that these players must be able to hold their own with one discipline,
and then contribute in another. Bits and pieces cricketers don’t do the job for you’
(Rahul Dravid, interviewed in Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 43).
A typical bits-and-pieces player will bowl medium-paced seamers or defensive
‘pushed-through’ spinners, and bat ‘usefully’ in the late middle order.
Compare ALL-ROUNDER
blade
blade n 1. the solid part of the bat, as distinguished from the handle, with which the ball
is struck.
See BAT
2. the bat itself:
‘St. Hill did not hook by preference to long-leg … He seemed merely to step inwards and
swish the blade across the flight so that when it hit the ball it was pointing at the bowler’
(James 1963, p 90).
blind
blind adv —bat blind to be the side that bats first in a one-day game, and therefore have
no target to aim at
blind spot
blind spot n a point on the wicket – usually at a good length (See LENGTH) and roughly
in a line with leg stump – where the ball, when pitching, causes the maximum difficulty
for the batsman, either because he is momentarily unable to see the ball or because he is
uncertain whether to play forward or back:
‘A good-length ball pitching on or just outside the leg-stump is the most likely of all to
light upon the “blind spot”’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 80).
‘It is worth suggesting that what is known as the blind spot is a spot created by the
batsman himself when his head is in such a position with regard to the ball that his eyes
have no chance’ (C.B. Fry, Cricket: Batsmanship 1912, p 74).
blob
blob n a batsman’s score of nought; a duck (old):

‘Mr Jardine encouraged me by at once snapping up the adventurous Vic Richardson for
a blob’ (Larwood 1933, p 104).
block
block n —take block (of a batsman) to fix one’s position in relation to the wickets at the
start of an innings, so as to be able to assess the ball’s line of flight; take guard (See
GUARD):
‘Alan [Kippax], after he took block, shuffled forward in front of the wicket a fraction of
an inch at a time till the ball was delivered’ (A. B. R. Roche, WCM January 1984).
쐽 Australia the area in the middle of a cricket ground where several pitches are laid out;
the SQUARE
쐽 vb to stop the ball defensively with the bat:
‘He blocked the doubtful balls, missed the bad ones, took the good ones and sent them
flying to all parts of the field’ (Dickens, Pickwick Papers 1837, ch 7).
blockhole
blockhole n the mark or indentation in the pitch made by a batsman when ‘taking block’
and serving to fix his position in relation to the wickets and to guide him in assessing the
ball’s line of flight:
‘After he [Sutcliffe] had taken guard and marked his block hole mathematically, he
would pat the crease decisively 3 or 4 times’ (Cardus 1978, p 92).
blonger
blonger n a batsman’s score of nought; a duck (slang):

19 booth ball
‘“So”, said the gang from the White Hart, sitting on the grass terraces at Campbell Park
on Sunday, eating game pie and watching Shane Warne get a first-ball blonger against
the Steelbacks, “what about the Aussies? Bring ’em on or what?”’ (Mike Selvey,
board
board n the scoreboard:

‘Essex had made the poorest of starts to the day, Gooch and Gladwin both gone with only
one on the board’ (Norman Harris, Sunday Times 3 June 1984).
body-break
body-break n = ACTION-BREAK (old):

‘There has been a tendency in late years to rely on the medium-paced swerver rather
than the man who relies on his pace combined with body break’ (‘Second Slip’, Crick-
eter Spring Annual 1933).
bodyline
bodyline n, adj fast leg-theory bowling, especially as used by the England fast bowlers
during the 1932–3 Test series in Australia:
‘Body-line bowling has assumed such proportions as to menace the best interests of the
game, making protection of the body by the batsmen the main consideration’ (telegram
sent to MCC by the Australian Board of Control, 18 January 1933, the fifth day of the
Third Test match at Adelaide).
The term carries the clear implication of deliberate intimidation and for this reason
Harold Larwood, the spearhead of England’s attack in the Bodyline series, always
objected to it: ‘It was maliciously coined by a cute Australian journalist for the express
purpose of misleading … The mere use of the term “Body” was meant to damn me and
damn me it did’ (Larwood 1933, p 18). Exactly which ‘cute Australian journalist’
coined the term has been a matter for some dispute. England’s leg-theory tactics –
developed primarily as a response to Donald Bradman’s phenomenal run-scoring in the
1930 Australian tour of England – were already attracting comment before the first
match of the Test series. In late November 1932 the Australasian (a Melbourne
weekly) carried an article by Jack Worrall on the game between MCC and An
Australian XI, which had been played at Melbourne from the 18th to the 22nd of
November. Worrall’s comments included the following:
‘Voce’s half-pitched slingers on the body line provided about the poorest attempt at what
should be Test bowling it is possible to conceive’’.
The controversy was already in full swing by the time Australia went in to bat at Sydney
on the first day of the First Test (2 December 1932). Later that day, the Melbourne Her-
ald (Australia’s leading evening paper) carried a piece on the game that had been tele-
graphed from Sydney at lunchtime by its reporter Hugh Buggy. Echoing the phrase used
earlier by Worrall, Buggy’s article included the expression ‘bodyline bowling’ and this
seems to have been the first use of the term. It is unlikely that Buggy’s intentions were
malicious – he was probably just using telegraphic shorthand for ‘bowling on the line of
the body’ – but his sub-editor Ray Robinson kept the phrase intact. At any rate it was
quickly taken up by the rest of the press, and it probably helped to raise the temperature
of the debate.
See LEG-THEORY
bombada
bombada Corfu lit a ‘bomb’: a full toss

bonus points
bonus points n in various league competitions, points awarded to a team on the basis of
its batting and bowling performances. In the English County Championship, a maximum
of eight bonus points (on top of the 14 points awarded to the winning side) may be earned
by either team for reaching specified targets within (currently) the first 130 overs of each
side’s first innings: five batting points, one for each 50 runs scored over 150 (maximum
points being reached when 400 runs have been scored); and three bowling points, one
point being awarded for the third wicket taken, a second for the sixth wicket, and a third
for the ninth. These points are retained regardless of the result of the match.
booth ball
booth ball, boother n an early form of boundary hit, in which the ball, on reaching the
tents or booths dotted around the edge of the ground, was declared dead and a stipulated
number of runs was credited to the batsman. Before the second half of the 19th century
there were no boundaries as such, and runs were usually ‘run out’ in full: the booth ball
boot hill 20
was an exception to this rule, presumably on the grounds that the ball would have been
expected to travel further but for the ‘intervention’ of the booth.
See also BOUNDARY
boot hill
boot hill n a very close fielding position in front of the wicket, especially forward short
leg. With its evocation of the Wild West (where the dead were buried on ‘Boot Hill’), the
term alludes to the extreme hazards of fielding in this position. (slang):
‘The shin pads worn by fielders at “Boot Hill” … are custom-built, starting below the
ankle-bone, encasing the lower leg and with a cup which protects the knee’ (Oslear &
Mosey 1993, p 200).
bosie
bosie, bosey n especially in Australia a googly, so called after its ‘inventor’ B. J. T.

Bosanquet, who used this ball with considerable effect when bowling for MCC on the
1903–4 tour of Australia. (now rare):
‘He [Benaud] varied his attack with a leg-break … a well-disguised bosie, and an excel-
lent flipper’ (Jack Fingleton, Four Chukkas to Australia 1959, p 36).
bottom edge
bottom edge n the edge of the bat closer to the ground, either at the bottom of the blade
or on the lower side of a bat held horizontally; for the batsman, the danger of a ball that
comes off the bottom edge is not that he will be caught, but that the ball will be played
on to his stumps:
‘As he hooked at Cowans … the ball crashed into the base of his stumps off the bottom
edge’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 31 July 1983).
bottom hand
bottom hand n the lower of the two hands holding the bat (the right hand in the case of
a right-handed batsman). The bottom hand gives firmness and solidity to a stroke, and a
player is sometimes said to ‘give it plenty of bottom hand’:
‘Such is the power and dominance of his [Pietersen’s] bottom hand his strokes frequently
resemble a hockey player sending a long pass downfield.’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 10
March 2006).
bounce
bounce n 1. the quality in the wicket that determines the extent to which a bowled ball
will rise after pitching. A ‘plumb’ wicket is characterised by its even and predictable
bounce, but on wickets less favourable to batting the ball may rise more steeply than
usual or (worst of all from the batsman’s point of view) it may behave inconsistently
from one delivery to the next, exhibiting ‘variable bounce’:
‘If the wicket is wet then only a light roller is used as a heavy one will draw up moisture
and affect the bounce’ (Harry Brind, WCM December 1983).
‘What all players crave is a bit of pace in a pitch and consistent bounce’ (Simon Hughes,
Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket 2002, p 13).
2. the extent to which a bowler is able to make the ball rise from the wicket after pitching:
‘Fowler was quickly undone by Garner’s steep bounce’ (Michael Carey, Daily Tele-
graph 1 June 1984).
쐽 vb to bowl a bouncer at a batsman:
‘I could see nothing wrong in bouncing Whitney, who is one of those irritating tail-
enders who stop the straight balls and miss the wide ones’ (Brearley 1982, p 140).
‘Amarnath … found it easy to hook over the boundary and it was apparent that the West
Indies bowlers were soon wary of bouncing him’ (Rajan Bala, Cricinfo Magazine May
2006, p 46).
bouncer
bouncer n a fast short-pitched ball that rises after pitching so as to reach or pass the striker
above shoulder height; a bumper:
‘First Willis bowled a perfect bouncer at Chappell, not too short and dead straight.
Chappell, protecting his face, could only lob the ball up for Taylor’ (Brearley 1982, p
77).
‘What’s the point of bowling a bouncer over someone’s shoulder? Up by his chest or by
his neck, that’s when a batsman sometimes has to play’ (Michael Holding, interviewed
in Cricinfo Magazine April 2006, p 63).
‘Bouncer’ is a relatively modern term which has gradually superseded ‘bumper’ in the
last forty years or so. Any short-pitched ball is technically a bouncer, but the term is
generally reserved for the ball that comes close enough to the striker to compel him
21 bouncer
either to hit it – often lobbing up a catch – or to take evasive action in order to avoid
being hit himself. The bouncer is accepted as a legitimate weapon in the fast bowler’s
armoury, provided it is used ‘tactically’ (to surprise and unsettle the batsman) rather
than ‘persistently’ (to terrify him into submission).
The first legislative attempts to control the use of bouncers came in the aftermath of the
Bodyline series. An MCC directive of November 1934 instructed umpires to treat
‘direct attack bowling’ as unfair, and defined it as follows: ‘Direct attack … consists in
persistent and systematic bowling of fast, short-pitched balls at the batsman standing
clear of his wicket’. The wording of the original ruling (which was incorporated into
the Laws in 1939) reflects the contemporary preoccupation with fast leg-theory
bowling. The modern ruling, however, provides a broader definition of ‘dangerous and
unfair bowling’, as follows: ‘The bowling of fast short pitched balls is dangerous and
unfair if the umpire at the bowler’s end considers that by their repetition and taking into
account their length, height and direction they are likely to inflict physical injury on the
striker’ (Law 42 § 6). The situation is further complicated by a clause in the law to the
effect that ‘the relative skill of the striker shall also be taken into consideration’, so that
the umpire has also to decide whether a player is to be regarded as a ‘recognised’
batsman for the purposes of the Law. The arrival of the helmet has not made the
umpire’s task any easier, and may have had the paradoxical effect of turning tail-end
batsmen (formerly a protected species) into legitimate targets for the bouncer.
Once the umpire is satisfied that a bowler’s use of bouncers is ‘unfair’ he should invoke
the following procedure: (1) signal ‘no-ball’ when a bouncer is bowled and caution the
bowler; (2) repeat the process if the bowler again delivers a bouncer, and indicate that
the warning is a final one; and (3) in the event of a further infringement, direct the
captain to take the offending bowler off (even in the middle of an over), keep the
bowler off for the rest of the innings, and report the bowler to the appropriate governing
body. (It should be noted that the same procedure is to be used in the case of ‘fast high
full pitches’, or ‘beamers’).
Inevitably, regulations of this kind are open to differing interpretations, and in recent
years attempts have been made to tighten up the rules. Current ICC Test Match
boundary 22
regulations add a rider to Law 42 § 6, stipulating that ‘A bowler shall be limited to two
fast short-pitched deliveries per over’, adding that a ball which passes above the
batsman’s head and cannot be hit by ‘a normal cricket stroke’ will count as a wide. The
definition of ‘bouncer’ has also been clarified in recent years: it is described as a ball
that ‘passes, or would have passed, over head height of the striker standing upright at
the crease’. This seems to have taken a lot of the heat out of the issue (for the time
being, at least), and placated those who favoured drawing a line across the pitch at the
halfway point as a way of precisely defining the bouncer – an idea scornfully rejected
by Larwood when it was first floated after the Bodyline tour.
See also SHORT-PITCHED
boundary
boundary n 1. the limits of the playing area, marked by a line, fence, or rope, or in some
other way; reference can be made to particular sections of the boundary in terms of the
nearest fielding position (thus, the third man boundary, the mid-wicket boundary, and
so on)
2. a shot by the batsman that sends the ball across the boundary:
‘He is batting with concentration, too, and rips a beautiful boundary straight past the
bowler’ (Moorhouse 1979, p 20).
‘Sobers, now 57, was at the ground to see his record broken, and strode immediately to
the crease to congratulate Lara when the batsman pulled Chris Lewis for the boundary
which pushed his name to the top of Wisden’s most famous list’ (Michael Henderson,
Times 19 April 1994).
3. the distance from the wicket to a particular point on the boundary:
‘Wasim’s driving to the long, straight boundary of the Adelaide Oval was as powerful as
anything ever seen on the ground’ (Derek Hodgson, Wisden 1993, p 41).
As a general rule, a ball reaching the boundary scores four runs and one that crosses it
without bouncing scores six. These ‘allowances’ are, however, customary rather than
statutory, and the Laws make provision for the possibility of local variation (see Law
19 §4). It may, for example, be necessary to take account of a permanent obstacle
within the field of play, such as the ancient (and recently replaced) lime tree at
Canterbury (a ball hitting this tree – at whatever height – counted as a four).
Boundaries did not feature in cricket until the 1860s and before their introduction all
hits had to be ‘run out’ in full (but cf BOOTH BALL). W. G. Grace says that there were no
boundaries at Lord’s when he first played there in 1864, but they were used in the Eton
v Harrow match two years later, and first appear in the Laws in the revised edition of
1884. They seem to have been introduced mainly for the safety of the spectators, who
might otherwise be trampled underfoot by overzealous fielders chasing the ball into the
crowd. The allowance of six runs for a hit clearing the boundary line did not become
general until 1910 – prior to that, the ball had to be struck right out of the ground to
score six. A variation of the rules applying in Australia at the turn of the 20th century
(until 1906) allowed five runs for a ball that cleared the boundary without bouncing. In
recent years, concern has been expressed about the practice of shortening boundaries
and its effects on the game. As Gideon Haigh has commented, ‘it is not simply that
short boundaries advantage batsmen … short boundaries advantage a particular kind of
mediocre slogger, introducing greater uniformity into the game’ (Cricinfo Blog, 28
March 2006).
See also SIX
bounds
bounds n in the single-wicket version of the game, a line marked on the pitch square with
the wicket and to a length of 22 yards on either side of it. When the game is being played
between sides of fewer than five players the ball must be hit into the area in front of the
bounds before any runs can be scored.
bowl
bowl vb 1. to propel the ball in the direction of the striker’s wicket by any fair and legal
method of delivery (See BOWLING):
‘When he has bowl’d one Ball, or more, he shall bowl to the number of Four before he
changes Wickets’ (Laws 1744).
23 bowler’s back drive

‘Warne might turn thirty-six next month and have bowled 45,533 deliveries in interna-
tional cricket, but his thirst for the game seems unquenchable’ (Haigh 2005, p 99).
2. to complete an over by bowling the requisite number of balls:
‘The game then changed dramatically in the 12th over, bowled by Cowans, who worked
up a good pace’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
3. to dismiss a batsman by hitting his wicket with the ball so that one or both of the bails
is dislodged:
‘The only partnership of any substance came from Daryll Cullinan and Hansie Cronje,
who added 71 for the fifth wicket before they were bowled by DeFreitas and Lewis for
45 and 36 respectively’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 26 August 1994).
‘At this stage, England’s misses mattered little when their biggest threat, Harmison,
returned to bowl Warne and blow away the last four in 14 balls’ (David Frith, Wisden
2006, p 96).
4. to bowl a ball or balls of a particular kind:
‘Pat Pocock … won his first England cap at 21, and bowled crisp off-breaks with a confi-
dence that sometimes troubled his captains’ (Frith 1984, p 166).
‘He now bowls very close to the stumps and aims to pitch the ball on leg stump so that
the batsmen have to play’ (Vic Marks on Ashley Giles, Wisden 2005, p 59).
‘Hoggard’s greatest success of the year came early, when he bowled England to a glori-
ously improbable victory at Johannesburg by taking the first six wickets’ (David Hopps,
Wisden 2006, p 64).
5. (of a captain) to put a particular player on to bowl:
‘I had at times bowled Botham for extremely long spells, as I did in this match’ (Brearley
1982, p 67).
‘Such was the lack of thrust in the West Indian attack that Stollmeyer, now promoted to
the captaincy … found it necessary to bowl himself through 71 overs’ (Manley 1988, p
100).
6. (of a team) to field:
‘It seemed a strange decision when England, with two off-spinners in the side, were
ideally suited to bowling last’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
‘Ponting had decided to bowl first, did not change his strategy when he received word
about McGrath, and walked into his own tornado’ (Haigh 2005, p 67).
See also BOWL OUT
쐽 n 1. an opportunity to bowl or a spell of bowling:
‘It was Phil Tufnell who took the opportunity to press his claim to a Test place at Sabina
with another long and steady bowl’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Daily Telegraph 14
February 1994).
2. a single delivery of the ball (obsolete):
‘Miss Dean, for example, showed really superior cricket. In batting she exhibited a good
defence against the dangerous bowls, and opened her shoulders at and hit freely and
cleanly the loose ones’ (Town and Country Journal [Sydney] 13 March 1886).
bowled
bowled adv a mode of dismissal in which a batsman is given out if his wicket is put down
by a ball delivered by the bowler, ‘even if it first touches his bat or person’ (Law 30 § 1).
The dismissal is credited solely to the bowler and entered in the scorebook as ‘b bowler’.
bowler
bowler n 1. the player who bowls the ball at the striker’s wicket:
‘The Bowler must deliver the Ball, with one foot behind the Crease, even with the Wicket’
(Laws 1744).
2. a player who specialises in bowling:
‘To understand Sobers’ greatness properly, however, one has to look at the fact that
Bradman, Harvey, Hutton and all the others with whom one could make a comparison,
save Hammond, were not bowlers’ (Manley 1988, p 213).
3. (in combination) a player who bowls balls of a particular type or who has a particular
function in the bowling attack (as in ‘spin-bowler’, ‘change-bowler’, etc.)
bowler’s back drive
bowler’s back drive n India a form of drive by which the ball is hit back down the pitch
and past the bowler; a STRAIGHT DRIVE
bowling 24
bowling
bowling n 1. the act, manner, or skill of delivering the ball to the batsman
2. the performance or ability of an individual bowler or of the bowlers in a team
‘The Indian hero was Mohinder Amarnath who defied the bowling for three and a half
hours for his first innings top score of 58’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer May 1983).
‘His bowling had gone from useful-third-seamer to firecracker strike bowler’ (Simon
Barnes, Wisden 2006, p 171).
It is arguable that the evolution of cricket has to a very large extent been determined by
developments in bowling, rather than by developments in batting. In the earliest days
of the game the ball was literally ‘bowled’ along the ground with an underhand delivery
and by the mid-18th century the bowler’s repertoire consisted of a mixture of daisy-
cutters and lobs. But in the last quarter of the 18th century, improvements in bowling
technique revolutionised the game. The so-called ‘length-ball’ – a well pitched-up ball
that bounced only once before reaching the striker – was perfected during this period,
and its supreme exponent was the Hambledon player David Harris (b 1754). Harris’s
consistently penetrative bowling demanded fundamental changes in batting
techniques, and this led to ‘a revolution in the game, changing cricket from a backward
and slashing to a forward and defensive game’ (Pycroft 1854 in HM, pp 153–4).
The next major development was the evolution of ‘roundarm’ or ‘straight-arm’
bowling, in which the ball is delivered with the arm extended more or less horizontally.
As early as the 1780s Hambledon’s Tom Walker had briefly experimented with
something along these lines, but the real pioneer of the new style was John Willes of
Kent, who bowled roundarm from about 1803 onwards. It caught on very quickly, and
the often-quoted report of a Kent v All England game played in July 1807 seems to
imply that not only Willes but most (if not all) of the bowlers in this match employed
the new technique:
‘The straight-arm bowling, introduced by John Willes, Esq., was generally practised in
this game, and fully proved an obstacle against getting runs in comparison to what might
have been got by the straight-forward bowling’ (Sporting Magazine quoted in Box 1868,
p 73).
A rearguard action was mounted, but to little avail. Nyren (1833 in HM, p 41) warned
that roundarm bowling would reduce ‘the elegant and scientific game of Cricket’ to ‘a
mere exhibition of rough, coarse horseplay’, but neither the protestations of ex-players
nor the attempts at preventive legislation (first in 1816, again in 1828) could halt its ad-
vance. The authorities finally capitulated in 1835, with a law that allowed the bowler’s
hand to be raised as high as the shoulder.
In fact, however, this could only be a temporary solution. It was already clear to many
that the effectiveness of the straight-arm delivery was greatly enhanced if the arm was
raised above the level of the shoulder, so that, once roundarm bowling had been legal-
ised, the transition to a modern-style overarm delivery was only a matter of time. Al-
though the stipulations of the 1835 law were twice reinforced (in 1845 and 1858)
overarm bowling became widespread, and umpires generally connived. In the notorious
incident of 1862, when the England player Edgar Willsher was repeatedly no-balled for
bowling overarm in an England v Surrey match, Willsher was simply bowling in his usu-
al fashion. The point about the incident was that the umpire wanted to force a ‘constitu-
tional crisis’ so that the issue could be resolved once and for all. Two years later the
relevant section of the Laws was drastically pruned back, to read simply: ‘The ball must
be bowled’ – thus legalising overarm bowling and bringing to an end a controversy that
had raged for over 60 years. As one contemporary philosophically commented: ‘The par-
tial enforcement of the law as it stood, and the disagreements which were continually re-
sulting therefrom, rendered almost any change an advantage’ (Box 1868, p 119).
Although underarm and roundarm bowling remained legal until fairly recently, both
styles had become virtually obsolete within a generation of the recognition of the over-
arm style.
See OVERARM, ROUNDARM, UNDERARM
bowling average
bowling average See AVERAGE

25 brace
bowling crease
bowling crease n a line marked on the ground at each end of the pitch, from which the
bowler delivers the ball. The bowling crease is in line with the stumps and extends on
either side of them to reach a total length of 8 feet 8 inches/2.64 metres (Law 9 § 2). The
original (1744) code of Laws stipulated that the bowler’s back foot (the right foot in the
case of a right-handed bowler) should remain behind the bowling crease at the moment
of delivery: ‘If he delivers the Ball, with his hinder Foot over the Bowling-Crease, the
Umpire shall call no Ball’.
The introduction of the RETURN CREASE (qv) later in the 18th century led to a
redefinition of the no-ball rule, which no longer specifically mentions the bowling
crease, though the coaching books still recommend that the back foot should land ‘just
behind and parallel to the bowling crease’ (MCC 1952, p 30). The length of the bowling
crease was fixed in 1774 at three feet on either side of the wicket, and it reached its
present length in 1902.
bowling machine
bowling machine n any of various mechanical devices designed to propel the ball
towards the wicket in order to provide batting practice. Early examples of the species are
the CATAPULTA and the BALISTA (qv), which were invented in the mid-19th century. But
these Heath-Robinson contraptions were probably in their day a less cost-effective
expedient than simply hiring the services of a professional bowler. Their modern
descendants, however, make much better economic sense. One of the best-known
contemporary bowling machines is MERLYN (qv), now established as an indispensable
member of many national sides.
bowling points
bowling points See BONUS POINTS

bowl out
bowl out vb 1. = BOWL vb 3

2. to dismiss the batting side, but not necessarily by ‘bowling’ them:
‘The trouble with putting the other side in in a Test match is that so much is staked on
bowling them out on the first day’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer October
1983).
‘Forty-six? Forty-six! England, having been reduced to 40 for eight on the fourth
evening of the third Test in Port of Spain were bowled out six runs and 14 minutes into
the fifth day’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 31 March 1994).
3. to use up the over allowance of a bowler in a limited-over match:
‘He [Malcolm Marshall] took three for four in six balls to rip apart the middle of the Kent
batting. But once Marshall was bowled out, Dilley and Ellison … hit out’ (Ian Ridley,
Guardian 2 June 1983).
bowl-out
bowl-out n a method of settling the result of a match in a knock-out competition, used

either because both sides have reached an identical total and lost the same number of
wickets, or because the game has been abandoned:
‘After further rain, that match was declared void, and with the captains unable to agree
whether to start a 20-over or ten-over match … the umpires resorted to a bowl-out’
(Wisden 1994, p 680).
Like its equivalent in soccer – the dreaded penalty shoot-out – the bowl-out is the
cruellest way for a team to exit from a knockout competition. The method currently
used in England is that five players from each side bowl two balls each at an unguarded
wicket, and the side with the greatest number of hits goes through.
box
box n 1. a genital protector, usually in the form of a triangular shield made of a strong light
material, worn inside the trousers by batsmen, and sometimes by wicket-keepers and
close fielders
2. a fielding position between point and slip; gully or backward point (old):
‘Hobbs was caught in that nondescript position which is variously known as “the box”
and “the gully”’ (Daily Mail 29 June 1926).
‘Box’ was used interchangeably with gully in the earlier part of the 20th century, before
gully became established as the ‘standard’ term.
brace
brace n —bag a brace to score nought in each innings of a match:

‘Trumble had followed Arnold’s example and had “bagged a brace”, having failed to
score in each innings’ (Melbourne Argus 4 March 1904).
Bradmanesque 26
‘Brace’ is of course a contraction of ‘brace of ducks’ and thus – in the great tradition
of English euphemism – a resounding failure is made to sound like a highly creditable
achievement.
See also DUCK, PAIR
Bradmanesque
Bradmanesque adj denotes a style of batting, or a player’s batting record, characterised

by the rapid accumulation of very high scores:
‘Sobers’s … display was simply incredible: 722 runs, 3 hundreds, all over 150, and at
an average of 103.14 – Bradmanesque’ (Manley 1988, p 176).
‘Bradmanesque is the term to describe Amre’s average in first-class cricket. At the time
of writing he has an enviable average of almost 88’ (Haresh Pandya, WCM January
1993).
The reference is of course to Sir Donald Bradman, whose voracious appetite for runs
is reflected in a career Test average (99.94) that is almost 65% higher than that of his
closest rival. Bradman’s extraordinary feats on the Australians’ tour of England in
1930 (which included a score of 309 not out made in a single day at the Leeds Test) led
to the development of BODYLINE tactics (qv) on England’s subsequent tour of Australia.
brain bucket
brain bucket n especially in South Africa a protective helmet (slang)

break
break n 1. spin imparted to the ball by the bowler, or the resulting deviation of the ball
after pitching (See SPIN):
‘He [W. G. Grace] would give, apparently, the most tremendous twist to his fingers,
making a grunt as though the act of putting on so much break were hurting him’ (Cardus
1978, p 47).
2. the direction taken by a ball that turns after pitching:
‘He will hit against the break so hard and so often that the poor bowlers wish he would
go back to hitting with it’ (James 1963, p 216).
3. a leg-break or off-break; a spinner:
‘Just when it appeared that the gritty Javed and the doughty Sohail were settling down
to a big partnership, Sachin came along with his gentle breaks which resulted in Sohail
being caught low at mid-wicket.’ (Purandare 2005, p136).
쐽 vb 1. (of the ball) to deviate from the original line of flight after pitching, as a result
of spin imparted by the bowler:
‘Bob, letting alone a ball wide of the off-stump under the impression that it was going to
break away, was disagreeably surprised to find it break in instead, and hit the wicket’
(P.G.Wodehouse, Mike 1909).
‘Immediately after lunch, however, he [Bosanquet] clean-bowled him with a ball which
the Warwickshire wicket-keeper thought was breaking from the off and which broke from
leg!’ (Warner 1934, p 31).
2. (of the bowler) to cause the ball to break in this way:
‘I could bowl fast-medium with a high action, swing the ball late from leg and break it
with shoulder-and-finger action from the off’ (James 1963, p 43).
See also LEG-BREAK, OFF-BREAK, ACTION-BREAK
breakaway
breakaway n a ball that breaks ‘away’ from the batsman, moving from leg towards off
after pitching:
‘It means, too, that the demise of the finger-spinner — the right-arm off-break, or left-
arm breakaway bowler — is hastened’ (Arlott 1983, p 17).
breakback
breakback n a ball, usually of fast or medium pace, that breaks ‘back’ towards the
batsman, moving from off to leg after pitching:
‘He [W. C. Smith] differed in method entirely from the great majority of slow right-
handers, for he relied chiefly on the ball that broke from leg … and not on the break-back
like most of his class’ (Warner 1934, p 43).
‘Nissar, a tall, strapping, six-foot Punjabi was the quicker of the two: he looked like a
fast bowler and bowled like one with the ability to swing the ball both ways and with a
devastating breakback of the type that accounted for both Holmes and Sutcliffe’ (Bose
1990, p 73).
27 bunsen
The term ‘breakback’ formerly embraced balls of any pace breaking from off to leg,
but in modern usage it tends to be restricted to the faster ball and is thus synonymous
with ‘off-cutter’.
Compare OFF-BREAK
bring
bring vb —bring the ball back (into the batsman, from the off etc) to bowl the ball so
that it moves in towards the wicket either after pitching or while still in the air:
‘Like Richards, he brought the ball back abnormally from the off’ (David Frith, The Fast
Men p79).
bump
bump vb 1. (of the ball ) to rise steeply off the wicket after pitching, typically as a result
of some irregularity in the surface; steeple (old):
‘The wicket … played very queerly, the ball never coming off at a true pace and contin-
ually bumping or shooting’ (Headlam 1903, p 146).
2. (of the wicket) to bounce unevenly (old):
‘There’s a breathless hush in the close tonight
Ten to make and the match to win
A bumping pitch and a blinding light
An hour to play and the last man in’
(Sir Henry Newbolt, Vitai Lampada 1899).
3. to bowl a bouncer at a batsman:
‘Colin Croft … is not that fond of West Indian batsmen either, come to think of it, repeat-
edly bumping them in the nets’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1982).
bump ball
bump ball n a ball hit hard into the ground by the batsman and subsequently taken by a
close fielder before it hits the ground again, thus presenting the illusion of a catch:
‘When an umpire has to decide the question of a “bump” ball or not, he must be guided
by its length, its flight from the bat, and the way in which the latter has been used’
(Badminton 1888, p 242).
‘Should the bowler’s end umpire be unable to decide whether a catch was taken from a
bump ball or not, he shall first consult with the square leg umpire’ (Standard Test Match
Playing Conditions (ICC) 3.2.3.2).
bumper
bumper n 1. a fast short-pitched ball; a bouncer:

‘There is a very great deal more in Fast-Leg-Theory than the mere delivery of “leg-side
bumpers” — a feat, I should imagine, of which any lusty yokel is capable’ (Larwood
1933, pp 181–2).
2. any ball that rises steeply off the wicket after pitching; a ‘bumping’ ball (old ):
‘From the fact of the ground not being a good one, the “bumpers” of Lillywhite could
not be mastered’ (Bell’s Life 18 August 1855).
bumpy
bumpy adj 1. (of the wicket) characterised by irregular or unusually steep bounce:
‘A bumpy wicket is a wicket upon which you may get a shooter one over and a blow on
the chest the next, as a pleasing variety to those that come frequently right over your
head the first bound’ (Badminton 1888, p 309).
2. (of a ball) rising steeply off the pitch:
‘The little Lancastrian got 2 for a very clever hook off a bumpy one from Cotter, the ball
being negotiated close to his left ear’ (Melbourne Argus 27 February 1904).
bundle out
bundle out vb to dismiss the batting side quickly and for a very low total:
‘The hosts were bundled out for 104 as Ramadhin enjoyed his last triumph in Test
cricket, taking 4 for 25 in 10 overs’ (Manley 1988, p 139).
bunny
bunny n 1. a late-order batsman with little or no batting skill; a rabbit:

‘He may be regarded as a bunny, but Glenn McGrath is the only No.11 Test batsman to
provide six instances of helping a partner reach a century.’ (Kersi Meher-Homji &
Rajesh Kumar, Cricinfo Blogs 30 December 2005).
2. a batsman who has been repeatedly dismissed by a particular bowler:
‘He [Hoggard] can officially call Sehwag his bunny now after getting him for the sixth
time in Tests’ (John Stern, Cricinfo 19 March 2006).
bunsen
bunsen n a pitch conducive to spin bowling; a ‘turning’ wicket (slang):

buy 28
‘Should they produce what county cricketers know as “Bunsens”, Pakistan can call on
something of everything, while England have Nick Cook … and Vic Marks’ (Scyld Berry,
Observer 26 February 1984).
This esoteric item of jargon from the English county circuit is rhyming slang, from
‘bunsen burner’ = ‘raging turner’.
buy
buy vb —buy a wicket to take a wicket by means of bowling and fielding tactics that offer
the batsmen the opportunity of scoring quick runs, typically by bowling to a deep-set
defensive field in the hope of getting catches in the deep, or — in the case of a spin
bowler — by flighting the ball rather than ‘pushing it through’ with a flat trajectory:
‘He will now try to buy a wicket, Turner’s above all, so he brings in his spin and spreads
his field wide’ (Moorhouse 1979, p 60).
buzzer
buzzer n a ball thrown in from the field that goes past the wicket; an overthrow (slang):
‘Overthrows, or “buzzers” as they are sometimes known … will always cause a bit of
excitement, laced with humour’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 89).
bye, (also formerly bye-ball) n a run scored from a ball (other than a wide or no-ball) that
bye
passes the wicket without touching either the striker or his bat. Any runs accruing in this
way (whether actually run or coming from a boundary) are credited to the batting side as
byes, under ‘extras’, but not to the individual batsman, and the umpire signals a bye to
the scorers by raising his arm above his head with the hand open.
Byes are not specifically mentioned in the original (1744) code of Laws, but seem
already to have been a feature of the game by that time: the scores of the famous Kent
v All England match played on 18th June 1744 include a record of the byes made by
each team. It is likely that the term originally subsumed what were later distinguished
as leg-byes, and when wides were first introduced they too were counted as byes.
See EXTRAS
C
c
c abbr CAUGHT; used in the scorebook, following the name of a batsman and preceding the
name of a fielder, to indicate the manner of the batsman’s dismissal and the player
responsible for it. In earlier times dismissals by catching were credited to the catcher
alone; thus, in the Kent v All England match of 1744,:
‘Lord J. Sackville C by Waymark 5’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 86).
But since the early 19th century it has been usual to mention the bowler as well (thus
‘c Gilchrist b McGrath’).
See also C AND B
cafeteria bowling
cafeteria bowling n poor-quality bowling that invites the batsman to ‘help himself’:
‘Cumberland were set 221 from 54 overs for victory after some “cafeteria bowling” on
the last morning’ (Gary Woodworth, BBC Sport Website, May 2006).
call
call vb 1. (of the umpire) to declare that a bowler has made an unfair delivery; no-ball a
bowler:
‘Larwood opened the bowling to Woodfull and was “called” first ball for dragging his
feet’ (Melbourne Argus 21 November 1932).
2. (of a batsman) to shout to the batsman at the opposite end in order to indicate whether
a run should be taken:
‘Then Turner called Mallet for an impossible run, and the latter was out by yards’
(P.G.Wodehouse, Report on Dulwich v. St Paul’s, 1939).
쐽 n an act of doing this, or the responsibility for doing this in a given situation:
‘If the striker hits the ball in front of the wicket it is his call; if he hits it behind the wicket
it is his partner’s call’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 19 July 1983).
After the first run has been taken, the call for any subsequent runs should be made by
the player who will be running towards the end most immediately threatened (the
‘danger end’).
c and b
c and b abbr CAUGHT AND BOWLED; used in the scorebook, following the name of a
batsman and preceding the name of a bowler, to indicate that the batsman has been
dismissed by a catch taken by the bowler of the ball
쐽 n an instance of a bowler taking a catch off his own bowling:
‘Mischler looked like getting a century, when Bailey suddenly produced an unexpected
slow one and, following up, took an excellent c & b’ (P.G.Wodehouse, Report on
Dulwich v. St Paul’s, 1939).
candidate
candidate n a batsman who is out for nought in his first innings and is thus in line for
getting a ‘pair’ by scoring a second duck (old):
‘Mr Jardine made a good catch in the slips to get rid of Vic Richardson who thus became
a “candidate” and was duly elected in the second innings!’ (Larwood 1933, p 151).
cap
cap n 1. a notional award, in respect of a place in a particular team, made to a player each
time he is selected to play for that team:
‘Bob Taylor, in his 23rd season, maintained his remarkable consistency and won his
50th England cap during the series against New Zealand’ (Wisden 1984, p 341).
captain 30
‘Australian selectors must take the plunge and hand Sydneysider Phil Jaques his first
Test cap if Justin Langer is unfit for the Boxing Day Test at MCG’ (Robert Craddock,
Herald Sun (Australia), 19 December 2005).
2. (also county cap) an award made in English first-class cricket to a player who is
considered to have completed his ‘apprenticeship’ and become an established member
of his county’s playing staff; the change in status has financial and contractual implica-
tions, too
쐽 vb to award a cap to a player:
‘Since the war a benefit has been normally awarded after some 10 seasons as a capped
player’ (Trevor Bailey, Cricketer March 1984).
‘Australia had made three other changes, capping the NSW slow left-armer Murray
Bennett and recalling … Greg Matthews and … Andrew Hilditch’ (WCM February
1985).
captain
captain n the player chosen as the leader of a cricket team

쐽 vb to act as the captain of a cricket team:
‘Lloyd played a dominating innings and captained astutely, much more willing to exper-
iment and adapt than his less experienced opposite number’ (Christopher Martin-
Jenkins, Cricketer August 1984).
The captain is responsible for the overall strategy of his team in a match. His duties
include marshalling the bowling attack, setting the field in consultation with the
bowler, determining batting tactics and the timing of declarations, and of course – if he
has won the toss – deciding whether to bat first or put his opponents in. In addition, the
‘responsibility lies with the captains for ensuring that play is conducted within the spirit
and traditions of the game … as well as within the Laws’ (Law 42 § 1). It is therefore
up to the captain to ensure that none of his players indulge in time-wasting, ‘sledging’,
ball-tampering, arguing with the umpire, or any other form of undesirable behaviour.
Carmody field
Carmody field n Australia an ultra-attacking field set for a fast bowler bowling with the
new ball; an UMBRELLA FIELD. The field is packed with fielders in close-catching
positions, forming an arc around the batsman, and it usually includes four slips, a gully,
and a point on the off-side, and two or three close fielders on the leg-side, such as a short
leg, a leg slip, and a short mid-on. The term derives from Keith Carmody, who regularly
deployed this type of field as captain of Western Australia in the early 1950s.
carpet
carpet n the ground (old):

‘Voce, who is usually such a good field, put two possible chances on the carpet when
O’Brien was in the thirties and forties’ (Larwood 1933, p 152).
carry
carry vb 1. (of a ball struck by the batsman) to continue in flight without touching the
ground, especially so as to reach and be caught by a fielder:
‘There is much less walking and rather more appealing, but people do not claim catches
which do not carry’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1982).
2. —carry one’s bat (out) (of a batsman) to remain undismissed at the end of one’s
team’s innings, when ten wickets have fallen:
‘The South African innings was soon over for 91, Nourse batting at no. 8 carrying out
his bat for 18’ (Warner 1934, p 202).
‘Nothing looked more certain than that Tavaré would carry his bat … but he was unex-
pectedly bowled as he tried to straight drive a near full toss’ (Richard Streeton, The
Times 29 October 1982).
The phrase is now usually restricted to an opening batsman who has batted right
through his side’s innings, but earlier writers favoured a less exclusive interpretation
which reflects the origin of the term. It comes from the time when a batsman who was
dismissed left his bat behind at the wicket for the player coming in next, a practice
echoed in several now-obsolete phrases like to give up one’s bat or to throw down
one’s bat, which were once used to indicate a batsman’s dismissal:
‘He had delighted to hear the stumps rattle, and to see opponent after opponent throw
down his bat and walk off’ (Mary Mitford, Our Village 1830, ch IV).
The batsman who remained undismissed at the end of an innings thus ‘carried his bat
31 catch
out’.
n 1. a quality in the wicket that imparts consistently good (but not excessive) bounce
쐽
to the ball after it pitches:
‘Peter Marron’s pitch otherwise proved well worth Michael Vaughan’s winning the toss:
it was hard, with carry that lasted the whole match, and abrasive’ (Haigh 2005, p 103).
2. the amount of momentum in a ball that has been hit in the air:
‘His top edge steepled towards long leg and seemed as if it might have enough carry to
take him to his hundred’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 1 December 2005).
cart
cart vb to hit the ball or attack the bowling with unrestrained power:
‘Understandably, he was not the Hughes who carted Mortimore for 24 in an over and
drove Bedi for 26’ (Terry Cooper, WCM September 1984).
‘He has never been cowed by reputation; he demonstrated that when he carted Glenn
McGrath for a quartet of fours in an over … in the Champion’s Trophy’ (David Foot,
Wisden 2005, p 65).
castle
castle n the wicket that a batsman is defending:

‘Milton and Graveney carried the score to 91 before Milton very unluckily touched his
own castle in playing back a little hurriedly at a ball well up to him’ (Peebles 1959, p 95).
쐽 vb to bowl a batsman out:
‘There I stood, castled for the second time in the match’ (Ken Mackay quoted in Geoff
Armstrong, A Century of Summers: 100 years of Sheffield Shield Cricket, p 147).
‘Though Australia lost an early wicket when Mike Salter was castled by Vaas, there was
no sign of panic’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
Catapulta
Catapulta n a primitive type of bowling machine invented in 1837 by ‘Felix’ (Nicholas

Wanostrocht) and used for providing batting practice. According to its inventor, ‘the
history of this machine in its original form is traced back to the time of the Romans’
(Felix 1850, p 33), and in fact the basic operating principle is the same as for the Roman
war engine of the same name. In the case of Felix’s Catapulta, however, the ball is not
hurled by the arm that swings forward but is ‘made to rest upon a stage and struck from
it after the manner of a billiard ball’ (ibid, p 34). The machine also incorporated a variety
of adjustable mechanisms that enabled the ball to be ‘propelled with the greatest
exactitude as respects both pitch and pace’ (Box 1868, p 76). Thus, e.g., ‘a plate upon
which the ball rested would, by a lateral movement upon a screw, enable the attendant to
deliver it either on, or off, at pleasure’ (ibid). The manufacture and retailing of the
machine was in the hands of Mr W. H. Caldecourt, from whom it could be bought (in
1850) for ‘11l. 11s. complete with the latest improvements’ (Felix 1850, p 8). See also
BALISTA, BOWLING MACHINE, MERLYN.
catch
catch vb 1. to take and keep hold of the ball after it has been hit by the batsman and before
it has made contact with the ground:
‘It flew fast to fourth slip, where Gower … caught the ball above his head’ (Brearley
1982, p 117).
2. to dismiss a batsman by catching the ball in this way:
‘The next ball had Burke dabbing outside the off stump and caught by Evans’ (Peebles
1959, p 76).
쐽 n 1. an act of catching the ball and thereby dismissing the batsman who hit it:
‘Allen hit well with Voce in and was unfortunate to miss his 50, Bradman bringing off a
magnificent catch’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933).
‘Gilchrist … was greeted also by his nemesis Flintoff, who again cut him off in his prime
with the help of a slip catch by Strauss that defied belief even in replay’ (Haigh 2005, p
146).
2. a ball hit by the batsman that gives the fielding side an opportunity of making a catch;
a chance:
‘If possible, it is best to get to a catch in time, and take it standing still with both hands’
A catch is only valid if the ball has first touched the striker’s bat or his hand holding
the bat, even if it subsequently hits his pads or body (See CAUGHT). This is essentially
caught 32
the position outlined in the original (1744) code of Laws, but there is some evidence to
show that, at an earlier stage still, catches behind the wicket did not carry the penalty
of dismissal (R. S. Rait-Kerr, The Laws of Cricket 1950, p 3). It stands to reason, in any
case, that catching would have been a less prominent feature of the game during its
most primitive phase, when the ball was rolled along the ground to the batsman. A more
recent amendment to the regulations addressed the novel situation of the ball becoming
trapped in the cage-like structure at the front of some helmets, and it states that ‘It is
not a fair catch if the ball lodges in a protective helmet worn by a fielder’ (Law 32 §
3(b)).
caught adv a mode of dismissal in which a batsman is given out if the ball ‘touches his
caught
bat … and is subsequently held by a fielder as a fair catch before it touches the ground’
(Law 32 § 1). The catcher must be within the field of play – with no part of his body
grounded over the boundary line – throughout the act of making the catch. The dismissal
is credited to the bowler and is entered in the scorebook as ‘c catcher b bowler’. No runs
can be scored off a ball that is caught, but if the batsmen have crossed before the catch is
made, the surviving batsman does not return to the end he started from. A batsman cannot
be out caught off a no-ball.
See also CATCH
caught and bowled adv out by means of a catch taken by the bowler of the ball
caught and bowled
쐽 n a ball hit by the batsman which is caught by the bowler:

‘Tiredness rather than anything else finally caught up with him. After six hours and forty
minutes he hit a hard caught and bowled back to the bowler’ (Bose 1990, p 137).
caught behind
caught behind adv dismissed by a catch taken by the wicket-keeper:

‘Hookes played a loose stroke to be caught at extra cover off Baptiste, who also had
Border caught behind’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer January 1984).
centurion
centurion n a batsman who scores a century:

‘Martin Crowe, at 21 years 123 days, became the third-youngest New Zealand Test
centurion’ (WCM March 1984).
‘He [Brett Lee] should have had the centurion Pietersen caught by Shane Warne at slip
for 15’ (Kevin Mitchell, Wisden 2006, p 68).
century
century n a batsman’s score of 100 runs or over made in a single innings:

‘They dismissed Australia for 162 and then Myrtle Maclagan recorded the first century
(119) in women’s Tests and put on a record opening stand of 145 with Betty Snowball’
(Cashman & Weaver 1991, p 91).
33 charge
‘At fifteen years, seven months and seventeen days, Sachin Tendulkar became the
youngest Indian to score a century on debut in the Ranji Trophy’ (Purandare 2005, p 68).
See also DOUBLE CENTURY, HALF-CENTURY
chance
chance n an opportunity for dismissing the striker, especially from a stroke that gives the
fielding side a reasonable chance of taking a catch:
‘His century was marred by two chances early in the game’ (Headlam 1903, p 121).
‘Yesterday, driving a trifle loosely for once through the off-side when on 238, he grazed
Cummins’s fingertips … That was a questionable chance; more acceptable was his
fallible scoop when on 413’ (David Foot, Guardian 7 June 1994).
chanceless
chanceless adj (of an innings or partnership, especially a long one) made without any
opportunity for dismissal being given:
‘Mohsin and Shoaib … put on 173 chanceless and scintillating runs’ (Robin Marlar,
Sunday Times 25 March 1984).
‘Weekes continued after Worrell left and was at the wicket for only 325 minutes for his
chanceless and undefeated 304 runs’ (Manley 1988, p 84).
change
change n 1. = CHANGE-BOWLER (old ):

‘They are generally moderate bowlers … who are often very valuable to their side as
changes’ (Badminton 1888, p 194).
2. (also change ball) a type of delivery that is not a bowler’s standard or ‘stock’ ball,
but is bowled occasionally to create an element of surprise:
‘Discovering that the wily Trinidadian could not turn his leg-break significantly on the
hard Sydney wicket, Hassett … played him as an off-spinner with a straight ball as his
change’ (Manley 1988, p 97).
change-bowler
change-bowler n a bowler, typically not a specialist, whose principal function is to

relieve the regular bowlers or to enable a front-line bowler to change ends:
‘After they had taken 17 in two overs from the change bowlers, Gatting and Smith,
Gower … had to act quickly and bring back the quicks’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 4
January 1984).
W. G. Grace, regarded in his day as ‘the best change bowler in England, bar none’
(Badminton 1888, p 215) took nearly 3000 wickets in his career. But a modern change-
bowler, though occasionally effective as a partnership-breaker, is looked to mainly for
containment.
See also FIRST CHANGE
change ends
change ends vb to bowl from the opposite end of the wicket to that from which one
bowled previously:
‘A bowler shall be allowed to change ends as often as desired, provided that he does not
bowl two overs, or parts thereof, consecutively in the same innings.’ (Law 22 §6).
The current law has been in force since 1889. Originally the bowler was allowed to
change ends ‘but once in the same Innings’ (Laws 1744), but when he did change he
could bowl two overs in succession. In 1870 the law was amended to allow the bowler
two changes per innings, provided still that no more than two overs were bowled
consecutively. The modern rule, by which consecutive overs were finally banned, was
established – significantly enough – at the same time as the first increase in the length
of the over.
See OVER
change of pace
change of pace n a deliberate variation in the speed at which the ball is delivered,
especially when the ball is bowled at a slower pace than the bowler’s norm in an attempt
to deceive the batsman into playing too early.
See also SLOWER BALL
charge
charge, give the bowler the charge vb to leave one’s crease and advance down the
wicket before the bowler releases the ball:
‘Soon after Ellis was stumped, charging unsuccessfully at Reedman’ (Geoff Armstrong,
A Century of Summers: 100 years of Sheffield Shield Cricket, p 46).
cherry 34
‘If the bowler throws at the striker’s wicket in an attempt to run him out (as when the
batsman “gives him the charge”) it is a no ball’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 131).
cherry
cherry n —the (red) cherry the ball:

‘The stammer [in his run-up] does not worry Hughes… He is not ready to change it
because it is a vital part of the Hughes persona when there is a red (and white also)
cherry in his hand’ (Haresh Pandya, The Hindu 20 March 1993).
chest-on
chest-on adj, adv describing a bowling action in which the bowler’s chest is almost in
line with the batsman’s wicket at the point of delivery:
‘His [McGrath’s] chest-on action has preserved his back and his easy run has saved his
knees and feet’ (Haigh 2005, p194).
Compare SIDE-ON
chinaman
chinaman n 1. especially in Britain a ball bowled by a left-arm wrist-spin bowler that

breaks from off to leg when bowled to a right-handed batsman; the ‘stock’ ball of a left-
arm wrist-spinner
2. especially in Australia and the West Indies a ball bowled by a left-arm wrist-spin
bowler that breaks from leg to off when bowled to a right-handed batsman; the left-arm
wrist-spinner’s googly.
Left-arm wrist-spin was pioneered in Britain by the Yorkshiremen Roy Kilner (in the
twenties) and Maurice Leyland (in the thirties); while the Australian ‘Chuck’
Fleetwood-Smith (who also played in the thirties) was ‘the founder of prodigious left-
arm googly bowling in Australia’ (Frith 1984, p 108), where the art flourished with
practitioners like Jack Walsh and George Tribe. One of the best-known bowlers of
chinamen in recent times was the South African Paul Adams, whose eccentric bowling
action was famously described as ‘like a frog in a blender’. The origins of the term itself
cannot be established with any certainty. The earliest OED citation for ‘chinaman’ is
from 1937, and it is commonly supposed to have been named after Ellis Achong, a
Trinidadian left-arm bowler of Chinese descent who played six Tests for the West
Indies between 1929 and 1933. David Frith reports the story of Walter Robins, who,
when stumped off Achong’s bowling, is said to have ‘turned to Learie Constantine and
thundered, “Fancy getting out to a bloody chinaman!”’ (Frith 1984, p 113). This sounds
a little too good to be true; more probably, the term derives from the politically
incorrect connotations of inscrutability or deviousness which in the past attached (in
English) to the words ‘Chinese’ and ‘Chinaman’ (cf next entry).
Compare GOOGLY
Chinese cut
Chinese cut n a batting stroke made unintentionally when the batsman, attempting to
play an attacking shot, fails to read the line of the ball and deflects it off the inside edge
of his bat; the ball then passes between his body and the stumps on its way down towards
fine leg:
‘His first over … cost 16 runs, eight of them from a stroke known to me in my schooldays
as the “Chinese cut”, an attempted forcing shot off the back foot on the off-side where
the ball is edged past the stumps down to fine leg’ (Brearley 1982, p 117).
‘This was the start of a barren run for England: they didn’t win a Test in Pakistan for 39
years and 19 matches, until Graham Thorpe’s Chinese cut in the Karachi gloom in
2000–01’ (Cricinfo, 15 January 2003).
쐽 vb to hit the ball when playing a Chinese cut:
‘Cheerful ones merely smile sadly as some clown of a batsman misreads a googly and
Chinese cuts it’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1982).
chin music
chin music n fast short-pitched balls likely to hit the batsman’s head or upper body;
intimidatory bowling (slang):
‘Ganguly defied the predictions of chin music and lit up a gloomy Gabba with a scintil-
lating 144’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine April 2006, p 42).
chip
chip vb to hit the ball so that it comes off the bat in a high but fairly short arc, usually going
over the heads of the close fielders:
35 close catch
‘When the time came to prevent him taking a single to retain the strike, Brian [Lara]
chipped the ball with unerring accuracy over the in-field and was content with one run
at the end of the over’ (Paul Allott, Cricketer May 1994).
chop
chop n a form of cut, usually played to a ball that keeps unexpectedly low, in which the
bat is held horizontally and brought sharply down on the ball just after it has passed the
batsman. ‘The action is, as it were, an exaggeration of the cut’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 186)
and somewhat resembles the wielding of an axe – hence the name.
See CUT n 1
chucker
chucker n a bowler whose action is regarded as ‘unfair’ in that it approximates more to

throwing than to bowling with the arm straight:
‘Jack Saunders … described by his Test captain Joe Darling as “the dirtiest chucker
Australia ever had”, took 79 wickets at moderate cost in 14 Tests between 1902 and
1908’ (Frith 1984, p 75).
‘Batsmen become paranoid about the actions of bowlers, and being called a “chucker”
is, for a bowler, akin to being called a cheat’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 19 October
2005).
See also THROW
circle
circle n the area within which, in certain limited-overs competitions, a specific minimum
number of fielders must be stationed at the moment when the ball is delivered:
‘In the game at county level there are one or two other reasons for the call of “No Ball”,
and I suppose the best known of these is when there are not the required number of
fieldsmen within the fielding circle’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 132).
‘He had made good use of the idea of hitting out in the first fifteen overs, when most
fielders are placed inside the circle’ (Purandare 2005, p 137).
The ‘circle’ is actually a misnomer, because the area is made up of two semicircles, one
centred on the striker’s wicket and one on the bowler’s wicket and each having a radius
of 30 yards (27.4 metres); the ends of each semicircle are joined by a pair of lines
running parallel to the pitch; and the whole configuration is marked by white dots
painted at five-yard intervals.There is some variation in regulations governing fielding
restrictions, but in ODIs the rules are that only two fielders are allowed to stand outside
the circle during overs in which restrictions apply, and even in ‘non-restricted’ overs at
least four fielders (in addition to the bowler and wicket-keeper) have to remain within
the circle. Any ball bowled in contravention of these rules counts as a no-ball. The
circle was first introduced in England’s Benson & Hedges Cup competition in 1981,
and subsequently extended to many other one-day contests. The objective of this
restriction is to prevent the setting of wholly defensive fields with every available
player out in the deep.
See also FIELDING RESTRICTIONS, POWERPLAY
clean bowl
clean bowl vb to bowl a batsman out with a ball that knocks his wicket down without
first touching his bat, pads, or body. See illustration on next page:
‘At the follow on Davis immediately struck again, clean bowling McEvoy’ (Eric Hill,
Daily Telegraph 10 August 1984).
clip vb to hit the ball smartly off the legs with an angled bat, deflecting it into the leg-side
clip
area, especially behind square:

‘White hit Nash for three consecutive boundaries … He then clipped the same bowler to
deep square-leg and scampered back audaciously to register his maiden Test half-
century’ (Vic Marks, Observer 19 June 1994).
close
close n = CLOSE OF PLAY:

‘At the close England found themselves very handily placed with the West Indies 239 for
seven’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 14 July 1984).
close catch
close catch n a catch taken by a fielder standing close to the wicket, e.g. at short leg or
in the slips:
‘When the left-handers Brian Lara and Keith Arthurton went to close catches within the
last half-hour, the issue was nicely balanced’ (Tony Cozier, Caribbean Cricket Quar-
terly Jan/March 1994).
close of play 36
close of play
close of play n the prearranged time at which a day’s play finishes. To signal close of
play, the umpire calls ‘Time’ and removes the bails. The exact time varies widely
according to local rules and conditions, but two generally applicable points of law should
be noted, viz. that a new over can be started provided that ‘the umpire, after walking at
his normal pace, has arrived at his position behind the stumps at the bowler’s end before
the time agreed for the next interval, or for the close of play’, and secondly that ‘the over
in progress at the close of play on the final day shall be completed’, even if a wicket falls
in the course of it (Law 16 §§4, 10).
close the face
close the face See FACE

closure
closure n the voluntary closing of an innings; declaration:

‘When eight wickets had fallen and 306 was on the board, Hollins declared the innings
closed. The closure, as it turned out, was very neatly timed’ (Headlam 1903, p 187).
coffin
coffin n a cricketer’s holdall for clothing and equipment (slang):

‘Colchester is one of these places where you change by rota, the rooms being too tiny to
tolerate 11 cricketers and their “coffins”’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1982).
collar
collar vb to dominate completely the bowling of an opposing team or player:

‘The bowling was rather loose, and the splendid batting of Caffyn was much appreci-
ated. The bowling was what is termed in England completely “collared”’ (Lillywhite
1860, p 20).
‘Pringle bowled better at the end of the innings, so that Essex were never collared as
Gooch was to collar Middlesex’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 24 July 1983).
come on
come on vb 1. (of a bowler ) to begin a new spell of bowling:

‘Then he came on first change from the Nackington Road end for the 10th over of Kent’s
reply and immediately plucked out the off stump of Rob Key’ (Andy Wilson, Guardian
19 July 2006).
2. (of the ball) to move quickly off the pitch, without significant variation in pace or
bounce, allowing the batsman to time his shots. The ball typically ‘comes on to the bat’
on a hard, bouncy wicket:
37 county championship
‘The good pitch has a light covering of grass, it has bounce and movement, it doesn’t
turn till the fourth day [and] the ball comes on’ (Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine,
January 2006, p31).
compile
compile vb to score the stated number of runs. The term usually suggests patient and
determined accumulation of a high score:
‘Curtis compiled his century in 348 minutes off 314 balls, with 13 fours. It was a pains-
taking effort which put his team in a commanding position’ (Michael Nally, Observer 2
May 1993).
‘This was most perfectly demonstrated in his series-turning innings of the Fourth Test,
when he [Flintoff] compiled – rather than swatted or biffed or bludgeoned – a century of
murderous purpose’ (Simon Barnes, Wisden 2006, p 171).
conversion rate
conversion rate n the proportion of innings in which a batsman, having reached a score
of fifty, goes on to make a century:
‘For all his recent travails, Vaughan’s conversion rate is unimpeachable: this was his
fifteenth hundred for the twenty-seven occasions he has passed fifty’ (Haigh 2005, p103).
cordon
cordon n a ring of close fielders in an arc around the batsman, especially the slips:
‘Lloyd … trained and moulded his players into the most awesome fielding side in history.
Strict daily practice regimes honed a slips cordon that seldom put down a chance and
often made a catch out of the seemingly impossible’ (Manley 1988, p 392).
‘After an edge from Strauss off Lee bisected Warne and Ponting at first and second slip
… there was what seemed to be a pregnant silence in the Australian cordon’ (Haigh
2005, p 116).
corner
corner n —around the corner deflected behind the wicket on the leg-side, down towards
fine leg:
‘He had to … fend off another period of hostile quick bowling from Steve Harmison and
Andrew Flintoff, but for every bouncer he received there was a well-timed drive or clip
around the corner.’ (Andrew McGlashan, Cricinfo, 1 December 2005).
corridor
corridor, corridor of uncertainty n the narrow ‘channel’ between a batsman’s off stump
and about one foot (0.3m) outside it. A fast ball bowled ‘down the corridor’ creates
uncertainty in the batsman’s mind: if he plays the ball, he is in danger of edging a catch
to slip, but if he leaves it he is at risk of being bowled, or being out lbw (since the batsman
can be out even if he is hit outside off stump, provided he is not playing a shot):
‘This is the key to his princely cricket, because almost the entire cricket world has grown
up thinking the only way you can contain a batsman is to bowl down the corridor of
uncertainty’ (R Mohan, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
‘When the bowler bowled into the corridor of uncertainty on and outside the off-stump,
the classic late cut came into play’ (Purandare 2005, p 27).
country
country n the area of the field furthest from the wicket; the deep:
‘The amount of runs that can be saved or given away during two long inningses by a
fieldsman in the country … is astonishing. It would do no one any harm to write up a
memorandum of the fact above his bed [!]’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 17).
‘He was caught in the country one short of a hundred against New Zealand at Perth’
(Haigh 2005, p 118).
county championship
county championship n the premier first-class competition in English cricket, in

which 18 county sides (the 18th, Durham, joined the championship in 1992) compete for
the title of county champion. The championship is based on a league system in which
points are awarded to the winning team in any given match, while either side may also
score BONUS POINTS (qv) for their batting and bowling performances in the first innings.
Until fairly recently, the championship was based around three-day fixtures, but
following experiments with a mix of three- and four-day games, the four-day match
became the norm in 1993.
Games involving English county teams have been played on a regular basis since the
beginning of the 18th century, and several of the present county clubs have existed in
their present form since the mid-19th century. The modern county championship,
however, dates back only as far as 1890. From the 1860s onwards, an unofficial
cover 38
competition had been encouraged by the sporting press, which usually determined the
‘champions’ on the basis of the team that lost the fewest games. This ‘championship’,
with a more sophisticated scoring system, was officially constituted in 1890, and the
first champions were Surrey. A major reorganisation of the championship programme
in 1969, following the introduction of one-day competitions in the early 60s,
considerably reduced the number of first-class (i.e. three-day) games. Beginning in the
2000 season, the championship was divided into a first and second division (with nine
counties in each). The top two teams in the second division at the end of the season are
promoted, and the bottom two in the first division are demoted.
cover
cover n = COVER POINT:

‘He [Constantine] goes to British Guiana with the inter-colonial team, does nothing to
speak of with bat or ball, but … emerges as one of the most brilliant covers ever seen in
the West Indies’ (James 1963, p 108).
쐽 vb 1. to stand behind and deeper in the field than another fielder in order to stop any
balls which pass him:
‘In those days of fast bowling they would put a man behind the long-stop, that he might
cover both long-stop and slip’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 62).
The term is used extensively in the early literature to define the functions of a number
of deep fielders. The idea survives nowadays only in the term cover point.
2. to put covers over the pitch, the bowlers’ run-ups, or any other part of the field as a
protection against rain:
‘In 1980, the TCCB decided to cover all county pitches. The idea was to give the England
team a boost by making the surfaces for the domestic competition more like those
encountered in Tests’ (Marqusee 1994, p 127).
The Laws state that ‘The pitch shall not be completely covered during the match unless
provided otherwise by regulations or by agreement before the toss’. (Law 11 § 2). In
practice, however, ‘this Law is almost extinct’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 57): local and
international playing regulations generally do provide for the covering of the pitch
when it is not being used. For example, the ICC’s Standard Test Match Playing
Conditions state that ‘Law 11.2 shall be replaced by the following: The pitch shall be
entirely protected against rain up to the commencement of play and for the duration of
the period of the match. It shall be wholly covered at the termination of each day’s play
or providing the weather is fine, within a period of two hours thereafter’. While no
doubt making life easier for the batsman, this arrangement ‘virtually eliminates the
element of weather-chance which in the past made English cricket so absorbingly
unpredictable’ (Arlott 1983, p 76). Some have argued, too, that the move towards full
pitch-covering in England (see citation above) has been counterproductive, merely
leading to dead wickets, because ‘English pitches lack the bounce of pitches overseas,
particularly those of Australia and the West Indies’ (John Thicknesse, Wisden 1993, p
23). And, as many commentators have ruefully observed, this has also led to the virtual
disappearance of the ‘sticky’ wicket.
cover drive
cover drive n a form of drive, usually played to a good-length ball pitching just outside
off stump, by which the ball is sent past cover point:
‘Thorpe wasted little time in revealing his current good form, immediately locating the
middle of his bat with precise pulls and cover drives’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
See DRIVE
cover-drive
cover-drive vb to hit the ball when making a cover drive:

‘Gifford opens from the pavilion end and is cover-driven for 4 off his first delivery by
Williams’ (Moorhouse 1979, p 65).
‘Ganguly was imperious through the off-side and his cover-driving was sumptuous’
(Harsha Bhogle, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 26).
cover-nips
cover-nips See NIPS

cover point
cover point, cover n an off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) anywhere
in an arc between point and extra cover, deeper than point but close enough to the
39 crease
batsman to save the single. The fielder in this position was originally referred to as ‘The
Man who covers the Point and Middle Wicket’ (Boxall 1800, p 62).
See also COVERS, EXTRA COVER, FIELDING POSITIONS
covers
covers n the large off-side area between point and mid-off, patrolled by cover point and
extra cover:
‘Then came twenty glorious minutes. Cyl drove John through the covers to the boundary,
a low humming hit’ (James 1963, p 83).
‘You can tell that Ponting is in good touch if he hits the ball through the covers early’
(Haigh 2005, p 34).
cover slip
cover slip See SLIP

cow corner
cow corner n the part of the leg-side boundary towards which the ball is propelled by a
cowshot, roughly between deep mid-wicket and long-on:
‘Surrey … only avoided their lowest ever score (12) by an edge through the slips and a
wild swipe to cow corner’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1983).
‘When the slogger Neil Carter arrived, Warne adjusted his field to have cow corner well
patrolled, but Carter just stretched myopically forward to a big leg-break’ (John Collis,
Guardian 12 May 2006).
cowshot
cowshot n an uncontrolled cross-batted shot, typically played to a straight ball pitching

outside off stump, in which the batsman pulls the ball round from off towards the leg-
side boundary between deep mid-wicket and long-on; a stroke resembling the sweep, but
having a more random quality and usually associated (hence the name) with the
uncomplicated ‘rustic’ slogging of the authentic tailender:
‘If the crowd were keen on naught but Surrey’s chances in the match, a cowshot by Hutch
would cause as much satisfaction as Hobbs’ master-stroke’ (Cardus 1978, p 38).
See also AGRICULTURAL
cradle
cradle n an apparatus used for catching practice, consisting of a concave, roughly boat-
shaped frame fitted with wooden slats; balls are thrown at the cradle with a low
trajectory, especially in order to provide practice in slip-catching
crease
crease n 1. any of the lines marked on the ground at each end of the pitch and used to
indicate the limits of a batsman’s ground or the area within which a bowler may fairly
crease occupation 40
deliver the ball. These are the BOWLING CREASE (qv) and the POPPING CREASE (qv), both
of which are mentioned in the original (1744) code of Laws, and the RETURN CREASE
(qv), which makes its first appearance in the 1774 code:
‘He bounded from the crease … and was just in time at the end of this manoeuvre to smite
the ball as it bounced and send it hurtling to the pavilion’ (P.G. Wodehouse, Reginald’s
Record Knock 1909).
2. —at the crease having one’s innings; batting:
‘Hanif Mohammad thereupon proceeded to immortality. Batting throughout the fourth
and most of the fifth day, he eventually made 337 … He was at the crease for three hours
longer than Hutton, 16 hours and 13 minutes in all’ (Manley 1988, p132).
crease occupation
crease occupation n See OCCUPATION OF THE CREASE

cricket
cricket n 1. the game itself:

‘John Denwick of Guldeford … being of the age of fyfty and nyne yeares … saith upon
his oath that hee hath known the parcell of land … for the space of Fyfty years and …
that hee being a schollar in the Free schoole of Guldeford, hee and several of his
fellowes did runne and play there at Creckett and other plaies’ (Guild Merchant Book,
Guildford 1598).
2. the manner or quality of play, by a team or individual, in a game of cricket:
‘Some of the “sweet girl cricketers” displayed a knowledge of the game and a profi-
ciency that could only have been acquired by long and regular practice. Miss Dean, for
example, showed really superior cricket’ (Town and Country Journal [Sydney], 13
March 1886).
‘The afternoon session contained some wonderfully competitive cricket from England
after Peter Such had broken the Australian opening partnership’ (Mike Selvey,
Guardian 7 July 1993).
‘The Australians played their best cricket shortly after lunch, when Flintoff was edging
towards his hundred and Jones was momentarily becalmed’ (Haigh 2005, p 155).
쐽 vb to play cricket:
‘At Harrow I was always cricketing–rebelling–fighting–rowing’ (Lord Byron, Letters &
Journals 1830).
Speculation as to the origins of the game, and the etymology of the word itself, has been
going on for almost 200 years without coming up with any very convincing answers.
The term cricket is variously thought to be derived from the target aimed at and the
implement used in defending it. In the former case it is argued that the word is related
to Flemish or Low German krick-stoel, a long low stool (resembling the earliest types
of wicket in shape), and the theory to some extent rests on the likely connection of
cricket and stool-ball at an early stage in their evolution. The more popular
interpretation connects ‘cricket’ with the Old English crycc or (more plausibly) Middle
Flemish crick, a staff for leaning on (from which ‘crutch’ is also derived). Neither
theory is at all conclusive, and it would be unwise to argue with the OED’s verdict of
‘Etymology uncertain’.
As for the game itself, strenuous efforts have been made to demonstrate its extreme
antiquity, and references of the most tenuous kind have been seized upon to support
some fairly speculative theories. The best-known and perhaps most plausible of these
is a reference in Edward I’s Wardrobe accounts for 1299–1300 to ‘Monies disbursed
for the said Prince’s playing at Creag and other sports’. But the almost total absence of
corroborative evidence for the medieval period – such as references in legal documents
and literary works – casts serious doubt on the idea that cricket, in anything remotely
like its present form, was being played as early as this. The first genuinely reliable
reference (quoted above) is dated 1598 and refers to a period about 50 years earlier, so
that it is safe to assume that cricket was being played in the south of England by at least
the early 16th century.
It is in the 17th century that references to cricket begin to come thick and fast. Royalist
propaganda directed at Cromwell condemns the ‘dissolute and dangerous course’ of his
youth, when he had been ‘famous for foot-ball, cricket, cudgelling, and wrestling’.
41 cross bat
Cricket, then, was already being played in London when Cromwell was a boy (the early
1600s). Later in the same century it seems to have made the transition from being a
pastime indulged in by children (or, according to a more bucolic version, Kentish
shepherds) to a game played by adults and, increasingly, patronised by the nobility and
gentry, who were especially interested in its potential as a medium for gambling. By
the end of the 17th century it was a well-established game played in both urban and
rural settings. For technical developments, see individual entries, especially BAT,
BOWLING, WICKET.
cricketal, cricketical adj of or relating to cricket (obsolete):
cricketal
‘The juncture was critical, not cricketal’ (R. A. Fitzgerald, Wickets in the West 1873, p
288).
‘The “Hawks” was the first of a number of clubs, run upon more or less similar lines …
partly social and partly cricketical’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 349).
Cricket Australia
Cricket Australia n the governing body for cricket in Australia, replacing the ACB
(Australian Cricket Board) in 2003, and a Full Member of the ICC (qv) since 1909
cricketer
cricketer n a person who plays cricket

cricketress
cricketress n a woman who plays cricket (obsolete):

‘All Alfred Mynn’s sisters were famous cricketresses’ (Pall Mall Gazette 2 June 1890).
cricket wicket
cricket wicket n a playing surface which, in the course of a match, provides conditions
that give encouragement both to the batsman and to all types of bowler. A cricket wicket
is likely to produce an even contest between bat and ball, with a clear result at the end:
‘Not only was the suggestion unfair [Fletcher’s call to groundsmen to help England by
producing seaming pitches], his reasoning was astray. This was proved at the Oval
where a well-balanced side, capably led and playing good, aggressive cricket, beat
Australia on one of the best cricket wickets I’ve seen in England’ (Ian Chappell, ’Why
we beat the Poms’, Wisden 1994, p 31).
cross
cross vb 1. (of the batsmen) to pass one another in the middle of the pitch while taking
a run:
‘If the Players have cross’d each other, he that runs for the Wicket that is put down, is
out: If they are not cross’d, he that returns is out’ (Laws 1744).
2. to hit the ball across its line of flight with a horizontal bat (old):
‘I do not consider it good play to cross the ball from one side to the other’ (Boxall 1800,
p 41).
‘To cross a ball is the worst of all bad play’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 26).
cross bat
cross bat n a bat held in a slanting or horizontal position so that, in the execution of a
stroke, it moves across the line of flight of the ball rather than straight down it:
‘Some of the most effective scoring strokes are those played with a relatively “cross”,
i.e. horizontal, bat’ (MCC 1952, p 88).
‘Lara stepped across his crease with the anticipation of the supremely gifted sportsman,
and tapped it with a cross bat to fine leg’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricinfo Magazine January
2006, p 30).
The cross bat is used exclusively for attacking shots, such as the hook, pull, or cut, and
was at one time regarded with the utmost suspicion. In his Young Cricketer’s Tutor
(1833) John Nyren extols the virtues of the upright bat and repeatedly warns his
youthful readers against the heretical cross-bat strokes. Nyren’s philosophy looks
stodgy nowadays, but its rationale is of course the fact that a straight bat moving
directly down the line of the ball presents a larger surface area, and for a longer period,
than a horizontal bat moving across the line. The cautious approach of Nyren and his
contemporaries should be viewed in the light of the very unpredictable wickets on
which they had to play. The gradual softening of conventional attitudes towards the
cross bat probably has a lot to do with the great improvement in playing surfaces in the
second half of the 19th century, but cross-bat shots still carry a health warning, and the
‘official’ line is that they should only be played when there is no possibility of being
bowled.
Compare STRAIGHT BAT
cross-bat 42
cross-bat
cross-bat adj (of a stroke) played with a cross bat:

‘Bowlers do not always bowl a length, and from balls of bad length runs are often most
effectively … made by cross-bat strokes’ (MCC 1952, p 88).
cross-batted
cross-batted adv with a horizontal bat:

‘The cut, whether off the front or back foot, is played cross-batted and … the margin of
error is proportionally small’ (MCC 1952, p 95).
쐽 adj = CROSS-BAT
crumble
crumble vb (of a wicket) to disintegrate; a ‘crumbling’ wicket is one that is beginning to

break up, typically towards the end of a long match in dry conditions, and its loose
surface encourages spin and produces variable bounce:
‘Crumbling results either from the nature of the turf and soil or from the wear and tear
of long inningses’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 86).
curator
curator n Australia, NZ, West Indies the person responsible for the maintenance of the
ground and the preparation of wickets for matches; groundsman:
‘When Steve Waugh turned up at Edgbaston for the fifth Test he was incredulous:“Your
curator must be mad. This is exactly the sort of pitch we would have prepared for
ourselves”’ (Vic Marks, Observer 29 August 1993).
‘Ponting is leaning towards playing two spinners on Boxing Day, MCG curator Tony
Ware believes his pitch will be more suited to three seamers’ (Malcolm Conn, The Age
(Melbourne) 24–25 December 2005).
curl
curl n movement of the ball in the air or off the pitch; swing or break (old ):
‘His delivery was fast under-hand, and he had a good deal of curl from leg’ (Pullin 1900,
p 27).
‘I have not been able to discover, any more than the bowlers themselves, why or how curl
in the air takes place’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 107).
쐽 vb (of the ball) to change direction by moving in the air or off the pitch; swing or break:
‘He [Lamborn] was once bowling against the Duke of Dorset, and, delivering his ball
straight to the wicket, it curled in, and missed the Duke’s leg-stump by a hair’s breadth’
(Nyren 1833 in HM, p 54).
‘It is a well-known fact that a new ball will invariably curl more than one which has had
thirty or forty runs scored off it’ (Warner 1934, p 60).
curly
curly adj moving in the air or off the pitch; curling (old ):
‘Neale was out to a curly one from Williams after making a very attractive 55’ (Headlam
1903, p 155).
cut
cut n 1. a batting stroke in which the ball is hit towards the off-side in an arc between cover
and third man, with the bat held at an angle closer to horizontal than perpendicular:
‘Tightly packed off-side fields didn’t have the opportunity to move as another shot
flashed through the cordon, while Merv Hughes’s attempts to restore control were met
with audacious pulls and ferocious cuts’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
The cut is an attacking shot, typically played to a fast ball pitching rather short of a
length outside the off stump, and it is executed by moving the back foot across towards
off stump and bringing the bat down on the ball as it passes the batsman. A successful
cut depends to a large extent on the power of the batsman’s wrists and ‘like all wrist
strokes, charms the spectator by accomplishing great results at the expense of
apparently little effort’ (Badminton 1888, p 6). Cuts are usually classified as either
‘square’ or ‘late’, depending on the point at which the ball is struck.
See also FORWARD CUT
2. the practice or technique of cutting the ball in bowling:
‘This time Willis, Cowans and Dilley found that speed and bounce were less important
than swing and cut’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
쐽 vb 1. (of the batsman) to hit the ball to the off-side with a more or less horizontal bat
when making a cut:
‘If you are in a position to cut and the ball should bump, it is wise to leave it alone, for
the danger of being caught at third man is very great’ (Badminton 1888, p 62).
43 cut through
‘Enter Botham, to overtake Fletcher in two overs by straight-driving and cutting ten runs
off Kapil Dev’ (Berry 1982, p 113).
‘He will be keen to have a longer knock in the second innings … after being caught
behind off Kent’s impressive South African import Tyron Henderson, cutting at a ball
that was too close to him’ (Andy Wilson, Guardian 19 July 2006).
2. (of the bowler) to make the ball move off the pitch into or away from the batsman by
drawing the hand rapidly across the seam at the moment of delivery:
‘Even in the last over he [Lillee] cut one back at high speed to go over Emburey’s
stumps’ (Brearley 1982, p 148).
The term is used only of faster bowlers and has evolved fairly recently to distinguish
this method of imparting ‘break’ to the ball from the wrist- and finger-spin used by the
slower bowlers.
3. (of the ball) to deviate from its original line of flight after pitching; in modern usage,
used only of faster balls, but formerly applied to balls of any pace:
‘Aided by a turn or motion of the wrist, the Ball may be made to cut or twist, after it has
grounded, and will perplex most Strikers’ (Lambert 1816, p 15).
‘Tendulkar shouldered arms to a Jason Gillespie delivery, thinking the ball would go
safely over the stumps. Instead it cut back and hit him high on the pad’ (Purandare 2005,
p 370).
cutter
cutter n 1. a batsman skilled in cutting the ball; an exponent of the cut (CUT n 1):
‘For a tall man he [Nayadu] was a very good cutter: pictures show him making an
outlandish, even exaggerated late cut but that could be very effective’ (Bose 1990, p 70).
2. a relatively fast ball that cuts after pitching (CUT vb 3); a leg-cutter or off-cutter:
‘Cutters require a jerk with the hand as the fingers come across the ball’ (Alf Gover,
Cricketer November 1984).
cut through vb (of the ball) to continue in its original line of flight after pitching, without
cut through
significant lift or deviation but with some (apparent) quickening of pace, typically on a
wet wicket:
cut through 44
‘Going in on the wet cutting-through wicket, Massie hit the incapacitated bowlers all
over the field’ (Badminton 1888, p 318).
D
d
d abbr declared
dab
dab n a tentative prod with the bat towards a ball outside off stump, sometimes played as
a gentle cut shot but often made involuntarily:
‘After Allan Lamb had been grabbed left-handed at short leg … Gower played a horribly
noncommittal dab’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 22 January 1984).
쐽 vb to attempt to hit the ball when making such a stroke
daisy-cutter
daisy-cutter n a fast underarm ball delivered so that it skims along the surface of the
pitch:
‘Mr Thornton went on with the quick daisy-cutters, and down fell the players’ wickets’
(F. Gale, Echoes from Old Cricket Fields 1871, p 49).
The term is self-explanatory and was originally used to describe ‘a horse that in trotting
lifts its feet only very slightly from the ground’ (OED).
danger area
danger area n the former name for the PROTECTED AREA of the pitch
danger end
danger end n the end of the pitch towards which one of the batsmen is running and to
which the ball is being returned from the field
day-night match
day-night match, day-nighter n a limited-overs game in which one innings is played

in the afternoon and the other under floodlights at night:
‘They [Barbados] began the series … by winning their first four matches but, dogged by
rain and switched to day-night matches under lights, they lost their last four to strong
provincial opposition’ (Caribbean Cricket Quarterly, Jan/March 1994).
dead
dead adj 1. (of the wicket) lacking pace and bounce, and generally unresponsive. A ‘dead’
wicket gives little assistance to the bowler, but it does not offer much help to the batsman
either:
‘G Swain, Esq. and Lieutenant Surman took the bat first, and played very steadily, but
could not make many runs, the ground being very dead’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 19).
2. (of the ball) no longer in play according to the laws of the game, for any of a wide
variety of reasons. The ball becomes dead, e.g., when a batsman is out, if it gets lost, or
if it becomes lodged in the clothing of either the batsman or the umpires. Most impor-
tantly, there is always a stage between one delivery and the next when the ball is tempo-
rarily ‘dead’, either because it has crossed the boundary or because it has become ‘finally
settled in the hands of the wicket-keeper or the bowler’ (Law 23 § 1(a)). In all such cases
the ball’s ‘deadness’ is implicit, and it is not actually pronounced dead by the umpire.
There is, however, a further set of circumstances, outlined in Law 23 § 3, in which the
umpires may intervene and declare the ball dead – as e.g., when ‘the striker is distracted
by any noise or movement …while he is preparing to receive or receiving a delivery’ (23
§ 3.(b) (vi)), and most notably if the umpire ‘intervenes in a case of unfair play’ (23 §
3.(b) (i)). In cases such as these the umpire calls ‘dead ball’ and signals to the scorers ‘by
crossing and re-crossing the wrists below the waist’ (Law 3 § 14 (a)). Once the ball
becomes or is pronounced dead, it remains out of play until the bowler starts his run-up
to deliver the next ball, and so long as the ball is dead no wicket can be taken and no runs
scored. Finally, it is worth noticing that the ball does not become dead if the wicket is
put down by a fielder without thereby dismissing the batsman, or if an unsuccessful
appeal is made: in both cases the batsmen may still attempt to take runs and the fielding
dead bat 46
side may still attempt to run them out. Compare in play (See PLAY).
dead bat
dead bat n a bat used purely defensively, either in making a forward blocking stroke with
no backlift and with the bat angled towards the ground, or with the bat held loosely in a
backward defensive position:
‘The more the ball is turning, the more do they rely on their back play, unless of course
they are able to smother it by playing right forward with a dead bat’ (MCC 1952, p 72).
‘Bailey continued according to plan, which meant the forward stab or the dead-bat back
stroke to all except the most eminently scorable balls’ (Peebles 1959, p 83).
dead-bat
dead-bat vb to hit the ball with a dead bat, or play a defensive innings using a dead bat:
‘Warne saved an Ashes match … with the bat ten years ago, playing strokes in the
gloaming while Tim May dead-batted’ (Haigh 2005, p121).
death
death n —the death the final overs of an innings in one-day cricket, when batsmen
typically aim to score rapidly. The death usually refers to the last ten overs of an innings:
‘An important aspect of one-day bowling is bowling at the death’ (Fanie de Villiers
Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p68).
death rattle
death rattle n the sound, heard by the batsman, of his wicket being hit behind him, e.g.
if he has left a ball which then goes on to hit the stumps:
‘I was gripped by the drama stretching over days and nights, full of shifting fortunes,
subplots and intrigue, by the finality of the fall of a wicket, the death rattle of the stumps’
(Mike Marqusee Wisden Asia Cricket, September 2004).
deck
deck n the ground, especially the playing surface:

‘On a pacy, bouncy deck Curtly Ambrose and Ian Bishop were just too good, and
Australia went down by an innings with more than two and a half days unused’ (Chas
Keys, Australian Cricket October 1993).
‘On a flat deck, a bowler has to slash his pace and focus on line and length alone’
(Purandare 2005, p 130).
declaration
declaration n an act of declaring an innings closed before all ten wickets have fallen:
‘His declaration left Australia 232 to win in a little under two hours plus twenty overs’
‘There are … some captains who were known for making what are known as “generous”
declarations, and the story goes that Essex players once locked Keith Fletcher in the
toilet to prevent a declaration until another 40 runs had been added’ (Oslear & Mosey
1993, p 68).
declare
declare vb (of the captain of the batting side) to close the innings before all ten wickets
have fallen:
‘The captain of the batting side may declare an innings closed, when the ball is dead, at
any time during a match.’ (Law 14 § 1).
The law allowing declarations is a surprisingly recent one, dating back only as far as
1889. It had of course always been possible for a batting side to end its innings quickly
– if the state of the game demanded it – by deliberately getting themselves out, and the
hit wicket rule provided an invaluable fall-back for real emergencies (See HIT WICKET).
Such a situation would not, in any case, have arisen very often on the ‘sporting’ wickets
of the 18th and early 19th centuries, when low scores were the norm. But the dramatic
improvement in playing surfaces from the 1860s onwards produced too many matches
in which the only alternatives were an inevitable draw or the undignified spectacle of
batsmen throwing their wickets away in order to revive the game. The growing
controversy over the acceptability of this practice was resolved when the MCC ruled
‘that on the last day of a match, including one-day matches, the in side should at any
time be empowered to declare the innings at an end’. The time limit was progressively
relaxed over the next twenty-odd years so that by 1910 a declaration could be made at
any time after the start of the second day of a three-day match. There was no further
change until 1947 and, after a number of minor adjustments, the law reached its present
form in 1951.
See also FORFEIT
47 defensive
declared
declared adv used in recording the score to indicate that a side’s innings has been
voluntarily declared closed (thus, ‘West Indies 502 for 6 declared’)
deep
deep adj, adv occupying or indicating a fielding position a relatively long way from the
batsman’s wicket:
‘Fowler might have been caught at short leg if the fielder had been two yards deeper’
(Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 31 July 1983).
‘Parore’s wicket, cleverly obtained by first placing a man on the deep square boundary
to indicate the possibility of the short ball and then pitching it up outside off stump …
gave him [De Freitas] second-innings figures of five for 71’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 7
June 1994).
Also used in combination to indicate a modified fielding position that would otherwise
be somewhat closer to the striker such as third man, mid-wicket, or extra cover:
‘Chappell went for the hook and Lamb at deep backward square-leg judged the catch
perfectly’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
Compare SHORT. See FIELDING POSITIONS
쐽 n —the deep the area of the ground that is relatively far from the wicket; the outfield
deep field
deep field n 1. any part of the field close to the boundary; the deep
2. a fielding position (or the player occupying it) close to the boundary in the area behind
the bowler’s wicket; long field (old):
‘Gauvinier … mis-hit and skied it, and deep field, running at full speed, brought off a
beautiful catch’ (H. de Selincourt, Game of the Season 1931, ch 1).
defence
defence n 1. the act or skill of batting as it relates to keeping one’s wicket intact rather
than to scoring runs:
‘When I began there was very little length-bowling, very little straight play, and little
defence either’ (William Beldham in Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 134).
‘The art of defence — which is the style of play adapted to stop the ball, as distinguished
from the offensive method … — may be roughly divided into forward play and back play’
2. the defensive ‘barrier’, consisting of the bat and sometimes also the padded leg, with
which a batsman attempts to protect his wicket:
‘Border’s defence was beautifully constructed, at least until the end of his career’ (Robin
Marlar, Sportstar [Chennai], 4 June 1994).
‘Harmison … became faster with each succeeding ball, and finally barged through
Langer’s defence, like a nightclub bouncer bursting through a crowd’ (Haigh 2005, p
208).
‘Hoggy shambled out as if it was an Evening Cup tie at Farsley, but he had long taken
pride in a stubborn defence’ (David Hopps, Wisden 2006, p 65).
defend
defend vb to bat in a defensive style:

‘His ability to read the leg-spin was always evident, and his judgment of when to hit the
ball and when to defend was infallible’ (Mike Selvey, WCM January 1985).
defensive
defensive adj 1. (of a batting stroke or a style of batting) adapted to the protection of
one’s wicket rather than to scoring runs:
‘Back and forward play may be further divided into back and forward play for defensive
purposes, and back and forward play with the object of making runs’ (Warner 1934, p 8).
‘When he [Glenn Turner] first appeared his shots were just about limited to a forward
and backward defensive push’ (Jim Laker, WCM August 1984).
‘The stonewalling R.G.Barlow was for twenty years a model Lancashire professional….
As a defensive batsman, he was the perfect complement to the stroke-making Hornby’
(Marqusee 1994, p 79).
2. (of a style of bowling or fielding) adapted to preventing the batsmen from scoring
freely rather than to taking wickets; accurate, medium-pace inswing bowling, and
‘pushed-through’ rather than ‘flighted’ spin – both tending to restrict strokeplay – are
characteristic features of defensive outcricket:
‘Despite the defensive formations, the English pair were never quiet, save for a short
period as Flintoff approached his first Test century’ (Haigh 2005, p 145).
defensive field 48
defensive field
defensive field n any arrangement of fielders that is primarily intended to prevent the
batsmen from scoring runs, rather than to maximise the likelihood of getting them out:
‘They batted cautiously, they bowled accurately but negatively, and they set defensive
fields nicely calculated to throttle and frustrate the West Indian stroke players’ (Manley
1988, p 145).
A defensive field may either be forced upon the fielding side, if the batsmen are able
to dominate the bowling and disperse the close fielders, or it may be deployed for
tactical reasons, as for example when the batting side has plenty of wickets in hand but
is chasing a difficult target to win the match. A defensive field is characteristically deep
set, with a relatively large number of fielders occupying the ‘run-saving’ positions (like
third man, fine leg, mid-wicket, and long-on) and a relatively small number in close
catching positions.
Compare ATTACKING FIELD
deficit
deficit n the number of runs by which a side trails its opponents at a particular stage in the
game, especially at the completion of an innings:
‘A heavy pessimism prompted by an overnight deficit of 373 hung over the Surrey innings
from the start’ (Cyril Chapman, Guardian 1 May 1984).
deliver
deliver vb to propel the ball towards the batsman; especially, to release the ball from the
hand in bowling:
‘The classic position at the crease for fast bowlers is side on towards the batsman at the
other end just before delivering the ball’ (Alf Gover, Cricketer April 1983).
delivery
delivery n 1. a ball delivered by the bowler:

‘Intikhab Alam … began his Test career, when a few days short of 18, by bowling
Australia’s Colin McDonald with his first delivery’ (Frith 1984, p 165).
‘Warne is a prodigious spinner of the ball … and the volume of spin imparted is such that
the ball dips into the right hander late in flight before gripping the surface – that super-
49 direct hit
natural delivery to Gatting providing the perfect example’ (Vic Marks, Observer 13 June
1993).
2. the manner in which a bowler delivers the ball; a bowler’s action:
‘He had a high delivery … and his balls were provokingly deceitful’ (Nyren 1833 in HM,
p 44).
depth
depth n the strength of a team in batting or bowling, considered in terms of the number of
high-quality players in each of these departments; e.g., a side that has capable batsmen
playing as low as number 8 in the order would be said to have depth in batting:
‘The batting has considerable depth … Watch out for the square-cutting of Hudson, the
hooking and driving of the Kirstens, Cronje, and Cullinan’ (Donald Woods, Guardian
20 July 1994).
‘The left-arm spinner Tim Shaw fell away badly … but the presence of Rudi Bryson, Brett
Schultz, Eldine Baptiste and the improving Paul Rayment gave them unmatched depth in
seam’ (Wisden 1993, p 1102).
devil
devil n a quality of extra pace or ‘nip’, imparted to a ball by the bowler or deriving from
the pitch, which makes the bowling dangerously effective (obsolete):
‘A fairly long run up to the wickets … gives more impetus to the ball, and what is popu-
larly known as “devil”’ (Badminton 1888, p 166).
‘The ideal match is a match that does not last more than two days, where the wicket has
got a bit of devil in it’ (Badminton 1888, p 402).
dibbly-dobbley
dibbly-dobbley, dibbly-dobbler n a bowler of limited ability, typically a medium-pace

seamer whose main contribution is restricting run-scoring opportunities:
‘The Zimbabweans were so poor, they bowled first in the most helpful conditions imag-
inable and allowed England to make 472. Then they lost 19 wickets in a day, eight of
them to part-time dibbly-dobbleys’ (Tim de Lisle, Independent 28 May 2003).
dig
dig vb 1. —dig in to bowl the ball so that it pitches hard and short, in order to extract the
maximum possible bounce from the wicket:
‘The main tactic of most fast bowlers seems to be to dig the ball in short and hope for a
catch close to the wicket as the batsman fends the lifting missile away from his face’
(Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
2. —dig out to avoid being yorked by a well pitched-up ball by keeping the bat very
close to the ground as the stroke is made:
‘Then Botham bowled four successive deliveries well up in the blockhole; each one
Yashpal dug out and hit hard and straight’ (Berry 1982, p 91).
쐽 n NZ, mainly Australia an innings:
‘Tasmania … looked solid until Tim May’s spin found them out as the Test offie took 5/42
in their second dig total of 123’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
‘The teams seemed close to parity as the New Zealanders contemplated their second dig’
(Haigh 2005, p 20).
dip
dip vb (of the ball) to turn or swing in towards the batsman while in flight, losing height
rather more steeply than expected at the end of its trajectory:
‘He appeared to be a bit late to a ball from Meckiff which pitched well up to him and
perhaps dipped in a shade’ (Peebles 1959, p 122).
‘It set off on the line of Gatting’s pads and then dipped in the air further towards the leg
side until it was 18 inches adrift of the stumps’ (Vic Marks, Wisden 1994, p 21).
direct attack
direct attack n fast short-pitched bowling aimed at the batsman; bodyline. An MCC
directive following the 1934 season in England states that: ‘County captains shall take
all steps in their power to eliminate from the game the type of bowling as now defined,
i.e. direct attack’.
See BOUNCER
direct hit
direct hit n a ball that hits the wicket when thrown in by a fielder, especially when this
results in a run-out:
‘Then Martyn called Ponting for a single, only to see his captain beaten by a direct hit
from the covers’ (Lawrence Booth, Wisden 2006, p115).
dismiss 50
dismiss
dismiss vb to get a batsman or batting side out:

‘Kapil Dev, 35, became Test cricket’s leading wicket-taker on Feb 8, when he dismissed
Sri Lanka’s Hashan Tillekeratne in the third Test at Ahmedabad’ (WCM March 1994).
‘Australia were dismissed cheaply but McGrath, taking gleeful advantage of the slope,
undermined England’ (Stephen Brenkley, Wisden 2006, p 87).
dismissal
dismissal n an act of taking a batsman’s wicket or of being involved in the taking of a

wicket, as by catching the ball:
‘Poised and precise, he [Ian Healy] completed 26 dismissals (21 catches and five stump-
ings), a record in a Test series in England’ (Mike Coward Wisden 1994, p 18).
‘Katich … watched in horror as a delivery he was leaving alone bent in and took off
stump. This dismissal haunted him in the second innings’ (Chloe Saltau, Wisden 2006, p
108).
do
do vb 1. (of the ball) to move in the air or off the pitch to the specified extent (in phrases
like ‘do something’, ‘do a bit’, etc):
‘The best inswinger will start about middle-and-off and “do” enough to hit leg’ (Arlott
1983, p 36).
‘Tavaré succeeded in getting out to him only by trying to steer through third man a ball
that did nothing’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 12 June 1983).
2. (of the wicket) to be conducive to movement off the pitch:
‘His [Rhodes’] fine length must always command respect, but unless the wicket does
something he should not be dangerous’ (Melbourne Argus 12 December 1903).
dolly
dolly n 1. (also dolly catch) a ball, struck (or mis-hit) by the batsman, that comes slowly
to a fielder, usually with a high trajectory, presenting him with a simple catch:
‘Wells received a “dolly” catch and bowl off the splice’ (Daily Chronicle 17 August
1904).
2. a slow high underarm ball; a donkey drop (old):
‘But he might give Mr. Champain an over or two of his ‘dollies’’ (Neville Cardus Close
of Play 1956, p 78).
쐽 vb 1. to hit the ball so as to present a fielder with a simple catch:
‘He picked the wrong ball from Pocock for a pull and dollied it to mid-on’ (D. J.
Rutnagar, Daily Telegraph 1 June 1984).
2. (of the ball ) to come off the bat straight to a fielder:
‘Colin [Cowdrey] played at it and got an edge, the ball dollying to Andy Corran at first
slip’ (Bomber Wells, Cricketer December 1982).
The word first appears as a noun around the turn of the century, but its use as a verb is
much more recent. The origins of the term are obscure, but it is tempting to see a
connection with an Anglo-Indian word ‘dolly’ meaning ‘a complimentary offering of
fruit, flowers … and the like, presented usually on one or more trays’ (Hobson-Jobson
1886). Since a dolly catch is one that is ‘handed to you on a plate’ it is not too fanciful
to see it as an extended use of this Anglo-Indian term, especially as it entered the
language of cricket at a time when a large amount of so-called ‘Hindustani’ vocabulary
was being imported into British English.
donkey drop
donkey drop n a slow ball with a high, dropping trajectory, usually bowled underarm; a
lob, especially one that is easy to hit:
‘If the [the lob bowler] does not take wickets, he will be sure to come in for a lot of chaff
from the rest of his side for bowling “donkey drops”’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 96).
The term is a derogatory one, implying that the bowling of such innocuous balls shows
stupidity worthy of a donkey.
doosra
doosra n a ball bowled by a right-arm finger-spinner that breaks from leg towards off after
pitching; a disguised leg-break, effectively a finger-spinner’s googly:
‘Saqlain Mushtaq invented and Murali perfected the doosra to counter hard-charging,
bludgeon-wielding modern batsmen who were threatening to make finger-spin obsolete’
(Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p31).
Pakistan’s Saqlain Mushtaq, who is generally credited with the ‘invention’ of the
doosra, says that he locks his wrist, with the back of his hand facing the batsman, then
51 down
uses three fingers to impart spin to the ball. ‘My grip does not change and neither does
my action, which makes it hard to pick’ (Interview in Cricinfo Magazine January 2006,
p 22). In Hindi and Urdu, the word means ‘the other one’ or ‘the second one’, deriving
from doh meaning ‘two’.
dot ball
dot ball n a ball from which no runs are scored and no wicket is taken, so called because
such a delivery is recorded with a ‘dot’ in the detailed bowling analysis (see illustration
at SCOREBOOK):
‘One day he is trying to get wickets, the next merely attempting to bowl “dot” balls’
(David Acfield, Cricketer November 1984).
‘South Africa’s last batsman, Donald, came in. Sachin bowled three consecutive dot
balls’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 34).
double
double n 1. in English first-class cricket, the feat of taking 100 wickets and scoring 1000
runs in a single season
2. any notable all-round achievement by an individual player taking a specified round
number of wickets and scoring a specified round number of runs, the number of runs
typically being a tenfold multiple of the number of wickets:
‘When 64, Imran had the satisfaction of becoming the fifth player to complete the double
of 2000 runs and 200 wickets in Tests’ (WCM February 1984).
‘Betty Wilson … was the first Test cricketer, male or female, to complete the match
double of 100 runs and 10 wickets in a Test match. (Alan Davidson achieved this double
two years later in the historic tied Test at Brisbane.)’ (Cashman &Weaver 1991, p 120).
Until the late sixties, the ‘English’ double of 100 wickets and 1000 runs was a
reasonably common occurrence: Wilfred Rhodes, for example, notched up 16 doubles
in the course of his career and many later players regularly achieved the double. The
most outstanding all-round performance in an English season was George Hirst’s
‘double double’ of 2385 runs and 208 wickets in 1906 – one of the few cricket records
that can confidently be regarded as safe. However, the reduced county championship
programme operating since 1969 severely limited players’ opportunities for notching
up big aggregates (particularly of wickets), and the double was beginning to look
unattainable until Richard Hadlee, playing for Nottinghamshire, finished the 1984
season with a remarkable 117 wickets and 1179 runs. With further reductions to the
first-class schedule in 1993, the English double is now almost certainly a thing of the
past.
double century
double century n 1. a batsman’s score of 200 runs or over, made in a single innings:
‘Greenidge charged to a glorious 214 not out, reaching his double century with a hook
off Foster’ (Cricketer August 1984).
‘That came after a 2003 when he [Ponting] … scored 11 international centuries in the
calendar year and unleashed two successive double-centuries against India’ (Bruce
Wilson, Wisden 2006, p 71).
2. a batsman’s score of a century in each innings of a match (old ):
‘Double century is the scoring of two separate centuries in the same match’ (A. E.
Knight, The Complete Cricketer 1906, p 342).
double figures
double figures n a batsman’s score of ten runs or over in a single innings:

‘With only Solkar reaching double figures (eighteen), the Indians were all out for forty-
two in the second innings’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 48).
double wicket
double wicket n the variety of cricket played using two sets of wickets, with overs being
bowled alternately from each end; the ‘normal’ form of the game as distinguished from
SINGLE WICKET (qv) (old ):
‘One run at single wicket is exactly equivalent to two at double wicket’ (Badminton 1888,
p 383).
down
down adj, adv (of the wicket) in or into a position that results in the dismissal of a
batsman. The wicket may be bowled down by the bowler, knocked down by the batsman
or his bat, or put down (and occasionally thrown down) by a member of the fielding side
making a run-out or stumping:
drag 52
‘The wicket-keeper should … take the ball before the wicket and, as he receives it, his
hands should be drawn back, putting the wicket down with one motion’ (Nyren 1833 in
HM, p 31).
‘The striker is out Bowled if his wicket is put down by a ball delivered by the bowler’
(Law 30 § 1 (a)).
The wicket is considered to be down if either bail is completely removed from its
position by the ball or the batsman; a temporary disturbance of the bails does not result
in the wicket being down. If an unsuccessful run-out attempt has resulted in the
removal of the bails, any further run-out attempt off the same ball will require the actual
removal of a stump from the ground in order to put the wicket down.
쐽 adj 1. —one, two etc (wickets) down with the stated number of wickets having fall-
en:
‘England, nine down and six short of victory, had two balls coming with David Allen, the
number ten, at strike, and Cowdrey, his arm in plaster, at the bowler’s end’ (David Frith,
The Fast Men, p184).
2. —(bat) first, second etc wicket down to bat at number three, number four etc in
the order (i.e. after the fall of the first, second etc wicket):
‘When Sobers came to the wicket, batting once again in the pivotal first wicket down slot,
the score was 87 for 1’ (Manley 1988, p133).
‘He means that he is – contrary to what certain commentators think – good enough to
bat one down for England’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 5).
drag
drag vb 1. to hit across the line of the ball making a sort of extended pull shot:
‘When he bowled wide of the off-stump, Old dragged him to long-on’ (Brearley 1982, p
91).
‘The asking-rate was less than three when Pietersen dragged a Yuvraj Singh delivery
down to deep midwicket’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 78).
2. to play the ball on to one’s stumps while attempting to execute a scoring stroke:
‘Vishwanath had dragged on, trying to square-cut Botham’ (Berry 1982, p 103).
‘Hayden might have nicked half a dozen deliveries either side of lunch yesterday, and
twice almost dragged pull shots onto his stumps’ (Haigh 2005, p 204).
3. (of a bowler) to keep the back foot in contact with the ground at the moment of
delivery, drawing it along the surface and and beyond the bowling crease, thus effec-
tively reducing the length of the pitch:
‘Larwood opened the bowling to Woodfull and was “called” first ball for dragging over
the crease’ (Melbourne Argus 21 November 1932).
‘Dragging’ became a controversial issue in the early sixties, as more and more bowlers
exploited the loophole in the no-ball regulations. Under the version of the no-ball rule
then in force, the fairness of a delivery was determined by the position of the bowler’s
back foot in relation to the bowling crease, and this made it difficult for umpires to state
categorically that a ‘dragging’ bowler was bowling unfairly. The practice put batsmen
at an obvious disadvantage and so – since the law as it stood offered no remedy – new
legislation was required. The result was the present no-ball law (Law 24 § 5), by which
the fairness of a delivery is principally determined by the position of the bowler’s front
foot (See NO-BALL).
4. to impart back spin to the ball when bowling (old)
쐽 n 1. a cross-batted stroke resembling the pull:
‘On this type of wicket the drag or short arm pull is largely utilized … to any ball short
of a length’ (Warwick Armstrong, The Art of Cricket 1922, p 37).
2. back spin imparted to the ball by the bowler, causing it to lose pace, or ‘hang’, after
pitching (old):
‘The two other spins which can be put on the ball are what have been called the drag (or
back spin) and top spin’ (Cricket (Badminton Library 1920 edn) p 84).
draw
draw n 1. a match that ends without either side winning; that is, in the case of a two-
innings match, without one side dismissing the other side twice and scoring a higher total
of runs; technically a tie does not count as a draw (see Law 21 § 5):
53 drinks
‘Cricket had hardly caught its breath after Edgbaston … but now 2005 had something
else to give. A draw, of all things: the first in 17 Ashes Tests.’ (Choe Saltau Wisden 2006,
p 106).
One of the earliest references to a cricket match ending in a draw is in the Daily Journal
of 25 August 1731, which reports an 11-a-side game between the Duke of Richmond
and a Mr Chambers. The parties had agreed beforehand to play until 7 o’clock, but
when the time came Mr Chambers’ side, now in its second innings, still ‘wanted about
8 or 10 Notches’ to reach the 33 runs they needed for victory. So ‘they were obliged to
leave off, tho’, besides the Hands then playing, they had 4 or 5 more to come in: Thus
it proved a drawn battle’. Such an outcome was not only rare at this time (owing to the
poor state of the wickets and the consequent low scores) but would also have been most
unsatisfactory, since the chief interest of any early 18th century game was in the bets
riding on the result. In fact, the word ‘draw’ itself, in its sporting sense, derives from
the practice of ‘drawing’ or ‘withdrawing’ the bets made on a contest when its issue
was undecided. The following report describes an early cricketing example of this
phenomenon, in a match that actually ended in a tie: ‘On Wed., Sept 1, on Lamb’s
Conduit Fields, Richmond, Fulham, and Barnes against London, 3 a side.
London Surrey
1st innings 4 18
2nd innings 19 5
23 each, so they drew stakes’ (Whitehall Evening Post 2 September 1736).
See also TIE
2. a batting stroke by which the ball is deflected off the angled face of the bat and passes
between the wicket and the batsman’s legs in the direction of fine leg or backward square
leg; it is presumably so called because the ball is gently ‘drawn’ away from the wicket
rather than more forcefully ‘pulled’:
‘In playing the Draw … turn the face of the bat inwards, so as to describe an angle of
45° with the parallelism of the wicket’ (Felix 1850, p 24).
Felix and his contemporaries imply that the draw was a popular stroke in the mid-19th
century, but by 1900 it had almost died out:
‘John Wisden … was one of the last of the school of batsmen who favoured the old-fash-
ioned “draw” stroke…. The stroke is now rarely or never seen’ (Pullin 1900, p 19).
쐽 vb 1. to fail to reach a result in which one side wins:
‘On Wed., June 16, on Dartford Brimp, London drew with Dartford: to play another
match on Thur., June 24, in the Artillery Ground’ (St James’s Evening Post 27 June
1731).
2. to hit the ball using the ‘draw’ stroke:
‘“Drawing” between leg and wicket is not a new invention. Old Small … was famous for
the draw’ (Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 141).
3. —draw stumps to remove the stumps from the ground at the end of a match or at the
end of a day’s play:
‘It had been arranged to draw stumps at 1.30 in order to allow the players to get down
to the racecourse and back their fancy in the Viceroy’s Cup’ (Headlam 1903, p 117).
See also STUMPS
drift
drift vb (of the ball) to curve gently into or away from the batsman while in flight:
‘If I am bowling an inswinging yorker wide of the crease there is a good chance it will
drift down leg’ (Wasim Akram, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p69).
drifter
drifter n a slow ball that curves deceptively into or away from the batsman while in flight,
without moving sharply enough to put him on the alert:
‘Zaheer … was making the most of the brief respite afforded by the off-spin of Gomes …
until in the last over before lunch, the 31st, he played round a drifter and was bowled’
(Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer August 1983).
drinks
drinks, drinks interval British, drinks break Australia, NZ n a break of not more than
five minutes during a session of play in which drinks are brought on to the field for the
players, traditionally by each side’s twelfth man. The Laws used to specify that no more
drinks waiter 54
than one such interval could be taken in each session of play. But the current code (15
§9) is more relaxed, and leaves the issue to the captains.
drinks waiter
drinks waiter n Australia =TWELFTH MAN. Traditionally, the twelfth man brings out
refreshments during the drinks interval. (slang)
drive
drive n a batting stroke in which the ball is struck with a full downward swing of a
perpendicular bat. The drive is an attacking shot, typically played to a ball of good length
pitching on or just outside the line of the stumps, and is executed by advancing the front
foot towards the pitch of the ball, and giving the bat a full backlift before bringing it down
onto the ball very shortly after it pitches. Quick footwork in ‘running out’ to the pitch of
the ball can enable the batsman to drive even a ball of less than full length. Drives can be
made to anywhere in front of the wicket in the arc between cover and midwicket, and are
usually classified according to the direction they take, which is in turn largely governed
by the line of the bowled ball:
‘The straighter the ball is pitched in a line with the wicket, the straighter should be the
drive, and vice versa’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 186).
Thus, for example, an ‘on drive’ is usually made to a ball pitching on or just outside leg
stump.
See COVER DRIVE, OFF DRIVE, ON DRIVE, SQUARE DRIVE, STRAIGHT DRIVE
쐽 vb to hit the ball with a full downward swing of the bat when making a drive:
‘There is nothing that more completely demoralises a bowler than a player who comes
out and drives when the ball is at all over-pitched’ (Badminton 1888, p 78).
‘When Brittin was finally out, driving to mid-on, Daniels and Jo Chamberlain added a
violent 34 from 16 balls’ (Paul Weaver, Guardian 21 July 1993).
‘The 90mph-plus full toss from Brett Lee that he somehow drove through extra cover he
later deemed the greatest shot he had ever played with his eyes closed’ (David Hopps,
Wisden 2006, p 65).
drop vb 1. to fail to take a possible catch, or fail to dismiss a batsman in this way:
drop
55 Duckworth/Lewis method
‘Richie Richardson, the West Indian captain, said he thought England had become
demoralised by the dropped catches that allowed his team to come back from the verge
of defeat and set England 194 to win’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 31 March 1994).
‘In the ensuing tide of English euphoria it was swiftly forgotten that KP had been
dropped three times, most calamitously by Shane Warne’ (Paul Hayward, Wisden 2006,
p 70).
2. to bowl the ball in such a way that it pitches at a particular length, on a particular spot,
or in line with a particular target:
‘Bowlers of intellect will (if they discover your propensity to the forward play …) drop
the ball shorter and shorter, and lead you insensibly into error’ (Felix 1850, p 16).
‘The third prong of the attack was Clarrie Grimmett, dropping the ball as if radar-
guided onto a teasing spot’ (WCM January 1984).
‘He took three steps, dropped the ball on the leg-wicket … and could hit the top of the
off-stump three times in an over’ (James 1963, p 61).
쐽 n an act of dropping a possible catch:
‘Next ball the Yuvraj was dropped in the slips. Perhaps this too was a tactical drop.
Patiala’s lavish hospitality came as a welcome relief after many tough days of touring’
(Bose 1990, p 82).
‘His progress should have been arrested at 21 when he punched Jones at knee height to
Pietersen at short cover: Pietersen’s third drop of the match’ (Haigh 2005, p 38).
duck
duck n 1. a batsman’s score of nought, so called because of the supposed resemblance

between a duck’s egg (the original term – see below) and the figure ‘0’ in the scorebook.
(The analogous term ‘love’, used in tennis and other games, has a similar derivation –
from l’oeuf, ‘the egg’).
Like dying or getting drunk, failing to score in cricket is too delicate a subject to be
discussed without resort to circumlocution, and the term ‘duck’ is simply the most
popular of the many euphemistic expressions that have been coined to get round any
embarrassment. A batsman may get a ‘blob’ or a ‘full moon’, or may even be out
‘without troubling the scorers’ – as if he were doing them a positive favour. At the other
extreme, some scoreboards put a representation of a real duck beside the unfortunate
batsman’s name, and in some forms of cricket the PA system accompanies the batsman
on his walk back to the pavilion to the strains of ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ or
something equally demoralising. The only thing worse than scoring nought is scoring
nought in each innings, and the language of cricket has a number of suitably indirect
expressions to cope with this contingency.
The earliest recorded use of ‘duck’ is dated 1863, and it is no coincidence that the term
should have evolved at precisely the time when wickets were beginning to improve and
high scores were becoming less of a rarity: presumably there had been little disgrace in
scoring nought during the earlier, low-scoring days of the game.
See also BRACE, PAIR
2. —break one’s duck to score the first run or runs of one’s innings; get off the mark:
‘What matters is not that he should “break his duck”, but that he should still be there
and getting a sight of the ball’ (MCC 1952, p 105).
duck’s egg
duck’s egg, duck egg n a score of nought; a duck (obsolete):

‘The player who plays only because he is a good bat, and never bowls after he has laid
his duck egg, has no opportunity of getting four or five wickets with the ball’ (Badminton
1888, p 90).
Duckworth/Lewis method
Duckworth/Lewis method n a system designed for calculating revised targets for

either team in rain-interrupted limited-overs games. Famously complicated, the method
was first proposed in a paper by Frank Duckworth and Tony Lewis (not the former
England cricketer), which appeared in the Journal of the Operational Research Society
in 1998 (Volume 49.3, pp 220–227). It was adopted by the ICC shortly afterwards. In
outline, targets are set ‘in accordance with the relative run scoring resources which are
at the disposal of the two sides’ (The Duckworth/Lewis Method, published by ICC and
available from its website). Inevitably, Duckworth/Lewis has its flaws: some critics say
Duke ball 56
it tends to favour keeping wickets in hand above fast scoring, and it may be weighted too
much in favour of the team which is batting at the point when the game is interrupted.
But the system has been regularly updated and improved. Earlier versions allowed for
manual calculation using tables, the current ‘Professional Edition’, adopted in 2004,
requires a software program to work out targets, making Duckworth/Lewis a byword for
byzantine complexity.
See also VJD METHOD
Duke ball, Duke’s ball n a type of cricket ball manufactured in the UK and widely used
Duke ball
in English cricket. The Duke ball has a more prominent seam than the KOOKABURRA
BALL (qv) and this is said to enhance movement in the air. England is now the only Test-
playing team to use these balls in Test matches, most other sides preferring the
Kookaburra.
E
easy-paced
easy-paced adj (of the wicket) characterised by a relative slowness of pace and evenness
of bounce, and thus providing conditions more favourable to batting than to bowling:
‘Sidebottom looked the most penetrative of the pace bowlers and at 42 he took Cockbain
by surprise with a ball dug sharply into this easy-paced wicket’ (Paul Fitzpatrick,
ECB
ECB n England and Wales Cricket Board: the governing body for cricket in England and
Wales. The ECB was formed in 1997, taking over the responsibilities of the National
Cricket Association (NCA), the Women’s Cricket Association (WCA), the Cricket
Council, and the Test and County Cricket Board (TCCB) – all of which have ceased to
exist.
economical
economical adj (of a bowler or style of bowling) tending to restrict scoring

opportunities, without necessarily taking wickets; conceding relatively few runs:
‘Selvey … has sustained a reputation as an economical new-ball bowler with ability to
swing and seam the ball either way’ (Alan Lee, Cricketer December 1982).
economy
economy n a statistic used in records of a bowler’s performance for showing the average
number of runs conceded for each over bowled. In mid-2006, e.g., Shane Warne’s
‘economy’ rate stood at 2.64, calculated by dividing runs scored off his bowling (17297)
by the number of overs bowled (just over 6500).
edge
edge n 1. the thinnest part of the blade of the bat, closest to its sides, as opposed to the
‘meat’. Balls coming off the edge of the bat are often deflected onto the stumps or into
the cordon of fielders between the wicket-keeper and point. A ‘thin’ edge is one where
the ball only just makes contact with the bat as it passes, so that the degree of deflection
is slight; with a ‘thick’ edge, the contact area is larger, so the ball comes off the bat at a
wider angle. An edge can be further distinguished as a ‘top’, ‘bottom’, ‘inside’, or
‘outside’ edge:
‘When he dropped the ball on the off-stump it might straighten, to take the outside edge
of the bat, or continue to the inside of your ribs’ (James 1963, p 60).
‘As the match entered its crucial phase, DeFreitas and Fraser regularly passed the edge
of the bat, but at the same time were unable to confine the rate of scoring to under three
an over’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
2. a ball deflected off the edge of the bat; a snick:
‘We kept a third man and square-leg to stop the edges going for too many runs’ (Brearley
1982, p 76).
‘But then Laxman – reprieved when the umpire failed to spot a thin edge – batted with
typical majesty to shepherd the lower order’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine
January 2006, p 103).
쐽 vb to deflect the ball with the edge of the bat, rather than hitting it cleanly:
‘Often in the past fast bowlers have switched their line of attack from over to round the
wicket, in order to slant the ball across a right-handed batsman and get him edging into
the slips’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 4 December 1983).
‘The last ball of his first over saw Mark Waugh pushing firmly but loosely and edging on
to his leg stump’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 7 July 1993).
‘Many an innings has been turned around by Gilchrist, but he edged behind after slicing
and slamming six fours’ (David Frith, Wisden 2006, p 96).
eighty-seven 58
eighty-seven
eighty-seven n an individual or team score of 87 runs (or of 187, 287 etc), which in
Australian cricket is generally regarded as very unlucky. 87 is the Australian equivalent
of England’s NELSON (qv), and probably derives from the fact that the score is an
’unlucky 13’ runs short of 100. As with Nelson, the evidence in support of the
superstition is not particularly convincing. As Bernard Whimpress writes in the Oxford
Companion to Australian Sport (1992, p 129): ‘The myth-makers would have us believe
that 87 is a dread score, yet among the 348 cricketers who have represented Australia in
501 Test matches up to mid-1990, only eleven have had this number recorded against
their name’.
eleven
eleven n a cricket team consisting of eleven players. The Laws state that ‘A match is
played between two sides each of eleven Players’, with the rider that ‘A match may be
played by agreement between sides of more or less than eleven players, but not more than
eleven players may field’ (Law 1). Surprisingly, these stipulations date back only as far
as the code of 1884. Prior to that it was not unusual to find that, for any given game, the
numerical strength of the two sides was specially tailored to produce a reasonably fair
contest. For example:
‘In September 1856 we had the All-England Eleven at Dublin, where they played
Eighteen of Ireland’ (Pullin 1900, pp 71–2).
An extreme case was the match between 33 of Norfolk and 11 of All England, which
the Norfolk players, recording a total of 36 ducks, somehow contrived to lose by an
innings (Norfolk Chronicle 29 July 1797). This practice, however, is seen by Charles
Box (1868, p 61) as a ‘departure from what the chief of the Hambledon Club
determined to be the proper number’. And it is a fact that, even in the absence of
specific legislation, important matches were nearly always played between teams of 11
players from the earliest times. The first known case of an 11-a-side match is in 1697:
‘The middle of last week a great match at Cricket was played in Sussex; they were eleven
of a side, and they played for fifty guineas apiece’ (Foreign Post 7 July 1697).
emergency
emergency n a player not belonging to a team but brought in to replace a regular member
(obsolete):
‘He [E. M. Grace] got every wicket in the 2nd innings, in the match played at Canterbury,
14 August 15, 1862, Gentlemen of Kent v. M.C.C., for whom he played as an emergency,
and in which … he scored 192 not out’ (W. G. Grace, Cricketing Reminiscences 1899, p
12).
Though defined in the OED as a ‘substitute’, an emergency was clearly not a substitute
in the strict sense because, as the quotation shows, he was allowed to bat and bowl.
Compare SUBSTITUTE
emperor pair
emperor pair n a ‘pair’ recorded by an opening batsman who is twice dismissed without
scoring in the first ball of his side’s innings:
‘Gooch, on an emperor pair after Dilley removed him first ball in his last innings, looked
destined for his sixth … century when he was out at 99’ (Christopher Wordsworth,
See also PAIR, KING PAIR
end
end n 1. either of the two areas, each comprising a set of stumps and creases, that form the
extremities of the pitch; the batsman facing the bowling is at the ‘striker’s end’ and his
partner is at the ‘non-striker’s end’ or ‘bowler’s end’; and at any given ground each ‘end’
usually has a name based on some local feature:
‘The Umpire at the striker’s end may elect to stand on the off side instead of the on side
of the pitch’ (Law 3 § 11).
‘As the match went on, the wind veered in front of square so that later on all four were
keen to bowl from the Kirkstall Lane End’ (Brearley 1982, p 60).
See also CHANGE ENDS
2. —keep an end up, keep one’s end up to maintain one’s own wicket intact; said
especially of a late-order batsman who plays cautiously in order to enable a more estab-
lished player at the other end to continue his innings
even time
even time n a scoring rate of one run per minute:

59 extra-slip
‘Constantine smashed the ball to all parts of the field to finish his Test career with the
bat with a bravura flourish. He made 79 in less than even time’ (Manley 1988, p 48).
expensive
expensive adj (of a bowler or style of bowling) conceding a relatively high number of
runs per over:
‘Back in Australia he was successful but expensive against the 1910–11 South Africans’
(Edward Liddle, WCM December 1983).
‘Mick Lewis, who conceded 113 runs, now holds the most expensive bowling figures in
a 10-over spell in ODIs’ (Edward Craig, Cricinfo Magazine April 2006, p 75).
express
express n (old) 1. a very fast ball:

‘Other bowling feats with his “expresses” include 7 wickets for 9 runs, 9 wickets for 9
runs, and 9 wickets for 8 runs, in 1871’ (Pullin 1900, p 211).
2. (also express bowler) a very fast bowler:
‘With the terrifying express bowler John Jackson bowling opposite Cris Tinley, the
attack, it was said, consisted of “a corkscrew at one end and a thunderbolt at the other”’
(Frith 1984, p 23).
‘India made a decent start and were doing well at 147 for one, when “Rawalpindi
Express” Shoaib Akhtar castled Rahul Dravid’ (Purandare 2005, p 261).
extra
extra adj used in combination to indicate a supplementary fielding position situated fairly
close, typically along an anti-clockwise arc, to one of the established fielding positions
(old ):
‘Long-off was moved to long-on, and extra-cover to extra long-on — that is, about half-
way between long-on and where square-leg would be’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 135).
Nowadays this usage survives only in the term ‘extra cover’, which is now an
established position in its own right.
쐽 n 1. = EXTRA COVER:
‘Cowdrey set the partnership on its way with a four to extra’ (Peebles 1959, p 106).
‘Atherton was out … driving on the up to short extra where the substitute Cullinan
proved himself an equal of any of his colleagues in the field’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
2. a run credited to EXTRAS
extra cover
extra cover, (also formally extra cover point) n an off-side fielding position (or the
player occupying it) between cover and mid-off. It can be further distinguished as ‘deep’
or ‘short’, in which case the term is often shortened to deep extra or short extra.
See FIELDING POSITIONS
extras
extras n any runs that do not result, directly or indirectly, from a scoring stroke made by
the striker; specifically, runs credited to the batting side (but not to an individual
batsman) in respect of byes, leg-byes, no-balls, or wides. Any additional runs that are
obtained other than by actual running (as from a boundary, a lost ball, or an instance of
the ball being stopped by a player’s helmet) are credited to the striker if he hit the ball,
but otherwise to the appropriate category of extras. In the case of no-balls and wides, the
one-run ‘penalty’ which is incurred ‘shall be in addition to any other runs scored’ (Laws
24 §12, 25 §5).
The term ‘extras’ does not appear until the second half of the 19th century, by which
time the relevant legislation had more or less achieved its present shape. In the earliest
period of the game the only runs that could be scored without hitting the ball were from
byes; no-balls, though defined in the original (1744) code of Laws, did not incur any
penalty until 1829. When wides were first introduced in about 1810 they were, for
scoring purposes, ‘to be put down to the Byes’, and they did not appear as a separate
item until 1828. The final component of the extras appeared in 1850, when leg-byes
were for the first time distinguished from ‘ordinary’ byes.
See BYE, LEG-BYE, NO-BALL, WIDE
extra-slip
extra-slip n See SLIP

F
face
face n 1. the flat front part of the blade of the bat, with which the ball is usually hit:
‘[In back play] The ball ought to be met with the full face of the bat’ (Badminton 1888,
p 55).
2. —open the face (of the bat) to turn the face of the bat outwards towards the off-side
when playing an attacking shot, so that the ball is sent into the area between cover point
and third man:
‘The next ball was outside the off-stump. Tendulkar went on the back foot, opened the
face of his bat, and steered the ball at exactly the opposite angle from the previous one’
(Purandare 2005, p104).
3. —close the face (of the bat) to turn the face of the bat inwards towards the leg-side,
as e.g. when playing a glance, so that the ball is sent into the area behind the wicket on
the leg-side
쐽 vb 1. to be in the position of defending one’s wicket against the bowler; be the batsman
at the striker’s end:
‘Botham protected Willis so well that he had to face only 5 balls in the last 20 minutes,
and we added another 31 crucial runs’ (Brearley 1982, p 74).
2. to play as a batsman against a particular bowler:
‘Atherton … said the key to facing Ambrose was not giving him a breakthrough early on.
He then grinned ruefully: his own dismissal to the first ball of the innings had started the
rout’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 31 March 1994).
facer
facer n India the batsman who is facing the bowler; the striker.
Compare RUNNER
fag
fag n a fielder, especially one who is not a full member of a team but whose function is
simply to retrieve balls in the deep field:
‘On a fine day the long row of nets is fully occupied, and the “fags” in the out-field have
their hands full indeed’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 343).
쐽 vb (also fag out) to act as a fag; field:
‘Winchester boys were never allowed to touch a bat till they had been two years in the
school, their whole time in play-hours being devoted to compulsory fagging out’ (F.
Gale, The Game of Cricket 1887, p 134).
The word is an extended use of the English public-school term for a junior boy who
does menial jobs for his seniors.
fair
fair adj denoting a delivery which is not a no-ball, wide, or dead ball, and off which the
batsman can be dismissed in any of the usual ways:
‘Muttiah Muralitharan, whose bent-elbow delivery has somehow been deemed fair by
umpires in four countries … had three of the last four wickets with his prodigious off-
breaks’ (Caribbean Cricket Quarterly Jan/March 1994, p 37).
fall
fall vb (of a wicket) to be taken by the bowling side when a batsman is dismissed:
‘In 58 minutes seven wickets had fallen for 19 runs on a pitch playing little worse than
in the first innings’ (Brearley 1982, p 77).
쐽 n the taking of a wicket:
61 fast bowlers’ union

‘A batsman may retire at any time during his innings…. If after retiring a batsman
resumes his innings, it shall be only at the fall of a wicket or the retirement of another
batsman’ (Law 2 § 9).
The term derives from the idea of the wicket being ‘down’ when a batsman is
dismissed.
farm
farm vb —farm the bowling/the strike (of a batsman) to keep control of the strike,
especially by scoring singles off the fifth or sixth ball of each over, in order to ensure that
a weaker batting partner is not exposed to the bowling for any longer than necessary:
‘The young giant received but two balls while his captain farmed the bowling for just
under half an hour’ (Peebles 1959, p 184).
‘Smith farmed the strike and Chatfield, when he had to play, did so efficiently enough to
wallop Marks for two successive on-side sixes’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 13 February
1984).
Compare ROTATE
fast
fast adj, adv denoting a bowler, a ball, or a style of bowling characterised by high speed;
‘fast’ is one of the three basic types according to which bowlers are conventionally
categorised (the other two being slow and medium-pace) and a really fast bowler is
capable of propelling the ball at speeds approaching 100 mph (160 kph); fast bowlers
usually open the bowling and take the new ball:
‘Weighing up the tour generally, it is obvious that our fast bowlers have won us the
games; in particular, Larwood has been a great factor’ (‘Second Slip’, Cricketer Spring
Annual 1933).
‘Nothing shows up suspect technique in batting more than top class fast bowling, and the
West Indians have that in abundance’ (Tom Graveney, Cricketer August 1984).
‘Thorpe … started to pierce the off-side with increasing frequency, until reaching the 90s
he was overcome with a tension induced by a keen, accurate and fast spell from Donald’
(Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
쐽 adj (of the wicket) providing conditions favourable to fast bowling, especially by en-
abling the ball to continue in its course after pitching without any loss of pace:
‘He should also ponder the pace of the ground, and never forget that wet on the top of a
hard ground makes the fastest surface of any’ (Badminton 1888, p 267).
‘The West Indies seemed still to be very much in the contest as they left Brisbane for
Perth, which undoubtedly boasts the fastest wicket in the world’ (Manley 1988, p 232).
fast bowlers’ union
fast bowlers’ union n an unofficial and unspoken ‘understanding’ supposedly existing

among fast bowlers of opposing teams, whereby they are guaranteed immunity from
bouncers or other forms of intimidation while they are batting. The agreement is upheld
featherbed 62
by the obvious sanction (also unspoken) that any fast bowler who bowls bouncers at his
opposite number can expect similar treatment when it is his turn to bat. The arrangement,
though apparently ‘sporting’, tends to have little effect when there is an obvious
imbalance in the fast-bowling strengths of the two sides, and in recent years the
bargaining power of the fast bowlers’ union has all but disappeared. Other factors
contributing to its decline are the arrival of the helmet – which makes any batsman ‘fair
game’ – and the near-extinction, in the intensely competitive modern game, of the
genuinely incompetent number 11 slogger.
featherbed
featherbed n a soft and easy-paced wicket offering no encouragement to the bowlers; for
the batsman it makes survival easy, but its slowness of pace does not provide conditions
favourable to attacking strokeplay:
‘England now start thinking about the three one-day games, which start on Saturday
back at Christchurch, which is at least unlikely to be a featherbed’ (Matthew Engel,
Guardian 16 February 1984).
feed
feed vb to bowl in such a way as to encourage the batsman to play a stroke which he is
known to favour, typically in order to induce a catch to a specially placed fielder:
‘He is a strong hooker of the ball, but, perhaps because it brought about his downfall at
Brisbane, it seemed that the bowlers fed this shot’ (Peebles 1959, p 184).
fence
fence n —the fence the boundary:

‘Kaif drives Tudor between cover and extra cover. Neither fielder has the chance to
move as the ball rockets to the fence’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 13).
fend
fend vb to make a tentative, often involuntary, prodding movement with a raised bat,
especially as a means of self-defence:
‘The main tactic … seems to be to dig the ball in short and hope for a catch close to the
wicket as the batsman fends the lifting missile away from his face’ (Christopher Martin-
Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
‘Flintoff roared in to have Ponting caught fending with the second ball of a new spell’
(Haigh 2005, p 198).
ferret
ferret n a late-order batsman with absolutely no batting skill, so called because he ‘goes
in after the rabbits’ (slang)
See RABBIT
fetch
fetch vb to score the stated number of runs (obsolete):

‘The Londoners went in first and fetch’d 95; then the Kentish men went in and fetched
80; upon which the odds ran 10 to 3 on the former’ (Grub Street Journal 17 July 1735).
field
field n 1. the entire area of grass, marked off by a boundary line around its outer edge, on
which a game of cricket is played, as distinguished from the ‘pitch’ or central area
between the two wickets:
‘On that sunlit fourth morning, England strode out on to the field with Australia 175 for
8, chasing 282’ (Steven Lynch, Wisden 2006, p 100).
2. a fielder:
‘On smooth wickets you would see Peel at one end, and perhaps Bates at the other, with
eight fields on the off side’ (Badminton 1888, p 60).
3. the members of a fielding side, considered in terms of the particular configuration in
which they are deployed:
‘He obviously considered the time was come to check a situation which might become
dangerous, and for a spell Davidson and Mackay bowled defensively to deep-set, run-
saving fields’ (Peebles 1959, p 135).
‘Warne … places his field with the same air as a tycoon touring his factory, or a director
sweeping through his set’ (Haigh 2005, p 212).
See also ATTACKING FIELD, DEFENSIVE FIELD
4. the fielders collectively:
‘Mr Jardine rang his changes and shifted the field about, but the first pair seemed
immovable’ (Larwood 1933, p 142).
63 fielding
‘There were many glorious back-foot drives straight to the ropes, and he pierced the field
beautifully, placing the ball in the smallest of gaps between mid-off and extra cover’
(Purandare 2005, p174).
5. —in the field as a fielding side:
‘South Africa’s tenacity in the field was finally capped by Gary Kirsten, scoring a direct
hit at the bowler’s end after running back from mid-on to prevent the lumbering Fraser
from converting two runs to three’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
6. —6–3 field, 7–2 field etc a field setting in which the specified number of fielders
(excluding the bowler and wicket-keeper) is positioned on the off and leg sides of the
wicket respectively: thus in a 6–3 field there are six off-side fielders and three on the leg-
side:
‘Giles … hardly turns the ball enough to justify operating round the wicket with a 7–2
field as he did after tea’ (Haigh 2005, p44).
‘They were going to treat Tendulkar as an exceptional case. They planned to have an 8–
1 field for him and bowl to him wide outside the off-stump’ (Purandare 2005, p324).
‘He does not seem to worry about much – certainly not Muttiah Muralitharan’s extraor-
dinary two-seven field, with only a point and a mid-off on the off side’ (Steve James,
Guardian, 13 May 2006).
쐽 vb 1. to be, or be a member of, the side that is attempting to bowl the batting side out:
‘The players had to field in muffs and greatcoats, and such was the cold they could
scarcely feel the handle of the bat, or know whether they had fielded the ball or not’
(Lillywhite 1860, p 51).
2. to act as a fielder in the specified position:
‘For once the ploy worked nicely, Hughes timing his hook perfectly so that it carried all
the way to Emburey fielding a few yards in from the edge just behind square’ (Brearley
1982, p 93).
3. (of a captain or team) to elect to be the fielding side after winning the toss:
‘Despite losing his leading fast bowler, Ponting decided to field on a cloudy morning,
influenced by some gloomy predictions about the pitch’ (Steven Lynch, Wisden 2006,
p102).
4. to stop and return the ball when acting as a fielder:
‘Parked out at mid-on, he would never field a ball if he could kick it on to a team-mate’
(Frith 1984, p 137).
5. (of a team) to go into a match with the stated players:
‘Australia brought in Hogg … for Maguire, while Pakistan fielded the same side which
had drawn the Fourth Test in Melbourne’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer March 1984).
fielder
fielder n 1. any member of the side that is fielding, apart from the bowler and wicket-
keeper:
‘The field set by Courtney Walsh was such that the boundaries were protected by six or
seven fielders for the first four balls of each over’ (Paul Allott, CricketerMay 1994).
2. a player who fields with the stated level of skill or in a particular fielding position:
‘Fullston played an important role in the 1984–85 series against England taking 19
wickets … She also scored some useful runs and was a fine close to the wicket fielder’
‘Jonty Rhodes is probably the greatest fielder in the world, virtually covering two posi-
tions – point and cover, or mid-on and mid-wicket – with acrobatic agility and speed’
(Donald Woods, Guardian 20 July 1994).
‘Fielder’ is now the usual term, but it was not much used before the 20th century. The
earlier word ‘fieldsman’ first entered the language in the mid-18th century, and was
used in every version of the Laws until the code of 2000.
fielding
fielding n the performance or ability of an individual fielder or of the fielders in a team

‘The inspirational fielding of Jonty Rhodes, whose exceptional speed over the ground …
acted equally as a depressant on the opposing batsmen and as a stimulant to his own
bowlers’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
fielding positions 64
‘Slip fielding needs great powers of concentration, never mind quick reflexes’ (Simon
Hughes, Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket 2002, p 120).
fielding positions
fielding positions (for definitions see individual entries) to those who are uninitiated
in the language and lore of cricket, there is nothing so mysterious as a description of a
field setting: ‘Shoaib is bowling to an attacking field, with three slips and a gully, a silly
point, two short legs (one forward and the other slightly backward of square), with only
two men out in the deep, at third man and long on’. Yet what looks at first like a foreign
language is in fact a logical and highly flexible code that enables a commentator to
describe with considerable accuracy any position occupied by a fielder on a ground
covering several acres.
The key to understanding the system is the fact that it is made up of two distinct
elements. The first element comprises a set of basic, mainly ‘binary’, markers, each of
which establishes a broad area or direction in relation to the batsman. These are shown
in Fig. 1 and are: off and leg (or on); square and fine; backward and forward; wide and
straight; and deep (or long), short, and silly.
The second element in the code is a finite set of terms which, unlike the markers in Fig.
1, denote precise positions in the field: the most common members of this set are shown
in Fig. 2. The names of this group of positions have evolved over the years in an ad hoc
way, and lack the symmetry and logic of the items in the first set. In fact, of course, all
these names have their own rationale, but ‘wicket-keeper’ is the only member of the set
that could really be called self-evident, and the apparent arbitrariness of all the others
helps to make the system as a whole look fairly impenetrable.
These two main sets of terms form the basis of a highly productive system of
description. By using individual items or combinations of items from either or both of
the sets, it is possible to pinpoint any position on the cricket field. For example:
forward short leg denotes a position that is in front of the line of the batsman’s wicket
(forward), not very far from the bat (short), and on the side of the pitch lying behind
the batsman as he stands at the crease (leg).
Fig. 3 shows some of the fielding positions whose names are formed by combining
items from the set in Fig. 1.
65 fifty
Fig. 4 shows some of the fielding positions whose names are formed by combining
items from both main sets.
fielding restrictions
fielding restrictions n the regulations that prescribe limitations in the deployment of

fielders:
‘In addition to the restriction contained in clause 41.2.1 above, further fielding restric-
tions shall apply to certain overs in each innings’ (Standard One Day International
Match Playing Conditions, ICC 2005, p139).
The only universal fielding restriction, outlined in Law 41§ 5, states that at the moment
when the ball is delivered ‘there shall not be more than two fielders, other than the
wicket-keeper, behind the popping crease on the on side’. In one-day forms of the
game, however, additional restrictions generally apply, chiefly with the aim of
preventing captains from setting wholly defensive fields. In ODIs, current regulations
stipulate a total of 20 overs in which fielding restrictions are in force, consisting of the
first ten overs of the innings, and two further blocks of five overs each to be decided
by the captain of the fielding side – the so-called POWERPLAYS (qv). During these overs,
no more than two fielders may be stationed in the outfield, outside the CIRCLE (qv).
field placing, field setting n the way in which the fielders are positioned around the
field placing
playing area for a particular bowler:

‘Bowling around the wicket, with a low arm, Vine differed from those who were expert
in imparting leg-spin to genuinely fast balls … only in his trajectory, which was lower,
and in his field-placing, which was heavily accented to the leg side’ (Frith 1984, p 53).
fieldsman
fieldsman n a fielder:
‘There have been numerous fieldsmen at point who have made themselves a name, and
by universal testimony in his day, Mr R.T. King of Cambridge University was not
approached in excellence in this position’ (Badminton 1888, p 279).
fifty
fifty n a batsman’s score of between 50 and 99 runs; a HALF-CENTURY:

‘As for the batting, England’s perennial problem was that batsmen would get fifties and
then get out’ (Peter Hook, Australian Cricket October 1993).
figures 66
figures
figures n a summary of a bowler’s performance in an innings or a match, showing wickets

taken against runs scored; it sometimes also includes the number of overs and maidens
bowled, but in this case the term ANALYSIS (qv) would be more usual:
‘On 31 July 1956, Jim Laker, the tall, taciturn Surrey Yorkshireman, completed match
figures of 68–27–90–19’ (Frith 1984, p 129).
‘The winning sequence began with Davison’s amazing performance against the USA …
when he took 17 for 137, the best first-class match figures anywhere since Jim Laker’s
Test in 1956’ (Ron Fanfair, Wisden 2005, p 1523).
fine
fine adj, adv close to, and on either side of, an imaginary line separating the off and leg
sides of the pitch behind the batsman’s wicket:
‘Sometimes short-slip is put very fine, sometimes rather wider, as circumstances may
require’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 43).
‘Cowdrey went ahead with another four off Davidson, which went very fine past back-
ward short-leg’ (Peebles 1959, p 186).
Also used in combination to indicate a modified fielding position that would normally
be somewhat squarer, such as third man or backward short leg.
Compare STRAIGHT. See FIELDING POSITIONS
fine leg
fine leg n a fairly deep leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
batsman’s wicket and close to the imaginary line separating the off and leg sides of the
pitch. Fine leg is a fairly modern term, rarely found in pre-war writings, which developed
out of the older fine long leg.
fine-leg drive
fine-leg drive n a form of on drive played to a ball pitching on or outside leg stump, in
which the ball is sent towards long leg or fine leg; this is an ‘advanced’ version of the on
drive – itself a notoriously difficult stroke to play well – hence its rarity, as the citation
here shows:
‘Then with rare boldness Azhar essayed the old-fashioned fine-leg drive, not seen here
since Cowdrey in the ’70s. Unlike Colin, he missed’ (Dave Crowe, Cricketer May 1994).
finger
finger n —give the batsman the finger (of the umpire) to signal that the batsman is out
by raising the index finger (slang):
‘Roy Palmer delayed his decision long enough for Healy to think he might have got away
with it, and then gave the Australian keeper the most malevolently slow finger’ (Mike
Selvey, Guardian 7 July 1993).
finger-spin
finger-spin n spin imparted to the ball chiefly through movement of the fingers, rather
than of the wrist. The right-arm bowler’s off-break and the slow left-arm bowler’s ‘stock’
ball – in effect a leg-break – are both achieved by means of finger-spin. The right-arm
finger-spinner grips the ball chiefly with the thumb and first two fingers and twists it
from left to right in a movement that is sometimes compared to turning the handle of a
door, with the first finger imparting most of the ‘break’. The direction and flight of the
ball is easier to control than if bowled with WRIST-SPIN (qv), so finger-spinners tend to
be more economical than wrist-spinners.
The term finger-spin was formerly less exclusive and was at one time used to denote all
forms of slow spin-bowling, as distinguished from faster bowling in which the break was
achieved by means of ‘cut’ or ‘action-break’. It was thus often applied to what would
now be called wrist-spin: the OED has a 1906 citation in which Schwarz, Faulkner, and
Vogler – the legendary South African googly trio – are described as ‘finger-spin
bowlers’. In modern usage the distinctions are more finely drawn.
finger-spinner
finger-spinner n an exponent of finger-spin:

‘Udal does concede that part of the problem is that finger spinners such as himself – as
opposed to wrist spinners such as Warne – have become targeted by batsmen.’ (Jon
Henderson, Observer 23 October 2005).
first change
first change adj, adv bowling as the first bowler brought on to replace one of the two
opening bowlers in a side’s attack:
67 flamingo
‘The normal rule is that the middle order accelerate after the front-line bowlers … have
gone, but that is difficult to operate when Marshall is bowling first change’ (Matthew
Engel, Guardian 5 June 1984).
‘Shaun Pollock, in his 99th Test, started his new career as a first-change bowler and top-
order batsman with a cleanly struck 40 at No.6’ (Neil Manthorp, Guardian 3 April
2006).
쐽 n a first change bowler:
‘First change was Victor Pascall, for long years the best slow left-hander in the West
Indies’ (James 1963, p 60).
first-class
first-class adj 1. denoting cricket played at the highest level, as defined by the ICC;
specifically, cricket played in matches of three or more days’ duration between two
teams of eleven players that are officially recognised as having first-class status:
‘Lara rocked back on his elegant heels for the boundary which gave him a remarkable
501 not out, the highest individual score in the records of first-class cricket’ (David Foot,
Matches played in the major domestic competitions of all full members of the ICC (that
is, Australia, Bangladesh, England, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri
Lanka, West Indies, and Zimbabwe) are all accorded first-class status, as of course are
any Test matches played between member countries. Well-known first-class
competitions include the English County Championship, the Carib Beer Cup in the
West Indies, the Ranji Trophy in India, the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy in Pakistan, and the
Pura Cup in Australia. Other less regular fixtures may also be adjudged first-class by
the relevant governing bodies: for example, the annual Ireland-Scotland match has
first-class status, as do games between certain UCCE (university) teams and English
first-class counties. In earlier times, the English domestic game boasted a considerable
number of ‘extra’ first-class fixtures, such as matches involving the Free Foresters,
Leveson Gower’s XI, and of course the Gentlemen and Players.
2. of, concerning, or involved in first-class cricket:
‘The Maharajah of Porbander … played in the first four matches making 0, 2, 0, 2, 2. He
did not play again on the tour and had a first-class average of 0.66. He was said to be
the only first-class cricketer in England to have more Rolls-Royces than runs’ (Bose
1990, p 69).
‘Beckett, who died in Paris on 22 December 1989, aged 83, had two first-class games
for Dublin University against Northamptonshire in 1925 and 1926, scoring 35 runs in
his four innings’ (Obituary of Samuel Beckett, Wisden 1990).
first drop
first drop n the number three position in the batting order, so called because the player
batting in this position goes in after the first wicket has fallen (slang):
‘“How will he cope with this?” asked the sages, rightly ignoring Cook’s first-drop expe-
riences with Maldon CC’ (Steve James, Guardian 12 May 2006).
first slip
first slip See SLIP

five-for
five-for n a bowler’s haul of five or more wickets in an innings (slang):

‘South African conditions have made this a bowler’s tournament, as witnessed by the 12
five-fors that have already been recorded’ (Simon Briggs, Daily Telegraph, 13 July
2003).
See also MICHELLE
fiver
fiver n a shot by the batsman resulting in a score of five runs; specifically, a ball hit over
the boundary without bouncing, which, under regulations in force in Australia during the
first few years of the 20th century, carried an allowance of five runs (obsolete):
‘Braund drove a loose one from Saunders high and straight, the ball landing on top of
the bicycle track, almost a fiver’ (Melbourne Argus 15 December 1903).
Compare FOURER, SIXER
flamingo
flamingo n an unorthodox batting stroke in which the batsman balances on one leg,
usually flicking the ball towards the on-side; the flamingo is one of Kevin Pietersen’s
trademark shots
flash 68
flash
flash vb to play a ball passing outside the off stump with a quick, involuntary movement
of the bat, often withdrawing the bat again hastily in an attempt to avoid making contact
with the ball:
‘England were 193 for six and after two punishing fours Botham flashed at a short one
from Thomson and was caught by Chappell at first slip’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer
February 1983).
‘Both were off Muralitharan and both to shortish balls outside off stump at which Cook
flashed, once without contact but the other producing the four which flew between wick-
etkeeper and slip’ (Steve James, Guardian 12 May 2006).
flat
flat adj 1. (of a ball bowled by a slower bowler) characterised by a low, straight trajectory
rather than a high ‘looping’ arc:
‘The standard of wicketkeeping … probably is higher than it has ever been in respect of
keeping to pace and swing bowling; and even, which is not easy, to flat, pushed-through
spin’ (Arlott 1983, p 54).
2. (of the wicket) having an even and rather lifeless surface, so that the ball bounces
consistently but without menace:
‘A flat wicket raises a dicey question: pack the middle order with an extra batsman for
security, or play an extra bowler to dismiss the opposition?’ (Amrit Mathur, Sportstar
[Chennai] 16 July 1994).
‘Australia claimed just five South African second-innings wickets during 126 overs on
the flattest Perth pitch ever produced’ (Malcolm Conn, The Age (Melbourne), 24–25
December 2006).
flat bat
flat bat n 1. a bat held horizontally with its full face presented to the ball:
‘Benaud dropped the ball a shade short, and Richardson withdrew a pace and lathered
it with the flat bat, presumably aiming to clear mid-on’ (Peebles 1959, p 178).
2. (also flat-bat) a shot played with a flat bat:
‘Heading in the second innings for an initial first-class century, he reached 98 at
Fitzherbert Park with a hazardous flat-bat over cover’ (Terry Power, WCM).
flat-bat
flat-bat vb to hit the ball fairly straight with a ‘flat bat’, producing a somewhat unorthodox
shot, often when the ball is neither short enough to cut nor far enough up to drive:
‘After flat-batting Thomson over cover point for four he was hit a painful blow on the toe
by a full toss’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
flat six
flat six n a six that follows a relatively low trajectory:

‘Jason Brown was driven for a flat six over long-on with a stroke which was the epitome
of economy: minimum lift of his three-pound bat but superb timing and control’ (Paul
Bolton, Daily Telegraph 18 April 2004).
flick
flick vb to hit the ball towards the leg side with a light quick movement of the wrists,
usually sending it over the heads of the the close fielders and into the area behind the
wicket:
‘This combination of solidity and audacity quickly provoked Border into … bringing in
his deep fine leg, whereupon Asiwar showed his brilliance by walking across his crease
to flick deliveries into the unpopulated areas around long leg’ (Peter Roebuck, Sydney
Morning Herald 21 February 1990).
‘Sachin batted aggressively, driving, cutting and flicking the nigglingly accurate Walsh’
쐽 n a leg-side shot played with a light quick movement of the wrists into the area behind
the wicket, especially to a half-volley pitching on or around leg stump
flight
flight n the ability to control and vary the trajectory of the ball, and the consequent
potential for deceiving the batsman as to its length and pace, when considered as one of
the skills of a slow bowler; especially, the ability to deliver the ball with a high, curving
trajectory:
‘Two runs later Harris went down the wicket to Laker, who beat him with flight and turn,
and was stumped’ (Peebles 1959, p 37).
69 follow-on
‘In the 1970s, the great Bedi lulled batsmen with imperceptible changes of flight and
line’ (Vic Marks, Observer 5 March 2006).
쐽 vb to deliver the ball with a relatively high, curving trajectory with the intention of de-
ceiving the batsman, especially in order to draw him forward out of his crease; give the
ball air:
‘By what is called “flighting” the ball the bowler is out to delude him as to where it will
pitch, in other words to make the ball look as if it will drop farther up than it in fact will’
(MCC 1952, p 59).
‘Cyril Vincent … played in 25 Tests, excelling at Leeds in 1935, when he took eight top
England wickets with immaculate flighted left-arm spin’ (Frith 1984, p 103).
Flighting the ball represents the ‘attacking mode’ of slow bowling, in that it is primarily
intended to take wickets even at the risk of severe punishment.
Compare PUSH THROUGH
flipper
flipper n a relatively slow ball that behaves somewhat like a top-spinner and is produced
by a particularly convoluted variety of wrist-spin:
‘He turned the series in Australia’s favour with a decisive spell in the second innings,
beginning with a flipper that completely deceived Richie Richardson’ (Australian
Cricket October 1993).
The flipper is produced by gripping the ball mainly with the tips of the first and third
fingers and squeezing or ‘flipping’ it out so that it emerges from the back or side of the
hand with an extra helping of top spin on it. If successfully executed it will hurry
through without deviation, keeping low and gaining pace as it pitches, so that it reaches
the batsman sooner than he expects. The flipper has been described as ‘the most arcane
and esoteric ball in cricket’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 11 March 1984) and its ‘invention’
is usually attributed to Clarrie Grimmett; more recent exponents include Richie
Benaud, Abdul Qadir, and Shane Warne.
floater
floater n a well-flighted slow ball, typically bowled by a finger-spinner, which drifts in

the air into or away from the batsman, the object being to draw the batsman forward and
entice him to play down the wrong line:
‘Hughes had the better of this contest until the off-spinner deceived him with a perfect
floater which he tried to sweep but missed’ (Brearley 1982, p 86).
‘Lara laid Muralitharan’s wide variety of balls to waste…The off-break, the floater, the
arm-ball, the top-spinner, were all read from the bowler’s wrist’ (Purandare 2005, p
186).
fly-slip
fly-slip n an off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) directly behind the slips
and somewhat shorter than third man; fly-slip is particularly effective for trapping a
batsman who is inclined to slice the ball over the heads of the slips:
‘So many runs came from uppercuts over the slips that Willis eventually sent two men
two-thirds of the way back to the boundary to act as fly-slips’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian
6 November 1982).
follow on
follow on vb (of a team) to have a second innings immediately after the first at the request
of the opposing captain, after failing to reach a score within a stipulated number of runs
of the opposing team’s first innings score, in accordance with the follow-on rule:
‘Not even Lee’s hard-hit 47 could prevent Australia from following on for the first time
since Karachi in 1988–89’ (Lawrence Booth, Wisden 2006, p 115).
follow-on
follow-on n an enforced second innings taken by a side immediately after its first innings,
when its first innings total falls short of its opponents’ score by a stipulated number of
runs:
‘Such was the resentment against West Indies captain Jeff Stollmeyer, over his decision
not to compel England’s follow-on, that he was given police protection’ (Crawford
White, News Chronicle Cricket Annual 1954, p 6).
The enforcement of the follow-on is at the discretion of the opposing captain, whose
side must of course have batted first, and this option is currently available when his
team leads by the following margins: 200 runs in a match of five days or more, 150 runs
in a three- or four-day match, 100 runs in a two-day match, or 75 runs in a one-day
follow through 70
match (Law 13 § 1). If the first day’s play is completely lost, the figures are adjusted
accordingly: thus the margin would be reduced to 150 in the case of a five-day Test
match in which there had been no play on the opening day. The follow-on rule was first
introduced in 1835 and was to be applied when the side batting second was 100 runs or
more in arrears. The relevant figures were changed from time to time but the main
difference from the present Law was that, until 1900, the follow-on was compulsory,
rather than being an option available to the opposing captain.
follow through vb to complete a batting stroke or a bowling action with a follow-
follow through
through:
‘Like all other strokes, the cut should be followed through as far as possible’
‘He [Flintoff] was following through almost three-quarters of the length of the pitch’
(Haigh 2005, p 78).
follow-through
follow-through n 1. the stage in a batting stroke after the ball has been struck, when the
stroke is completed with an upward or lateral swing of the bat:
‘A full swing in the second half of the stroke is good because in any follow-through
freedom and length make for power’ (C.B. Fry, Cricket: batsmanship 1912, p 44).
2. the stage in a bowler’s delivery after the ball has been released, when the bowler
completes his delivery stride and, if bowling relatively fast, continues running for several
paces; a ‘deliberate and fluent follow-through’ is listed in the M.C.C. Coaching Manual
(MCC 1952, p 28) as one of the four requirements for a good bowling action:
‘Cotter’s follow-through was also dramatic, taking him yards down the wicket before his
arm’s swing finished’ (Edward Liddle, WCM December 1983).
3. a worn or roughened area on the pitch produced by the repeated impact of a bowler’s
feet as he completes his delivery with a follow-through; such patches should not in
theory appear directly between the wickets, since the Laws expressly forbid bowlers
running down the pitch after a delivery (Law 42 § 12), but they may still be close enough
to be exploited by a resourceful spinner:
‘Its texture when dry is such that the follow-throughs, even if not part of the main strip,
can powder, offering some help to the versatile spinner’ (Brearley 1982, p 110).
71 forfeit
foothold
foothold n a roughened area on the pitch offering a secure grip for a player’s foot,
especially for a batsman or bowler:
‘Lock … had persevered in all circumstances and made immediate and effective use of
the first signs of wear or dust from the footholds’ (Peebles 1959, p 67).
‘The umpires shall allow players to secure their footholds by the use of sawdust’ (Law
10 § 7).
footwork
footwork n the manner or skill with which a batsman moves his feet when batting,
especially as this contributes to effective strokeplay:
‘Viswanath came in, to meet Underwood’s first two deliveries with such precision of
footwork that no soothsayer was required to see that a long overdue score was in the
making’ (Berry 1982, p 102).
for
for prep 1. used when giving a team’s total score to show the number of wickets that have
fallen when the score is at the stated number. In England, South Africa, the West Indies,
and the Indian subcontinent, the convention is that the score precedes the word ‘for’: eg
England were struggling at 116 for six (or for the loss of six wickets). In Australia and
New Zealand, the numbers are reversed, with the first figure showing the number of
wickets that have fallen, e.g. Australia declared on five for 342.
2. used when giving a bowler’s analysis, to show the number of runs that have been
scored off his bowling in relation to the number of wickets taken; the first digit indicates
wickets, and the second runs conceded:
‘The first sensational performance of Laker’s first-class career came in the Test trial at
Bradford in 1950, when he took 8 for 2’ (Frith 1984, p 129).
3. —three-for, ten-for etc a bowler’s haul of the specified number of wickets (slang):
‘That 10-for was the prelude to his domination of the Australians in 1956, which rose to
a crescendo at Old Trafford’ (Subroto Sirkar, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 27).
See also FIVE-FOR
force
force vb 1. to hit the ball when playing a FORCING SHOT:

‘Some of his straight drives off Bedser with a sudden bend of the knees, forcing the ball
off a good length with very little back lift and with immense wrist strength, were breath-
taking’ (Manley 1988, p 83).
2. —force the pace to try to increase one’s rate of scoring, even if this involves taking
risks, when runs need to be made quickly:
‘Atherton was out trying to force the pace, driving on the up to short extra, where the
substitute Cullinan proved himself an equal of any of his colleagues in the field’ (Richard
Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
쐽 n a FORCING SHOT:
‘The force can also be played to the short of a length ball just outside the leg stump which
cannot be hooked or pulled’ (Wayne Larkins, Cricketer September 1984).
forcing shot
forcing shot n an attacking batting stroke played usually to a ball pitching rather short
of a length and typically just outside off stump (or leg stump), in which the bat is swung
downwards and forwards with great force, sending the ball into the area between cover
and mid-off (or between mid-wicket and mid-on):
‘After leaving so many alone, Farhat attempted to play a forcing shot at a ball he should
have defended’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 18 July 2006).
forfeit
forfeit vb 1. (of a captain) to forgo an innings completely, as provided for under the Laws
of the game or local playing regulations:
‘The Kent skipper, Chris Tavaré, forfeited his side’s first innings in a bid to make a
match of it against Hampshire’ (Guardian 31 May 1983).
The right to forfeit an innings is a fairly recent innovation, and is typically exercised in
an attempt to get a result when a match has been severely curtailed by bad weather. The
relevant Law simply states that ‘A captain may forfeit either of his side’s innings. A
forfeited innings shall be considered as a completed innings’ (Laws 14 §2).
2. (of one of the teams in a game) to concede the game to the opposing side by refusing
to play:
forward 72
‘In accordance with the laws of cricket it was noted that the umpires had correctly
deemed that Pakistan had forfeited the match and awarded the Test to England’ (State-
ment by David Collier, ECB Chief Executive, at the Kennington Oval 21 August 2006).
For the first time in the history of Test cricket, Law 21 §3 (a) (i) was invoked at the
Kennington Oval on 20 August 2006, when the umpires awarded the Fourth Test
between England and Pakistan to the home side on the grounds that Pakistan had
refused to continue playing after having 5 penalty runs awarded against them. Pakistan
were allegedly in breach of Law 42 §3, which deals with the whole issue of fielding
sides ‘changing the condition of the ball’.
See also BALL-TAMPERING
forward
forward adv striking or attempting to strike the ball from a position in which the ‘front
foot’ (the left foot in the case of a right-handed batsman) is advanced down the wicket to
the pitch of the ball and carries most of the weight of the body:
‘He bowled at me in a match, fast straight stuff to which one could play forward comfort-
ably’ (James 1963, p 107).
‘The floater … is bowled at a slower pace than the arm-ball, or indeed at the same pace.
The difference with this delivery is that it tends to draw the batsman forward and into
playing down the wrong line’ (Lindsay Moody, Cricketer August 1994).
쐽 adj (of a stroke or style of play) made by or characterised by the batsman playing for-
ward:
‘David Harris … wrought quite a revolution in the game, changing cricket from a back-
ward and slashing to a forward and defensive game’ (Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 153).
‘Yesterday his first movement to Warne was always forward, pad closely escorting his
bat when it wasn’t leading the way’ (Haigh 2005, p 203).
The type of bowling practised in the earliest days of cricket did not encourage the
playing of strokes off the front foot:
‘With the primitive fashion of ground bowling, called sneakers, forward play could have
no place’ (Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 153).
But the more sophisticated style of bowling that evolved towards the end of the 18th cen-
tury – specifically the well pitched-up ‘length ball’ perfected by David Harris (See
BOWLING) – led to the introduction of the ‘straight bat’ and to a greater emphasis on for-
ward play.
Compare BACK. See also FRONT FOOT
쐽 adj, adv indicating a position a little in front of the line of the batsman’s wicket. Usu-
ally used in combination to indicate a modified fielding position that would normally be
squarer on to the wicket, such as short leg or square leg:
‘Chappell avoided a pair when he pushed his first ball uppishly past Cook at forward
short-leg’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
Compare BACKWARD. See FIELDING POSITIONS
forward cut
forward cut n a batting stroke in which the front foot is brought forward and somewhat
across towards the off, and the ball, typically a short-pitched delivery well outside the off
stump, is hit with a horizontal bat into the area between point and cover. Unlike a true
cut, the stroke derives much of its force from the arms and shoulders (rather than the
wrists) and the MCC coaching book (MCC 1952, p 95) concedes that it ‘is really a cross-
batted drive or slash’.
four
four n an instance of the ball crossing the boundary after bouncing at least once, especially
when hit by the batsman but also as a bye, wide, or leg-bye, or as the result of an
overthrow. The umpire signals a four to the scorers by waving the hand from side to side,
and four runs are added to the score of the batsman or team as appropriate.
See BOUNDARY
fourer
fourer n a four (obsolete):

‘Warner scored the first fourer by hitting McLeod twice to the mid-on boundary in the
same over’ (Melbourne Argus 18 January 1904).
73 front-foot
fourth umpire
fourth umpire n in international games, an additional umpire whose duties include

controlling access to the pitch and being in charge of the match balls. In addition, the
fourth umpire ‘shall act as the emergency third umpire’ in the event of the third umpire
being unable to continue (ICC Standard Test Match Playing Conditions 3.1.6).
French cut
French cut n Australia, NZ an attempted drive in which the ball is accidentally deflected
off the inside edge of the bat so that it passes between the batsman and the wicket and
runs down towards fine leg; a CHINESE CUT
front foot n the foot that is further from the stumps when a batsman is standing at the
front foot
crease; the left foot in the case of a right-handed batsman or the right foot in the case of
a left-handed batsman. A ‘forward’ stroke, in which this foot is advanced down the
wicket towards the pitch of the ball and carries most of the batsman’s weight, is said to
be played ‘off the front foot’:
‘Most great batsmen have been ready and able to play off the front and the back foot with
equal facility’ (MCC 1952, p 72).
‘One of the faults I picked up in England was because I started playing everything on the
front foot. But then all batsmen tend to get that way in England where you have to
counter the movement by going forward’ (Mohammed Azharuddin, Sportstar [Chennai]
7 May 1994).
‘An interesting discussion on batting in English conditions ensued, with Richards
holding forth on the merits of getting on the front foot’ (Rajan Bala, Cricinfo Magazine
May 2006, p 46).
See also FORWARD. Compare BACK FOOT
front-foot
front-foot adj played, or tending to play, off the front foot:

‘Already the ball was coming through sluggishly, which did not suit Gooch’s front foot
game’ (Berry 1982, p 113).
‘Years ago each team had a genuine swing bowler and the great craft is to pitch the ball
up, which induces the front foot drive, one of the game’s aesthetic shots and that brings
the slips into play’ (Geoffrey Boycott, Colin Cowdrey Lecture, 19 July 2005).
frontline 74
frontline
frontline adj 1. denoting a bowler who is one of the main specialist bowlers in a team,
especially one of the opening bowlers:
‘In Tasmania he refused to bowl his front-line bowlers in a bizarre protest at the actions
of the local groundsman’ (Geoff Armstrong, A Century of Summers: 100 years of Shef-
field Shield Cricket, p 16).
2. denoting a specialist batsman who bats in the top order or middle order:
‘The frontline batsmen were all at sea against an attack which was accurate, if not
hostile’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
full
full n at the point in the trajectory of a well pitched-up ball where it reaches or passes the
batsman while still in flight:
‘Lawson tried to york him and in fact Randall played all round a ball which passed his
bat on the full and hit the base of the middle and off stumps’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer
February 1983).
full moon
full moon n a batsman’s score of nought; a duck (obsolete):

‘Two men go in, both of whom in their 1st innings had scored full moons’ (Bell’s Life, 4
July 1841).
full pitch
full pitch n a FULL TOSS:

‘The second kind of full-pitch — the one reaching the batsman about the height of his
knees — is the most usual of full pitches, and enjoys the distinction of being considered
the easiest of all balls to hit’ (Badminton 1888, p 144).
‘Having had a full-pitch hit for six and a half-volley for four, there was a strong proba-
bility that Mr Downing would pitch his next ball short’ (P.G. Wodehouse, Mike and
Psmith 1909).
This term, which is is no longer in general use, survived until recently in a section of
the Laws devoted to the bowling of ‘Fast High Full Pitches’ (1980 code, 42 §9). The
corresponding section of the most recent code of Laws (42 §6 (b)) refers instead to
‘high full pitched balls’.
full toss
full toss n a ball bowled right up to the batsman so that it does not pitch before reaching
the bat. The full toss relieves the batsman of any of the difficulties associated with
movement off the pitch and uneven bounce, and unless very fast it also eliminates the
crucial problem of assessing the ball’s length. It is, therefore, generally regarded as a bad
delivery.
See diagram at LENGTH
G
galli cricket
galli cricket n India a form of street cricket, using a soft ball, which is played widely in
the Indian subcontinent. For many future players, galli cricket is their first experience of
the game:
‘“I have never played cricket before”, he chuckles after he was bowled for a cheeky
single. Chiru has never even played galli cricket because of his dad’s frequent transfers’
(Souvik Chowdhury, The Hindu 30 January 2003).
gap
gap n a space between fielders, through which the batsman attempts to play the ball in
order to maximise the chances of scoring runs:
‘He had got to 365 with a cover drive off Caddick to the boundary. Not for him the
nervous squirting of the ball into the gaps for runs which could, in theory, be made more
safely’ (R. Mohan, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
gardening
gardening n the process by which a batsman attempts to smooth out any irregularities in
the wicket, especially by prodding the pitch with his bat in between deliveries:
‘There was a good deal of agitated gardening from the batsmen and Howarth, unusually
for him, appeared in a helmet’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 3 February 1984).
gate
gate n 1. the space between the bat and the batsman’s leg, especially when the batsman
fails to keep bat and pad together when playing a forward stroke:
‘Lara shimmied down the pitch, misjudged the length, and the ball turned obligingly out
of the rough and through the gate before hitting middle’ (Vic Marks, Wisden 2005 p 59).
2. a set of stumps; a wicket (which did of course originally mean a type of gate)
(obsolete):
‘Upon the earliest appearance of the game in Ireland, the people applied the word Gate
instead of Wicket’ (W. Bolland, Cricket Notes 1851, p 109).
쐽 vb to dismiss a batsman by bowling him through the ‘gate’:
‘Lamb … was nicely caught at short leg by Rameez, and when Randall was “gated” by
a Qadir googly, the writing was on the wall’ (Jack Bannister, WCM May 1984).
gazunder
gazunder n = GOZUNDER
gentleman
gentleman n 1. (especially in Britain before 1962) an amateur cricketer involved in first-

class cricket (See AMATEUR):
‘We think that the Universities, or the laziness of University men, may chiefly be blamed
for the dearth of gentlemen bowlers’ (Badminton 1888, p 378).
2. —the Gentlemen (in the period 1806–1962) a team selected by MCC from the body
of amateur cricketers to play in one of the regular matches against ‘the Players’ (See
PLAYER):
‘In 1844 the Gentlemen lost the services of Mr. Felix, perhaps their best bat, and Sir F.
Bathurst, their second best bowler, and were defeated by 38 runs’ (Badminton 1888, p
359).
The first Gentlemen v Players match was staged in July 1806 at the original Lord’s
ground, and the annual Lord’s encounter (which continued until the abolition of
amateur status in 1962) was the high point of the English cricket season before Test
matches with touring sides became a regular feature. In addition to the Lord’s
showpiece, Gentlemen v Players matches were also held annually at the Oval (from
get 76
1857 to 1934) and at the Scarborough Festival (from 1885 to 1962), and occasional
extra games were staged at other grounds.
get
get vb 1. —get (the ball) away to manage to hit a scoring stroke and penetrate the cordon
of fielders, especially when playing against tight defensive bowling:
‘Botham, off a short run with Taylor standing up, was difficult to get away, and
Hemmings bowled his off-breaks tidily’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
2. —get out a. to dismiss a batsman or batting side b. to be dismissed; lose one’s wicket
3. —get up (of the ball ) to rise relatively high off the wicket after pitching; lift:
‘Soon after that, Marsh was lbw pushing half forward at one from Cowans which did not
get up’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
give
give vb —give out/not out (of the umpire) to signal that a batsman is out/not out in
answering an appeal made by the fielding side:
‘An umpire shall intervene if satisfied that a batsman, not having been given out, has left
his wicket under a misapprehension that he is out.’ (Law 27 § 7).
given man
given man n a player who is not a regular member of a team but is allowed to play for it
in a particular match, often being supplied by the opposing side in an attempt to produce
a more even contest:
‘On Aug. 28, at Stephens Castle Green, New Alresford beat Bishops Waltham with 2
given men, by 9 wickets’ (Hampshire Chronicle 4 September 1775).
The use of ‘given men’ was a common feature of the early Gentlemen v Players games,
when Players of the highest calibre, such as Beldham and Lambert, were drafted into
the Gentlemen’s team in an effort to strengthen it.
glance
glance n (also leg glance) a batting stroke in which the ball is deflected from an angled
bat into the area between square leg and fine leg. It is played with a more or less straight
bat, usually to a ball pitching on or outside leg stump, and can be made off the front or
back foot, depending on the length of the ball. At the moment of impact the face of the
bat is angled so that the ball ‘glances’ off behind square on the leg-side.
This elegant stroke developed out of the rather ungainly DRAW (qv), which had enjoyed
a vogue in the mid-19th century. Though already established in the 1880s, the glance
will always be associated with its most brilliant exponent, K. S. Ranjitsinhji, whose
leg-side play mesmerised cricket audiences in Britain at the turn of the 20th century. In
Ranji’s own version of the glance the back foot seems not to move at all, while the left
leg is crossed over in front of the right. Ironically the footwork may be traced back to
a rather barbarous method of coaching by which Ranjitsinhji was encouraged not to
‘back away’ while at the wicket:
‘I had to have my right leg pegged down every time I practised during my first two years
at serious cricket’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 164).
The terms ‘glance’ and ‘glide’ are usually treated as synonymous, but if any distinction
can be made it is that ‘glide’ more strongly suggests simply holding the bat at an angle
and letting the ball ‘glide’ smoothly off it, while ‘glance’ has a slightly more active ring
about it, suggesting a quick turn of the wrists as the ball comes onto the bat.
쐽 vb to hit the ball when making a glance:
‘Richardson took a single to point off the third ball, and Bailey glanced the fifth for
three’ (Peebles 1959, p 157).
glide
glide n a GLANCE, especially one in which the bat is already at an angle at the moment of
impact, so that the ball is deflected smoothly off it with little or no movement of the
batsman’s wrists:
‘There is another stroke by which good-length balls on the leg-side can be played — the
glide or glance’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 190).
쐽 vb to hit the ball when making a glide:
‘Trumper’s eye and quickness are inconceivable, and give him time not merely to hook
and glide but to hit the ball with unique power’ (A. E. Knight, The Complete Cricketer
1906, p 74).
77 googly
glove
glove vb to deflect the ball off one’s batting gloves, as by mistiming a stroke, often
presenting the fielding side with a catch:
‘Knowing that the pitch would be slow, I twice hooked him, but nearly gloved another
short delivery that bounced like a tennis ball’ (Brearley 1982, p 25).
‘Atherton swished at the first, ducked the second and gloved the third’ (Vic Marks,
Observer 4 July 1993).
gloveman
gloveman, glovesman n a wicket-keeper:

‘In 1929 his Kentish gloveman, Ames, set a new record of 127 dismissals, 48 of them
stumpings’ (Frith 1984, p 90).
‘Ian Healy fought back after the potentially terminal Brian Lara stumping “incident” to
show what a magnificent glovesman he is’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
gluepot
gluepot n a wicket with a ‘glutinous’ surface, which develops when wet turf is drying
under a warm sun; a sticky wicket (See STICKY):
‘There’s a reason why the bowler who beat Kumble to 300 wickets at home was Murali.
Those Sri Lankan glue-pots are made for the man’ (Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine
January 2006, p 31).
go
go vb 1. to lose one’s wicket; be dismissed, especially by a ball of the stated type:

‘Worrell went to an outswinger, while Walcott dragged a drive onto his stumps’ (Mark
Browning, WCM March 1994).
‘The pair added 143, but with both going before the close the Australians still narrowly
shaded the first day’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 119).
2. —go up (of a fielder) to appeal by jumping up and raising the arms; the term is used
especially to describe the action of the slips and other close fielders when appealing for
the umpire’s decision on a close catch or lbw:
‘The batsman … took his bat out of the way, the ball clipped the top of the pad, the
bowler, keeper and slips went up and so did Umpire Taufel’s finger for the caught
behind’ (Prem Panicker, Rediff on the Net, 28 January 2000).
go for
go for vb (of a bowler) to be hit for the specified number of runs:

‘Things suddenly explode. Flintoff goes for three consecutive fours in the next over, and
Tudor is pulled again for six in the over after that’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p12).
going-in
going-in n an innings (obsolete):

‘Mr Colchin … displayed his abilities to great advantage on the Middlesex side, bringing
at the first going in 42 notches’ (Middlesex Journal 13 August 1772).
golden duck
golden duck n an instance of a batsman being out for nought off the first ball he receives:
‘On the afternoon of 19 February 1999, 100,000 people are waiting for Tendulkar to
explode. They’re thinking of the golden duck in the first innings. They want vengeance’
(Bhattacharya 2006, p 127).
good length
good length See LENGTH

google
google vb to bowl the ball so that it breaks from the off, using an (apparent) leg-break
action; bowl a googly:
‘Grimmett … can spin the ball and google it’ (Daily Telegraph 25 April 1930).
googler
googler n a googly bowler:

‘In R. H. Bettington they have a googler who might triumph over the best of wickets’
(Daily Mail 9 July 1923).
googly
googly n a ball bowled by a right-arm wrist-spin bowler that breaks from off to leg; an
off-break bowled with an (apparent) leg-break action:
‘Abdul Qadir had both Richards and Haynes embarrassed by their inability to read a
googly that Jeff Stollmeyer, watching about 120 yards away, spotted the moment it left
the bowler’s hand’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer August 1983).
‘Warne’s googly does not spin so sharply as Mushtaq’s nor is it as well disguised’ (Vic
Marks, Observer 13 June 1993).
‘Kaneria bowls leg-spinner and googly alike, from a high arm with little discernible
change of action’ (David Hopps, Guardian 15 July 2006).
goose game 78
The googly is inextricably linked with the name of B. J. T. Bosanquet, who played for
Oxford, Middlesex, and England at the turn of the 20th century. Earlier bowlers may
have occasionally bowled what were in effect googlies (knowingly or otherwise), but
it was Bosanquet who perfected the delivery and used it consistently at the highest level
of the game. In Bosanquet’s own words, ‘the whole secret of it lies in turning the ball
over in the hand by dropping the wrist at the moment of delivery, so that the axis of
spin is changed from left to right to right to left, thus converting the spin from being an
ordinary leg-break into an ordinary off-break’ (Bosanquet quoted in Warner 1934, p
32).
Bosanquet worked hard at the googly while at Oxford and one of his early triumphs
was a haul of 15 wickets in the University’s match against Sussex in 1900. His Test
career (7 appearances between 1903 and 1905) was brief but memorable. Though not
always effective at this level, he turned in the occasional match-winning performance,
notably his 6 for 51 in the crucial second innings of the fourth Test of the Australian
tour (1903–4), which helped England to win back the Ashes. Bosanquet himself
quickly faded from the picture, but his technical innovation had far-reaching, and
initially spectacular, effects. The googly was enthusiastically taken up by England’s
rivals and the South Africans won two successive series against England (1905–6, and
1907) with a Test attack boasting no fewer than four googly bowlers. Even some years
later, Sir Pelham Warner wrote that ‘the ideal side on a perfect wicket would … contain
two googly bowlers, one medium right-hander, one left-hander, and one fast right-
hander’ (Warner 1934, p 39). The decline of top-class wrist-spin bowling in the post-
war era made the googly something of a rarity. But the emergence of Abdul Qadir, who
played for Pakistan from the late 1970s, helped to keep the art alive, and contemporary
cricket includes a number of top-flight leg-spinners capable of bowling the googly.
Finally, there is the perennial question of the word’s etymology. The suggestion that it
derives from a Maori word, and got its name during an MCC tour of New Zealand in
1902–3, can almost certainly be ruled out because the word ‘googly’ already existed in
Australia in the 1890s, when it was apparently applied to any high, teasing slow
delivery (cf Frith 1984, pp 36, 60). The most plausible explanation is that the googly –
in both its pre- and post-Bosanquet phases – was a ball that so mystified the batsman
that it made him ‘goggle’ (or ‘google’, to use an old dialectical variant). While not
wholly satisfactory, this is probably as close as we are likely to get.
Compare CHINAMAN
goose game
goose game n extremely cautious, defensive batting; stonewalling (obsolete):

‘Allen and Westcott were wisely content to play the goose-game for a draw’ (Headlam
1903, p 213).
The origins of this term – which was much in vogue around the turn of the 20th century
– are shrouded in mystery. The ‘Game of Goose’ is the name of a now obsolete board
game dating back to the 16th century, but there is no evidence to show that extreme
caution was the key to winning it. Another possible clue is the former Harrovian
custom of playing the last cricket match of the year at the beginning of the autumn
term: the game was traditionally followed by a dinner of goose and was called the
‘Goose Match’. But again, it is difficult to see why this particular match should have
been characterised by defensive batting.
gozunder
gozunder, gazunder, guzunder n Australia a yorker, so called because it ‘goes under’

the bat (slang):
‘Batting last here, however, will not be a boot-filling exercise, and Ponting fetched one
gazunda from Harmison yesterday that left him shaping as if for French cricket’ (Haigh
2005, p 45).
grass
grass vb to drop a catch:

‘His only chance came at 34 when a stinging cut against Gilmour was grassed by Hill in
the gully’ (Richard Streeton, The Times 29 October 1982).
79 grounder
‘So far he has hit 14 fours and offered a chance only when, on 16, he edged Harmison
low to Flintoff, at second slip this time, the fielder grassing the chance’ (Mike Selvey,
Guardian 1 December 2006).
greasy
greasy adj denotes a wicket that is basically hard and true, on which a small amount of
rain has fallen, making movement off the pitch difficult to achieve, and thus generally
favouring the batsman:
‘A hard fast wicket, made greasy on the top by rain, is the best of all from the point of
view of a batsman who knows how to utilise the opportunity’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 84).
Unlike the more treacherous ‘sticky’ wicket (which requires heavy rain) the greasy
wicket is not wholly ruled out by modern regulations on pitch-covering, since some
time is likely to elapse between the onset of rain and the point when the wicket is fully
covered.
green
green adj denotes a wicket with a relatively lush covering of grass that retains early
morning moisture well into the day, producing conditions favourable to movement of the
ball off the pitch:
‘England, coping well with a green Calcutta wicket – which in those days and for some
years afterwards was the best wicket for pace bowlers in India – had made 403’ (Bose
1990, p 86).
The modern practice of covering the pitch outside playing hours, so far from shutting
out moisture, actually inhibits its evaporation, with the result that even a fairly well
mown strip may effectively be ‘green’ in the early part of the day, especially in English
conditions.
green top
green top n a ‘green’ wicket:

‘The Australians exacted a measure of revenge when Bruce Reid, Craig McDermott and
Merv Hughes overwhelmed the Kiwis on the ’Gabba’s fiery greentop to set up a series
victory’ (Chas Keys, Australian Cricket October 1993).
‘Crowe had a fine series personally but remembers, during … a game played on a green
top with a lush outfield, picking up the ball and noticing chunks removed from one side’
(Mike Selvey, Guardian 13 July 2006).
ground
ground n 1. the entire area of grass on which a game of cricket is played, as distinguished
from the ‘wicket’ or ‘pitch’ between the two sets of stumps:
‘If at any time the umpires together agree that the condition of the ground, weather or
light is not suitable for play, they shall inform the captains’ (Law 3 §9 (b)).
2. the area behind the popping crease of the wicket at which the batsman is standing,
within which he is immune from being stumped or run out:
‘The fielding was so good that half the Twenty-two were afraid to move off their ground’
‘A batsman shall be considered to be out of his ground unless his bat or some part of his
person is grounded behind the popping crease at that end’ (Law 29 § 1).
The crease itself is not part of the batsman’s ground. The notation ‘out of ground’ often
appears in 18th century scoresheets as a mode of dismissal, presumably indicating a
run-out.
쐽 vb 1. to bring the bat into contact with the pitch inside the popping crease, as when
completing a run:
‘Having grounded his bat after the first run, he stood his ground as his partner stormed
through safely for his second’ (Ian Brayshaw, The Times 27 December 1983).
‘Short-leg specialist Andrew Hudson … took Jonty’s throw and clipped off the bails as
Sachin desperately grounded his bat’ (Purandare 2005, p 143).
2. (of the ball) to make contact with the pitch after being bowled; to pitch:
‘The Ball may be made to cut or twist, after it has grounded, and will perplex most
strikers’ (Lambert 1816, p 15).
grounder
grounder n a very short-pitched underarm ball that travels mainly along the ground; a
grub (obsolete):
‘The old bat used to be heavy at the point — very requisite for picking up a Grounder’
(J. Pycroft, Cricket Tutor 1862, p 8).
ground fielding 80
ground fielding
ground fielding n the department of fielding concerned with stopping and retrieving
balls that travel along the ground, rather than with catching:
‘The ground fielding was again superb, with Fowler chasing and slithering and bringing
up clouds of red dust just to turn fours into threes’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 21 January
1985).
groundsman
groundsman n the person responsible for the maintenance of a cricket ground and the
preparation of wickets for matches.
See also CURATOR
groundstaff
groundstaff n a staff of players employed at a particular club, originally in order to give

members batting and bowling practice:
‘Vogler … was accepted on the MCC groundstaff, and in 1906 his bowling might have
been penetrative enough for Middlesex to have offered him a contract’ (Frith 1984, p 66).
The groundstaff has declined as an institution, and in England it is only at Lord’s that
a significant groundstaff is still retained, made up of promising young British and
overseas players who, in addition to playing cricket, assist the groundsman, act as
stewards at big matches, and so on.
grub
grub, grubber n a ball bowled underarm along the ground; although this style of bowling
has been more or less obsolete for over a century, it was only quite recently that the Laws
expressly ruled against it:
‘In the one-day international at Melbourne in 1981, when New Zealand needed six runs
off the last ball of the match to tie it, Greg told his brother Trevor to bowl an underarm
grub’ (John Arlott, Guardian 4 January 1984).
‘Armitage then tried a “grubber” all along the ground — Trevor Chappell wasn’t the
first — and Lillywhite took him off’ (Frith 1984, p 27).
See also UNDERARM
guard
guard n 1. the position adopted by the batsman in which the bat is held upright in front of
the wicket, just inside the popping crease, with the side of the blade pointing down the
pitch. The batsman ‘takes’ guard – usually at the start of an innings or following a change
in the bowler’s point of delivery – by asking the umpire (who ‘gives’ guard) to indicate
the line from where he is standing to a particular point on the batsman’s wicket, typically
middle stump, middle-and-leg, or leg stump; the batsman then marks this position with
a BLOCKHOLE (qv), which provides a point of orientation enabling him to assess the ball’s
line of flight and to determine his own position in relation to the wicket.
See also ONE LEG
2. —take guard (of a batsman) to begin an innings:
‘Shane Watson enjoyed a sedan chair ride in Sydney by taking guard on his Test debut
at 471 for 5, but such are the luxuries of playing for the world’s best team’ (Haigh 2005,
p9).
gully
gully n a close off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) slightly behind the
line of the batsman’s wicket, between the slips and point. Gully is a relatively recent term
for a position that would formerly have been called short third man or backward point. It
became established as a regular position in its own right – and thus eventually evolved a
distinctive name – following the development of the modern OFF-THEORY attack (qv)
towards the end of the 19th century:
‘A. O. Jones … was, indeed, quite exceptional as a fieldsman in any position, but espe-
cially in the slips and at short third man, or in the “gully” as it is called nowadays’ (P.
F. Warner, My Cricketing Life 1921, p 229).
The name apparently derives from the more general meaning of gully, and suggests a
narrow channel or ‘gorge’ between point and the slips.
guzunder
guzunder n = GOZUNDER
H
hacker
hacker n especially in South Africa an attacking batsman, especially one with a hard-
hitting uncultured style batting in the lower order; a slogger
half-century
half-century n a batsman’s score of between 50 and 99 runs, made in a single innings:

‘Although Wilson played only eleven Tests, she scored 862 runs at an average of 57.47,
including three centuries and three half centuries’ (Cashman & Weaver 1991, p 122).
‘He had already in the one-dayers started slowing down after reaching half-a-century’
See also CENTURY, DOUBLE CENTURY
half-cock
half-cock adj denoting a defensive batting stroke in which the bat is held quite straight,
more or less over the popping crease, and the ball is allowed to come on to it:
‘On slow wickets, especially if the ball breaks, the “Half-cock stroke” should not be
used, since Back-play is more effective in defence’ (C.B. Fry, Cricket: Batsmanship
1912, p 164).
‘With his next ball he had Botham well caught by Martin Crowe at short-leg off a half-
cock defensive push’ (Andrew Longmore, Cricketer April 1984).
This is an improvised stroke, made when the batsman has misjudged the pitch of the
ball and brought his front foot down the wicket in order to make a forward shot, only
to find that ‘he cannot reach far enough to smother the ball at the pitch’ (Badminton
1888, p 51). The arms are then quickly drawn back to effect a stroke that is neither
forward nor back.
쐽 adv making a half-cock stroke:
‘In the next over Richardson, playing half-cock at a brisk outswinger, edged Davidson
to third slip’ (Peebles 1959, p 71).
half-hit
half-hit n a badly-timed shot that sends the ball only a relatively short distance (old ):
‘Extra cover-point, and sometimes even cover-point as well, may be brought across the
wicket and placed for half-hits wide on the on — i.e. about half the distance from the
batsman that a deep field would stand’ (Badminton 1888, p 112).
half-pitcher
half-pitcher n especially in Australia a fast short-pitched ball; a bouncer (old ):

‘He had to duck for safety as a half-pitcher from Voce flew past his ear’ (Melbourne
Argus 17 January 1933).
half-tracker
half-tracker n Australia a ball that pitches halfway down the wicket or ‘track’; a long hop
half-volley
half-volley n a ball that pitches just in front of the popping crease and comes straight on
to the bat, enabling the batsman to hit it soon after it bounces with a minimum of danger
or difficulty:
‘His first ball was a long-hop, the second a swinging half-volley: Wood hit both for fours
to leg’ (Brearley 1982, p 75).
‘Instead of patting it back, the little man cracked an audacious square cut … It had been
a good-length delivery; Viswanath made it look like a half-volley’ (Bhattacharya 2006,
p 71).
Even a ball of good length (i.e. slightly shorter than a half-volley) can by deft footwork
be turned into a half-volley:
‘Batsmen who are quick on their feet often jump out to the pitch of a ball, and thereby
make it a half-volley’ (Warner 1934, p 19).
hand 82
The word is derived from the general sporting term ‘volley’ (from the French volée,
flight) meaning either a ball that reaches its target without bouncing, or a hit or kick at a
moving ball (as in tennis or soccer) before it bounces. Cricket’s ‘half-volley’ is a ball that
is ‘almost a volley’.
hand
hand n (obsolete) 1. a member of a team; a player:

‘The second match between London and Kingston & Moulsey … the Country lost five of
their best hands that played on Moulsey Hurst, but notwithstanding all that, the Country
won their match by 3 notches’ (London & Country Journal 25 July 1739).
2. (also hands) an innings:
‘There were several very considerable wagers laid of the first hands which were won by
the London gamesters by one notch’ (St James’s Evening Post 29 June 1732).
‘Umpires … to allow Two Minutes for each Man to come inn when one is out, and Ten
Minutes between each Hand’ (Laws 1744).
3. the score made by an individual or team in an innings:
‘Andrew [Freemantle] … would often get long hands, and against the best bowling too’
handled the ball
handled the ball, handled ball adv a mode of dismissal in which the batsman is given
out ‘if he wilfully touches the ball while in play with a hand or hands not holding the bat
unless he does so with the consent of the opposing side’ (Law 33 §1); the dismissal is
entered in the scorebook as ‘handled the ball’ and the wicket is not credited to the bowler:
‘The England captain’s 18th Test century, the glue that held England firm, was ended
when he was given out “handled ball”’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 8 June 1993).
Although it is exceptionally rare for a batsman to be dismissed in this way – since 1857
there have been only 50 or so instances at first-class level – the rule against handling
the ball is of great antiquity and appears in the original (1744) code of Laws, as follows:
‘If the Striker touches, or takes up the Ball before it has lain quite still, unless ask’d by
the Bowler, or Wicket-Keeper, it’s out’. An early instance of the law in action appears
in a match report in the Kentish Weekly Post, 8 September 1797, where a member of
the Strood Club, a Mr Horn, is recorded as being out ‘handling b. in play’. More
recently, in 2001, Michael Vaughan – in rather controversial circumstances – became
only the seventh player in Test cricket to be dismissed in this way.
hang
hang vb 1. to lose pace after pitching and come on to the bat more slowly than expected,
especially as a result of back-spin imparted by the bowler:
‘The ball that hangs or stops a bit after pitching instead of coming on is perhaps the most
fatal ball that is bowled’ (Badminton 1888, p 77).
‘Then the West Indian [Kallicharran], looking comfortable on 55, mistimed a crafty ball
from Emburey which hung back and Barlow took a simple catch at cover’ (Robert
Armstrong, Guardian 3 August 1983).
2. —hang one’s bat out to dry to hold one’s bat loosely, away from the body, espe-
cially when attempting to play a rising ball outside off stump, resulting in a stroke played
with very little power or control
쐽 n loss of pace after pitching:
‘However short and bad a ball, it should be carefully watched all the way in case of an
unexpected hang or rise’ (Warner 1934, p 17).
hanging guard
hanging guard n a defensive position in which the batsman goes on to the back foot and
allows the bat to ‘hang’ in a perpendicular position so as to cover the wicket (obsolete):
‘Practise going (from the attitude of play) back quickly to the hanging guard, and notice
if your bat hang well over to cover as much of the wicket as it can’ (Felix 1850, p 16).
harrier
harrier n a ball that rises very steeply off the pitch; a steepler (slang):
‘Hadlee produced a “harrier”, a ball that took off almost vertically and ground the
knuckles of Lamb’s right hand’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 5 February 1984).
The delivery is named after the vertical takeoff Harrier jet, and the term enjoyed a brief
vogue after the South Atlantic campaign of 1982, in which these planes featured
prominently.
83 Hawk-Eye
Harrow bat
Harrow bat n a bat that is one size down from the full-size adult bat, for use by younger
players
Harrow drive n a batting stroke made unintentionally when the batsman, attempting to
Harrow drive
play a normal off drive, fails to get properly in line and deflects the ball off the inside
edge of the bat, either through the slips or down towards long leg:
‘Fletcher had the luck to see two of his nine boundaries come off the inside edge,
“Harrow drives” or “Chinese cuts”’ (Berry 1982, p 113).
The term was not always a derisive one, but originally denoted an orthodox drive
through extra cover, which was thought to be especially characteristic of Harrovian
batsmen:
‘The “Harrow drive” towards extra-cover-point was at one time peculiar to the school’
Its more modern meaning may well have been foisted on it by Harrow’s arch-rivals:
‘Mr. Stevens scored several useful 4’s by the stroke through the slips which Etonians call
the Harrow drive’ (The Times 19 July 1923).
hat n a hat trick (old):
hat
‘Bates, the Yorkshireman, had just dismissed two of their best bats, McDonnell and
Giffen, in two consecutive balls … Somebody suggested that, in the faint hope of securing
a “hat” for Bates, we should try a silly mid-on’ (Badminton 1888, p 209).
hat trick
hat trick n 1. (also formerly hat feat) the act of dismissing three batsmen in three
consecutive deliveries:
‘Ferrands performed the hat feat by bowling 3 wickets with successive balls of an over’
(Wisden 1873, p 33).
‘Simpson-Hayward took seven wickets for 34 runs and three of those with consecutive
balls. He was presented by the last batsman of the trio with a fez, in token of the hat-trick’
(Headlam 1903, p 175).
‘With the score on 67, McGrath struck twice with two exquisite deliveries. The hat-trick
ball looped into the slips, sparking huge appeals and much queasiness’ (Hugh Cheval-
lier, Wisden 2006, p 122).
The hat trick is so called because of the old custom, probably originating in the mid-
19th century, of presenting a new hat to a bowler who achieved this feat (see quote
above). A hat trick still ‘counts’ if the three consecutive dismissals are spread over two
consecutive overs by the same bowler, or even over both innings of a match, though in
the latter case the dramatic impact is obviously somewhat diminished. The term is
occasionally used to describe three consecutive stumpings or three catches by the same
fielder:
‘There has only been one “hat-trick” of stumpings in this country, and that happened
exactly 100 years ago, in 1893’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 195).
Like many cricketing terms, ‘hat trick’ has entered the vocabulary of many other sports,
and indeed the general language, too (in expressions like ‘a hat trick of election victo-
ries’).
2. —on a hat trick having taken two wickets in two balls, so that one will get a hat trick
if one takes a wicket with the next ball:
‘DeFreitas … started the third day sensationally, and after the first four balls found
himself on a hat-trick’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
‘On a hat-trick, Kaneria again relied on his by now well-trusted googly to hit Geraint
Jones right in front but Hair was again unmoved’ (Agha Akbar, The Nation (Pakistan)
4 December 2005).
haul
haul n the number of wickets a bowler takes in a given period, as in an innings, a match,
or a series:
‘After enduring a rough initiation in the first Test at Lord’s, he burst back to form with
a 10-wicket haul at Edgbaston’ (Andrew Miller, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 84).
Hawk-Eye
Hawk-Eye n a computerised system used for tracking the trajectory of a bowled ball,
which can indicate whether a ball would have hit the stumps if it had not been hit or
otherwise stopped by the batsman (trademark):
headquarters 84
‘Langer … wasn’t alone in looking askance at Rudi Koertzen’s lbw decision yesterday,
Hawk-Eye suggesting that the stumps would merely have sustained a slight graze’
(Haigh 2005, p76).
According to its own website, Hawk-Eye ‘uses sophisticated image processing
techniques to process the output of a series of cameras positioned around a sports
ground’. Invented by Dr. Paul Hawkins, Hawk-Eye has proved an invaluable aid to
commentators since it was first introduced in 2001, but the question of whether it
should now also be used by the THIRD UMPIRE (qv) is hotly debated. Hawk-Eye is also
used in coverage of major tennis tournaments.
headquarters
headquarters n Lord’s cricket ground, considered (by English people at least) as the
‘headquarters’ of the game:
‘England had selected no fewer than five Middlesex players to play New Zealand at
headquarters’ (Jim Laker, WCM December 1983).
heavy ball
heavy ball n a delivery that is faster than it seems and comes on to the bat with more force
than the batsman anticipated:
‘Yardy’s Underwood-style heavy ball proved Akmal’s undoing when he cut loosely’
(Cricket on Five website, 10 September 2006).
helmet
helmet n a piece of strong protective headgear, sometimes equipped with a metal grille in
front of the face, worn by batsmen as a protection against fast short-pitched bowling, and
sometimes also by fielders in close catching positions. Helmets first appeared in the late
1970s, a development not unconnected with the dominance at that time of the West
Indies’ lethal four-man pace attack. They quickly became established – especially among
younger players – as an item of equipment almost as essential as batting gloves or pads.
Predictably enough, their arrival was greeted by a good deal of harrumphing from the
older generation, but it should be remembered that when pads were first introduced in
the mid-19th century they got a similarly contemptuous reception from older players
who had ‘managed perfectly well without them’ (See PAD). A more serious argument
against the helmet was the idea that a batsman’s unconscious instincts of self-
preservation might be fractionally impaired by the sense of security that comes of
wearing one, and it is certainly true that helmeted batsmen have been hit more often than
their helmetless elders ever were. Players themselves, however, would argue that the
helmet greatly increases a batsman’s confidence, and it is now a standard part of any
cricketer’s kit.
The arrival of the helmet led to certain adjustments in the Laws. For example, if a ball
hit by the batsman lodges in a fielder’s helmet (as in the protective grille at the front)
the ball becomes ‘dead’ and the batsman cannot be out (Law 32 § 3(b)). Similarly, a
catch does not count if the ball rebounds off a fielder’s helmet, whereas a ball could
legitimately be caught if it ricocheted off a fielder’s head (Law 32 § 3(e)). The old law
imposing a five-run penalty in the case of a fieldsman stopping the ball with his hat
(introduced in 1798) still stands, and applies equally to the case of a ball being stopped
by a helmet left lying on the ground (Law 41 §3).
hip
hip n a leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) roughly equivalent to the
modern square leg. Originally the term indicated the general area square of the wicket on
the leg-side, as if starting from the hip of the batsman, whose stance was more ‘two-eyed’
in the early game. (obsolete):
‘If the ball is directed to the legs of the Striker, or near Stump, it is frequently hit to the
hip’ (Lambert 1816, p 13).
hit
hit n an act of striking the ball in an attempt to score runs, as distinguished from a purely
defensive push or blocking stroke:
‘To make this hit [the cut] … the ball must be judged to bound well to the off, rather
short’ (Felix 1850, p 31).
‘His 18 were got by some fine hits, cuts and leg-hits principally’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 20).
‘With one of the largest hits seen in Test cricket, Garner hit Hogan out of the ground’
(WCM May 1984).
쐽 vb to strike the ball, especially to do so forcefully in an attempt to score runs, rather
85 hit wicket
than playing purely defensively:
‘Before this alteration in the bat, defence was almost unknown. The long pod and curved
form of the bat, as seen in the old paintings, was made only for hitting’ (Pycroft 1854 in
HM, p 134).
‘Having endeavoured … to enumerate a few principles as to defensive tactics, we will
now try and discuss offensive tactics, or hitting’ (Badminton 1888, p 59).
‘Not since Gilbert Jessop’s 104 against Australia at The Oval in 1902 had such hitting
been seen in a Test match. Jessop hit 17 fours off 76 balls; at Old Trafford Botham hit
six sixes and 13 fours off 102 balls’ (John Woodcock, Wisden 1994, p 34).
‘Dhoni spends hours practising six-hitting, trying to master the art of hammering the
ball out of the ground’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine March 2006, p 36).
As the quotations suggest, this word has undergone a noticeable change in meaning
over the last hundred years or so. It was originally used to describe any scoring stroke
as distinguished from purely defensive play, but it came increasingly to be applied to
the attacking shots played with a cross bat, as opposed to the more ‘respectable’
straight-batted ‘strokes’ such as the cover drive. In discussing the on drive played to a
ball pitching outside leg stump, Ranjitsinhji notes that it ‘can either be a genuine hit or
a very hard forward stroke’ (1897, p 188). More recently, the word has become
synonymous with batting of unrestrained aggression, and while a classical batsman is
admired for his ‘strokeplay’, a player whose primary instinct is to attack is often
referred to as a ‘hitter’.
See also LEG HIT
hitter
hitter n an aggressive batsman who plays attacking shots whenever possible:

‘Ten days before the Lord’s Test … Amar Singh revealed himself to be a hitter of high
class. Coming in at no.10 he made 131 not out, putting on 125 in eighty minutes with
Jehangir Khan’ (Bose 1990, p 77).
‘In Afridi, 31 from 14 balls, Pakistan have a batsman of whirring destruction; in Abdul
Razzaq, 51 not out from 22 balls, a devastating hitter of more earthbound talent’ (David
Hopps, Guardian 16 December 2005).
hit the ball twice
hit the ball twice adv a mode of dismissal in which the batsman is given out ‘if, while
the ball is in play, it strikes any part of his person or is struck by his bat and, before the
ball has been touched by a fielder, he wilfully strikes it again with his bat or person, other
than a hand not holding the bat, except for the sole purpose of guarding his wicket’ (Law
34 § 1); the dismissal is entered in the scorebook as ‘hit the ball twice’ and is not credited
to the bowler. If the batsman ‘lawfully’ hits the ball a second time (i.e. to prevent it hitting
his stumps) he is not allowed to take any runs from the shot. ‘Hit the ball twice’ is one
of the modes of dismissal that remain valid even in the case of a no-ball. The rule dates
back to the earliest (1744) code of Laws: ‘If a Ball is nipp’d up, and he strikes it again
wilfully, before it came to the Wicket, it’s out’. Allowing for changes in wording, the rule
has remained in force throughout the history of the game. It has, however, been very
sparingly invoked: with only 21 instances since 1864 of batsmen being out in this way at
first-class level, ‘hit the ball twice’ is one of the rarest of all forms of dismissal.
hit under leg
hit under leg n an obsolete batting stroke, similar to the DRAW (qv), in which the front
foot is raised off the ground and the ball is deflected off an angled bat under the raised
leg and into the area backward of square on the leg-side
hit wicket
hit wicket adv a mode of dismissal in which the batsman is given out ‘if, after the bowler
has entered his delivery stride and while the ball is in play, his wicket is put down either
by the striker’s bat or by his person’ (Law 35 §1). As the wording makes clear, the
batsman does not have to hit the stumps with his bat in order to be out hit wicket; the
effect would be the same if, e.g., his sleeve brushed the bails off. The dismissal is credited
to the bowler and is entered in the scorebook as ‘hit wicket b bowler’. The batsman is not
out, however, if he hits the wicket while trying to avoid being stumped or run out.
The earliest (1744) code of Laws includes a hit wicket ruling: ‘If he strikes, or treads
down, or falls himself upon his Wicket in striking (but not in over-running) it’s out’.
Unaccountably, the rule was omitted from the code of 1774, but it reappears with a
hoik 86
revised wording in 1788, and it has remained essentially unchanged ever since. Early
scorebooks show a variety of ways of recording such dismissals, including ‘struck
himself out’ and ‘beat down his stumps’. But in those days, before the introduction of
the declaration and the follow-on, the hit wicket rule had an additional significance, in
that it was often invoked as a ploy for cutting short an innings: many batsmen
dismissed in this way had in fact broken their wickets deliberately, as in the following
report: ‘Kingsclere made 71, and Newbury nearly 200 and beat their own wickets
down, expecting when the evening had so far advanced as not to admit of any further
play, that the game would have been yielded up to them’ (Reading Mercury 15 August
1791).
hoik
hoik, hoick vb to hit the ball towards the mid-wicket or square leg boundary, playing an
aggressive cross-bat shot off the back foot, but often with rather minimal footwork:
‘His century … had been reached in the most satisfying manner, rocking onto the back
foot and hoiking Ambrose through midwicket for his 15th boundary’ (Mike Selvey,
Guardian 9 April 1994).
‘Flintoff had scored all but one of the 32 previous runs off the bat when Pietersen
hoicked the slow left-arm of Yuvraj Singh to deep midwicket’ (Lawrence Booth,
Guardian 29 March 2006).
쐽 n an aggressive cross-bat shot towards the mid-wicket or square leg boundary:
‘It is sufficiently clear, and unfortunately a matter of not uncommon experience … that
one may perpetrate an outrageously rustic “hoick” in the very nick of time and achieve
a terrific drive to the boundary’ (C.B. Fry, Cricket: Batsmanship 1912, p 11).
hold back
hold back vb to bowl a ball at a slower than usual pace in order to induce the batsman to
play too early:
‘Tait looked to be bowling within himself, kept a respectably full length, and brought
both to bear when he held one back to bowl Trescothick’ (Haigh 2005, p153).
‘Collingwood holds one back a little, Yuvraj picks the wrong length and tries to send it
sailing above midwicket.’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p13).
See also SLOWER BALL
hole out
hole out vb to be dismissed by hitting the ball, usually into the deep field, and being
caught:
‘For the next hour he [Viv Richards] decimated the shell-shocked Indian bowling,
scoring 61 off 35 balls with four huge sixes and five fours before he holed out to wide
long-on’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer April 1983).
‘If anyone heard a tearing sound coming from the Australian dressing room after Brett
Lee holed out to cow corner yesterday afternoon, it can only have been that of Buchanan
filing his latest battle plan’ (Haigh 2005, p 212).
‘Hole out’ is a golfing expression, meaning to sink the ball into a hole, but in the
language of cricket it represents an undesirable rather than a desirable end.
home
home n the area between the striker’s wicket and the popping crease, considered as the
batsman’s own territory within which he is safe from being stumped or run out; the
batsman’s ‘ground’:
‘When the Ball has been in hand by one of the Keepers, or Stoppers, and the Player has
been at Home, he may go where he pleases till the next Ball is bowl’d’ (Laws 1744).
‘They were going along very nicely indeed when a smart pick-up and return by
Armstrong compelled Arnold to do his best to get home’ (Melbourne Argus 19 January
1904).
home-and-easy
home-and-easy adj denotes a type of high, lobbing underarm bowling, so called

because it was pitched well up to the batsman (cf HOME TOSS) and delivered at an ‘easy’
pace (obsolete):
‘He [Lord Frederick Beauclerk] introduced a slow home-and-easy kind of bowling,
which was very effective’ (Mitford 1833 in HM, p 132).
home toss
home toss, home pitch n a FULL TOSS (qv), so called because it is pitched right up to
the batsman standing at ‘home’ in his ground (obsolete):
‘The Catapulta could bowl a home toss, a grubber, …’ (Bell’s Life, 15 October 1837).
87 hustle
hook
hook n (also hookshot) a batting stroke in which a short-pitched ball is swept round to
the leg-side with a horizontal bat. The shot can be played to any rising short ball pitching
on or not too far outside the stumps, and is executed by moving the back foot far enough
across to get right behind the line of the ball; the bat, held horizontally, is then swung
across the ball’s line of flight, usually sending it into the area between square and fine
leg:
‘The hook has never been an easy shot … This is not because it is difficult to execute but
because it is difficult to control’ (Purandare 2005, p 108).
쐽 vb to hit the ball when making a hook:
‘Hooking a fast bowler is fraught with no little danger, for often the ball comes shoulder
high to the batsman’ (Warner 1934, p 17).
‘Twenty minutes before lunch on the third day of the fifth Test against England, he
hooked Chris Lewis for the 44th of his 45 fours to pass Sir Garfield Sobers’s record Test
score of 365 not out’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Daily Telegraph 19th April 1994).
hook-stroke
hook-stroke n a HOOK (old ):

‘Remember that sovereign hook-stroke of his; nay, he did not hit the ball — he dismissed
it from his presence’ (Cardus 1978, p 40).
hooligan
hooligan n Australia, NZ a delivery that behaves unexpectedly after pitching owing to an

irregularity in the wicket, or the irregularity that makes it do this (slang)
how’dat
how’dat Corfu used both in appealing (like ‘howzat’) and to describe the position of the
batsman against whom a successful appeal is made (like ‘out’)
howzat
howzat, (also how’s that, how was he, etc) interj an interjection used by fielders when
appealing to the umpire to give a batsman out. The unabbreviated form is ‘how’s that,
umpire?’ but it is unlikely that anything so sedate is ever actually heard on a cricket field.
hundred
hundred n a batsman’s score of 100 runs or over; a CENTURY:

‘All of Lara’s three Test hundreds have been big ones, his previous highest being his 277
in Australia’ (Farokh Engineer, Sportstar [Chennai] 14 May 1994).
‘Sachin had, after first becoming the youngest Ranji [Trophy] centurion, also become
the youngest to score a hundred in the Irani Trophy’ (Purandare 2005, p 75).
hustle
hustle n increase of pace by the ball as it comes off the pitch, forcing the batsman to react
hastily:
‘Edmonds … knows better than anyone that while the Oval pitch sometimes dusts, it
seldom encourages hustle’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 10 July 1983).
I
ICC
ICC abbr the International Cricket Council: the governing body for cricket at the
international level. The ICC is responsible for – among other things – approving the
details of Test tours and other international tournaments like the World Cup, conferring
Test status on new countries, and discussing proposals for changing the Laws of the
game. It was founded on 15th June 1909, as the Imperial Cricket Conference, and its
original members were England, Australia, and South Africa. India, New Zealand, and
the West Indies were admitted to membership in 1926, followed by Pakistan in 1953,
while South Africa’s membership lapsed on its withdrawal from the Commonwealth in
1961. In 1964 the ICC changed its name to become the International Cricket Conference
and a new two-tier membership system was adopted, involving a distinction between
‘Full Members’, whose representative sides are qualified to play official Test matches,
and ‘Associate Members’, comprising those countries ‘where cricket is firmly
established and organised’. The six countries already belonging in 1965 became Full
Members, and the election of Sri Lanka to full membership in 1981 brought the number
of Test-playing countries to seven. South Africa was re-admitted to the ICC in 1991,
followed a year later by Zimbabwe. The most recent recruit to the top tier is Bangladesh,
admitted as a Full Member in 2000. Meanwhile, a third category of membership,
‘Affiliate Members’ was established in 1984, with Italy its first representative. In 2006,
there were 10 Full Members, 32 Associates, and 55 Affiliates. The ICC adopted its
current name in 1989.
in
in adv, adj 1. in or into the position of being the batsman or batting side:
‘The Party that wins the Toss-up, may order which Side shall go in first, at his Option’
(Laws 1744).
‘With the score at 57–3, I went in ahead of Gatting, hoping to steady the innings for a
while’ (Brearley 1982, p 116).
‘A cricketer need only look at his scores and references to see how often the out side …
has prevented the in side from getting the runs required’ (Badminton 1888, p 197).
2. (of the ball ) moving in the direction of leg-side and towards the batsman, from a line
initially further to the off:
‘Hudson … had any intent on a four-hour net broken by a clever ball from Tufnell, which
drifted in to him as he went to drive towards extra cover’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
쐽 adv (of the fielders) positioned fairly close to the wicket rather than in the deep:
‘I can easily bring the field in for Harbhajan Singh but not so easily for Virender
Sehwag’ (Rahul Dravid, quoted in Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p39).
쐽 n a decision by the umpire that a batsman is not out (obsolete):
‘They are the sole Judges of all Outs and Inns [and] of all fair or unfair Play’ (Laws
1744).
independent umpire
independent umpire n an umpire standing in a Test match or other international game

who does not come from either of the countries whose teams are competing against each
other:
‘The long-overdue introduction of a worldwide panel of independent umpires for inter-
national cricket might have been designed for a man whose body and soul is wedded to
the game’ (David Hopps, Guardian 10 February 1994).
89 insert
Independent umpires first appeared in Test cricket (officially at least) in February
1994, when Englishman Dickie Bird stood at Auckland in the first Test between New
Zealand and Pakistan. (There are occasional ad hoc earlier examples, such as when
John Hampshire and John Holder stood in the 1989–90 series between India and
Pakistan.) A 1993 ICC ruling had established the International Umpires’ Panel, a group
of 20 umpires appointed by the (then) 9 Test-playing countries, from whom one ‘third-
party’ umpire was to be chosen to officiate in Tests along with the ‘home’ umpire.
Since 2002, both umpires in any Test match are ‘independent’, being drawn from the
10-strong ‘Elite Panel of ICC Umpires’.
infield
infield n the part of a cricket field that is close to the wicket, as distinguished from the
outfield:
‘This time Ghai stayed in the infield after the over’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 21
January 1985).
‘His partnership with Mahendra Singh Dhoni … was decisive, and the ease with which
he worked the ball into the gaps and hit cleanly over the infield was revealing’ (Dileep
Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 79).
infielder
infielder n a fielder occupying an attacking position relatively close to the wicket:

‘Both times there is a strident chorus of appeal and Turner is surrounded by infielders
with arms and legs splayed in mid-air’ (Moorhouse 1979, p 58).
inning
inning n the innings of an individual batsman (obsolete):

‘If the Notches of one Player are laid against another, the Bets depend on the First
Inning, unless otherwise specified’ (Laws 1809).
innings
innings n 1. a division of a cricket match in which one of the two teams has its turn to
bat, or is ‘in’:
‘During the match the pitch may be rolled at the request of the captain of the batting side,
for a period of not more than 7 minutes, before the start of each innings’ (Law 10 § 1).
First-class matches typically consist of two innings per side, taken alternately except in
the case of a follow-on, while one-day games usually consist of one innings per side.
The decision as to which side shall have the first innings lies with the captain who has
won the toss. A team’s innings is considered to be at an end when 10 wickets have
fallen or (in certain competitions) when a stipulated number of overs has been bowled;
it may also be declared closed by the captain at any time, and in certain circumstances
forfeited.
2. the turn of an individual player to bat, especially when considered in terms of the
number of runs he scores or the quality of his batting:
‘Ponsford and Oldfield [put on] 63 more for the sixth and I was dreadfully sorry that
Oldfield’s innings should end as it did’ (Larwood 1933, p 130).
‘At Old Trafford, Botham played an innings of classical power and splendour’ (Brearley
1982, p 120).
‘Eager to redeem his first-innings duck, Anwar plays, as he so often has against India,
an innings on which the match may turn’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 125).
3. —by an innings indicates the winning margin when one side scores more runs in a
single innings than its opponents score in both their innings; a match completed in this
way is termed an innings defeat (or an innings victory, depending on one’s viewpoint)
The word ‘inning’ originally denotes ‘an act of going in or bringing in’ and is formed
in the same way as ‘outing’, ‘offing’, and similar words. It is first found in a cricket
context in the early 18th century, though an earlier form GOING-IN (qv) is still
encountered 50 years or so later. At first the singular form ‘inning’ was used to indicate
the turn of an individual batsman, while the collective effort of the team was their
‘innings’ – a plural formed in the normal way. At some later point the form ‘innings’
ceased to be treated as a plural and began to be used without distinction for both the
individual’s turn and the performance of the whole team.
insert
insert vb (of a captain) to put the opposing side in to bat after winning the toss:
inside 90
‘The West Indies won the toss and Clive Lloyd confidently inserted the Indians. His deci-
sion appeared vindicated when Gavaskar was caught off Roberts for two in the second
over’ (Marqusee 1994, p 228).
‘McGrath’s grunts of pain were still fresh in his ears when he [Ponting] inserted
England, perhaps partly as a vote of confidence in the rest of his attack’ (Haigh 2005, p
71).
inside
inside prep with the bat moving along a line on the near side of the ball’s line of flight, so
that the ball passes the outside edge of the bat:
‘Howarth played inside a perfect ball which just clipped the off bail’ (Matthew Engel,
Guardian 3 February 1984).
Compare OUTSIDE
inside edge
inside edge n 1. the edge of the bat, when held more or less perpendicularly, that is
closer to the batsman; the ‘leg-side’ edge of the bat:
‘Rutherford went stubbornly on, but at 92 he played back at Statham and was caught at
the wicket, apparently off the inside edge’ (Peebles 1959, p 31).
2. an unintentional deflection of the ball off the inside edge of the bat:
‘Jeff Crowe got away with what looked as though it must have been an inside edge to
Bob Taylor’ (John Thicknesse, Cricketer April 1984).
‘There was a biggish shout for LBW by Gul, but Cook got an inside-edge so big it could
have been a steak in an American diner’ (Rob Smyth, Guardian 13 July 2006).
inside-edge
inside-edge vb to deflect the ball unintentionally off the inside edge of the bat:
‘Six batsmen were caught behind off outside edges, one inside-edged onto the stumps,
another top-edged’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 72).
inside out
inside out adv, adj sending the ball into the off-side area, especially between extra cover
and point, by playing slightly inside the line of it with a downward swing of the bat, so
that the ball is deflected off the outside edge of the bat:
‘It was Gomes who started the Indian decline, first when Yashpal Sharma scooped him
“inside out” to one of the three off-side fielders’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer
August 1983).
‘The tail folded without much resistance, though Willis played two of his unique sliced,
inside-out drives over the off-side’ (Brearley 1982, p 85).
insinuator
insinuator n a slow flighted or turning ball (obsolete):

‘Thirty runs were wanting; a weak bat advancing; Lord Frederick bowling slow “insin-
uators”; and a good wicket-keeper on the look-out’ (Felix 1850, p 21).
inswing
inswing n movement of the ball in the air, typically from a line on or just outside off
stump, in towards the batsman:
‘The generality of seam bowling is inswing, which is relatively easy to produce; but it
can be monotonous and restrictive of strokes’ (Arlott 1983, p 38).
‘The new ball saw the end of Cook, bowled thrillingly through the gate by the fast
inswing of Sami’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 15 July 2006).
Inswing (unless occurring very late in the ball’s trajectory) is generally easier for the
batsman to deal with than outswing. But its effectiveness as a means of containment
makes it a useful option, especially in limited-overs cricket.
See SWING. Compare OUTSWING
inswinger
inswinger n 1. a ball that swings in towards leg from a line initially closer to the off:
‘Edgar struck a typically trenchant 84 and Cairns’s mild inswingers brought a handful
of wickets’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1983).
‘Two more second-innings wickets included an inswinger for an lbw decision against
Adam Gilchrist – a collector’s item, that one, as Gilchrist had never before been
dismissed lbw in a Test by a fast bowler’ (David Hopps, Wisden 2006, p 65).
2. an inswing bowler:
‘If one of the opening bowlers is an inswinger he [the batsman] should open his stance
to bring himself in line with the ball from the bowler’s hand’ (Alf Gover, Cricketer
September 1984).
91 IWCC
intimidation
intimidation n the intentional use of bowling methods calculated to cause or threaten

injury to the batsman.
The previous (1980) code of Laws explicitly defined intimidation as ‘the deliberate
bowling of fast short pitched balls which by their length, height and direction are
intended or likely to inflict physical injury on the Striker’ (Law 42 § 8). In the current
(2000) code, however, there is no mention of intimidation, and the relevant sections on
UNFAIR PLAY (qv) (Law 42) refer instead to ‘dangerous and unfair bowling’.
See also BOUNCER
Irish swing
Irish swing n Australia, NZ, India movement of the ball in the air in a direction opposite
to what one would expect; REVERSE SWING (slang):
‘The current buzz phrase around English cricket dressing rooms is “reverse or Irish
swing”’ (Frank Tyson, Sportstar Weekly 10–16 September 2005).
IWCC abbr International Women’s Cricket Council, the former governing body for
IWCC
women’s cricket at international level, now integrated into the ICC (qv)
J
jaffa
jaffa n a ball that moves unexpectedly in the air or off the pitch, and is almost impossible
for the batsman to play successfully; an unplayable delivery, so called because – from the
bowler’s point of view, at least – it is a ‘juicy’ delivery (slang):
‘One of Nash or Larsen is unlikely to play at Lord’s … which presents the tourists with
a ticklish dilemma. Larsen can land the ball in the right place regularly but at an innoc-
uous pace. Nash can’t, but occasionally bowls a “jaffa”’ (Vic Marks, Observer 12 June
1994).
‘Terence Duffin received a peach of an outswinger, Hamilton Masakadza missed a
similar delivery that angled in; Tatenda Taibu got a jaffa that seamed away’ (Siddhartha
Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo 20 September 2005).
jag back
jag back vb to turn sharply and quickly in towards the batsman after pitching:
‘It made for some memorable dismissals, none more than those of Thilan Samaraweera,
who twice shouldered arms to deliveries that pitched outside off and jagged back’
(Osman Samiuddin, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 82).
jerk
jerk vb to deliver the ball using an underarm or roundarm action in which the elbow is
brought against the side of the body so that the ball is catapulted forward (obsolete):
‘The Ball must be bowled (not thrown or jerked)’ (Laws 1816).
The ban on ‘jerking’ is elucidated by Felix (1850, p 44): ‘Neither the elbow, nor any
other part of the arm in the act of delivering the ball, may touch the hip, or ribs, or any
other part of the body whereby any increased speed may be communicated to the ball’.
jerker
jerker n a bowler who ‘jerks’ the ball rather than bowling it fairly (obsolete):
‘Brett was … neither a thrower nor a jerker, but a legitimate downright bowler’ (Nyren
1833 in HM, p 44).
See also YORKER
Jessopian
Jessopian adj (of a batting stroke or style of batting) characterised by unrestrained

aggression; big-hitting and fast-scoring:
‘Evans led the way with some square-cuts of Jessopian quality, and the 300 was soon up’
(Peebles 1959, p 30).
Although one-off adjectives have often been coined to describe the style of great
players (‘Comptonesque’, ‘Hobbsian’, etc) ‘Jessopian’ – along with BRADMANESQUE
(qv) – is one of the few that has endured as a cricketing term, perhaps because the
batting style it characterises is uncomplicated and easily categorised. The term derives
from Gilbert Jessop, who played for Cambridge, Gloucestershire, and England from
the 1890s until the First World War. Scorned by the purists, Jessop’s powerful and
often unorthodox hitting established some remarkable records for fast scoring,
including: a 50 in quarter of an hour (Gloucestershire v Somerset, 1904), a 150 in 63
minutes (Gents v Players, 1907), and a double century in two hours (Gloucestershire v
Sussex, 1903).
jump
jump vb (also jump out) to move quickly forward out of one’s ground, especially in order
to make a drive; by going down the wicket, the batsman is able to convert a ball of full
length into a half-volley:
‘Hopkins jumped at one from Rhodes and missed, but was back before Lilley … could
get the bails off’ (Melbourne Argus 12 December 1903).
93 jump
‘The best method of meeting him is to be ever ready to jump out to drive anything the
least over-pitched’ (Warner 1934, p 15).
쐽 n an act of advancing quickly down the wicket:
‘The jump, or the run to drive, was not a stroke they remembered only when they found
themselves tied up by a length bowler’ (James 1963, p 210).
K
Kanga cricket
Kanga cricket n a simplified form of cricket for young children, played with a soft ball
and lightweight plastic bats and stumps. Kanga cricket was introduced in Australia in
1983, and is promoted by the ACB as a way of encouraging children’s interest in cricket
and developing their cricketing skills. It is also played in New Zealand as ‘Kiwi cricket’
and in England as ‘Kwik cricket’. The rules of the game are sufficiently adaptable to
enable more or less any number of children to play in the time available.
kato
kato Corfu lit ‘down’: the fielding side.

Compare PANO
keep
keep, keep wicket vb to act as wicket-keeper:

‘To “keep” to a bowler like Shane Warne, who alternatively spins the ball from outside
the batsman’s leg stump to somewhere in the vicinity of first slip and then makes one go
straight ahead just four inches off the deck, requires remarkable skill’ (Australian
Cricket October 1993).
‘By choice I would have always played just as a batsman, but when Graham Gooch
asked me if I would keep on the Indian tour, I could hardly say no’ (Alec Stewart,
keeper, ’keeper
keeper, ’keeper n = WICKET-KEEPER:

‘It took the second new ball and the aggression of Benjamin … before Dassanayeke
deflected an outswinger to the keeper’ (Tony Cozier, Caribbean Cricket January/March
1994).
keep low
keep low vb (of the ball ) to fail to rise to the expected height after pitching:
‘First he dismissed Dyson, whom he forced on to the back foot, with a ball that kept low’
kick
kick vb (of the ball ) to rise steeply and unexpectedly high off the pitch; steeple:
‘It was soon evident from the way the ball kicked and hung that runs would be difficult
to get’ (Headlam 1903, p 163).
‘Three balls later Yallop had gone, beautifully caught at short square-leg from a nasty,
kicking delivery’ (Brearley 1982, p 77).
king pair
king pair n a ‘pair’ recorded by a batsman who is twice dismissed without scoring off the
first ball he receives:
‘The wicket looked like a nightmare and played only slightly less badly. Sobers, on a
“king pair”, was nearly caught first ball when he pushed forward to one that jumped’
(Manley 1988, p 182).
See also PAIR, EMPEROR PAIR
Kiwi cricket
Kiwi cricket See KANGA CRICKET

knock
knock n a turn at batting by an individual or team; an innings:

‘They will have to look to compiling well over 400, and very briskly, in their first knock
to exert any pressure at all’ (John Sheppard, Sunday Times 8 July 1984).
‘Crowe hit eight fours in his attacking knock’ (WCM January 1985).
‘Once Sehwag’s breezy knock ended at 36, the Indian innings was becalmed in the face
of some accurate bowling’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p
104).
95 Kwik cricket
Though more or less synonymous with ‘innings’ the term tends – when applied to an
individual batsman’s innings – to be used to describe an attacking spell of batting (such
as a brisk, entertaining half-century) and is unlikely to be applied to a major innings by
a strokemaking batsman or to a prolonged, defensive occupation of the crease.
쐽 vb —knock over to dismiss a team quickly and for a small total:
‘The Kiwis made a useful 312 and then knocked the home side over for a mere 162,
Richard Hadlee taking 4/33’ (Chas Keys, Australian Cricket October 1993).
Kookaburra ball
Kookaburra ball n a type of cricket ball manufactured in Australia and used in cricket
worldwide. The Kookaburra has a wider and flatter seam than the DUKE BALL (qv), and
is said to retain its shine for longer on hard wickets. It is now used in eight of the ten Test-
playing nations; Duke balls are still used in England, while in India the SG BALL (qv) is
still used for Test matches but Kookaburras are used in ODIs:
‘The much more dangerous “bodyline” of Lillee and Thomson, bowling with Kooka-
burra cricket balls which kept their bounce for 40 or 50 overs instead of rapidly going
soft like the balls of Larwood’s day, also won a series for Australia’ (Tony Pawson,
Cricketer July 1983).
Kwik cricket
Kwik cricket n the British name for KANGA CRICKET, which was introduced into Britain
in 1988
L
CRICKET AND ITS LAWS - A BRIEF HISTORY
To understand how cricket developed from a rustic pastime to an organised sport, follow the
money. Anyone who has read Fielding or Thackeray, Eliot or Austen, will know that the
English upper-classes in the pre-Victorian era were incorrigible gamblers. The sandwich was
famously invented when the eponymous 4th Earl, unable to drag himself away from the
gaming table, demanded sustenance in situ in the form of a piece of meat slammed between
two slices of bread. For people like the Earl, sports of all kinds (prize-fighting, horse-racing,
and indeed cricket) were above all a vehicle for gambling - and this in turn created a need for
regulation. By the early 1700s, wagers on the outcome of cricket games involved astonish-
ingly large sums of money, and with so much at stake it was vital that all parties should agree
on the terms of the contest.
Timeline
1727
Articles of Agreement for two proposed games (one in Surrey, one in Sussex) between teams
sponsored by the Duke of Richmond and a Mr A.Brodrick. As well as establishing the prize
money for each game, these articles specify, among other things, the length of the pitch (23
yards), the size of the teams (12 men apiece), and the rules for substitution 'if any of the
Gamesters shall be taken lame or sick after the Match is begun'. This is not, however, a
compete code by any means, and some speculate that its function was to supplement an
already-existing set of Laws which has not been preserved.
1744
The earliest known complete code of Laws. The first surviving printed version of this code
appears in The New Universal Magazine of November 1752, headed 'The Game at Cricket,
as settled by the Cricket-club, in 1744, and play'd at the Artillery-Ground, London'.
According to F.S.Ashley-Cooper (Cricket: A Weekly Record of the Game: 1900), the Laws
had been drawn up by 'the noblemen and gentlemen who frequented the Artillery Ground'.
The likelihood is that this version brings together, clarifies, and sets down for the first time
rules which had probably been established for several decades.
1755
The first code of Laws published as a pamphlet, a 20-page publication entitled 'The Game at
Cricket, As settled by the Several Cricket-Clubs, particularly that of the Star and Garter in
Pall Mall'. The content and sequence of these Laws matches that of the 1744 code, but some
of the English is more 'modern' (the earlier version, for example, refers to the ball as 'she' and
'her', but by 1755 'she' has become 'it'). This code forms the basis for the conduct of the
modern game.
1774
A major new revision was carried out by a committee of 'Noblemen and Gentlemen of Kent,
Hampshire, Surry [sic], Middlesex and London'. It includes clauses for regulating the
outcome of bets, such as 'If the Notches [runs] of one Player are laid against another, the Bet
depends on both Innings, unless otherwise specified'.
97 late cut
1785-5
A further revision, which includes the first reference to the three-stump wicket that had been
adopted a few years earlier.
1788
The first code published under the auspices of the MCC, which had been formed the previous
year. Thus begins MCC's role as sole guardian of the Laws of Cricket. The 1788 code defines
the LBW law much more precisely, and also includes the first known prescriptions regulating
the rolling and mowing of pitches.
1835, 1884, 1947, 1979

Four further revised editions published by MCC. Each code brings together various amend-
ments that had been introduced from time to time between major editions.
2000
Publication of the most recent Code which - for the first time - includes a two-page 'Preamble'
on 'The Spirit of Cricket'.
MCC retains the copyright of the Laws, and any proposed amendments only become law if
approved by a two-thirds majority at a special meeting of the club. Increasingly, however,
the Laws are supplemented by regulations emanating from the ICC, and how long MCC can
retain its historical role - as cricket's centre of gravity moves eastward - is anybody's guess.
In 1774, the same year as one of the major earlier revisions, a diatribe appeared in the
Chelmsford Chronicle (reproduced in Fresh Light on 18th Century Cricket by G.B.Buckley
(1935)), lamenting cricket's degeneration into little more than an excuse for gambling. A
game once played 'for manly exercise, animated by a noble spirit of emulation' had been
'perverted from diversion and innocent pastime to excessive gaming and public dissipation'.
Apocalyptic stuff, and with a familiar ring to it. But almost 250 years on, cricket is alive and
well - a salutary lesson, perhaps, for today's Jeremiahs.
lap
lap n a gentle sweep stroke played with a horizontal bat very close to the ground, usually
sending the ball into the area between square leg and fine leg
vb to hit the ball into the leg-side area when playing this stroke:
쐽
‘Knott, typically, cut and lapped zealously and helped to add 47 for the sixth wicket’
(David Green, Daily Telegraph 1 June 1984).
last over See CLOSE OF PLAY
last over
late
late adv, adj 1. (happening or played) characterised by movement at an advanced stage

of the ball’s flight:
‘He kept the ball well up, swinging it late from outside the off-stump to middle-and-off’
(James 1963, p 92).
‘There is no smothering a good late outswinger which starts about middle stump; and,
if it finds the edge … must almost certainly go to slip or wicketkeeper as a catch’ (Arlott
1983, p 38).
‘Hoggard, his late swing the perfect foil for Flintoff, contributed a sublime spell of four
for four from 19 balls to finish things off’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 121).
2. (of a batting stroke played) when the ball is already close to the line of the stumps:
‘There are very few players, indeed, who can cut late with anything like effect or
severity’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 182).
‘This moment differs from player to player, and one who has plenty of time to play his
shots and who can actually play them late … is the better player’ (Purandare 2005, p 36).
late cut
late cut n a cut made by hitting an off-side ball at the latest possible moment, delaying
contact until the ball is level with and even beyond the stumps, and sending it into the
area behind gully. Described by Ranjitsinhji (1897, p 182) as the ‘most telling’ of cuts,
it demands great power and control in the wrists:
late-cut 98
‘No one in India – and very few anywhere else in the world – has played the late cut as
late or as fine as Viswanath’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 68).
late-cut
late-cut vb to hit the ball when playing a late cut:

‘Cowdrey reached his fifty when he late-cut Benaud for a couple’ (Peebles 1959, p 159).
late order n the players batting at or towards the end of a team’s batting line-up; the tail:
late order
‘It was left to a distinctly out-of-touch Lamb to help the late order salvage something’
(Matthew Engel, Guardian 4 January 1984).
‘Ravi Ratnayeke … ran through the late-order batsmen with a spell of 4 for 10 from six
overs’ (WCM May 1984).
‘Despite a late-order collapse of a kind once familiar to England supporters … the home
side gained a first-innings lead of 154’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 27 May 2006).
lbw
lbw adv (also lb, leg-before-wicket, leg-before) a mode of dismissal in which the
batsman is given out if he stops a ball, other than with his bat or hand, which in the
umpire’s judgement would otherwise have hit the wicket. This dismissal is credited to
the bowler and entered in the scorebook as ‘lbw b bowler’.
쐽 n a dismissal in which the batsman is out lbw:
‘Julie Harris finished with 15 wickets, including a hat-trick of lbws against West Indies’
(Carol Salmon, Wisden 1994, p 952).
The current lbw law prescribes three situations in which a decision may be given
against the batsman, subject in all cases to the overriding condition that the ball would
have hit the wicket had it not been intercepted by the batsman. The batsman should be
given out: (1) if the ball pitches in a straight line between wicket and wicket THEN hits
the batsman standing between wicket and wicket (or, in the case of a full toss, if the
ball would have pitched between wicket and wicket if not intercepted by the batsman);
(2) if the ball pitches outside off stump THEN hits the batsman standing between
wicket and wicket; and (3) if the ball pitches on the off-side of the wicket AND is
intercepted by the batsman outside the line of off stump BUT in the umpire’s opinion
the batsman makes no attempt to play a stroke. In all three cases a decision can still be
given against the batsman even if the point of interception is above the level of the
bails.
Apart from a general injunction against ‘standing unfair to strike’, the original (1744)
code of Laws has no mention of lbw as a mode of dismissal; but with the old-style
curved bats, requiring a stance well outside leg stump, the problem would scarcely
99 left-hander
have arisen. The arrival of the straight bat in about 1770 opened up new possibilities
for the defence of the wicket and these must have been quickly exploited by batsmen,
because in 1774 the specific ‘offence’ of lbw appears for the first time in the Laws: the
batsman was to be given out if he ‘puts his leg before the wicket with a design to stop
the ball, and actually prevents the ball from hitting the wicket by it’. The next 200 years
saw a gradual extension in the scope of the law which, effectively, put the bowler in an
increasingly advantageous position. The question of the batsman’s ‘design’ was
quickly eliminated from the reckoning (1788), so that even accidental obstruction
could lead to dismissal; the point of interception was extended in 1823 to include any
part of the batsman’s body, not just his legs; and, much more recently, the law was
further extended in 1937 to include the case of balls pitching outside off stump
(condition (2) above). The third type of dismissal (condition (3) above) was introduced
in 1970 in an effort to discourage deliberate ‘padding up’ to the ball, a ploy developed
by batsmen to combat the 1937 ruling (see PAD UP). Some would argue, however, that
both modern extensions to the law (1937 and 1970) have given an undue advantage to
bowlers of inswing and off-spin, possibly to the detriment of more attacking styles of
bowling. The conditions for an lbw decision are now defined with considerable
precision, but the difficulties for the umpire are as great as ever. Television replays and
modern technology, notably HAWK-EYE (qv), can make umpiring errors glaringly
apparent, and this has increased pressure for lbw decisions to be subject to appeal to
the third umpire. Few would disagree with the verdict of a 19th-century commentator
that the lbw law is ‘the most perplexing and disagreeable of the whole code’ (Box 1868,
p 135).
leading arm
leading arm n the bowler’s non-bowling arm, the left arm in the case of a right-arm
bowler. At the moment before the bowling arm is brought over to deliver the ball, the
‘leading arm’ is held upward and forward, pointing down the wicket:
‘Dilley … worked at running in closer to the stumps and getting his leading arm round
to fine-leg instead of third man’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 22 May 1983).
leading edge
leading edge n the edge of the bat that is nearer the bowler as the batsman plays a stroke:
‘Gooch was caught and bowled off a leading edge next morning for 127’ (Berry 1982, p
138).
쐽 vb to deflect the ball off the leading edge of the bat:
‘Warne was also … as much as a victim of misfortune as McGrath yesterday. Pietersen
miscued him into space on the off, Bell leading-edged him to leg’ (Haigh 2005, p 110).
leather
leather n the cricket ball, so called because of the material from which its outer cover is
made; the term is best known from the cliché ‘the sound of leather on willow’, but it is
also used in other cricket contexts:
‘They [the French] can see no delight in being bowled at over 22 yards, or of getting in
the way of “leather” at a much longer range’ (Box 1868, p 22).
‘They gave us a fine bit of leather-hunting in their second innings, scoring 341’ (W. G.
Grace, Cricket 1891, p 89).
leave
leave vb (of the ball) to move sharply away from the batsman, going towards the off-side
from an initially straighter line:
‘Fraser beat him [Lara] with a near yorker then, at 347, got a ball to lift and leave him’
(Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Daily Telegraph 19 April 1994).
‘When the bowlers … got the ball to leave him outside the off-stump, he went up on his
toes and cut it with the full swing of the bat’ (Purandare 2005, p 130).
left-armer
left-armer n a bowler who delivers the ball from his left hand:
‘The pace bowling depended on the occasionally devastating but still erratic Wayne
Holdsworth, the spasmodically fit 34-year-old Geoff Lawson, and the ever-competitive
left-armer Michael Whitney’ (John Mackinnon, Wisden 1993, p 1064).
See also SLOW LEFT-ARMER
left-hander
left-hander n a batsman who stands at the crease with his bat to the left of his body,
usually holding the bat with the left hand lower than the right on the handle:
leg 100
‘Azhar sent in Kambli at number three. This despite the fact that earlier in the game, the
left-hander had made a dashing thirty-five at his usual number five slot’ (Purandare
2005, p 195).
leg
leg n 1. that side of the pitch on which the striker stands to receive the ball, separated from
the off-side by an imaginary line passing between the two wickets, bounded at its outside
edge by the fine-leg, square-leg, mid-wicket, and long-on boundaries, and constituting
half of the entire playing area. Also called ON:
‘When Vaughan then attempted to turn the first ball of Warne’s second over to leg out of
the rough, the Australians began appealing while the ball was still arcing to slip’ (Haigh
2005, p 149).
2. a leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) equivalent to the modern
square leg (obsolete):
‘The Man that stands to the Leg. He stands the on side, little behind the straight line of
the popping crease; if he stands to save the runs, he will stand fifteen yards or more from
the stumps’ (Boxall 1800, p 59).
The unadorned ‘leg’ gradually gave way to more detailed descriptions like square leg,
short leg, and long leg.
쐽 adj, adv on, towards, or relating to the leg-side:
‘It may be taken for certain that for every leg ball you see now in first-class matches you
saw ten or twenty in former days’ (Badminton 1888, p 65).
‘One peculiarity of the leg-twisting ball is that when the ground is soft and sticky it is
comparatively of no avail’ (Badminton 1888, p 113).
‘As runs came Larwood packed his leg field; and now had seven men on the leg side’
‘He set his innings under way by twice cracking short deliveries from Makhaya Ntini to
the leg boundary’ (Peter Roebuck, The Age (Melbourne) 17 December 2005).
See also LEGS
leg-before, leg-before-wicket
leg-before, leg-before-wicket adv = LBW:

‘Walsh pitched a fullish length and Ramprakash, with a shot that was neither attack nor
defence, misread the line and was horribly leg-before’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 18
March 1994).
‘Kapil had also earned his 400th Test scalp in the Perth Test when he trapped Mark
Taylor Leg Before’ (Purandare 2005, p 132).
leg-break
leg-break n 1. a relatively slow ball that deviates from leg towards off after pitching:
‘Warne spun the ball more than any bowler I’ve seen. His first delivery of the season,
that dream/nightmare leg-break to Gatting (depending on your vantage point) alerted
us’ (Vic Marks, Observer 29 August 1993).
‘Read advanced down the pitch and cracked a Kaneria leg-break into the stands at long-
on’ (Vic Marks, Observer 13 August 2006).
Technically, the term can apply to any ball breaking away from the batsman, such as a
right-arm bowler’s googly bowled to a left-handed batsman or the ‘stock’ ball of a slow
left-arm finger-spinner. But usually leg-break denotes the ball bowled by a right-arm
wrist-spinner (See WRIST-SPIN).
Compare LEG-CUTTER
2. deviation of the ball from leg towards off after pitching, caused by spin imparted by
the bowler; leg-spin:
‘Leg-break is artificial rather than natural, and is much more difficult to produce than
off-break’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 78).
leg-bye
leg-bye n a run scored from a ball (other than a wide or no-ball) that is deflected off some
part of the striker’s body, apart from his hand holding the bat, when he is attempting
either to hit the ball with the bat or to avoid being hit by the ball. If neither of these
conditions is met (i.e. if the umpire believes the batsman deliberately used his body to
deflect the ball) the umpire should call ‘dead ball’ and no runs will be allowed. Any runs
legitimately accruing as leg-byes – whether actually run or coming from a boundary –
101 legs
are credited to the batting side as ‘extras’, but not to the individual batsman, and the
umpire signals a leg-bye to the scorers by lifting a leg and touching the knee with his
hand.
Runs scored from deflections off the striker’s body were not distinguished from other
forms of bye until 1850, but were certainly a legitimate form of scoring long before
that. According to Charles Box (1868, p 124) ‘a suggestion was made by Mr. Denison,
in the year 1845, to particularize runs obtained off the padded legs’, and it is likely that
the impetus for this change was provided by the introduction of leg guards in about
1840.
See EXTRAS
leg-cutter
leg-cutter n a relatively fast ball that deviates from leg towards off after pitching,
produced by ‘cutting’ the ball rather than by wrist-spin (See CUT):
‘New Zealand bowled very well, especially Cairns, who varied his inswingers so cleverly
with his slower leg-cutter’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
Compare LEG-BREAK
leggie
leggie n especially in Australia a bowler of leg-spin; a wrist-spinner:

‘The ball that turned the series was undoubtedly the first-up delivery from leggie Shane
Warne, which deceived Gatting in flight and then spun from a foot outside the leg stump
to hit off’ (Peter Hook, Australian Cricket October 1993).
leg glance
leg glance, leg glide n a batting stroke, the GLANCE (qv):

‘He [Ranjitsinhji] played his famous leg glance with a dead straight bat, merely turning
his wrist over at the last possible second, and flicking the ball away’ (Warner 1934, p
130).
‘In the leg glide the left leg will be brought in its forward movement just inside the line
of the ball’ (MCC 1952, p 99).
leg guard
leg guard n either of a pair of padded coverings worn by batsmen to protect their legs; a
PAD (old):
‘Do not face fast bowling without leg guards’ (W. G. Grace, Cricketing Reminiscences
1899, p 293).
leg-gully
leg-gully n a close leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
batsman’s wicket but not as fine as leg slip; leg-gully is the mirror-image of the more
familiar off-side gully position
leg hit
leg hit n an attacking batting stroke sending the ball into the on-side area; especially, a
stroke played off the front foot to a ball pitching outside leg stump. If the ball pitches
fairly close to leg stump it is hit square of the wicket with a straight bat, but if it pitches
wide it is played with a cross bat into the area backward of square. (old):
‘Even now I take a melancholy pleasure in watching school matches, and saying So-and-
So will make quite a fair school-boy bat in time, but he must get rid of that stroke of his
on the off, and that shocking leg-hit’ (P.G.Wodehouse, Now, Talking about Cricket
1903).
leg-hitting
leg-hitting n the action or technique of hitting the ball to leg, especially when making a
‘leg hit’ (old):
‘With good leg-hitting, it would be impossible for the fielders to stand so near in as they
do, nor would any captain be such a fool as to ask them to do so’ (‘Second Slip’, Crick-
eter Spring Annual 1933).
legs
legs n 1. —off one’s legs a. with the ball being deflected off one’s legs (or pads) and on
to the stumps:
‘A favourite scheme for a slow bowler to get rid of a batsman is by bowling him off his
legs’ (Badminton 1888, p 137).
b. with regard to one’s batting strokes on the leg-side:
‘With Jack Heron also looking strong off his legs the innings began to gather momentum’
(Tony Pawson, Observer 12 June 1983).
2. —round/around one’s legs with the ball passing behind one’s legs and on to the
stumps:
leg-shooter 102
‘Boycott so completely misread him that he was bowled round his legs by a leg-break
while thinking it was a harmless leg-side off-break’ (Frith 1984, p 184).
‘Warne bowled exceedingly well throughout the series, though towards the end, the thrill
of bowling batsmen around their legs from out of the bowler’s rough tended to obsess
him’ (Peter Hook, Australian Cricketer October 1993).
leg-shooter
leg-shooter n a relatively fast ball that pitches on or outside leg stump and fails to rise
significantly off the wicket; a SHOOTER (qv) bowled down the leg-side (obsolete):
‘We read of the marvellous feat of Mr. T. A. Anson at the wicket when he stumped a man
off a leg-shooter of Alfred Mynn’ (Badminton 1888, p 278).
leg-side
leg-side n, adj (on or towards) the side of the pitch on which the striker stands:
‘The difference achieved by Jardine’s tactics of linking Larwood with two other great
fast bowlers in Voce and Allen, and giving him for periods a packed leg-side field, is
clear enough in the bowling figures’ (Tony Pawson, Cricketer July 1983).
‘He stepped out for a big hit off Mark Waugh, who saw the initial movement and sent the
ball down the leg-side, out of his reach’ (Purandare 2005, p 197).
See LEG
leg slip
leg slip n a close leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
batsman’s wicket and fairly near to the line of flight of the ball. Leg slip is a fairly recent
term for what could also be called fine short leg:
‘The danger men of the tournament, Kaluwitharana and Jayasuriya, were out in the first
over – the right-hander caught at third man and the left-hander falling to a leg-slip trap’
leg-spin
leg-spin n the practice or technique of spinning the ball so that it deviates from leg
towards off after pitching; especially, the bowling of leg-breaks by means of WRIST-SPIN
(qv):
‘Abdul Qadir … was soon to emerge as a torchbearer for leg-spin, an operator who
bemused dozens of county batsmen in the best Freeman tradition’ (Frith 1984, p 180).
‘It seems as if the cricket world is filled with legspinners all of a sudden at a time when
there had been a general feeling that the art of legspin bowling is slowly dying’ (Haresh
Pandya, WCM March 1994).
leg-spinner
leg-spinner n 1. an exponent of leg-spin bowling:

‘In the course of taking 87 first-class wickets with his leg-breaks … Ian Salisbury of
Sussex became the first specialist leg-spinner to play for England in 21 years’ (Rob
Steen, Wisden 1983, p 36).
‘Part of Kumble’s trouble has been that he has shared his time at the top with Warne,
the legspinner’s legspinner’ (Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine April 2006, p 34).
2. a leg-break:
‘There was not a great deal of flight about his leg-spinners and googlies’ (Frith 1984, p
125).
leg-theory
leg-theory n a form of attack in which the majority of the fielders are stationed on the
leg-side, with several in close catching positions, and the ball is bowled on or outside the
leg stump with the aim of restricting scoring strokes and inducing the batsman to hit a
catch. A typical leg-theory field might include a square leg, a fine leg, and three or four
fielders in the LEG TRAP (qv) between leg-slip and silly mid-on.
Field settings of this type are used especially by bowlers of off-breaks or inswingers,
and leg-theory has been a recognised tactic of the game at least since the late 19th
century. But in cricketing lore the term is inextricably associated with the controversial
MCC tour of Australia in 1932–33 – the so-called ‘Bodyline series’ – when England’s
leading fast bowler, Harold Larwood, carried the leg-theory attack to its logical, most
systematic conclusion. Larwood bowled extremely fast, often short-pitched balls to a
packed leg-side field, and finished the series with a record haul of 33 wickets. The
MCC’s tactics, which had been masterminded by the captain Douglas Jardine, were
bitterly condemned in Australia and allegations of ‘unsportsmanlike’ behaviour almost
brought the series to a premature end. Larwood himself always insisted that his version
103 length
of fast leg-theory was a legitimate tactic, and he rejected the provocative term
‘bodyline’ coined by the Australian press. But his claim that leg-theory was not a
decisive factor in England’s 4–1 victory – ‘We should have won this game and the
others whether I had bowled Fast-Leg-Theory or not’ (Larwood 1933, p 135) – is
disingenuous and not easily reconciled with the facts. What distinguished Larwood’s
bowling from previous forms of leg-theory was, first, the extent to which his leg-side
field was ‘packed’ (with as many as six close fielders) and secondly, Larwood’s high
pace and almost legendary accuracy.
Directly after the tour Larwood warned that any attempt to legislate against fast leg-
theory would make cricket ‘a less manly game’, and in his view ‘that would be an
Imperial disaster’ (!) (Larwood 1933, p 44). By the end of the following year, however,
the MCC had issued a directive aimed at curbing ‘persistent and systematic bowling of
fast, short-pitched balls at the batsman standing clear of his wicket’ (See BOUNCER). In
a sense this should have made no difference to Larwood, who always claimed that he
bowled at leg stump and not at the batsman. Nevertheless, Larwood’s version of fast
leg-theory, as a fully orchestrated ‘set piece’, was not employed again in first-class
cricket. In the contemporary game, a leg-theory field is constrained by restrictions
outlined in Law 41§ 5, which allows no more than two leg-side fielders behind the bat.
See also BODYLINE, FIELDING RESTRICTIONS
leg trap
leg trap n a field setting in which two or more fielders are stationed in close catching
positions on the leg-side, anywhere in an arc between leg slip and silly mid-on:
‘Sobers was one of the greatest fielders in the world in the slips, in the leg trap, or even,
if absolutely necessary, in the deep’ (Manley 1988, p 162).
length
length n 1. the point at which a ball pitches, considered in terms of the distance down the
wicket that it travels after leaving the bowler’s hand; length is the complement of ‘line’
and together they form the basic prerequisites for effective bowling:
‘To be a good judge of a ball’s length is a source of strength in any player’ (Badminton
1888, p 51).
‘Rhodes … was accurate in his length, had a deceptive flight, and on a sticky wicket
could make the ball “talk”’ (Warner 1934, p 40).
2. the optimum point at which a ball should pitch in order to cause maximum difficulty
for the batsman, lying between the point that produces a long hop and the point that
produces a half-volley:
‘Spare your vigour at first, now exert all your strength
But measure each step, and be sure pitch a length’ (Rev R. Cotton, ‘Hambledon Song’
1778 in HM, p 52).
‘Flintoff was awesome. Relentlessly hitting a length, he found seam, a hint of swing, four
wickets and a place in Ashes legend’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 121).
‘Harmison struck early, and hard, getting one to rise wickedly from only a yard or so
short of a good length’ (Keith Mitchell, Observer 30 July 2006).
The precise distance that constitutes a good length will depend on a number of factors,
such as the pace of the wicket, the age of the ball, and of course the speed of the bowler:
‘Bowlers differ generally in their paces, just the same they differ in their lengths:
length-ball 104
Slow Bowling, 3 Yds and 3 Qrs
Middling Ditto, 4 Ditto and a Half
Fast Ditto, Ditto Ditto
FROM THE STUMPS’
(Boxall 1800, p 13)
Boxall’s stipulations remain more or less valid (despite the intervening revolution in
bowling techniques), but the best definition of a good length does not depend on
precise figures: ‘A Victorian cricketer once described it as the ball delivered to such a
point on the pitch as produced the agonizing uncertainty in the batsman of not knowing
whether to play forward or back’ (Arlott 1983, p 38).
See also TEST MATCH LENGTH
length-ball n a ball that is pitched well up to the batsman and bounces once before
length-ball
reaching him; a ball of good ‘length’ (old):

‘The bowler … when he sees a man coming in that he knows will stop all his length-balls
with ease, is always in a degree disheartened’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 23).
The length-ball, as distinguished from the ‘grubs’ and ‘lobs’ of the earliest days of
cricket, was perfected in the Hambledon era (late 18th century), especially by David
Harris:
‘Length-bowling … was introduced in David’s time, and by him first brought to perfec-
tion’ (Pycroft 1854 in HM, p 151).
See BOWLING
Level 1 offence
Level 1 offence n an offence against the spirit or Laws of the game, as defined in Rule
CC 5.1 in the ICC’s Code of Conduct. The Code outlines (in considerable detail) four
categories of transgression, ranging from the fairly minor Level 1 to the career-
threatening Level 4. Level 1 offences include showing dissent at an umpire’s decision or
‘sending off’ a batsman who has been dismissed (see SEND OFF), and can result in a
forfeit of up to 50% of the player’s match fee. Racist comments are covered by the much
more serious Level 3, while Level 4 offences (which include ‘serious’ racist abuse and
acts of violence against officials or other players) can in extreme cases incur a lifetime
ban.
life
life n 1. a ‘lively’ quality in the wicket that makes it particularly helpful to the faster
bowlers, providing conditions conducive to pace off the pitch, good bounce, and
movement off the seam:
‘Lloyd, back after missing Port-of-Spain because of a hamstring injury, expected early
life from a well-grassed pitch’ (WCM May 1984).
‘There had been overnight rain and, on uncovered wickets, Verity and Robins were soon
extracting life’ (Bose 1990, p 108).
2. a fortuitous extension to a batsman’s innings due to failure by the fielding side to
dismiss him when an easy chance was offered:
‘On the first day Wessels had played extremely well after his early “life”’ (Henry
Blofeld, Cricketer February 1984).
lift vb 1. (of the ball) to rise from the pitch more steeply than usual, typically from a good
lift
length; unlike a ball that ‘kicks’ or ‘steeples’, the lifting ball depends less on
irregularities in the pitch and more on the skill of the bowler:
‘Hardly had Shah begun to play a few strokes than Sandhu made one lift to have him
caught behind’ (Tony Pawson, Observer 12 June 1983).
2. to hit the ball high in the air, especially when playing a front-foot shot:
‘Nayadu could never convey the certainty that Bradman did and there was one major
technical difference. Nayadu … was prepared to lift the ball and did it often and very
profitably. Bradman never lifted the ball’ (Bose 1990, p 70).
쐽 n a capacity for making the ball rise relatively steeply off the pitch:
‘The wickets were coconut matting on hard clay … But they took all the spin you put on
the ball and there was always some lift’ (James 1963, p 60).
lifter
lifter n a ball that rises off the pitch more steeply than expected, though not as high as a
‘steepler’:
105 live
‘Gooch was brought on as the partnership breaker, but the vital separation occurred at
the other end with a lifter from Gough just before tea’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
light
light n the opportunity to discontinue play when the light is judged by the umpires to be
unfit, offered to the batsmen at the wicket, who are thought of as deputising for the
captain of the batting side:
‘Play began at 3.40, with 25 overs a side the intention, but only one had been bowled by
Dennis when the Kent openers were offered the light’ (Guardian 18 July 1983).
‘England needed … to pretend that they had more of the initiative than they did. Hence
the furore when Lamb “accepted the light” on Monday evening’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday
Times 8 July 1984).
‘Langer and Hayden probably would not have accepted the light offer had they known it
would cost them the rest of the day, but they must also have known it would contain that
risk’ (Haigh 2005, p 206).
The umpires are the ‘sole judges’ of the fitness of the light for play, and they have the
right to suspend play if they believe that conditions are so bad that ‘that there is obvious
and foreseeable risk to the safety of any player’ (Law 3 §9(d)). In most cases, however,
the umpires take into account the wishes of the players. In cases where play has not yet
started, or has not yet resumed after a stoppage, play may begin if both captains inform
the umpires of their willingness to play in the prevailing conditions. But in cases where
the light becomes unfit while play is actually in progress, only the batting side are
‘offered the light’ and given the option of coming off or continuing; and if they do
agree to stay at the wicket in poor conditions, they can only successfully ‘appeal
against the light’ if conditions further deteriorate from the point at which they agreed
to stay on. The use of light meters in the modern game has made it possible for umpires
to judge more accurately the progressive deterioration (or improvement) of the light.
ICC Playing Conditions (3.7.5) stipulate that, as soon as the umpires have agreed that
the light is unfit for play, a meter reading should be taken and this can then be ‘used as
a benchmark reading’ for determining when play can begin again.
limited-overs
limited-overs adj denoting a type of cricket or a game of cricket played under

regulations allowing each side one innings of a stipulated number of overs:
‘Limited-overs cricket has made batsmen more powerful and faster between the wickets
and has taught them how to score quickly under pressure’ (Marqusee 1994, p 130).
See ONE-DAY
line
line n 1. the direction of the bowled ball’s flight from wicket to wicket:
‘Two overs later Border was caught at first slip as he tried to take his bat away from the
line’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 7 July 1993).
2. the degree of accuracy and control, with regard to the direction of the ball’s flight
(rather than the point at which it pitches) with which a bowler delivers the ball:
‘Kasper is not an out and out quick but has great command of line and can be quite
sharp’ (Nadeem Shahid, Cricketer September 1994).
Line is the complement of ‘length’ and together they form the basic prerequisites for
effective bowling:
‘Statham bowled magnificently to take four wickets for 90 runs in 36 overs, establishing
the mastery of line and length which always served him throughout his career’ (Manley
1988, p 103).
List A
List A n denoting a limited-overs domestic (as opposed to international) game or

competition, played between first-class teams. List A games include those played in each
country’s main one-day tournaments, and one-day fixtures between (e.g.) a county or
state side and a touring Test team.
Compare ODI
live
live adj (of the ball) still in play; not DEAD (qv):
‘The ball becomes live when the bowler takes the first pace of his approach to the wicket’
(Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 117).
lively 106
lively
lively adj denotes a wicket that offers assistance to the faster bowlers, helping them
produce good bounce together with pace and movement off the pitch; the lively wicket
was traditionally thought of as hard and dry, but nowadays liveliness is more likely to be
associated with the ‘green’ wicket that retains a little moisture early in the day:
‘There is logic in thinking that a side strong in fast bowling should bowl when the pitch
is at its liveliest, which it will be on the first morning while moisture lingers after the
groundsman’s final watering’ (Berry 1982, p 128).
lob
lob n a slow underarm ball with a high curving trajectory:

‘By the time the scoring-board registered two hundred, five wickets were down, three of
them victims to the lobs’ (P.G. Wodehouse, Mike: The MCC Match, 1909).
Although lobs of a kind were no doubt bowled during the Hambledon era (when all
bowling was underarm) lob-bowling was not seriously cultivated as a specialist skill
until the mid-19th century, when other forms of underarm bowling were already
obsolescent. The baffling flight of a well-bowled lob could pose serious problems of
timing for the batsman, and even if he managed to make contact with the ball he was
still not out of danger, since the lob-bowler’s ‘great aim’, according to Ranjitsinhji
(1897, p 94), was ‘to bowl balls which are difficult to score off unless hit in the air’.
Despite the rapid decline of underarm bowling that followed the legalisation of the
overarm delivery in 1864, the bowling of lobs remained relatively common for a
further 50 years. Successful exponents included Walter Humphreys of Sussex, who
took 148 wickets in 1893, and George Simpson-Hayward who took 23 Test wickets for
MCC on the 1909–10 tour of South Africa.
By 1914, however, the otherwise universal abandonment of underarm bowling had
turned the ‘lobster’ into something of a curiosity. His subsequent demise is possibly
explained by the fact that batsmen unused to underarm bowling could only cope with
lobs by ‘throwing the bat’. This made life uncomfortable for the fielding side and could
also cost a lot of runs; thus, even when taking wickets, the lob-bowler could be
unacceptably expensive. The last serious lob-bowler in first-class cricket was Trevor
Molony, who took four wickets in his four appearances for Surrey in 1921.
쐽 vb 1. to hit the ball high in the air:
‘Botham was retained as opener in the belief that, like Border, he might be able to lob
the ball into the outfield, which … can be patrolled by only two fielders in the first 15
overs’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 27 January 1983).
‘Soon after, Botham got Kambli to lob a catch to mid-on, and the rest of the batting
crumbled’ (Purandare 2005, p 134).
2. (of the ball ) to fly high in the air off the bat as a result of a badly-played shot:
‘A length ball straightens, pops and lobs into the slips off the shoulder of Constantine’s
bat, a catch that eight-year-old Bobby would scorn and ask please to be thrown a real
one’ (James 1963, p 132).
lobster
lobster n a bowler of lobs (old ):

‘He displayed a great turn of speed running out to the lobster, whom he really played
extremely well’ (Headlam 1903, p 187).
local six
local six n India a humorous term for a lofted shot that is caught in the outfield, the
implication being that it would have gone for six on a small local ground
loft
loft vb to hit the ball high in the air, especially when playing a front-foot shot such as a
straight drive. See illustration on next page:
‘In the following over … Botham stepped down the pitch and lofted the ball far above the
height of St Ann’s tower’ (Berry 1982, p 145).
‘Earmarked as one of the future stars of the middle order, he paid a heavy price for a
loose stroke, a lofted drive straight to cover point’ (Trevor Grant, WCM March 1994).
‘Langer was all fight, lofting Giles for two sixes in his first over, and heavily outscored
a hesitant, scratchy Hayden’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 119).
lolly
lolly n Australia a simple catch; a dolly

107 long hop
long
long adj (now used only in combination) occupying or indicating a fielding position close
or relatively close to the boundary. Although formerly used to describe positions all
round the ground (See LONG FIELD, LONG SLIP) the term ‘long’ has now been largely
superseded by ‘deep’ and survives only in the terms long-off, long-on, and long leg.
long field
long field n 1. the entire area of the field behind the bowler’s wicket, close to the
boundary and in an arc between wide long-off and wide long-on; also, a fielder
occupying a position in this area (old):
‘Rhodes drove a ball into the long-field very hard and low … and Douglas, racing along
the boundary caught it in his left hand just as it was clearing the ropes’ (Warner 1934,
p 79).
2. any of various deep fielding positions (obsolete):
‘Long field to cover the middle wicket and point is a situation in which the fieldsman will
have many hard balls to stop’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 36).
The modern terms long-off and long-on developed from the now obsolete long field,
straight off and long field, straight on.
long handle n an aggressive style of batting, so called because of the natural tendency
long handle
of a batsman playing attacking strokes to grip the bat closer to the top of the handle and
thus allow the bat to swing through a greater arc; used in phrases like ‘give it the long
handle’ and ‘use the long handle’:
‘As to sticky wickets … unless a batsman has an almost superhuman power of watching
the ball, the best thing he can do is to “take the long handle” and hit as hard as ever he
can’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 204).
‘Warne now opted to use the long handle, slashing 12 runs from a McCague over’ (Vic
Marks, Observer 4 July 1993).
long hop
long hop, (also formerly long hopper) n a short-pitched ball that does not rise steeply
from the pitch but comes through at a comfortable height, giving the batsman plenty of
time to play a shot:
‘Next he sent Kenyon a long-hop which was summarily sent to the boundary’ (Cardus
1978, p 155).
long leg 108

‘A rank “long hopper” may be sent to any point of the compass with a horizontal bat’
(Warner 1934, p 17).
The long hop, so called because the ball pitches early and comes on to the bat after a
prolonged ‘hop’, amounts to a free gift for the batsman and has long been regarded as
‘the sin of bowlers for which there is no forgiveness’.
long leg
long leg n a deep leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
batsman’s wicket and anywhere in an arc between deep fine leg and deep backward
square leg.
long-nips
long-nips See NIPS

long-off
long-off n a deep off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
bowler’s wicket and anywhere in an arc between deep extra cover and the area directly
behind the bowler.
long-on
long-on n a deep leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) behind the
bowler’s wicket and anywhere in an arc between the area directly behind the bowler and
the area behind wide mid-on:
‘Azhar was done in by the desire to hit Carl Hooper over long-on for a six’ (Purandare
2005, p 194).
long slip
long slip n an off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) equivalent to what
would now be called short third man, or possibly fly-slip (obsolete):
‘Long Slip or the Man that stands to cover the Short Slip [stands] the same distance from
the stumps as the long stop … between the man at the point and the man at the slip’
(Boxall 1800, p 61).
See also SLIP
long stop
long stop n a fielding position (or the player occupying it) directly behind the wicket-
keeper and close enough in to save the single:
‘Long Stop. This man should stand at a proper distance behind the wicket, to save a run,
if the ball should not be stopped by the Striker or Wicket-keeper’ (Lambert 1816, p 42).
Except in the lowest reaches of the game, this position has been more or less obsolete
for over a hundred years. In earlier times, however, long stop was a specialist fielder
occupying ‘a most important station in the game’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 34) – which is
hardly surprising when one remembers that the job of keeping wicket was originally
done by the bowlers in between overs (See WICKET-KEEPER). The importance of long
stop gradually diminished with the emergence of wicket-keeping as a specialist skill
and the increasing use of protective gear. At the same time, the improvement in playing
surfaces in the late 19th century reduced the need for a second line of defence ‘because,
now that wickets are good, fewer byes are let by wicket-keepers’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p
42). The crack Australian eleven that toured England in 1882 pointed the way forward,
with the brilliant J. M. Blackham keeping wicket to the ‘demon bowler’ Spofforth
without a long stop. Before the end of the decade long stop was virtually redundant:
‘In these days of slow bowling and fine turf captains of elevens do not bother themselves
with providing long-stops at all’ (Badminton 1888, p 269).
long-stop
long-stop vb to field in the long stop position (obsolete):

‘Cambridge had to provide itself with a long stop, and Mr. H. M. Marshall in that
capacity has earned undying fame; for long-stopping on Lord’s Ground in 1861 and
1862 was no laughing matter’ (Badminton 1888, p 276).
look out
look out vb to act as a fielder (obsolete):

‘Several players were stationed, to “look out”, in different parts of the field’ (Dickens,
Pickwick Papers 1837, ch 7).
loop
loop n the deceptive, curving trajectory of a slow ball delivered in a high arc:
109 lower order

‘Grieg, getting genuine loop with his off-breaks, reduced them to 89 for five at lunch’
(Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Daily Telegraph 14 February 1994).
쐽 vb (of the ball) to travel with a high curving trajectory, before or after pitching:
‘When Javed Miandad … groped at a perfectly pitched leg-break, the ball looped up to
kiss the shoulder of the bat and Ian Botham brought off a spectacular slip catch’ (Rob
Steen, Wisden 1993, p 37).
loose
loose adj 1. (of a ball) carelessly bowled and inaccurate in line or length:
‘With the exception of Hollins, who scored a useful 31, chiefly from loose balls to leg, no
one survived for long’ (Headlam 1903, p 163).
2. (of a batting stroke) carelessly played, so that the bat does not hit the ball cleanly or
an easy catch is offered to the fielding side:
‘Border and Hookes … were pulling the innings round with a partnership of 123 for the
fifth wicket when Hookes played a loose stroke to be caught at extra cover’ (Tony Cozier,
Cricketer January 1984).
loosener
loosener n one of the early balls of a bowler’s spell, when he is still ‘loosening up’ and
not yet bowling a good line and length:
‘Remarkably Chris [Old] did not take a wicket. Replacing him, Botham, with his third
ball, which was little more than a loosener, had Wood lbw’ (Brearley 1982, p 61).
‘The delivery was little more than a loosener but it was straight and Butt played all
around it’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 18 July 2006).
lost ball
lost ball n an instance of the ball becoming lost or impossible to recover. If such a case
arises, any member of the fielding side may call ‘lost ball’, whereupon the ball becomes
dead and six runs are added to the score of the batsman who hit it (unless of course the
ball has become lost without being struck from the bat, in which case the runs are
credited to the appropriate category of extras). If, however, the batsmen have already
taken more than six runs before ‘lost ball’ is called, they are allowed all the runs they
have completed. The lost ball is then replaced by a ball that has had a similar amount of
wear. Though rarely (if ever) invoked in first-class cricket, the lost ball law still has a job
to do in the lower reaches of the game. It was introduced in 1809 – at a time when a lot
of cricket was still played in sheep meadows and lost balls were a regular occurrence –
and has remained more or less unchanged, except that the original allowance of four runs
for a lost ball was increased to six in 1822/3.
lower
lower vb to account for the wicket of a batsman; take a wicket (obsolete):

‘He … then retired in favour of one of the regular bowlers, after having, simply by wild
erratic fast delivery, lowered three of the best Australian wickets’ (Badminton 1888, p
174).
The term arises from the idea of a dismissed batsman’s wicket being ‘down’ (See
DOWN).
lower order
lower order n the LATE ORDER (qv); the tail:

‘The largest crowd of the series — 7029 — turned up on Saturday to see Australia reply
with a respectable total of 150, thanks to some lower-order resistance from Anne Palmer
(39), Joyce Brewer (26) and Barbara Peden (24 not out)’ (Cashman & Weaver 1991, p
91).
‘Even in the press box, heads hit desks at the thought of Warne the fox loose in the
chicken run of England’s lower order’ (Haigh 2005, p 149).
M
maiden
maiden n (also maiden over) an over in which no runs are scored off the bat:
‘He played twice for England during Lord Hawke’s tour of South Africa in 1898–99,
holding the batsmen down at Johannesburg with 24 maidens in his 32 overs’ (Frith 1984,
p 51).
Long before it entered the vocabulary of cricket, the term ‘maiden’ had been used in
English in both these figurative senses – ‘unsullied’ or ‘unblemished’, and ‘happening
for the first time’. Thus, for example, the idea of a maiden over is prefigured in the
phrase ‘maiden sessions’, defined in Capt. Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
(1811) as ‘a sessions where none of the prisoners are capitally convicted’. Similarly,
its use in describing the first occurrence of some notable event can be seen in the term
‘maiden speech’, which considerably predates the equivalent cricket sense.
쐽 adj being the first instance of its kind:
‘In the West Indies’ second innings, they made 384, including a superb 176 by George
Headley, then the youngest player ever to score a Test century on his maiden appear-
ance’ (Manley 1988, p 30).
‘By tea, he had pulled, punched, slashed and smashed his way to an extraordinary
maiden Test hundred’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 122).
‘Panesar defied those who doubted he had what it takes at this level, claimed the great
Sachin Tendulkar as his maiden wicket and showed there is a future for spin in England’
(Mike Selvey, Guardian 24 March 2006).
The term ‘maiden’ had been used in English in both these figurative senses –
‘unproductive’ and ‘happening for the first time’ – long before it entered the
vocabulary of cricket. Thus, for example, the idea of a maiden over is prefigured in the
phrase ‘maiden sessions’, defined in Capt. Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
(1811) as ‘a sessions where none of the prisoners are capitally convicted’. Similarly,
its use in describing the first occurrence of some notable event can be seen in the term
‘maiden speech’, which considerably predates the equivalent cricket sense.
maiden ball
maiden ball n a ball from which no runs are scored; a DOT BALL (obsolete):
‘Clarke bowled 64 maiden balls’ (Lillywhite’s Guide to Cricketers 1854, p 26).
majority
majority n a lead held by one side over another, or the margin by which one side defeats
another (obsolete):
‘Oxford won easily in 1894, but Cambridge made it “all square” in 1895, her majority
being 134’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 360).
maker’s name
maker’s name n —show the bowler the maker’s name to bat very correctly, playing
with a straight bat so that the manufacturer’s logo is always visible
Manhattan
Manhattan, Manhattan skyline n a computer-generated bar graph used in TV

commentaries to show runs scored per over, usually in a one-day game; so called because
of its resemblance to a row of skyscrapers
Mankad
Mankad vb to run out the non-striker by knocking down the stumps at the bowler’s end
before delivering the ball, when the non-striker is backing up and is out of his ground.
The term derives from the Indian all-rounder Vinoo Mankad who, during India’s 1947–
48 tour of Australia, twice ran out the Australian opener Bill Brown in this fashion. (old )
111 medium-pacer
Mankading is not actually forbidden by the Laws, but is regarded as unsporting, and if
a bowler felt the non-striker was unfairly backing up too far it would be usual to warn
him first (as indeed Mankad himself did to Brown) before resorting to this drastic and
unpopular measure. Batsmen for their part are deterred from exploiting the situation by
a regulation to the effect that attempting to steal a run during the bowler’s run-up
constitutes ‘unfair play’ under Law 42.
Marillier
Marillier n Southern Africa an unorthodox batting stroke in which the ball is deflected
into the leg-side area behind square; a SCOOP (qv), named after the Zimbabwean player
Douglas Marillier:
‘A breathtaking 56 off 24 balls by Marillier, who was famous in his country for the unor-
thodox scoop shot named the ‘Marillier’ … coasted Zimbabwe to the improbable win’
(Rediff.com website (India), 7 March 2002).
mark
mark n 1. the point from which a bowler starts his run-up, usually marked in some way so
that the length and direction of the run-up remains constant:
‘At that moment Michael Holding suddenly marched back past his regular mark, stopped
two thirds of the way back to the pavilion and began gliding in off his long run’ (Matthew
Engel, Guardian 14 August 1984).
2. —off the mark having scored the first run or runs of one’s innings:
‘Lloyd edged Miller to slip, but instead of being caught for a duck he was off the mark
for two’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 3 June 1984).
MCC
MCC abbr the Marylebone Cricket Club: a body formed in 1787 by members of the old
White Conduit Club of Islington, based originally at a ground belonging to Thomas Lord
on the northern fringes of London’s West End (in what is now Dorset Square) but from
1814 based at the modern Lord’s Cricket Ground in St John’s Wood. The leading lights
in the foundation of the club were the Earl of Winchelsea and the Hon. Charles Lennox
(the future Duke of Richmond), and with such weighty aristocratic patronage MCC
quickly eclipsed Hambledon as the leading club in England. Although only a private
cricket club it has always wielded immense authority over the conduct and organisation
of the game at both national and international level. MCC organised the first international
tours, and when playing overseas the England team was officially known as ‘MCC’ until
1977. It is only in fairly recent years that this anomalous position has changed, as many
of MCC’s functions have been devolved to more ‘official’ bodies like the ICC and ECB.
Even now, MCC is still officially responsible for the Laws of Cricket. Within a year of
its foundation MCC had conducted the first major revision of the Laws (1788), and it has
been responsible since then for five further revisions, the most recent being published in
2000. It remains today the chief authority in this area: the copyright of the Laws belongs
to MCC, and they can only be changed if proposed amendments are approved by a two-
thirds majority at a special meeting of the club. In 1998, MCC members voted to admit
women, thus bringing to an end the club’s 200 years as a male bastion.
meat
meat n the thick central part of the blade of the bat, a few inches above the bottom edge:
‘Fernando’s bouncers were daringly pulled away – some off the meat of the bat, others
off the edge – and Vaas and Murali weren’t allowed to cast their pressure net’ (Bangla-
desh Observer13 December 2005).
meaty
meaty adj (of a batting stroke) striking the ball forcefully with the ‘meat’ of the bat:
‘He let the ball go with fine judgment outside the off-stump … punishing anything over-
or under-pitched with meaty drives, cuts and hooks’ (Brearley 1982, p 17).
medium-pace
medium-pace, medium-paced adj denoting a bowler, a ball, or a style of bowling

characterised by a speed significantly lower than that of a fast bowler but higher than that
of a slow bowler, and roughly in the range 55 mph/90 kph (slow medium) to 75 mph/120
kph (fast medium); medium-pace is one of the three basic types according to which
bowlers are conventionally categorised, and bowlers of this type generally rely on
accuracy of line and length, variation of pace, and movement in the air and off the seam:
‘In any chapter on bowling it would be impossible to omit the name of George Lohmann,
probably the greatest medium-paced bowler that ever lived’ (Warner 1934, p 63).
medium-pacer
medium-pacer n 1. an exponent of medium-pace bowling:

mental disintegration 112

‘The man who kept Wilson out of the England side … was the phenomenal Derek Under-
wood, whose speed through the air was such that many might be tempted to class him as
a medium-pacer’ (Frith 1984, p 155).
‘When the medium-pacer Tom Cartwright withdrew from the tour because of injury, the
MCC, fearful of public outrage, replaced him with D’Oliveira’ (Marqusee 1994, p 188).
2. a medium-pace ball:
‘Frederick Redwood … may find it hard to break into the four-day team despite grabbing
seven for 20 with his medium-pacers in the final trial match’ (Craig Cozier, Caribbean
Cricket January/March 1994).
mental disintegration
mental disintegration n the strategy of keeping one’s opponents under relentless

pressure throughout a game or series, with the aim of wearing down their self-
confidence:
‘The batting, bowling and fielding of his [Waugh’s] teams have all had the aim of
causing mental disintegration: a moment of uncertainty that leads to self-doubt that
leads to defeat’ (Simon Barnes, Wisden 2003, p 24).
Mental disintegration is associated chiefly with the modern Australian Test team. It is
said to have originated while Allan Border was captain but is mainly linked with Steve
Waugh’s captaincy.
Merlyn
Merlyn n a bowling machine manufactured by the British-based Merlyn Bowling

Company and widely used in batting practice. According to the company’s own
marketing blurb, ‘Merlyn can spin it more than Shane Warne, press a button and Merlyn
turns into Muttiah Muralitharan, Shoaib Akhtar or anyone you want!’. (trademark):
‘Warnie has bowled beautifully in the first two Tests and, who knows, without the help
of Merlyn we might have come to Old Trafford 2–0 down in the series’ (Ashley Giles,
Michelle
Michelle n a bowler’s haul of five or more wickets in an innings (slang):

‘Pakistan had eaten up just 167 of their 342 deficit, and Monty had taken four of the five
wickets to fall. When they came back, he got his “Michelle” – Faisal Iqbal edging a
classic middle-and-leg turner to first slip’ (Kevin Mitchell, Observer 30 July 2006).
The related term FIVE-FOR derives from a bowler taking (for example) five for 62. From
this is it a short step to “Michelle”, an ingenious piece of rhyming slang playing on the
name of Hollywood actor Michelle Pfeiffer.
middle
middle vb to hit the ball cleanly with the middle of the bat:
‘Lamb strode to the wicket soon after lunch at 58 for two, and from the outset middled
the ball on his way to his third Test century’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 28 August
1983).
쐽 n 1. —in the middle at the wickets, considered as the scene of the batting or bowling
action:
‘May lacked practice in the middle and this could have had a profound influence’
(Peebles 1959, p 52).
‘Back in the middle, neither Alderman nor Lillee swung the ball at all’ (Brearley 1982,
p 89).
‘From 265 journeys to the middle, he [Border] scored 27 centuries and a further 63 half-
centuries, passing 50 on more occasions than any other player’ (Ihithisham Kamardeen,
Sportstar [Chennai] 4 June 1994).
2. the thick central part of the bat; the MEAT:
‘The dreaded “edge”is a massive 40% of the blade’s 580 sq cm … but you want to use
only the “middle”, about 120 sq cm’ (Dr Richie Meyer, WCM March 1994).
‘It came off the middle-of-the-middle, with the batsman’s body perfectly positioned for
the pull, and it was struck in an imperious Caribbean style’ (Purandare 2005, p 194).
3. the middle stump of the batsman’s wicket:
‘In the second innings, Lara shimmied down the pitch, misjudged the length, and the ball
turned obligingly out of the rough and through the gate before hitting middle’ (Vic
Marks, Wisden 2005, p 59).
113 military medium

middle order
middle order n the players batting in the middle of a side’s batting line-up, after the
openers and before the tailenders; the middle order represents the backbone of a team’s
batting strength and its role is to score runs fairly quickly as the bowlers begin to tire and
the ball comes more slowly off the pitch. The middle order refers especially to players
batting at numbers four, five and six, but in its broadest sense it stretches from three and
four (the ‘early middle order’) to seven and eight (the ‘late middle order’):
‘Watkin demolished the visitors’ middle order in the second innings, dismissing Hooper,
Richards and Logie for 11 runs’ (Edward Bevan, Wisden 1994, p 24).
‘Kathleen Smith (b 1915) was a strongly-built all-rounder from Queensland: a left-hand
opening bowler and a right-hand punishing middle-order bat with a fierce hook’
‘Hoggard struck twice with the new ball en route to his 200th Test wicket, before the
debutant Sajid Mahmood routed the middle order with four wickets in nine balls’
(Andrew Miller, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 83).
middle wicket
middle wicket n an off-side fielding position between extra cover and the bowler; it
equates to the modern position of mid-off, and is not to be confused with mid-wicket
(obsolete):
‘The Man that stands Middle Wicket. His place is the off side, not far from the bowler’s
wicket and about twenty-two yards from the hitter’s wicket’ (Boxall 1800, p 50).
See MID-OFF
mid-off
mid-off n an off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) between extra cover and
the bowler. Mid-off is normally about 25 to 30 yards from the striker and fairly close to
the bowler, but the position can also be modified to be ‘deep’, ‘short’, ‘silly’, ‘wide’, or
‘straight’: See FIELDING POSITIONS. The term mid-off is a contraction of the earlier
‘middle wicket off’. The manuals and illustrations of the early 19th century all show
middle wicket (not to be confused with the modern mid-wicket) as one of the standard
fielding positions of the game at that time. However, an equivalent leg-side position was
also occasionally used, so the two ‘middle wicket’ positions came to be distinguished as
middle wicket off (= mid-off) and middle wicket on (= mid-on).
mid-on
mid-on n a leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) between mid-wicket and
the bowler. Though nominally the mirror image of mid-off, this is in practice a more
variable position and its precise location will depend on such factors as the type of
bowling, the pace of the pitch, and the style of the batsman. Consequently, ‘none of the
regular places is more elastic than mid-on’ (MCC 1952, p 20). For the etymology of this
term, see MID-OFF.
mid-wicket
mid-wicket n 1. a leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) between mid-on
and square leg. Mid-wicket is normally about 20 to 30 yards out from the pitch at a point
midway between the two wickets, but the position can also be modified to be ‘deep’ or
‘short’. See FIELDING POSITIONS.
2. = MID-OFF (obsolete):
‘Mid Wicket stands on the “off” side, a few yards in front and to the left of the bowler’
(G. H. Selkirk, Guide to the Cricket Ground 1867, p 31).
Mid-wicket is an ancient cricket term but only acquired its current meaning in the late
1930s. Prior to that mid-wicket, or ‘middle wicket’, was simply another name for mid-
off, and was indeed the preferred form in most early writing:
‘He at mid wicket disappoints the foe,
Springs at the coming ball, and mocks the blow.’ (James Love, Cricket: an Heroic Poem
1746).
The position now called mid-wicket would formerly have been called forward square leg
or perhaps extra mid-on.
military medium
military medium n, adj bowling of a steady medium pace; the word ‘military’ alludes
to the brisk, no-nonsense character of this type of bowling, in which efficiency and
reliability are the chief virtues:
miscue 114
‘There now is a vast army in English cricket of practitioners of “military medium”;
bowling briskly, seam up, achieving a little movement but, above all, striving for suffi-
cient precision to avoid punishment’ (Arlott 1983, p 41).
‘Tendulkar had a specific idea in mind. He knew the batsmen would go for big hits, so
he thought it best to frustrate them with military medium pace where the ball would
appear to arrive and yet not arrive’ (Purandare 2005, p 157).
miscue
miscue vb to fail to ‘middle’ the ball when playing a shot, so that the ball does not go in
the direction intended:
‘Richards having once hoisted Venkat for six, attempted to repeat the stroke and came
to grief, so badly miscuing the shot that he put up a lobbed catch to slip’ (Dilip Rao,
‘Strauss’s dismissal was quite against the run of play … a miscued sweep ballooned to
slip from his boot’ (Haigh 2005, p 145).
The term is borrowed from the vocabulary of snooker and billiards.
쐽 n an act of miscuing the ball:
‘With a flourish of the bat that might have decapitated an incautious wicket-keeper, he
struck a spectacular miscue. The ball re-entered the atmosphere above Jeff Crowe at
point’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 23 January 1984).
‘When Shahid Afridi launched a mini counterattack on the first day, Panesar stuck to his
method and the miscue followed’ (Vic Marks, Observer 30 July 2006).
misfield
misfield vb to fail to field the ball cleanly:

‘Then Greenidge greedily called for another run after Malcolm had again misfielded in
the rough down on the fine-leg boundary’ (Frank Keating, Guardian 5 January 1994).
쐽 n an act of misfielding the ball
miss
miss vb 1. to fail to catch a ball hit by a batsman; drop:

‘Right at the start Cowdrey was missed by Davidson at backward short-leg’ (Peebles
1959, p 159).
2. —play and miss See PLAY
miss out
miss out vb (of a batsman) to fail to score a substantial number of runs, especially in
circumstances favourable to batting:
‘The combined first innings scores of the two sides set a world record:1,376. Only
Merchant missed out: in the first innings he was out for 1, bowled by Mankad; in the
second he was out for 6’ (Bose 1990, p 135).
mollygrubber
mollygrubber See MULLYGRUBBER

move
move vb 1. (of the bowler, especially a fast or medium-pace bowler) to make the ball
deviate laterally, either during its flight (‘move the ball in the air’) or after it pitches
(‘move the ball off the pitch’ or ‘off the seam’):
‘A superb fast bowler with a classically flowing action and fundamental hatred of
batsmen, he had the capacity to move the ball either way in the air’ (John Arlott on
Dennis Lillee, Guardian 5 January 1984).
‘John, moving the ball off the pitch, was a consistent danger’ (Dick Brittenden, Cricketer
May 1983).
2. (of the ball, especially a fast or medium-pace ball ) to deviate laterally, either during
its flight or after it pitches:
‘Richardson … was surprised by the behaviour of the wicket. The ball moved around
appreciably for the three seamers’ (Vic Marks, Cricketer May 1994).
‘They have regularly come unstuck in arenas where their technique against the moving
ball was put to the test’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine August 2006, p
77).
movement
movement n lateral deviation of the ball, either during flight or after pitching:
‘He swung the ball out and in late enough for it not to be clear whether the movement
was in the air or off the pitch’ (Brearley 1982, p 150).
‘They kept the ball up to the bat and found movement off the seam on a greenish pitch’
(Henry Blofeld, Guardian 31 May 1983).
115 mystery ball

Movement in the air describes the curving arc of a ball that ‘swings’ into or away from
the batsman: See SWING. Movement off the pitch depends on the angle of the seam and
the rate and direction of spin on the ball as it makes contact with the ground. The effect,
in John Arlott’s words, ‘is not compellable by the bowler’ (Arlott 1983, p 19).
Certainly, some bowlers deliberately set out to produce such movement by ‘cutting’ the
ball as they release it (See CUT). But in the right conditions (especially on a well-
grassed, or ‘green’, wicket where the ball can ‘bite’ as it pitches) the ball will tend
naturally to move off the pitch from a normal fast or medium-pace bowling action, and
even the bowler may not always be sure which direction it will take.
mow
mow vb to hit the ball from off to leg with a low sweeping cross-batted stroke, somewhat
similar to the movement used in mowing grass with a scythe:
‘If the ball had cleared the ropes, Sehwag would have registered the first double-century
by an Indian in Melbourne. As it was, he mowed the ball high to deep mid-wicket to
depart on 195’ (Oliver Brett, BBC Sport website, 26 December 2003).
mullygrubber
mullygrubber, mollygrubber n Australia a fast ball that fails to rise significantly after
pitching; a SHOOTER (slang):
‘These men … rushed India from 35 for three to 379 for seven, despite the perils of a dead
pitch which from time to time produced a snorter or a shooter (Australians might prefer
“rib-tickler” and “molly grubber”)’ (Peter Roebuck, Cricketer November 1982).
muttoner
muttoner n a fast ball that hits the batsman’s hands and crushes the fingers against the
bat-handle. The term is said to be schoolboy slang from Winchester College. (obsolete)
mystery ball n a ball bowled by a slow bowler that moves off the pitch in an unexpected
mystery ball
way:
‘With his arsenal of leggies, toppies, zooters, shooters, sliders, flippers – not mention the
crucial mystery ball that does absolutely nothing but flummoxes batsmen merely because
it is so laden with potential menace – he blends technique and spontaneity, consistency
and surprise’ (Mike Marqusee, The Hindu 1 October 2004).
The mystery ball is as much a part of a spin bowler’s psychological armoury as of his
repertoire of deliveries. Although the term is sometimes used ‘generically’, and in the
quotation here refers to the wrist-spinner Shane Warne, it is associated especially with
the off-spinner Saqlain Mushtaq and a type of delivery now better known as the
DOOSRA (qv).
N
CRICKETING NICKNAMES
Andrew Delahunty
Cricket glories in a rich variety of players' nicknames. The most common type - though
admittedly not the most imaginative - are the chummy dressing-room nicknames, such as
Boycs (Geoff Boycott), Ramps (Mark Ramprakash), Thommo (Jeff Thomson), Gatt (Mike
Gatting), Colly (Paul Collingwood), Harmy (Steve Harmison), and so on. Note, incidentally,
that such nicknames don't necessarily make a name shorter, particularly where the prolific
'-y' suffix is concerned: think of Warney (Shane Warne), Goughy (Darren Gough), Goochy
(Graham Gooch), or Straussy (Andrew Strauss). Occasionally the result can be a little unfor-
tunate, as with Ian Bell, sometimes referred to by his teammates as Belly. Also common is the
'-ers' suffix, once an upper-class mannerism, popularised on the BBC's Test Match Special
by Johnners himself (Brian Johnston). Johnners' fellow commentators acquired names such
as Aggers (Jonathan Agnew) and Bearders (Bill Frindall, aka 'the Bearded Wonder'), and the
suffix also generates player nicknames like Athers (Michael Atherton) and Tuffers (Phil
Tufnell).
More creative are nicknames that play on a person's surname. Examples include Steve
'Tugga' Waugh (punning on 'tug-of-war'), Jason 'Dizzy' Gillespie (from the jazz trumpeter),
and Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff (from the cartoon character Fred Flintstone). When Sourav
Ganguly first appeared on the international scene, it was perhaps inevitable that some British
commentators would find it difficult to resist the temptation to refer to the Indian player as
'Ging' Ganguly (from the boy scout song), but the nickname hasn't really caught on. Perhaps
the most inventive surname-based nickname is one given to Mark Waugh. In the late 1980s
Waugh seemed to have been overlooked by the Australian Test selectors, in contrast to his
brother Steve, and was consequently dubbed Afghan, 'the forgotten Waugh', by the Australian
press. This was a witty allusion to the Afghan War, known at the time as the Forgotten War.
A neat variation on the surname-inspired theme is Chris Old's nickname Chilly, because C.
Old spells out 'Cold'. Geoff Arnold was Horse, from his initials G.G. (Geoffrey Graham).
Also based on a player's name is not only the simplest cricketing nickname of them all but
also the most magisterial. Don Bradman was universally known as The Don, from his first
name, of course, but also reflecting his stature within the game.
Some cricketing nicknames refer to a player's appearance, especially their stature or build.
The strapping Ian Botham was known as Beefy (and indeed Guy the Gorilla), while the
slightly built Keith Fletcher was The Gnome. Joel Garner, the lofty West Indian bowler, was
called Big Bird, the name of the enormous yellow bird in the US children's TV programme
Sesame Street. While Glenn McGrath's nickname Pigeon is a reference to his skinny legs,
Richard Hadlee's teammates called him Paddles because of his large feet. Michael Vaughan
is Virgil, after his supposed facial resemblance to Virgil Tracy, a character from another chil-
dren's programme Thunderbirds. Robin Smith's fellow-players dubbed him Judge because
they thought his hair looked like a judge's wig.
Many nicknames relate to a cricketer's attributes or style as a player. Thus Trevor Bailey, a
famously unshiftable stonewalling batsman when the match situation demanded it, was
117 Nelson
dubbed The Barnacle. Similarly, Rahul Dravid's nickname The Wall testifies to the difficulty
of breaching the batsman's solid defences. Fast bowlers' nicknames tend to allude to the speed
of their bowling. Fred Trueman was Fiery Fred, Frank Tyson Typhoon Tyson, Allan Donald
White Lightning, and Shoaib Akhtar The Rawalpindi Express (from his birthplace). Spinners
can sound no less fearsome: the relentlessly consistent Derek Underwood was known as
Deadly and the turban-wearing Harbhajan Singh rejoices in the splendid sobriquet The
Turbanator. Derek Randall, noted for his lightning speed in the field, earned the nickname
Arkle, after the famous racehorse. Another brilliant fielder, the former West Indies captain
Clive Lloyd, was dubbed Big Cat because of the feline stealth and agility he displayed as he
prowled in the covers. At the other end of the fielding spectrum but with a curiously similar
nickname is Phil Tufnell, called Cat by his Middlesex teammates because of his fondness for
taking naps during the day. He once slept through the whole of the morning's session of play
while on twelfth man duty.
Finally, a few individual gems to savour. Shane Warne is nicknamed Hollywood because of
the spinner's star quality and celebrity. He has also been called The Sultan of Spin and, less
flatteringly, Fat Boy Spin. This calls to mind one of the most cherishable cricket nickname
stories, concerning Ashley Giles, known to his admirers as the King of Spain. In 2004 his club
Warwickshire ordered a set of commemorative mugs to mark Giles's testimonial year. They
were printed on one side with a picture of the player and on the other with the words 'King
of Spain', a misprint for 'King of Spin'. Zulu is South African all-rounder Lance Klusener,
raised by a Zulu nanny and a fluent speaker of the language. Marcus Trescothick was once
Banger to his teammates, apparently a reference to his fondness for sausages. This may have
sent the wrong message to the selectors, however, and he now goes by the more prosaic name
Tres. Perhaps the finest cricketing nickname belongs to fast bowler Michael Holding, noted
for the long, light-footed run-up with which he glided in to bowl, before leaping high in his
final stride and unleashing a delivery of prodigious pace and fearsome bounce. Umpires used
to claim that they couldn't hear him approaching behind them, hence his brilliantly intimi-
dating nickname Whispering Death.
Andrew Delahunty is the author of The Oxford Dictionary of Nicknames and Talking Balls:
A Guide to the Language of Sport.
neck and crop
neck and crop adv —bowled neck and crop unmistakably clean bowled, usually with
one or more stumps knocked back or uprooted:
‘Sobers opened the bowling and proceeded to bowl Stewart “neck and crop” in the first
over’ (Manley 1988, p168).
Nelson
Nelson n the score of 111 runs (or any multiple of this) made by a team or an individual
player, generally believed to be extremely unlucky:
‘Simon Doggart … braved two overs of Clarke and went on to muster 22 before being
yorked by Monkhouse at the dreaded Nelson – 111’ (John Parker, Observer 22 May
1984).
‘Perhaps the square-leg umpire David Shepherd took pity on England; for the first time
ever he failed to perform his customary jump on Nelson, the bogy number’ (Mike Selvey,
The origins of this term lie in the erroneous notion that Admiral Nelson had one eye,
one arm, and one leg; in reality, of course, Nelson lost an arm and an eye but retained
the use of both legs. The notion that 111 is an unlucky score for batsmen is not borne
out by the statistical evidence. As a detailed analysis of Test scores has shown, the
number of batsmen out for 111 (in all Tests up to January 1994) stands at 33 –
considerably lower than the number of dismissals at most adjacent scores (for example,
46 batsmen had at that time been out for 109, and 44 with their score on 112). There is,
however, a marginally greater likelihood of a team being dismissed for 111 than for
most other scores in the range: Paul E Dyson’s analysis of Test scores (in Wisden
net 118
Cricket Monthly March 1994) revealed 133 instances of sides being all out for 111,
compared for example with 94 instances at 107, and 98 with the score on 113.
See also EIGHTY-SEVEN
net
net n 1. a period of play on a practice pitch in the ‘nets’; a practice session, especially a
session of batting practice:
‘Willis had a brief batting net. We have given up attempts to coach him, and now leave
him to his idiosyncratic ways’ (Brearley 1982, p 75).
2. —net bowler/batsman a player who is not a member of a team but who bowls or
bats with team members in the nets in order to give them practice:
‘The meeting was called because the selectors had left out Gower … Jack Russell and
Ian Salisbury from the tour of India; Salisbury, who had flown out to act as a net bowler
was later asked to join the tour’ (Matthew Engel, Wisden 1993, p14).
nets
nets n one or more practice pitches, each enclosed by an arrangement of netting, where
players practise batting and bowling:
‘After my knock in the nets and some slip-catching practice, I did the usual pre-match
interviews’ (Brearley 1982, p 52).
neutral umpire
neutral umpire n an umpire standing in a Test match or other international game who
does not come from either of the countries whose teams are competing against each
other; an INDEPENDENT UMPIRE:
‘Today in Auckland, TWMFU [‘the world’s most famous umpire’, Dickie Bird] will bend
a little stiffly over the stumps at Eden Park, flex his arms as if gathering in yet another
washing line, and the era of neutral umpires will be officially launched with the first Test
between Pakistan and New Zealand’ (David Hopps, Guardian 10 February 1994).
See INDEPENDENT UMPIRE
new ball
new ball n 1. a completely unused ball. In all grades of cricket, ‘either captain may
demand a new ball at the start of each innings’ (Law 5 § 3). In games of more than one
day’s duration, there is also provision for a new ball to be taken while an innings is still
in progress, once a stipulated number of overs has been bowled. For the fielding side the
advantages of the new ball are that it is ‘considered to swing more, and bounce in a
livelier fashion, than a more worn ball’ (Arlott 1983, p 81). But if the new ball offers the
chance of early wickets, it is also true that a hard, shiny ball will come more quickly off
the bat, and a dominant batting side can sometimes score freely off the new ball. The
fielding captain is not obliged to take the new ball as soon as it becomes available (it may
sometimes be worth persevering with an old ball that is turning well or moving about a
bit), but any subsequent new ball can only be taken after the full number of prescribed
overs has been bowled with the current ball, regardless of when that ball was taken. See
also REPLACEMENT BALL.
In 18th-century cricket, a single ball was used throughout the match, and the original
(1744) code of Laws required the umpires ‘To mark the Ball that it may not be
changed’. The law was amended in 1798 to allow a new ball to be requested at the
beginning of each innings, and this arrangement remained intact until 1907. The new
rule introduced in that year, allowing a fresh ball to be taken after 200 runs had been
scored, represented an attempt to strengthen the hand of the bowlers at a time when
batsmen were in a dominant position and the prevalence of high-scoring draws
threatened to alienate the public. Since 1945 various stipulations involving runs and/or
wickets have been used to determine the point at which the new ball becomes available.
Regulations vary from country to country, subject to a minimum of 75 overs (Law 5
§4), and in Test matches – following ICC regulations – the new ball can be taken once
80 overs have been bowled.
2. —take the new ball to open the bowling for a team:
‘There are as many bowlers vying to take the new ball for England this summer as there
are candidates in the Newbury by-election’ (Vic Marks, Observer 2 May 1993).
‘Who will take the new ball in the first one-day international in Lahore on Saturday is
anyone’s guess’ (David Hopps, Guardian 6 December 2005).
new-ball
new-ball adj denoting a bowler who opens a team’s attack by ‘taking the new ball’:
119 nips
‘The Indian new-ball bowler Karsan Ghavri snapped up three quick wickets’ (Bhattach-
arya 2006, p 62).
‘Dravid … surprised all by saying that he hadn’t seen a more consistent Indian new-ball
pairing than Munaf Patel and Sreesanth in 10 years’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan,
Cricinfo Magazine August 2006, p 78).
nibble
nibble vb to play tentatively to a ball pitching on or outside the line of off stump, often
edging it to a fielder:
‘Vaughan repaired the damage, but he nibbled outside off stump to give Ponting his first
wicket of the 21st century’ (Lawrence Booth, Wisden 2006, p 113).
nick
nick vb to hit the ball unintentionally with the very edge of the bat:
‘That troubled the left-handed opener Imran Farhat, who was leg-before, and then
Inzamam-ul Haq (15), the right-hander, who nicked one to Parthiv’ (Rituraj Borkakoty,
The Pioneer (New Delhi) 14 April 2004).
쐽 n a slight deflection off the edge of the bat; a thin ‘edge’:
‘He should have had Kevin Pietersen caught behind first ball, but Billy Bowden didn’t
hear the nick’ (Kevin Mitchell, Wisden 2006, p 68).
nightwatchman
nightwatchman n a late-order batsman who is sent in to bat ahead of his normal position
in the batting order when a wicket has fallen a short time before the close of play; the
nightwatchman usually has the most reliable defence of all the non-specialist batsmen
and his function is to stay in until the close and thus protect the wickets of players higher
in the order until the next day’s play:
‘McDonald was soon defeated by the indefatigable Statham, at which Grout came in as
night-watchman’ (Peebles 1959, p 117).
‘Jason Gillespie’s 201 not out at Chittagong was easily the highest score by a night-
watchman in a Test’ (Steven Lynch, Cricinfo website 21 April 2006).
nip
nip n 1. a quality in the wicket, or in a bowler’s delivery, that makes the ball move briskly
off the pitch with an apparent increase in pace:
‘Though the spinners did manage to turn the ball, they could not get the necessary nip
out of the wicket’ (K. N. Prabhu, WCM March 1984).
‘Afterwards, batting was much easier. Alderman lacked his earlier nip and tended to
over-pitch’ (Brearley 1982, p 83).
2. an unintentional glance or snick from the bat (obsolete):
‘A stroke, or Nip, over or under his Bat, or upon his Hands … if the Ball be held before
it touches the Ground it’s out’ (Laws 1744).
쐽 vb 1. to make the ball move sharply off the pitch, usually with some change of direc-
tion:
‘As soon as Lillee found his length he nipped one back from off to have me LBW’ (Brearley
1982, p 25).
‘Mohinder Amarnath … was, apart from his open stance, a model of technical perfection
until Holding nipped one through his gate to send the off stump dancing back’ (Christo-
pher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer August 1983).
2. to nick the ball unintentionally (obsolete):
‘If a Striker nips a Ball up just before him, he may fall before his Wicket, or pop down
his Bat … to save it’ (Laws 1744).
nipbacker
nipbacker n a ball that ‘nips back’, moving sharply in towards the batsman after pitching:
‘It was four for two moments later: Fowler was bowled by a nipbacker and Gower …
edged to third slip’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 26 November 1982).
‘An initial burst from Lee reduced England to 31 for four – Vaughan’s off-stump was
sent flying by a 91mph nip-backer’ (Steven Lynch, Wisden 2006, p 104).
nips
nips n the fielding position of point, presumably so called because the fielder was
stationed there to catch balls ‘nipped up’ off the edge of the striker’s bat (See NIP)
(obsolete):
nipt out 120

‘In the match between Eton and Harrow 1822 I fielded “nips”. It was the position since
named “point”. There were also cover-nips and long-nips’ (Herbert Jenner-Fust in
Pullin 1900, p 5).
nipt out
nipt out adv a term that is probably synonymous with 2; the entry is seen in some old
scorebooks to indicate a mode of dismissal, and refers to a batsman being out as a result
of a slight edge or ’nip’ (see NIP 4) (obsolete)
no-ball
no-ball n a delivery judged by the umpire to be unfair. When a no-ball is bowled the
umpire calls ‘no-ball’ and signals to the scorer by extending one arm horizontally. One
run is added as an ‘extra’ to the score of the batting side (the penalty is two runs in some
domestic one-day competitions), and the no-ball does not count as part of the over. The
batsman may also score runs in the normal way off a no-ball, but he can only be
dismissed by being run out or by hitting the ball twice, obstructing the field, or handling
the ball. Even if a batsman is dismissed, the penalty run or runs are still credited to the
batting side.
See also EXTRAS
쐽 vb 1. (of the umpire) to declare that the bowler has made an unfair delivery, by calling
‘no-ball’:
‘In 1862, Willsher was no-balled six times in succession by his old friend John Lilly-
white, standing as an umpire in the England v. Surrey match at the Oval’ (Marqusee
1994, p 62).
‘In Sri Lanka, the perception was that Hair’s no-balling of Murali was random and
preconceived’ (Vic Marks, Observer 27 August 2006).
2. (of a bowler) to bowl a no-ball:
‘I was glad that Willis and Dilley chose the other end since they are both prone to no-
ball’ (Brearley 1982, p 60).
The fairness of a delivery is assessed according to a wide variety of criteria. The most
important of these are: (a) the position of the bowler’s feet as the delivery is made –
some part of the front foot, whether grounded or in the air, must be behind the popping
crease, and the back foot must land inside the line of the return crease; (b) the
movement of the bowler’s arm – the bowler must not throw the ball (as by straightening
the arm just before delivering the ball: See THROW); and (c) the mode of delivery – the
bowler is supposed to inform the umpire whether he intends to bowl underarm or
overarm, left- or right-handed, over or round the wicket, and any change of ‘mode’
made without informing the umpire constitutes an unfair delivery. In addition, the no-
ball rule is used as part of the procedure for cautioning a bowler who persistently bowls
fast short-pitched deliveries (See BOUNCER). Finally, the fairness of a delivery may also
be affected by other factors not directly within the bowler’s control: for example, if the
wicket-keeper is not completely behind the line of the stumps as the ball is bowled, the
ball will be deemed unfair. Similarly, if fielding restrictions are contravened, the no-
ball rule is invoked.
The original no-ball rule referred only to the bowler’s back foot and prescribed no
penalty, the ball being regarded as ‘dead’ once the call was made:
‘If he delivers the Ball, with his hinder Foot over the Bowling-Crease, the Umpire shall
call no Ball, tho’ it be struck, or the Player be bowl’d out’ (Laws 1744).
At some time during the first ten years of the 19th century, a change was made to allow
the striker ‘all the runs he can get’ off a no-ball, with the proviso that he could be dis-
missed by being run out. The one-run penalty was first introduced in 1829 and ‘the first
mention of No ball on the score-sheet occurs in the year 1830 in a match between
Marylebone and Middlesex at Lord’s’ (Box 1868, p 153). Since then the rule has been
altered in two important respects. Throughout the first half of the 19th century the regu-
lations governing the movement of the bowler’s arm were repeatedly invoked, and oc-
casionally modified, in a rearguard action aimed at preventing the spread of roundarm
and overarm bowling (See BOWLING). The matter was laid to rest with the legalisation of
the overarm style in 1864. More recently, when ‘dragging’ became an issue in the early
1960s (See DRAG) the law relating to the position of the bowler’s feet was modified to
put the main emphasis on the position of the front foot, rather than (as previously) of the
121 NZC
back foot. This remains the case, but the issue is endlessly debated and there are always
pundits who favour a return to the back-foot rule.
non-striker
non-striker n the batsman who is at the opposite end of the wicket from the player who
is facing the bowling (the ‘striker’); his position is often referred to as the ‘non-striker’s
end’:
‘The non-striker calls for the run whenever the ball has been played behind the wicket’
(Ranji 1897, p 200).
notch
notch (obsolete) n 1. a run:

‘On Wednesday last a match at Cricket was played at Barnes Common between the
Gentlemen of Barnes, Fulham, & Richmond on the one side and the Gentlemen of
London on the other, when the Londoners were beat 19 notches’ (St James’s Evening
Post 12 August 1736).
2. an incision cut in a stick or tally as an early method of recording the scoring of a run:
‘They are sole Judges of all Hindrances … and in Case of Hindrance may order a Notch
to be scor’d’ (Laws 1744).
‘Awakened echo speaks the innings o’er
And forty notches deep indent the score’
(James Love, Cricket: an Heroic Poem, 1746).
쐽 vb 1. to score the stated number of runs:
‘All-Muggleton had notched some fifty-four’ (Dickens, Pickwick Papers 1837, ch 7).
2. to act as scorer; keep the score:
‘The umpires were stationed behind the wickets; the scorers were prepared to notch the
runs; a breathless silence ensued’ (Dickens, ibid).
In cricket as in other games, the earliest method of keeping a record was to cut, or
‘score’, an incision in a piece of wood each time a point was gained. The term ‘notch’
did not long survive the introduction of more sophisticated recording methods (though
writers sometimes use the verb ‘notch up’); the word ‘score’, by contrast, has become
very much part of the language.
notcher
notcher n a scorer (obsolete)

not out
not out adv, adj (of a batsman) remaining undismissed, e.g. after the fielding side has
made an appeal or after the end or declaration of his side’s innings:
‘In a series of intercolonial matches in Jamaica, George [Headley] made, out of 356, 203
not out; out of 151 for five, 57 not out; out of 456, 79 retired hurt’ (James 1963, p 146).
‘Bird consulted with Don Oslear, who had no hesitation in giving me not out’ (Brearley
1982, p 82).
‘When either batsman is dismissed … the not out batsman shall return to his original
end’ (Law 18 §9).
In recording the score of a team or individual, an asterisk is conventionally used to
indicate that a batsman has not been dismissed, thus: West Indies 790 for 3 dec (G.S.
Sobers 365*).
nudge
nudge n a gentle pushing movement of the bat by which the ball is deflected and ‘helped
on its way’, usually into the area backward of square, its effectiveness depending on
timing rather than on power:
‘He … began to time his drives and nudges and glances in what became a typically effi-
cient Fletcher innings’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 31 May 1983).
쐽 vb to play the ball with a nudge:
‘With more than usual relief I nudged a single to square-leg’ (Brearley 1982, p 148).
nurdle
nurdle vb to push or deflect the ball gently with the aim of scoring a single; the steady
accumulation of runs by ‘nurdling’, rather than by playing high-powered (and also high-
risk) ‘shots’, is especially typical of the one-day game (slang):
‘He had taken the academic approach, nurdled the ball, picked up his ones and twos’
NZC
NZC abbr New Zealand Cricket: the governing body for cricket in New Zealand, a Full
Member of the ICC (qv) since 1926
O
obstructing the field
obstructing the field adv a mode of dismissal in which the batsman is given out ‘if he
wilfully obstructs or distracts the opposing side by word or action’ (Law 37 § 1). The
relevant section of the Laws elaborates on the two cases in which an appeal is most likely
to be made, namely an attempt to prevent a catch being taken and an attempt to prevent
a run-out being made; and in all cases the umpire must be satisfied that the obstruction
was intentional. A dismissal under this law is entered in the scorebook as ‘obstructing
the field’, and the wicket is not credited to the bowler. Obstructing the field is one of the
few modes of dismissal that remain valid even in the case of a no-ball, but it is doubtful
whether this clause will ever be put to the test, given that only 19 players have ever been
dismissed in a first-class game for obstructing the field.
At a more primitive stage of the game, the art of batsmanship seems to have included
the skill of preventing the fielders from taking catches, at least within the immediate
vicinity of the wickets. The original (1744) code of Laws spells out the circumstances
in which either batsman may legitimately hinder a catch; for example, if the ball is hit
up to the other end of the pitch, ‘the other Player may place his Body any where within
the Swing of the Bat, so as to hinder the Bowler from catching it’. But even under this
code the batsman was out if he left his ground to obstruct a catch. The first MCC code
(1788) brought an end to this rather rustic feature of the early game, with a ruling to the
effect that ‘if under pretence of running a Notch, or otherwise, either of the Strikers
prevent a Ball from being caught, the Striker of the ball is out’. The law was
subsequently extended (1884) to cover any tactics by the batsmen that are intended to
hinder the fielding side.
obstruction
obstruction n 1. the act of OBSTRUCTING THE FIELD (qv)

2. the act of obstructing a batsman who is taking a run: intentional obstruction by a
fielder constitutes ‘unfair play’ under Law 42 and in such circumstances the umpire calls
‘dead ball’ and allows the batsmen any runs completed or attempted
occupation of the crease
occupation of the crease n the playing of a cautious defensive innings with the
emphasis on avoiding dismissal rather than scoring runs:
‘First-innings occupation of the crease is paramount, especially where pitches tend to
become more unreliable’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 15 January 1994).
‘Then, as in India, it was Damien Martyn who made crease occupation into an art form,
playing pendulously straight, essaying few memorable strokes but fewer false ones’
(Haigh 2005, p 43).
ODI
ODI n a one-day international:

‘A frantic cricket calendar meant that … India would play three Tests at home against
Sri Lanka, then fly to Sharjah for the four-nation Champions Trophy, and then fly back
home to play three ODIs against the Lankans’ (Purandare 2005, p 229).
off
off n 1. that side of the pitch on which the striker does not stand when receiving the ball,
separated from the leg-side by an imaginary line passing between the two wickets,
bounded at its outside edge by the third-man, extra-cover, and long-off boundaries, and
constituting half of the entire playing area. See FIELDING POSITIONS.
2. the off stump of the batsman’s wicket:
‘This is my area, middle, off and slightly outside off – all on the same length’ (Saqlain
Mushtaq, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p 22).
123 offer
adj, adv on, towards, or relating to the off-side:
쐽
‘A bowler very often bowls wide of the off stump … merely to make the hitter reach after
it’ (Boxall 1800, p 35).
‘These balls may be played straight off, or between the point of the bat and the middle
wicket’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 25).
‘Gatting was beginning to lose interest, until the ball bounced, turned and fizzed across
his ample frame to clip the off bail’ (Vic Marks, Wisden 1994, p 21).
‘He adhered religiously to an off-stump line, snared six of the last seven wickets and
returned figures of seven for 78’ (Fazeer Mohammed, Wisden 2006, p 1129).
Often used in combination, as in ‘off-break’, ‘off-drive’, etc.
This use of the word ‘off’ originates in the old distinction between the ‘off side’ and
‘near side’ of a horse or carriage, the off side being opposite the one on which a driver
walks or a rider mounts; the OED has several quotations referring to the off side of a
horse which long predate the earliest cricketing uses. Some early cricket writers also
use its antonym ‘near’ in referring to the leg-side, but this usage did not survive:
‘If the ball is directed to the legs of the Striker, or near stump, it is frequently hit to the
hip’ (Lambert 1816, p 13).
See also LEG, ON
off-break
off-break n 1. a relatively slow ball that deviates from off towards leg after pitching.
Technically, the term can apply to any ball breaking in towards the batsman, such as a
googly bowled to a right-handed batsman. But usually off-break denotes the ‘stock’ ball
of a right-arm finger-spinner (See FINGER-SPIN). The term off-break formerly embraced
balls of any pace that broke back from off: describing Tom Richardson, the great England
fast bowler of the 1890s, Pelham Warner observes:
‘He seldom bowled short, aiming at clean bowling the batsman with a good-length off-
break’ (Warner 1934, p 58).
‘My normal offbreak pitches further outside off stump’ (Saqlain Mushtaq, Cricinfo
Magazine January 2006, p 22).
In current usage it describes a slower ball, and the ‘fast off-break’ is nowadays called
an ‘off-cutter’ or ‘break-back’.
2. deviation of the ball from off towards leg after pitching, as a result of spin imparted
by the bowler; off-spin:
‘Leg-break is artificial rather than natural, and is much more difficult to produce than
off-break’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 78).
off-cutter
off-cutter n a relatively fast ball that deviates from off towards leg after pitching,
produced by ‘cutting’ the ball (See CUT) rather than by finger-spin:
‘V. W. C. Jupp … one of the most prolific and colourful all-rounders between the wars,
could adapt to conditions with either nippy off-cutters or slow off-spin’ (Frith 1984, p
95).
‘They slipped to 92 for four as Iain Sutcliffe lost his off stump to Amjad’s off-cutter’
(Andy Wilson, Guardian 19 July 2006).
Compare OFF-BREAK
off drive
off drive n a form of drive, played to a ball pitching on or just outside off stump, by which
the ball is sent into the area between cover and mid-off.
See DRIVE
off-drive
off-drive vb to hit the ball when playing an off drive:

‘In the seventy-ninth over he off-drove a no-ball by Underwood for four’ (Berry 1982, p
115).
‘A square off-driven four was all he added to his 101’ (Steve James, Guardian 15 July
2006).
offer
offer vb 1. to attempt to play a stroke, rather than deliberately leaving the ball alone:
‘The post-lunch session was almost siesta-like in its calm, with neither batsman offering
at anything that did not demand a stroke’ (Michael Carey, Daily Telegraph 15 December
1982).
offie 124
‘Katich, bowled not offering first time around, thrust overanxiously at Flintoff’ (Haigh
2005, p 120).
2. (of the umpires) to give the batsmen the opportunity to come off for bad light;
shorthand for ‘offer the light’.
See LIGHT
offie
offie n 1. a bowler of off-spin; a finger-spinner:

‘They looked solid until Tim May’s spin found them out as the Test offie took 5/42 in their
second dig total of 123’ (Australian Cricket October 1993, p 29).
2. an off-break:
‘With my offie, I roll my fingers over the ball towards the batsman using two fingers to
impart spin’ (Saqlain Mushtaq, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p 22).
off play
off play n the technique or skill of playing balls towards the off:
‘His off play was distinctly weak, but his hooking and forcing shots past mid-on were
magnificent’ (Headlam 1903, p 121).
off-side
off-side n, adj (on or towards) the side of the pitch away from that on which the striker
stands when receiving the ball:
‘Walter Hammond, for instance, finding his cover-driving checked by a slow left-arm
bowler accurate enough to bowl to a packed offside field and contain him, would go
down on one knee and sweep … to square-leg or finer’ (Arlott 1983, p 63).
‘Off-side play became an amateur fetish in the 1880s. A generation of public-school
batsmen were taught that hitting the ball for runs on the leg side was not the done thing’
(Marqusee 1994, p 74).
See OFF
off-spin
off-spin n the practice or technique of spinning the ball so that it deviates from off towards
leg after pitching; especially, the bowling of off-breaks by means of FINGER-SPIN (qv):
‘In the rout of the Australians in 1956 the decisive factor was not Laker’s off-spin. It was
that he had them on the run and kept them there.’ (James 1963, p 44).
125 on
off-spinner
off-spinner n 1. an exponent of off-spin bowling:

‘It used to be said, falsely, but, for Australian batsmen, valuably, that English off-spin-
ners could never succeed in Australia’ (Arlott 1983, p 44).
‘A delivery that might have gone down in cricket history as a freak ball that died with its
inventor, is now an established part of the offspinner’s armoury’ (Mukul Kesavan,
Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 36).
2. an off-break:
‘To his rugged batsmanship he added a crisp off-spinner bowled with a muscular arm
after a short, unelaborate run-up’ (Frith 1984, p 168).
off-theory
off-theory n a form of attack in which most of the fielders are stationed on the off-side,
many of them in close catching positions, and the ball is bowled on or outside the off
stump with the primary aim of inducing the batsman to hit a catch; a typical off-theory
field would include three slips, a gully, point or cover, mid-off and perhaps a third man,
leaving only two fielders on the leg-side:
‘Larwood had set his field for off theory with four men in the slips and Leyland covering
them on the boundary’ (Melbourne Argus 11 February 1933).
Off theory is of course the standard field setting for many types of bowling (especially
fast bowling), and is so well-established that the term is rarely used nowadays; it is
usually only the non-standard ‘leg-theory’ that is singled out by name.
In the very early days of cricket, when the object was to slog the ball and the ‘straight
bat’ had not yet evolved, there were probably more fielders on the leg-side than on the
off. By the early 19th century, however, field-settings already show an off-side bias,
and the basic principles of off-theory seem to be understood: ‘A bowler very often
bowls wide of the off stump, and a little faster than his common pace, merely to make
the hitter reach after it’ (Boxall 1800, p 35). But the refinement of this form of attack,
with the ring of fielders in close-catching positions, came only towards the end of the
century:
‘George Lohmann who played for Surrey from 1884 … was one of the first to put the
“off-theory” so much into practice. When a man like Lohmann bowls four out of five
balls on the off-side and crowds the fielders on that side … you may hit it, but it would
not be long before you hit it into a fielder’s hand’ (Pullin 1900, p 129).
Though heartily disapproved of by the older generation – ‘I call bowling off the wicket
wasted energy’ says George Wootton (Pullin 1900, p 203) – off-theory soon became the
norm. Like so many developments in this period, it is closely associated with the marked
improvement in playing surfaces characteristic of the time (See WICKET). As Ranjitsinhji
says:
‘Wickets are so good and true … that to clean bowl a good batsman is next door to
impossible. So bowlers have adopted almost universally what is known as the off-theory’
old enemy
old enemy n from an English point of view, Australia; from an Australian point of view,
England:
‘As in 1977, and again in 1978–9, we had won three Tests in a row against the old
enemy’ (Brearley 1982, p 131).
Australia and England are the oldest Test-playing countries and the rivalry between
them dates back to 1877.
old-fashioned point
old-fashioned point n a close fielding position (or the player occupying it) square of
the wicket on the off-side; a ‘short’ variety of point, distinguished from ‘silly’ point by
being squarer on to the wicket. The position of point itself was much closer to the wicket
in the 18th and 19th centuries than it is nowadays (See POINT), and it is to this older
position that the term old-fashioned point refers.
on
on n the side of the pitch on which the striker stands to receive the ball; LEG (qv)
쐽 adj, adv on, towards, or relating to the on-side:
‘On-balls have a greater tendency to turn in towards the wicket’ (New Sporting Maga-
zine July 1836).
on-break 126
Although broadly synonymous, the terms ‘on’ and ‘leg’ are not completely
interchangeable. ‘Leg’ originally denoted a fielding position square of the wicket on
the leg-side, and cricket terminology retains vestiges of an older distinction – implied
rather than explicit – whereby ‘leg’ indicates the area bounded by an arc from deep
square leg to deep fine leg, while ‘on’ denotes the area in front of the wicket on the leg-
side. Hence mid-on is in front of the wicket, but fine leg and leg slip are behind it;
similarly, the on drive goes in front of the wicket but the leg glance goes behind it. The
difference is most clearly shown in the terms long on and long leg, which are of course
in no way synonymous.
See also LEG, OFF
쐽 adv in or into the position of being the bowler:
‘A bowler should never be kept on if he is not getting wickets, and if the batsmen are
playing him with ease’ (Badminton 1888, p 208).
‘At 247, Benaud brought himself on for Rorke, but persevered with Lindwall’ (Peebles
1959, p 168).
on-break n a LEG-BREAK (obsolete):
on-break
‘One thing I am certain of, which is that there was an on-break from Farmer Miles’
bowling’ (Badminton 1888, p 282).
on drive
on drive n a form of drive, played to a good-length ball pitching on or just outside leg
stump, in which the ball is sent into the area between mid-on and mid-wicket. Described
by John Arlott (1983, p 61) as ‘the most difficult to play’ of all the batting strokes, the
on drive involves a rather complex movement in which the batsman’s weight is shifted
simultaneously forward and towards the on-side.
on-drive
on-drive vb to hit the ball when playing an on drive:

‘Colin Wells on-drove Emburey for successive sixes and Barclay moved steadily to his
unbeaten half-century’ (Patrick Barclay, Guardian 31 May 1983).
4th Test South Africa v

England at Wanderers
2005
Andy Strauss on drives
Ntini for 4 to bring up his
50
© Patrick Eagar
127 open
one-day
one-day adj 1. denoting a type of cricket or a game of cricket played under regulations
designed to produce a result within a single day’s play, typically involving one innings
per side limited by a stipulated number of overs:
‘It has become commonplace in one-day cricket to put the other side in on winning the
toss’ (Gordon Ross, Cricketer September 1984).
‘Lara was mindful of the threat posed by Danish Kaneria – who, like him, had been
rested from the one-day series – and never allowed him to settle’ (Fazeer Mohammed,
Wisden 2006, p 1127).
See also TWENTY20
2. characteristic of the style of cricket, and especially of batting, found in one-day games
(often disparaging):
‘In a Test match he has produced a … one-day shot and it is crucial’ (Scyld Berry,
‘We came to believe that in an era when batsmen were bringing one-day cricket attitudes
to the Test arena, few would have even a remote chance of surpassing Sir Gary’s mark
this side of 2000 A.D.’ (‘Roving Eye’, Sportstar [Chennai] 30th April 1994).
‘Barry Richards … made a valuable contribution to the supply of hot air in the press box
by fuming at length about too many one-day shots being played on a Test pitch’ (Telford
Vice, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 78).
One-day cricket started in Britain with the Gillette Cup in 1963, and all the main
cricket-playing countries now have at least one major limited-overs competition. One-
day internationals have been played since 1971, and the four-yearly World Cup was
inaugurated in 1975. Detractors have argued that the one-day format discourages the
development of specialist skills and puts a premium on all-round competence. For the
fielding side, the emphasis is often more on containment rather than on taking wickets,
so reliable, defensive bowling at medium pace is sometimes more effective than
aggressive (but potentially expensive) fast bowling or wrist-spin. And batsmen tend to
score runs by gently pushing or deflecting quick singles through defensively-set fields,
rather than by patiently building innings through a mixture of solid defence and
classical strokeplay. Conversely, the demands of one-day cricket have led to dramatic
improvements in the quality of fielding, and arguably to greater batting skill in the
lower order, making the truly inept number 11 ‘rabbit’ almost a thing of the past. And
there is no doubt that the one-day game, with its guarantee of a result and its often
gripping finishes, has created a wider audience for cricket at all levels.
one-dayer
one-dayer n a one-day match:

‘The Tests over, the first one-dayer was scheduled between India and Pakistan on 16
December at Peshawar’ (Purandare 2005, p 88).
one leg
one leg n the position of the bat when it is held so as to cover leg stump by a batsman
taking guard.
Compare TWO LEG
one short
one short interj the call made by the umpire in the event of either batsman taking a SHORT
RUN (qv)
on-side
on-side n, adj (on or towards) the side of the pitch on which the striker stands; on-side
and leg-side are virtually synonymous, but while leg-side tends to be used mainly with
reference to field settings and bowling tactics, on-side is more often used to describe a
batting stroke or a batsman’s technique:
‘Grimmett … concluded his analysis with the simple “Headley is the finest on-side
player in the world”’ (Manley 1988, p 44).
‘He square cut … and, using the strength of his wrists and forearms, hooked anything
short, no matter how fast, to the on-side boundary’ (B C Pires, obituary for Sir Clyde
Walcott, Guardian 28 August 2006).
open
open vb 1. to begin the innings of the batting side by being the first batsman (or one of the
two first batsmen) to face the bowling:
‘Jardine and Sutcliffe opened for England, and never appeared to be in the slightest diffi-
culty with the bowling’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933, p 30).
opener 128
‘No. 3 misses the occasional loosener that comes the way of the opening batsman’
(Brearley 1982, p 111).
‘Ganguly has won the toss and chosen to bat, Tendulkar walks out with Sehwag to open
the innings’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 112).
2. to bowl the first over or overs in an innings:
‘The Queensland fast bowler Fisher opened to Richardson down a fairish breeze from
the pavilion end’ (Peebles 1959, p 55).
‘Brett Lee opened with a wide, and Trescothick and Strauss only had to play at a couple
of deliveries in the first three overs’ (Haigh 2005, p 193).
3. —open the face (of the bat) See FACE
4. —open one’s shoulders See SHOULDER
opener
opener n 1. either of the first two batsmen on a batting side; an opening batsman:
‘The West Indies openers, Greenidge and Haynes … abandoned efforts to meet the
daunting, but increasingly more plausible, challenge of scoring 323 in the final innings
to win’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer May 1984).
The main role of the openers is to blunt their opponents’ bowling attack by batting
through the first 20 overs or so, while the ball is still new and hard and the opening
bowlers still fresh, and to provide a solid basis for their team’s innings.
2. either of the bowlers who bowl the first two overs in an innings:
‘Percy Fender … maintains that the Australians themselves precipitated events by their
unease at the prospect of facing a battery of four England fast bowlers, including
Larwood and his fellow Nottinghamshire opener, Bill Voce’ (Peter Deeley, Observer
Magazine, 7 November 1982, p 28).
order
order, batting order, (also formerly order of going in) n the arrangement of a team’s
batting resources, with regard to the order in which each player takes his turn to bat; the
‘order’ may be subdivided into the openers, the middle order, and the late order or ‘tail’:
‘Deep had been the consultation at supper as to the order of going in’ (Thomas Hughes,
Tom Brown’s School Days 1857, ch 8).
‘The Essex task was marginally eased by the absence of Mark Davies, ninth in the order,
who could not bat because of a shoulder injury’ (John Mason, Daily Telegraph 15
August 1984).
‘He has regularly shouldered the burden at the top of the order, and occasionally done
spectacularly well’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 81).
orthodox
orthodox adj 1. bowling or bowled with FINGER-SPIN as opposed to WRIST-SPIN (qv):

‘Pakistan held the upper hand, not so much in the bowling of Iqbal Qasim and Abdul
Qadir (though the latter’s wrist-spin was an asset) but in the ability of their leading
batsmen to counter the orthodox spin of Bracewell, Boock and Gray’ (WCM January
1985).
‘The left-arm orthodox finger-spinner from Luton can already lay claim to the hearts of
the Old Trafford regulars’ (Kevin Mitchell, Observer 30 July 2006).
2. playing or played in a conventional batting style:
‘First came a reverse sweep … Next another sweep, orthodox this time, hit with precision
and power’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 7 March 2006).
out
out adv, adj having one’s innings terminated, either as an individual batsman or as a
batting side; dismissed from batting:
‘If a Ball is nipp’d up, and he strikes it again wilfully, before it came to the Wicket, it’s
out’ (Laws 1744).
‘Bear in mind not to leave your ground till the ball has quitted the Bowler’s hand, or he
will be justified in trying to put you out’ (Clarke 1851 in HM, p 169).
‘Ponting’s only option was to blast England out double quick, but the light remained
sepulchral’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 121).
See also ALL OUT
쐽 adj of or denoting the team that is fielding, as distinguished from the team that is ‘in’
or batting:
129 outright
‘A cricketer need only look at his scores and references to see how often the out side …
has prevented the in side from getting the runs required’ (Badminton 1888, p 197).
See also OUTCRICKET
쐽 vb to get a batsman or batting side out; dismiss (old):
‘The home team were all outed for 153’ (Headlam 1903, p 187).
‘A poor batsman will often be “outed” by a half-volley, if it is speedy enough, but it is
not often that one catches a county cricketer off his guard’ (P G Wodehouse, Daily Mail
17 May 1907).
‘Back in the field, they improved this position by outing four of the opposition for 84’
(Peebles 1959, p 142).
쐽 n a decision by the umpire that a batsman is out; a dismissal (obsolete):
‘They are the sole Judges of all Outs and Inns [and] of all fair or unfair Play’ (Laws
1744).
A batsman can be out in any of the following ten ways (all of which are defined at the
appropriate places): (1) bowled (2) timed out (3) caught (4) handled the ball (5) hit the
ball twice (6) hit wicket (7) lbw (8) obstructing the field (9) run out (10) stumped.
Seven of these modes of dismissal (viz all except 2, 7, and 8) are included in the
original (1744) code of Laws and have remained unchanged, apart from technical
details. Four of the ten ways of getting out (viz numbers 2, 4, 5, and 8) are exceptionally
rare, and the ‘Records’ section in Wisden notes recent instances under the heading
‘Unusual Dismissals’.The decision as to whether a batsman is out rests exclusively
with the onfield umpires (or in certain cases with the THIRD UMPIRE), to whom the
fielding side must appeal. If the appeal is answered in the affirmative, the umpire
signals his decision to the players and the scorers by raising his index finger above his
head.
outcricket
outcricket n the performance or skill of a team as a fielding side, as distinguished from

its performance with the bat:
‘In contrast to Sri Lanka’s fine outcricket, Wettimuny was dropped once and Dias twice’
(WCM May 1984).
outfield
outfield n 1. the part of a cricket field outside the square and its immediate vicinity,
especially the area beyond the ‘infield’ and close to the boundary, often considered in
terms of the extent to which it helps or impedes the progress of a ball struck from the bat:
‘A target of 201 at five an over did not seem an exacting task for Lancashire, given an
easy-paced pitch and a fast outfield’ (David Lacey, Guardian 9 July 1984).
‘They were also helped … by shoddy West Indian fielding, with three grassed chances
and umpteen lapses in the outfield’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July
2006, p 83).
2. a fielder stationed in the outfield; an outfielder (old):
‘Ulyett is a very good outfield, as good a run-getting bat as Gunn, and at times a
dangerous bowler’ (Badminton 1888, p 216).
outfielder
outfielder n a fielder stationed in the outfield; a ‘deep’ fielder:

‘He [Constantine] was one of the great outfielders of all time, athletic, panther-quick,
sure-handed and with an arm that could rifle the ball into the wicket-keeper’s gloves like
a bullet even from the deepest boundary’ (Manley 1988, p 27).
‘A Pakistani outfielder, however, had to make a run for it as a herd of goats from the
prison farm dashed across the outfield, followed by the prisoners and their guards’
(David Turner, Wisden 2005, p 1524).
outing
outing n a period spent ‘in the field’, as distinguished from an ‘innings’ (old ):
‘A man even in full training invariably feels the effect of fatigue after bowling sixty or
seventy overs, and fieldsmen go through the same experience during a long outing’
outright
outright n Australia an instance of a side winning a game by scoring more runs in their
first (and only) innings than the total runs scored by their opponents in two innings. An
‘outright’ which carries bonus points in some competitions:
outside 130
‘In inter-state matches … there are no bonus points for batting. The aim initially is to go
for a win on the first innings – which carries points – and then to go for the “outright”’
(Trevor Bailey, Sir Gary: a Biography 1976, p 117).
outside
outside prep with the bat moving along a line on the far side of the ball’s line of flight,
so that the ball passes the inside edge of the bat:
‘Qadir played outside a slower ball from Lawson and was bowled when it came back off
the seam’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 31 December 1983).
Compare INSIDE
outside edge
outside edge n 1. the edge of the bat, when held more or less perpendicularly, that is
further from the batsman; the ‘off-side’ edge of the bat:
‘Harper, after a long intelligent spell at the left-handers … found the top outside edge of
Gower’s bat’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1984).
‘Flintoff raised an enquiring arm, followed by an impish smile, when he went past
Gilchrist’s outside edge in the next over’ (Haigh 2005, p 212).
2. an unintentional deflection of the ball off the outside edge of the bat:
‘Next ball, Read got an outside edge to a ball that went flying through the slips’ (Owen
Slot, Times 8 August 2006).
outswing
outswing, outswerve, away-swing n movement of the ball in the air, typically from a
line around middle stump, away from the batsman so as to hit or pass just outside off
stump; though more difficult to achieve than inswing, outswing is more likely to produce
problems for the batsman, especially if the ball moves late:
‘Inswing, of course, can be more easily smothered than outswing’ (Arlott 1983, p 38).
See SWING. Compare INSWING
outswinger
outswinger, away-swinger n a ball that swings away towards the off-side, especially so
as to pass outside off stump, from a line initially closer to middle stump:
‘Simpson … played a stylish little innings until he reached across too far and touched an
out-swinger from Lindwall, sending a difficult wide chance which Langley held with
clever agility’ (Cardus 1978, p 211).
‘Kapil runs into bowl … leaping into the delivery stride, elegantly side-on, and then
comes down hard on the deck with his left foot to release a perfect outswinger’ (Bhatta-
charya 2006, p 73).
over
over n a stipulated number of fair deliveries (six, in the contemporary game) bowled
consecutively by one bowler from one end of the pitch. Overs are bowled alternately
from each end of the pitch, and no bowler may bowl two overs consecutively in the same
innings. No-balls and wides do not count in the over. The term derives from the call made
by the umpire when the prescribed number of balls has been bowled: ‘When the Four
Balls are bowl’d he is to call Over’ (Laws 1744) thereby indicating that the field will
‘change over’ and the ball will be bowled from the other end of the wicket.
쐽 interj the call made by the umpire at the end of an over
The earliest code of Laws prescribes a four-ball over and this remained the norm for
well over a hundred years. The length of the over was officially increased to five balls
in 1889, but experiments with overs of five balls or more had evidently been in progress
for some time:
‘Some clubs insist upon bowling more than four balls to the over … Some contend for
five balls, being more convenient as a submultiple of ten’ (Box 1868, p 117).
The preference for longer overs reflects an increasing tactical sophistication on the part
of bowlers, who needed more than four balls in which to develop their plan of attack. At
any rate the pressure continued, and the modern six-ball over was established in 1900.
The 20th century saw a number of experiments with an eight-ball over, notably in Aus-
tralia where this was the norm from 1922 until 1979. England, New Zealand, the West
Indies, Pakistan, and South Africa all flirted with the eight-ball over at different times,
but in these cases the arrangement never lasted for more than two or three years. The
eight-ball over was still permitted in the 1980 Code of Laws, but in the most recent
(2000) Code, Law 22 states unequivocally that an over consists of six balls. The longest
over in international cricket was bowled by Pakistan’s Mohammad Sami in a one-day
131 overthrow
game against Bangladesh in 2004: it consisted of 17 balls, including seven wides and
four no-balls.
overarm
overarm, (also formerly overhand) adj, adv using the normal method of bowling, in
which the arm is raised almost vertically above the shoulder before swinging forward and
downward as it delivers the ball. Overarm bowling was finally legalised in 1864, but had
been tolerated with varying degrees of resistance ever since the legalisation of roundarm
bowling in 1835:
‘Over-arm bowling … returned cricket to being a side-on game, in which bowlers and
batsmen exploit the wicket-to-wicket axis’ (Marqusee 1994, p 62).
‘England added the third stump, the straight bat, overhand bowling and other essentials’
(Andrew Lang, Blackwell’s Magazine October 1901).
See BOWLING
overpitch
overpitch vb to bowl the ball so that it pitches further down the wicket than a good length:
‘Saunders was over-pitching them and Hayward drove a full toss to the track’
‘The really good player to lobs runs out to a certainty when the ball is overpitched’
See LENGTH
over-rate
over-rate n the average number of overs bowled per hour during a given period such as a
match, a series, or a season. In recent years, efforts have been made to reverse the steady
decline in over-rates since the 1950s. A rate of well in excess of 20 six-ball overs per hour
was quite normal in pre-war years, even at Test level, but Test match over-rates slumped
to as low as 12 or even 11 overs an hour, especially in the case of teams with all-pace
attacks. More recently, the modest resurgence in slow bowling has tended to nudge over-
rates upwards again. ICC rules stipulate a minimum of 90 overs per day (equivalent to
15 overs an hour) for Test matches, and failure to meet the target can lead to substantial
deductions from the fielding side’s match fees. Although these penalties are regarded as
hopelessly inadequate by some former players, the point has been well made that a
higher rate – such as prevailed between the wars – would be ‘incompatible with the
maximum concentration of thought and effort which modern Test cricket demands’
(Berry 1982, p 58).
over the top
over the top adv over the heads of the close or midfield fielders and out into the deep or
over the boundary (as when a batsman hits a ‘lofted’ drive):
‘I decided to hit Botham over the top, seeing no mid-on or a man deeper, but only one in
the country between long-on and deep mid-wicket’ (Sunil Gavaskar, WCM February
1984).
over the wicket
over the wicket adv delivering the ball from the hand that is closer to the bowler’s
wicket; for most types of bowler, this is the default form of delivery, and by going ‘over
the wicket’ the bowler is able to reduce to a minimum the angle between the ball’s line
of flight and the line passing from wicket to wicket:
‘It was now that Bright started to bowl over the wicket to the right-handers … a ploy he
was to rely on for most of the remaining Tests’ (Brearley 1982, p 32).
‘The modern left-arm spinner retreats by bowling over the wicket at the first sign of any
belligerence’ (Vic Marks, Observer 30 July 2006).
Compare ROUND THE WICKET
overthrow
overthrow n 1. a ball thrown in from the field that travels beyond the wicket after eluding
any intervening fielders, thus enabling the batsmen to take a run or runs, or to continue
taking runs if they have already started:
‘The criterion used to decide the total runs from an overthrow is: where are the two
batsmen at the moment the ball leaves the fielder’s hand?’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 98).
2. a run made as a result of an overthrow:
‘At Headingley in 1976 (England v. West Indies) Alan Knott was credited with a seven
in the course of scoring 116, for a single, two overthrows and four overthrows’ (Oslear
& Mosey 1993, p 100).
overthrow 132
If an overthrow crosses the boundary, any runs already taken by the batsmen, plus the
allowance for the boundary, are added to the score. The runs resulting from an
overthrow are credited to the striker (and debited to the bowler) if he hit the ball in the
first place; but if the original ball was a wide or resulted in a bye or leg-bye, any extra
runs coming from overthrows are added to the appropriate section of the ‘extras’. If a
ball thrown in from the field hits the stumps while the batsman is in his ground and then
continues into the outfield, the batsmen may still take runs on the overthrow.
P
pace
pace n 1. the speed at which a ball is delivered by a bowler:

‘If a batsman misjudges the pace of the ball he often loses his wicket’ (Badminton 1888,
p 123).
‘Tait lacks that sliding foot-cross that enabled Thommo to maintain height at delivery
and generate his extreme pace and lethal bounce’ (John Benaud, Cricinfo Magazine July
2006, p 89).
2. the extent to which the wicket affects the speed of the ball when it pitches:
‘He made the best use of the green, moist pitch that almost throughout was of uncertain
pace’ (WCM April 1984).
3. fast bowling:
‘Indian cricket, from being a theatre of pace, at times raw pace against exuberant batting
… was becoming measured batting against wily spin’ (Bose 1990, p 139).
‘He seemed troubled only once, in Australia, by the pace of Ray Lindwall and Keith
Miller in 1951–52’ (B C Pires, obituary for Sir Clyde Walcott, Guardian 28 August
2006).
‘By lunch, the jam-packed ground was buzzing after England’s pace foursome had the
visitors half out for 97 on a responsive pitch’ (David Frith, Wisden 2006, p 96).
paceman
paceman, (also pacer India) n a fast bowler:

‘The second day, though, saw a change of fortunes as West Indies’ pacemen restricted
India to a further 165 runs’ (WCM December 1983).
‘His 13-wicket haul in a Test at Perth, the paradise of pacers, is still talked about by the
West Indians who had to face him firing on all cylinders’ (Haresh Pandya, The Hindu 20
March 1993).
‘Where some of the world’s most talented batters groped, Gavaskar got thirteen centu-
ries against the West Indian pacers’ (Purandare 2005, p 27).
pack
pack vb to concentrate fielders on a particular side of the wicket, especially in close

catching positions; the bowler then bowls towards the ‘packed’ side of the wicket, with
the aim of preventing the batsman from scoring and inducing close catches:
‘As runs came Larwood packed his leg field; and now had seven men on the leg side’
‘This [restriction] was not welcomed by the off-spinning contingent on tour as we are
accustomed to bowling to a packed onside field’ (Vic Marks, Cricketer April 1983).
pad
pad n 1. either of a pair of protective coverings worn by batsmen and wicket-keepers to

protect their legs from above the knees to below the ankle
2. —off one’s pads hitting or deflecting the ball smartly towards leg at a late stage in
its flight, when it has almost made contact with the pads:
‘Hutton forced Lindwall for four to the on, a glorious forearm thrust off his pads’
(Cardus 1978, p 198).
Various forms of protection for the legs were experimented with in the early 19th
century, the most primitive being a single wooden board tied to the batsman’s front leg.
One writer describes a system involving ‘longitudinal sockets’ sewn into the trouser
legs at half-inch intervals, into which ‘long strips of Indian rubber’ could be inserted
(Felix 1850, p 7). Predictably enough, older players were disdainful of these namby-
pamby arrangements: Herbert Jenner-Fust, who played in the 1820s and 30s, reports
pad away 134

that ‘pads were not heard of in my young days, and the player would be laughed at who
attempted to protect his shins’ (Pullin 1900, p 6). These and similar comments are
strikingly reminiscent of remarks made in more recent years about the introduction of
protective helmets. But apologists for the helmet would probably say the same as W.
G. Grace said about pads, that ‘the sense of confidence that comes from wearing them
more than makes up for the slight loss of freedom’ (Badminton 1888, p 392).
Notwithstanding the scorn of the old guard, pads began to be widely adopted from the
1840s onwards, and much of the impetus for this change will have come from the major
developments in the area of bowling that were currently in progress:
‘When round-arm became “all the go”, and pace was regarded as the grand object to
be achieved, the bowling became often so dangerous that the legs of the batsmen needed
protection, and, as necessity is the parent of invention, pads of various designs were
brought into notice’ (Box 1868, p 158).
pad away
pad away vb to deliberately deflect the ball away from the stumps with one of the pads
in cases where one believes one cannot be out lbw:
‘Offsetting the benefits to off-spinners of the law penalising batsmen who deliberately
padded away had come the restrictions upon leg-side fielders’ (Frith 1984, p 149).
Compare PAD UP
pad-bat
pad-bat adj denoting a shot (or a catch resulting from it) in which the ball comes off the
edge of the bat after first hitting the batsman’s pad.
Compare BAT-PAD
paddings
paddings n an early form of protection for the batsman’s legs (See PAD) (obsolete):
‘Always, whether in practice or whilst engaged in matches, wear paddings’ (Felix 1850,
p 6).
paddle
paddle vb to play a gentle sweep shot, typically to a lowish ball pitching around leg
stump, hitting the ball into the area behind square leg:
‘Angus Fraser was bowled round his legs by Adams attempting to paddle, whereas that
sort of thing should be kept for Runaway Beach’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 22 April 1994).
‘He cut and glided the ball behind square on the off-side and paddled and whipped it
behind square-leg on the on-side’ (Purandare 2005, p 197).
pad play
pad play n the practice or technique of ‘padding up’ as a defensive manoeuvre, especially
when playing spin bowling:
‘Qadir … becomes frustrated at the “old pro” pad play of Bob Taylor, who thrusts his
front leg forward at any ball around off stump in case it turns out to be a googly’ (Scyld
Berry, Observer 11 March 1984).
pad up
pad up vb 1. to put on one’s pads in readiness for going out to bat:

‘Gower, who was originally padded up to go in No. 3, held back to let Edmonds and
Foster go in and slog’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 16 January 1985).
2. (also pad out) to move the front leg down the wicket, usually outside the line of off
stump, with the aim of preventing the ball from hitting the stumps if it should cut back:
‘Before the roaring crowd had regained breath, Morris padded up without constructive
ideas to Lock, and died the modern hero’s death, leg before’ (Cardus 1978, p 245).
‘Botham had to come in with 25 minutes to go, when Mike Gatting had his second break
of concentration, padding out again to another straight one from Marshall’ (Scyld
Berry, Observer 1 July 1984).
‘It was Panesar who broke the partnership when Yousuf, for some inexplicable reason,
padded up to a straight ball and was rightly given out leg before’ (Angus Fraser, Inde-
pendent 18 July 2006).
Padding up became especially prevalent after an alteration to the lbw rule in 1937 made
it possible for batsmen to be out to balls pitching outside off stump: by moving the front
leg forward and across, the batsman could prevent the ball hitting him ‘between wicket
and wicket’, and thus avoid dismissal (See LBW). But a further change in the rules in
1970, whereby a batsman could be given out even if the ball hit him outside off stump,
provided he was playing no stroke, made deliberate ‘pad play’ a distinctly more
hazardous business. Even so, batsmen still occasionally take the risk, no doubt
135 penalty runs

calculating that if their front foot is sufficiently far enough forward, or if some pretence
of playing a shot is made, the umpire will probably give them the benefit of the doubt.
Compare PAD AWAY
pair
pair, (also formerly pair of spectacles) n a batsman’s score of nought in both innings of
a match, so called because of the supposed resemblance of two noughts to a pair of
spectacles; a batsman who has scored nought in the first innings of a game is said to be
on a pair when he goes in to bat for a second time:
‘In a conversation after net practice he confessed that he had made a pair of spectacles
only once in his life’ (Cardus 1978, p 64).
‘Poor Woolmer got a pair without playing a single bad stroke’ (Brearley 1982, p 18).
See also KING PAIR, EMPEROR PAIR
palm-break
palm-break n Australia break applied to the ball by the movement of the palm of the hand
across the seam as the ball is delivered; CUT (obsolete):
‘All the bowlers found it a wicket upon which the ball declined to answer either finger
or palm-break’ (Melbourne Argus 16 January 1904).
pano
pano Corfu lit ‘up’: the batting side.

Compare KATO
partnership
partnership n 1. a period during which two batsmen are batting together, measured in
terms of the number of runs that are scored while they are at the wicket, and lasting either
until one of them is dismissed or – in the case of an ‘unbroken’ partnership – until their
side’s innings ends while both of them are still in; a partnership is ‘enumerated’ with
reference to the wicket that falls when the partnership ends, so that a ‘sixth wicket
partnership’ is one that begins after the fall of the fifth wicket:
‘Greenidge and Haynes … have shared in seven century partnerships, three of which
have passed the 200’ (Derek Lodge, WCM May 1984).
‘The outstanding partnership in West Indies first-class cricket was made by Worrell and
Walcott. This was the 574 for the fourth wicket for Barbados … in 1946’ (B C Pires,
Obituary for Sir Clyde Walcott, Guardian 28 August 2006).
2. a pair of batsmen, especially opening batsmen, who regularly bat together:
‘In the end, a great opening partnership is like a mutual support system in which each
element is conscious that they are part of a whole and where the whole is greater than
the sum of its parts’ (Manley 1988, p 76).
pavilion
pavilion n —back in the pavilion (of a batsman) having been dismissed:

‘The West Indies began their innings with Guyana’s Steve Camacho and the Trinidad
wicket-keeper, Deryck Murray, as openers. Both were back in the pavilion with five runs
on the board, as Snow began one of the great performances of his career’ (Manley 1988,
p181).
PCB
PCB n Pakistan Cricket Board: the governing body for cricket in Pakistan, a Full Member
of the ICC (qv) since 1953
peg
peg n a stump (old):

‘A loose one on the leg side was neatly turned for a couple, the next went perilously near
his off peg’ (Jack Hobbs, The Test Match Surprise 1926, p 143).
penalty runs
penalty runs n runs accruing to the batting side’s total as a result of ‘transgressions’ by
the fielding side; penalty runs include the usual allowances for no-balls and wides, and
for an instance of the ball being stopped by a helmet rather than a fielder; the terms also
applies to runs awarded in respect of more serious offences, including breaches of Law
42 on ‘Fair and Unfair Play’ and – under some local regulations – for failure to meet a
required over-rate:
‘A fielder may field the ball with any part of his person but if, while the ball is in play,
he wilfully fields it otherwise, … the ball shall become dead and 5 penalty runs shall be
awarded to the batting side’ (Law 41 §2).
‘Hair became the first umpire to impose a five-run penalty for ball-tampering’ (Vic
Marks, Observer 27 August 2006).
periscope 136
periscope
periscope n Australia a bat held above the batsman’s head when he ducks under a
bouncer (slang)
pick
pick vb (of a batsman) to form a correct assessment, as the ball is released by the bowler
(especially a bowler of wrist-spin), of where the ball will pitch and how it will behave
after it pitches, and take appropriate action:
‘Most of the Australian batsmen have told me that they can pick his leg break and play
him as an off-spinner for the rest of the time’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 2 January 1984).
‘His steep bounce, coupled with the problem of picking his length, presented more prob-
lems than his turn’ (David Green, Cricketer April 1983).
pick-up
pick-up n the action or method of bringing the bat up from a stationary position
preliminary to playing a stroke:
‘If his wrists are cocked early in the pick-up then it should be comparatively easy for him
to take the bat up higher when the full swing of the bat at the ball is called for’ (Alf
Gover, Cricketer March 1983).
‘Collingwood … is a batsman who has made huge strides since first entering county
cricket without a pick-up to speak of’ (Steve James, Guardian 15 July 2006).
pinch-hit
pinch-hit vb to bat as a pinch-hitter:

‘Andy Bichel, pinch-hitting in the absence of Darren Gough, maintained Irani’s scoring
rate before lifting Tim Groenwald to Nick Knight at mid-on’ (Richard Rae, Guardian 28
August 2006).
‘The West Indies and England picked up the example of the Kiwis, and Brian Lara and
Ian Botham gave their teams and the tournament more than just entertainment value
with their superb pinch-hitting’ (Purandare 2005, p 137).
pinch-hitter
pinch-hitter n a batsman whose job is to play aggressively and score runs quickly during
the early stages of his team’s innings; the pinch-hitter is a feature of one-day cricket, and
is typically a player who would normally bat lower down the order but is promoted in
order to set up a fast run-rate:
‘As one of the most uninhibited strikers of the ball in county cricket, Brown earns his
chance in the wake of the vogue for top-of-the-order pinch-hitters in the World Cup’
(Mike Selvey, Guardian 23 May 1996).
The tactic of using pinch-hitters first gained prominence during the 1992 World Cup,
but was most famously employed in the next World Cup (1996) by the opening pair of
the winning Sri Lankan team, Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana.
Unusually, the term is borrowed from baseball, but as one writer has observed it is:
‘curiously misapplied: in baseball, a pinch-hitter comes in to bat as a substitute late in
the game – at “the pinch” – to replace a weaker hitter’ (Mike Marqusee, Cricinfo Maga-
zine February 2006, p 29).
pintz
pintz Corfu a yorker; origins unknown

pitch
pitch n 1. the area of ground between the two sets of stumps; like ‘wicket’ (see WICKET)
the term is used both for the playing area itself and for the quality of its surface as this
affects the behaviour of the ball:
‘His spinning partner, David Freedman, a left-arm wrist-spinner who relies on the
“chinaman”, found the Sydney pitch less conducive’ (John Mackinnon, Wisden 1994, p
1131).
‘Had yesterday been the start of the second of two back-to-back Tests, Ponting might
well have batted; instead he speculated on gremlins in the pitch to go with those in the
mind’ (Haigh 2005, p 72).
No fielder is allowed to stand on the pitch before the ball hits or passes the bat. The
pitch is so called because it is the place where the wickets are ‘pitched’: see 5, below.
It measures 22 yards (20.12 metres) in length and 10 feet (3.04 metres) in width (Laws
7 § 1, 8 § 1). The length of a cricket pitch has not changed since the first code of Laws
in 1744, and there is evidence to suggest that it was already well established long before
then. Writing in 1833 and referring to an old manuscript that described the game in its
infancy, John Nyren observes: ‘It appears that about 150 years since, it was the custom,
as at present, to pitch the wickets at the same distance asunder, viz. the twenty-two
137 play
yards’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 84). This distance is equivalent to the chain, a linear unit
that is used for measuring land and was standardised at 66 feet by a Mr Gunter in the
early 17th century. However, ‘why twenty-two yards were originally resolved upon as
the limits of distance is not more mysterious than the appointment of eleven persons
necessary for playing the game’ (Box 1868, p 113). In other words, nobody really
knows.
2. the point at which the ball first makes contact with the ground after being delivered by
the bowler:
‘Trumper used to say that if you got to the pitch of the ball it did not matter which way
it was breaking’ (James 1963, p 178).
쐽 vb 1. to deliver the ball so that it makes contact with the ground at a particular point
on the wicket; also (of the ball) to hit the ground at a particular point when bowled:
‘The young Bowler should at all times strive to pitch the Ball to a good length’ (Lambert
1816, p 17).
‘Sohail and Inzamam hit the ball at will. The bowlers did not know where to pitch’ (Vijay
Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 7 May 1994).
2. to deliver the ball so that it hits the ground in line with a particular target area, on or
outside the stumps; also (of the ball) to follow such a line when bowled:
‘Supposing the ball pitches on or just outside the off-stump, the batsman will assuredly
play that particular ball more correctly if he moves his right leg across the wicket’
(Warner 1934, p 12).
‘For Asif, bowling wide of the crease, making the ball come in by pitching it just outside
the off-stump did the trick’ (Neeru Bhatia, The Week (India) 12 February 2006).
3. to set up the wickets in readiness for a game by driving the stumps into the ground:
‘On Mon., Aug. 7, in the field adjoining to the Wool Pack at Islington, London v. the
County of Middlesex for £20 a side. Wickets to be pitched at one o’clock, play or pay’
(Whitehall Evening Post 1 August 1732).
place
place vb to hit the ball skilfully through the gaps in the field so as to derive the maximum
benefit from a shot:
‘Zaheer … was making the most of the brief respite afforded by the off-spin of Gomes,
placing the ball with deft skill and honeyed timing’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Crick-
eter August 1983).
play
play n 1. the activity of conducting a game of cricket:

‘At the conclusion of the first day’s play, the Leicester Club went in against 50 notches
only’ (Leicester Journal 22 September 1791).
2. the performance of an individual or team in a match:
‘The umpires shall be the sole judges of fair and unfair play’ (Law 42 § 2).
3. the style or skill of a batsman in dealing with the bowling:
‘The play of Lord Winchilsea was the conspicuous thing in the match … All the five
bowlers tried at him in vain’ (Kentish Gazette 21–3 August 1788).
‘Grimmett considers Headley to be the greatest master of on-side play whom he ever
bowled against’ (James 1963, p 143).
4. —in play (of the ball ) in active use according to the Laws, as distinguished from being
‘dead’:
‘If a ball in play cannot be found or recovered, any fielder may call Lost ball. The ball
shall then become dead’ (Law 20 § 1).
The ball is ‘in play’ from the moment the bowler begins his run-up until it becomes
‘dead’ for whatever reason.
See DEAD
쐽 vb 1. to take part in a game of cricket:
‘Simpson-Hayward … had been unable to play at Pindi owing to a bruised hand’
(Headlam 1903, p 163).
play 138
‘Worrell was … the first West Indian player to demand a stipend for his services, and to
refuse to play (against India in the sub-continent in 1948–49) when it was peremptorily
refused’ (B C Pires, Guardian 28 August 2006).
2. to include a particular player or type of player in a team:
‘We should have liked to play two spinners … but we could not imagine either going in
with only two seamers or leaving out a batsman’ (Brearley 1982, p 80).
‘Will Andrew Flintoff be fit enough to bowl 20 overs in each innings? If not, there is no
way England can play four bowlers’ (Andy Bull, Guardian 19 August 2006).
3. to stage a match:
‘A three days’ match was played at the Surrey Ground … commencing on the 1st of July,
1847, between the counties of Kent and Surrey’ (Bat 1851, p 73).
4. to execute a batting stroke in an attempt to hit the ball:
‘By operating round the wicket and aiming at off stump, Yardley probably forced the
batsmen to play more often’ (Michael Carey, Daily Telegraph 15 December 1982).
‘Years afterwards, in a quite insignificant friendly match in Lancashire, I was standing
at short-leg when some batsman played an uppish stroke in my direction’ (James 1963,
p 63).
5. to hit the ball in a particular manner or in a particular direction when batting:
‘Dyson took two offside fours off Pringle before playing him wide of mid-on for two’
(Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
‘Lara … was so confident as to play the leg-spinner off the pitch — a good ploy early in
the innings against a bowler not previously encountered’ (Paul Allott, Cricketer May
1994).
6. to deal with bowling of a particular type or from a particular bowler:
‘The batting of the Montreal Club was much better than might have been expected. They
play fast bowling well, but we should advise them to practise against the slows a little
more’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 24).
‘Harvey alone played him [Lock] well, before being bowled by a ball which pitched well
outside his off stump and hit the leg’ (Peebles 1959, p 60).
7. (of the pitch) to provide favourable or unfavourable batting conditions as specified:
‘Seven wickets had fallen for 19 runs on a pitch playing little worse than in the first
innings when … the same batsmen had amassed 401 runs’ (Brearley 1982, p 77).
8. —play and miss to attempt to hit the ball, especially outside off stump, but fail to
make contact:
‘He played and missed a good deal early on, but then began to time his drives and nudges
and glances’ (Henry Blofeld, Guardian 31 May 1983).
‘Adam Gilchrist played and missed at the second ball from Makhaya Ntini but as soon
as Gilchrist found the boundary for the first time, fours became the norm’ (Edward
Craig, Cricinfo Magazine April 2006, p 74).
9. —play oneself in to play cautiously at the beginning of one’s innings, or at the start
of a new session of play, in order to become accustomed to the bowling, the light, and
the wicket:
‘Fowler moreover had to play himself in six times (100 minutes being lost to bad light
on the first day) before reaching 99 with an adventurous pull-drive’ (Scyld Berry, WCM
August 1984).
‘It’s a mystery why experienced players with good records continue to get themselves out
when they have done the hard work and played themselves in’ (Henry Blofeld, The
Australian 11 December 1990).
쐽 interj the call made by the umpire at the bowler’s end to indicate that play can begin,
at the start of an innings or on the resumption of play after an interval or interruption:
‘The company soon became very large, and by the time “play” was called there were not
less than 3,000 spectators’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 19).
For play across, play back, play forward, play inside, play outside see ACROSS,
BACK, FORWARD, INSIDE, OUTSIDE.
139 point
player
player n 1. a participant in a match:

‘They are not to order any Man out, unless appealed to by one of the Players’ (Laws
1744).
2. (especially in Britain before 1963) a professional cricketer, as distinguished from a
‘gentleman’ or amateur cricketer:
‘In the year 1806, the Gentlemen first arrayed themselves against the Players at Lord’s’
(Box 1868, p 89).
See GENTLEMAN, PROFESSIONAL
play on
play on vb to deflect the ball from the bat on to one’s stumps; the resulting dismissal is
entered in the scorebook as ‘bowled’:
‘Unfortunately for Essex’s immediate prospects, Gooch had played on at the start of
Williams’s decisive over’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 28 April 1984).
‘Tendulkar got a spirited thirty-one before playing on to the stumps’ (Purandare 2005, p
198).
play out
play out vb to move well forward down the wicket in order to make a stroke:
‘His innings was a very reformation of cricket, until at ten minutes to three he played out
at Wardle, and was beaten and bowled’ (Cardus 1978, p 179).
plumb
plumb adj denotes a flat, true wicket that provides optimum conditions for batting and
offers little or no assistance to the bowlers:
‘I clean bowled the Old Man, W. W. Read, and A. E. Stoddart in a couple of overs with
that ball, on a plumb Oval wicket’ (Cardus 1978, p 30).
쐽 adv clearly and indisputably lbw:
‘In his third over, he bowled me an attempted bouncer which cut back and kept insidi-
ously low. I was plumb LBW’ (Brearley 1982, p 89).
‘When he was only on eighteen, he tried to put a ball behind square-leg and found
himself trapped plumb in front of the wicket’ (Purandare 2005, p 82).
The first meaning of ‘plumb’ relates to the word’s more general use in the sense of
‘completely straight or perpendicular’ (as determined by a ‘plumb line’); while its use
as an adverb – meaning ‘utterly’ or ‘completely’ – is well established in the general
language in expressions like ‘plumb crazy’ and ‘plumb tuckered’.
poach
poach vb to attempt to catch a ball that is clearly going towards another member of the
fielding side:
‘Grout had scooped the ball to square leg where Kanhai awaited the simplest of catches.
Hall, however, raced over, “poached” the catch and dropped it’ (Manley 1988, p 155).
pod
pod n the blade of the bat (old):

‘When the practice of bowling length-balls was introduced … it became absolutely
necessary to change the form of the bat … It was therefore made straight in the pod’
point
point n (formerly point of the bat) a fairly close off-side fielding position (or the player
occupying it) between cover and gully and roughly in a line with the popping crease:
‘Louch of Chatham behaved with his usual activity: he caught out 3 at the point of the
bat [and] he got 29 in the second innings’ (St James’s Chronicle 22 September 1774).
‘The distance at which point should stand varies according to the pace of the bowling,
the pace of the wicket, and the hitting powers of the batsman in point’s direction’
The precise definition of this term has changed considerably over the last 200 years. In
the early days of cricket, point denoted a very close position: its full name – ‘the point
of the bat’ – indicates that the fielder stood very near to the end of the striker’s bat
(hence also the even older term ‘bat’s end’):
‘The Point of the Bat (Slow Bowling). The young fieldsman who is appointed to this situ-
ation … should place himself within three yards and a half of the batsman’ (Nyren 1833
in HM, p 32).
Even half a century later, it was believed that ‘in no case ought he to be more than eight
yards away’ from the wicket (Badminton 1888, p 263). Nowadays the ‘normal’ position
poker 140
of point for a fast bowler would be a good deal deeper still – say 20 to 30 metres from
the bat – and variations from this norm are shown by an appropriate adjective: thus, a
very close fielder a little in front of square is at silly point, while a player fielding a little
behind the line of the wicket is at backward point; a less common term is OLD-FASH-
IONED POINT (qv) indicating a close position square of the wicket – in fact, the position
that point occupied in earlier times.
쐽 vb to field at point (obsolete):
‘The bowling of Tarrant and Grundy … the pointing of Carpenter, was all cricket in
perfection’ (Baily’s Magazine September 1867).
poker
poker n a batsman with a ‘pokey’ style of play (obsolete):

‘To the poker, the man who refuses to do anything but stick his bat in front of the wicket
… the high-dropping full-pitch is an excellent ball’ (Badminton 1888, p 143).
pokey
pokey adj (of a batsman or batting style) characterised by a tendency to push or ‘dab’ at
the ball rather than committing oneself to a proper stroke (obsolete):
‘Sometimes mid-off … is required to go “silly mid-off” with a view to catching a pokey
batsman’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 54).
pop
pop vb 1. (of the ball ) to rise steeply and unexpectedly off the wicket after pitching,
usually as a result of some irregularity in the surface:
‘The balls were popping about in dangerous fashion, and Champain behind the wicket
was taking them above his topi or brushing them off his nose like flies’ (Headlam 1903,
p 163).
2. (of a batsman) to make the ball rise sharply off the bat, especially when playing a
defensive stroke:
‘When he had made 10 Burke, in sparring at Tyson … popped the ball up very near to
Mortimore at short-leg’ (Peebles 1959, p 181).
popper
popper n a ball that ‘pops’ up off the wicket (obsolete):

‘He defended his wicket well against “breakers” and “poppers”’ (Bell’s Life 19 July
1857).
popping crease
popping crease, batting crease n a line marked on the ground at each end of the pitch,
parallel with the BOWLING CREASE (qv) and 4 feet/1.22 metres in front of the stumps; it
marks the forward limit of the batsman’s GROUND (qv), and although in practice it is only
slightly longer than the bowling crease it ‘shall be considered to be unlimited in length’
(Law 9 § 3). The popping crease was already in existence at the time of the original
(1744) code of Laws, which stipulated that it ‘must be exactly Three Feet Ten Inches
from the Wicket’ (the extra two inches being added in 1819 at the same time as an
increase in the height of the wicket). However, there is evidence to show that it was a
fairly recent innovation when these Laws were drawn up. John Nyren’s tentative
reconstruction of the game as it was played ‘about 150 years since’ (i.e. in the late 17th
century) includes the following description: ‘Between the stumps a hole was cut in the
ground, large enough to contain the ball and the butt-end of the bat. In running a notch,
the striker was required to put his bat into this hole, instead of the modern practice of
touching over the popping crease. The wicket-keeper, in putting out the striker when
running, was obliged, when the ball was thrown in, to place it in this hole before the
adversary could reach it with his bat’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, pp 84–5). This practice of
‘popping’ the bat in the hole in order to complete a run led to ‘many severe injuries of
the hands’ and was eventually superseded – via an intermediate stage in which the
batsman had to touch a stick held by the umpire – by the ‘modern’ method, in which the
batsman’s crease becomes, for the purposes of scoring a run, a symbolic vestige of the
original ‘popping hole’. The popping crease at the non-striker’s end is used to mark the
forward limit of the bowler’s territory in determining whether a delivery is fair: the
umpire must be satisfied that the bowler’s front foot has landed ‘with some part of the
foot, … whether grounded or raised, behind the popping crease’ (Law 24 § 5 (ii)).
See also RUN
poppy
poppy adj (of the wicket) liable to make the ball ‘pop’:
141 pudding
‘Several … got out in hitting at balls which, off a wicket that was somewhat poppy, found
a lodging in a very safe pair of hands belonging to Walters’ (Headlam 1903, p 71).
post
post vb 1. (of a batsman, partnership, or batting side) to score the stated number of runs:
‘Greenidge and Haynes had jumped into their punishing and presumptuous grandeur.
They had posted a haughty 60 in no time’ (Frank Keating, Guardian 15 January 1994).
‘The bowlers did not know where to pitch and it was only some superb fielding which
prevented Pakistan from posting a world record total’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar
[Chennai] 7 May 1994).
The term alludes to the idea of the score being ‘posted’ on the scoreboard.
2. (of the captain) to station a fielder in the specified position:
‘Key tried a spot of bodyline, posting three fielders on the leg-side boundary for Loye’
(Andy Wilson, Guardian 21 July 2006).
pouch
pouch vb to take a catch:

‘But Anderson wasn’t finished, and with his next ball he produced a perfect slower
delivery which Collingwood pouched at deep-midwicket’ (Andrew Miller, Cricinfo
website, 21 December 2005).
powerplay
powerplay, Powerplay n in one-day internationals, one of three blocks of overs during

which no more than two fielders may be stationed in the outfield, outside the CIRCLE (qv).
The three powerplays consist of the first ten overs of an innings (‘Powerplay 1’), in which
these fielding restrictions always apply, and two further blocks of five overs each
(Powerplays 2 and 3) to be used at any time in the innings at the discretion of the fielding
captain. Powerplays were introduced in 2005, as a variation on ODI regulations whereby
fielding restrictions prevailed during the first 15 overs of an innings, the intention being
to offer fielding captains a wider range of tactical options and – it was hoped – to make
the cricket more exciting:
‘Pietersen was in rampant mood, and Dravid cleverly delayed the two Powerplays until
the stifling conditions had significantly weakened him’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo
Magazine May 2006, p 79).
See also FIELDING RESTRICTIONS
professional
professional n a person who plays cricket as a profession rather than as a pastime;

specifically, in the context of first-class cricket in Britain before 1963, a player in the paid
employment of one of the counties as distinguished from the ‘amateurs’ who – officially
at least – played without remuneration. People were already playing cricket as a
profession by the second half of the 18th century, and the first encounter between the
Gentlemen (amateurs) and Players (professionals) took place in 1806. The
amateur/professional distinction became institutionalised in the English first-class game,
as an extension of the overall class system. There were separate dressing rooms for the
two types of player, and a typically British system of nomenclature that made
everybody’s status quite clear (at least to anyone au fait with the code): thus, Surrey’s
team in the 1950s included the amateurs P. B. H. May and R. Subba Row and the
professionals Lock, G. A. R. and Laker, J. C. The distinction was marked, too, by
‘separate entrances to the field … separate travel, accommodation and dining
arrangements, even separate tables and menus’ (Marqusee 1994, p 74). With the
abolition of amateur status at the end of 1962 the term ‘professional’ lost its former social
connotations. Now that all first-class cricketers are professionals, the word is perhaps
most often used of those players – often overseas stars or former county players – who
are employed in league cricket as the sole paid member of an otherwise amateur team.
See also GENTLEMAN
protected area
protected area n that part of the pitch which, according to the Laws, must be protected
from damage by the bowlers. The protected area comprises ‘that area contained within a
rectangle bounded at each end by imaginary lines parallel to the popping creases and
5ft/1.52m in front of each and on the sides by imaginary lines, one each side of the
imaginary line joining the centres of the two middle stumps, each parallel to it and
1ft/30.48cm from it’ (Law 42 §11 (b)).
pudding
pudding n a damp, slow, lifeless wicket:

pull 142
‘Unless sunshine followed rain, the pitch would often stay a pudding, on which anything
underpitched sat up asking to be hit’ (John Thicknesse, Wisden 1993, p 24).
pull
pull n an attacking batting stroke in which the ball is ‘pulled’ round towards the leg-side
with a cross bat. The pull can be played to a ball pitching on any line, and is especially
effective when a shortish ball is hit, at the top of its bounce, at around waist height. The
stroke is played off the back foot, and is executed by moving the front foot slightly across
towards the leg-side so that the batsman is almost chest on to the bowler, and hitting the
ball across its line of flight and into the area between mid-on and square leg. The pull
differs from the hook in that the ball is typically hit at a lower height and is sent into the
area in front of square. In common with other strokes played across the ball’s line of
flight, the pull was regarded with great suspicion in the 19th century. To the author of the
Badminton book (1888, p 48) it is simply ‘a bad stroke’. Ranjitsinhji is slightly less
censorious, at least so long as the stroke is reserved for balls pitching outside off stump.
He contends, however, that ‘it is never used by a good player to deal with the ball pitching
on the wicket; at least if it is, the player is for the nonce a bad one’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p
192). Modern coaches are likely to take a more indulgent line, but it remains true that
considerable care is needed in selecting the right ball to pull.
Compare HOOK
쐽 vb to hit the ball across to the leg-side when playing a pull:
‘Then, with Australia’s total still 107, Harvey committed his fatal error, pulling against
Trueman with less than a great batsman’s power of selection’ (Cardus 1978, p 236).
‘In his second spell, he tried one short ball too many and saw most of them sit up,
begging to be pulled’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 80).
pull-drive
pull-drive n a pull, especially one played with the bat more perpendicular than horizontal
that sends the ball well forward of square on the leg-side:
‘A pull-drive by Robinson to the mid-wicket boundary was the only stroke of note in the
abbreviated play possible’ (Derek Hodgson, Observer 22 May 1983).
143 put in
Though sometimes used interchangeably with ‘pull’, the term tends to denote a stroke
somewhere between an on-drive, which is played more along the line of the ball, and a
full-scale pull, which is played across the line.
쐽 vb to hit the ball when playing a pull-drive:
‘Once, at the Oval, he [Clive Lloyd] pull-drove a ball from Robin Jackman … over
midwicket into the yard of Archbishop Tenison’s Grammar School on the far side of the
road’ (John Arlott, WCM June 1983).
pull shot
pull shot n a pull:

‘Hayden might have nicked half a dozen deliveries either side of lunch yesterday, and
twice almost dragged pull shots onto his stumps’ (Haigh 2005, p 204).
punch
punch n an attacking batting stroke in which the ball is hit hard and low with a straight
bat; the emphasis is on power rather than elegance, and the shot is usually played without
much follow-through:
‘Of all his strokes, the punch square on the offside, off the back foot, must have been the
most prolific in terms of boundaries’ (Robin Marlar, Sportstar [Chennai] 4 June 1994).
‘On a pitch where the pace and bounce are true, it’s better to cut with a horizontal bat
and avoid the back-foot punch’ (Virender Sehwag, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p
59).
쐽 vb to hit the ball hard and low with a straight bat and without much follow-through:
‘Drives he punched with plenty of bottom hand, although one has strong recollections of
Border cutting loose when on top of the bowlers and in that mood leaning back and
letting the bat flow away from the body’ (Robin Marlar, Sportstar [Chennai] 4 June
1994).
‘His progress here should have been arrested at 21 when he punched Jones at knee
height to Pietersen at short cover’ (Haigh 2005, p 38).
push
push n a defensive batting stroke in which a straight bat is pushed forward to meet the ball
with a minimum of backlift:
‘When he [Glenn Turner] first appeared his shots were just about limited to a forward
and backward defensive push’ (Jim Laker, WCM August 1984).
쐽 vb 1. to hit or attempt to hit the ball when playing a push stroke:
‘After nearly four hours Smith’s concentration faltered too: he pushed at a ball from
Sarfraz that should have been driven firmly or ignored, and played on’ (Matthew Engel,
2. India to push the ball through (see PUSH THROUGH):
‘Warne gave the ball a great tweak and also pushed it at times just to keep the batsmen
guessing’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
push through
push through vb (of a slow bowler) to deliver the ball fairly fast and with a low, flat
trajectory, especially with the aim of frustrating the batsman by restricting scoring
opportunities:
‘The finger-spinners have virtually abandoned flight, preferring safely to “push it
through” defensively flat’ (Arlott 1983, p 16).
‘Three times in the late 1950s he exceeded 100 wickets for the county, pushing the ball
through at a pace which discouraged much forward footwork’ (Frith 1984, p 124).
‘You don’t get good players out bowling slow. You have to push it through and Monty
can do that and still beat people in the air’ (Nick Cook, Guardian 2 August 2006).
put down
put down vb 1. to fail to take a possible catch:

‘In Australia’s first innings there was one period of twenty minutes during which the visi-
tors put down no less than five chances off Valentine’ (Manley 1988, p 97).
2. (of a fielder of wicket-keeper ) to dislodge either or both bails with the ball, especially
so as to cause the dismissal of a batsman:
‘Sueter … and Hammond … were the two best wicket-keepers I ever saw. Both of them
would put the wicket down without any flourishing or fuss’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 32).
put in
put in vb (of the captain who wins the toss) to ask the opposing side to take first innings:
put on 144
‘It has become commonplace in one-day cricket to put the other side in on winning the
toss’ (Gordon Ross, Cricketer September 1984).
‘Their captain, Inzamam-ul-Haq, part enabled their success by winning the toss and
putting England in to bat, a decision that looked inspired by the end of the day’ (Derek
Pringle, Daily Telegraph 18 August 2006).
put on
put on vb (of a batting side or batting partnership) to add the stated number of runs to
the team’s score:
‘They saw England make an encouraging start after the rain in the morning, the two left-
handers Fowler and Broad putting on 92 for the first wicket’ (Christopher Martin-
Jenkins, Cricketer September 1984).
‘On the fourth morning Laxman came out with Dravid. He went back at lunch with him.
Came out after tea with him. And they returned to the pavilion at stumps, having put on
335 runs’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 101).
put out
put out vb to dismiss from batting, especially by means of a run-out:

‘Bear in mind not to leave your ground till the ball has quitted the Bowler’s hand, or he
will be justified in trying to put you out’ (Clarke 1851 in HM, p 169).
pyjama game n a disparaging term for one-day cricket, so called because of the coloured
pyjama game
clothing and pads worn by the players:

‘It is amazing how he plays the cross-batted shot … cleanly and correctly. Many techni-
cally sound batsmen have been forced to do the same by pyjama cricket’ (Purandare
2005, p 196).
Q
quick
quick, quickie, quickster n a fast bowler:

‘Both Chappell and Inverarity mentioned Mike Whitney, the young left-arm quickie from
New South Wales, as the best long-term prospect in Australia’ (Brearley 1982, p 22).
‘The ball that moves in from on or just outside the off-stump sharply … has been one of
the most effective weapons of the fast bowler through the ages. Indeed, of the quicksters
of the present day, none uses it with more telling effect than Pakistan’s finest all-rounder,
Imran Khan’ (Manley 1988, p 102).
‘Proteas quick Andre Nel produced a sizzling 11-over spell late in the day which reaped
4–32’ (Herald Sun (Australia) 27 December 2005).
quilt
quilt (obsolete) vb to subject the bowling to aggressive and powerful hitting:

‘A batsman may be bowled first ball, a bowler may be quilted all over the field, but both
can redeem themselves by good fielding’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 61).
쐽 n a powerful hit:
‘His drives were superb, and included one terrific quilt out of the ground’ (Headlam
1903, p 121).
R
rabbit
rabbit n a late-order batsman with little or no batting skill; a tailender:

‘Nearly every eleven has a “rabbit” or two at the end’ (Westminster Gazette 8 May
1906).
‘He was still 20 runs short of his century when Panesar, mocked as a notorious rabbit,
arrived at the crease’ (Donald McRae, Guardian 9 May 2006).
This term was much in vogue in the 1920s and 30s, and could be applied to a poor
performer in any sport. Harold Larwood extends the metaphor by referring to the late-
order batsmen collectively as the ‘hutch’:
‘Short of a couple of discoveries during Australia’s next season … Australia will surely
have the hutch door open at 7 wickets down in the next season’s Test matches’ (Larwood
1933, p 176).
See also BUNNY
rain-affected
rain-affected adj denotes a playing surface that has been softened by rain and usually
provides conditions helpful to the bowlers, especially the spinners:
‘His 81 in the semi-final on a rain-affected Chepauk wicket had been crucial in getting
Holkar to the final’ (Bose 1990, p 143).
ramp
ramp n an unorthodox batting stroke in which the batsman, with a more or less straight
bat, hoists the ball directly over his own head and that of the wicket-keeper. It has been
described as ‘the most exotic trick shot in the book’ (Simon Briggs, Wisden 2003, p 33).
read
read vb (of a batsman) to form a correct assessment, as the ball is released by the bowler
(especially a slow bowler), of where the ball will pitch and how it will behave after it
pitches, and take appropriate action:
‘Qadir was a joy to watch … Nobody “read” him, and of the right-handers, Bob Taylor
played him better than most’ (Jack Bannister, WCM May 1984).
‘The first ingredient of a good stroke, no doubt, is early reading of the ball: identification
of its pace, spin and, above all, its length’ (Arlott 1983, p 62).
‘He went round the wicket to the Indians and in one virtuoso spell had them groping,
reduced to reading him off the pitch because they couldn’t tell the doosra from the hand’
(Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 38).
rear
rear vb (of the ball) to rise very steeply from the pitch after bouncing, often from a good
length:
‘The next two balls reared off the sluggish wicket and, while Jones managed to survive,
Mark Taylor was caught in the crossfire’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
red
red n —the red India the ball:

‘As the ball came close to the perfect half-volley spot, the bat came down straight with
astonishing hand-speed, and the red was thumped to the on-side boundary’ (Purandare
2005, p 125).
red cherry
red cherry See CHERRY

referee
referee n (since 1992) an official appointed by the ICC for Test matches and one-day
internationals, whose role is to ensure that the ICC Code of Conduct is maintained, and
specifically that the match is played ‘within the spirit of the game as well as within the
Laws’. The referee is ‘the independent representative of the ICC’ (ICC Code of Conduct,
147 retire
D.1) and submits a report to the ICC at the end of each game. He is empowered to apply
penalties (such as fining or suspending players) as laid down in section C of the Code.
regulation
regulation adj denoting a straightforward chance of catching the ball, especially when
the catch is dropped:
‘Just when Tamil Nadu was understandably desperate for a breakthrough, S. Suresh
spilled a regulation catch and let Uttar Pradesh escape with a draw’ (The Hindu 20
November 2004).
‘Geraint Jones’ error was a bad one, though, spilling a regulation outside edge when
Kumble had scored just nine’ (Jonathan Agnew, BBC Sport website, 3 March 2006).
remove
remove vb to dismiss a batsman:

‘McGrath idiotically bowled a bouncer, and they were off – but not before Warne found
extravagant, anxiety-inducing spin to remove Strauss’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006,
p 121).
replacement ball
replacement ball n a used ball taken to replace a ball that has been lost or become unfit
for play before it is due to be replaced by a NEW BALL (qv) in the normal way. The
replacement ball must be one that, in the opinion of the umpires, has had roughly the
same amount of wear as the ball it replaces. In normal circumstances, the umpires select
the replacement ball ‘and shall inform the batsmen and the fielding captain’ (Law 5 §5).
But as the quotation here shows, there are exceptions:
‘By penalising Pakistan and inviting the England batsmen to choose a replacement ball,
Hair was making his declaration: Pakistan, in his eyes, were cheating’ (Vic Marks,
Observer 27 August 2006).
See also NEW BALL
reply
reply vb (of a batting side) to score the stated number of runs when chasing a total made
by the opposing team:
‘England were on top for most of the match. This second day, when India replied with
105–2 in the last two sessions, was the only time when they were not’ (Berry 1982, p
114).
‘England won the toss and batted, rattling up 629 … India replied with 302 and followed
on’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 48).
쐽 n the innings of a batting side that follows that of their opponents:
‘Kuruppu deflected a catch to Gatting’s right at first slip in the second over of the Sri
Lanka reply’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 12 June 1983).
result
result n any of the three possible outcomes of a cricket match. A match can end in a DRAW
(qv), a TIE (qv), or with one side winning:
‘The final day dawned brightly, with every result possible and tension upgraded from
danger level to crisis point’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 122).
In a game of two innings per side, ‘the side which has scored a total of runs in excess
of that scored in the two completed innings of the opposing side shall win the match’,
while in a one-day game the side with the highest score wins (Law 21). The winning
margin is expressed in terms of runs when the side batting last fails to reach the target
set by their opponents (thus ‘England beat Australia by 2 runs’), and of wickets when
the side batting last reaches the target with the specified number of wickets still
standing (thus ‘Pakistan beat West Indies by six wickets’).
result wicket
result wicket n a wicket on which a match is unlikely to end in a draw, usually because
the conditions give some assistance to the bowlers and make batting relatively difficult:
‘Since 1989 they have forced the counties to play their three-day games on four or five-
day pitches: any miscalculation in favour of result wickets has been punished by the
threat of the 25-point reduction’ (Matthew Engel, Wisden 1993, p 11).
‘You know what you are going to get at Port-of-Spain, or at Headingley, or at the
Wanderers…: a definite conclusion on a result wicket’ (Scyld Berry, Cricinfo Magazine
June 2006, p 56).
retire
retire vb 1. (of a batsman) to leave the field during one’s innings without being dismissed
and (in some cases) with the option of resuming the innings at a later stage
return 148
A batsman may retire ‘because of illness, injury, or any other unavoidable cause’
provided he first notifies the umpire, and if capable of doing so he can resume his
innings at the fall of a wicket (Law 2 § 9). The most common reason for retirement is
physical injury, such as results when a batsman is hit by a fast short-pitched ball, and
if the injured batsman is unable to complete his innings he is marked down in the
scorebook as ‘retired hurt’, but is not regarded as having been dismissed. A batsman
may also voluntarily give up his wicket (as happens occasionally in uncompetitive
matches, when a batsman retires in order to give other members of the side a chance to
bat), and in this case his innings is regarded as ended and recorded as ‘Retired – out’
(Law 2 § 9 (b)).
2. to leave the field having been dismissed; be out (obsolete):
‘He and Parr played steadily together until Parr received a trimmer from Mr. Fisher,
which caused him to retire’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 21).
return
return vb 1. to throw the ball in to the batsman’s or bowler’s wicket after fielding it:
‘It is necessary to be able to gather in the hands a ball hit along or on to the ground and
to return it equally surely and swiftly to either wicket’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 16).
2. to achieve the stated bowling analysis in a match or spell of bowling:
‘He returned, too, the best first-class figures of any of the famous quartet, 9 for 72 for
Mysore v Kerala in 1969–70’ (Frith 1984, p 174).
‘After being asked to bat first, India were restricted to 185 for six from their 50 overs,
with Isa Guha, the Berkshire seamer, returning figures of four for 29’ (Christopher
Lyles, Observer 20 August 2006).
쐽 n 1. a throw by a fielder, sending the ball into the wicket:
‘Simpson-Hayward … had been unable to play at Pindi owing to a bruised hand — an
injury received in the last over of the match from a very hard return’ (Headlam 1903, p
163).
2. the bowling analysis achieved by a bowler in a match or spell:
‘They made a good start but declined from 4–139 to be all out for 196, with Raelee
Thompson having the excellent return of 5–33 off 28 overs’ (Cashman & Weaver 1991,
p 159).
return catch
return catch n a catch made by a bowler off one of his own deliveries:
‘Richardson, meeting a ball that may have stopped a little, gave Willis a return catch so
simple that he stood in disbelief’ (Michael Carey, Daily Telegraph 1 June 1984).
‘Lee’s sprint to a return catch from Strauss ate up the distance in a few strides, his eyes
never leaving the hovering ball’ (Haigh 2005, p 46).
return crease
return crease n either of two lines marked on the ground at each end of the bowling
crease and at right angles to it, extending at least 4 feet/1.22m behind the wicket and
(usually) as far forward as the popping crease, but considered to be of unlimited length.
The return creases mark the lateral limits of the bowler’s territory for the purposes of
determining whether a delivery is fair, the object being to prevent the bowler from
delivering the ball from too wide an angle. For a delivery to be fair, ‘the bowler’s back
foot must land within and not touching the return crease’ (Law 24 § 5). The return crease
makes its first appearance in the second major code of Laws, dated 1774.
reverse
reverse vb to bowl a ball with reverse swing, or (of the ball) to move in the air as a result
of reverse swing:
‘After Jones had reversed the ball past Kasprowicz’s outside edge, Tait had to face only
nine of 37 deliveries in the 43-run last-wicket partnership’ (Haigh 2005, p 159).
‘On the Test’s driest day, he had the ball reversing at 95mph when he pitched it up’
(Haigh 2005, p 216).
reverse sweep
reverse sweep n an unorthodox batting stroke in which – just as in a conventional sweep

– the batsman adopts a half-kneeling position with the front foot well forward and hits
the ball with a long sweeping movement of the bat, with the important difference that the
wrists are turned over and the bat is swung from leg towards off, sending the ball into the
third-man area. The reverse sweep ‘combines a right-hander’s body position – left foot
149 reverse swing

forward, right knee on the ground … with a left-hander’s horizontal swing of the bat’
(Simon Briggs, Wisden 2003, p 31):
‘He [Duleepsinhji] did play in that match and, by all accounts, played the first reverse
sweep, which so astonished the Parsee bowler Kapadia that he appealed to the umpire’
(Bose 1990, 65).
Though popularised in the 1980s by players such as Javed Miandad and Ian Botham,
this hazardous shot is believed (pace the above quotation) to date back at least as far as
E. M. Grace, and it has figured in the repertoire of a number of well-known players,
including Percy Fender and more recently Mushtaq Mohammad. Apart from being a
form of showmanship, the reverse sweep is an effective way of dealing with slow
bowlers who pack the onside field and then bowl on or outside leg stump.
쐽 vb to hit the ball into the off-side area when playing a reverse sweep:
‘He swung the first ball of this new over for two, and reverse-swept the next for four
more’ (Berry 1982, p 146).
‘His most spectacular shot came moments before he fell leg-before to Muralitharan, a
languid reverse sweep for six. Jonty Rhodes once reverse-swept Murali for six in a one-
day international in Colombo, but it might well be unique in Test history’ (David Hopps,
reverse swing
reverse swing n a form of ‘swing’, or lateral movement of the ball in flight, in which
the ball’s curving trajectory goes in the opposite direction to what a batsman would
expect if assessing the ball’s likely behaviour from the way it is held and delivered; a ball
with reverse swing on it will typically curve to a greater degree and later in its flight than
a ‘conventionally’ swinging ball:
‘A slight decrease in speed as the ball approaches the batsman is required if the peculiar
torque (“reverse swing”) created by the imbalance in the ball is to take effect’
(Marqusee 1994, p 166).
‘Simon Jones’ … reverse swing was as unintelligible to the Australians as Bosanquet’s
googly a hundred years earlier’ (Haigh 2005, p 105).
The physics of swing in general and reverse swing in particular are not fully
understood. The key appears to be an imbalance between the ball’s two hemispheres in
terms both of their weight and their aerodynamic properties. Reverse swing is
associated especially with dry conditions and hard wickets – both factors that are likely
rib-roaster 150
to accelerate the roughening of the ball’s surface on the side that the fielding team
leaves unpolished. The phenomenon has been studied by, among others, the physicist
and NASA scientist Dr Rabindra Mehta, whose wind-tunnel experiments (see SWING)
show that ‘a brand new cricket ball could reverse swing but only at high speeds, … and
that the speed needed for reverse swing decreases as the roughness on the batsman-
facing side of the ball increases’ (Rabindra Mehta, Cricinfo Magazine May 2006, p 69)
– in other words, as the ball gets older. Attempts by the fielding side to ‘activate’
reverse swing – by, for example, saturating one side of the ball with sweat and saliva
to make it heavier, or deliberately roughening it – bring us to the boundaries of ball-
tampering territory, and there is a longstanding link between reverse swing and
suspicions of unfair play. But its impact on the modern game is undeniable, and reverse
swing is firmly established as a major weapon in the fast bowler’s armoury.
See also BALL-TAMPERING
쐽 vb to make the ball swing in the direction opposite to what would be expected:
‘If you play on a wicket like Sharjah, the ball would be roughed up after 15 overs. All
you have to do is shine one side and if you have the capability you will be able to reverse
swing it’ (Imran Khan, Sportstar [Chennai] 14 May 1994).
‘With all eyes on the slow bowlers, it was Munaf that struck the telling blows, reverse-
swinging the ball at pace to do unto England what they had done to Australia during the
Ashes series’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Website, 13 March 2006).
rib-roaster
rib-roaster, (also formerly rib-tickler) n a fast ball that rises sharply from the pitch,
especially so as to put the batsman in danger of physical injury (old ):
‘Both “rib-roasters” and shooters were frequent at head-quarters, and many a lion on
the Cambridge lawn … has proved a veritable lamb when placed on a fiery Lord’s
wicket’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 343).
right-armer
right-armer n a bowler who delivers the ball from his right hand
right-hander
right-hander n a batsman who stands at the crease with his bat to the right of his body,
usually holding the bat with the right hand lower than the left on the handle
ring
ring n 1. the boundary of a cricket field (old):

‘There are few better moments at cricket than when one has forced a good-length ball
through the fielders on the off-side, standing well balanced where one is, and the ball
speeding to the ring’ (Warner 1934, p 11).
The term harks back to the period before the 1860s, when boundaries as such did not
exist but were simply formed by the ‘ring’ of spectators at the edge of the playing area.
In such circumstances it was obviously important for the fair conduct of the game that
the spectators maintained their positions in an orderly way:
‘As very considerable sums are depending not only upon the game but upon Small,
Miller and Minshull’s notches, the company are earnestly requested to keep a good ring’
(Morning Post 3 August 1776).
2. —in the ring fielding in a run-saving position, typically in the area 25 to 30 metres
from the batsman:
‘As soon as they come in, batsmen will scrutinise fielders “in the ring”, assessing which
ones are quick, which ones are slower, and which hand they throw with’ (Simon Hughes,
Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket 2002, p 125).
rip
rip vb to impart spin to the ball by moving the fingers rapidly across it as it leaves the hand:
‘The more Monty Panesar ripped the ball past the outside edge the better Jones looked’
(Mike Selvey, Guardian 1 August 2006).
쐽 n spin imparted to the ball as it leaves the hand; used especially in the phrase give it a
rip:
‘With strong hands and powerful shoulders he was always able to give the ball a good
rip and in the last Test he turned it as much as the wrist-spinners’ (David Capel,
rope
rope n —the rope(s) the boundary:

151 rubber
‘It was as if he [David Boon] knew that every over England’s bowlers would present him
with a short ball to cut for four or a half volley to clip away to the mid-wicket rope’ (Mark
Ray, Wisden 1994, p18).
‘There were many glorious back-foot drives straight to the ropes, and he pierced the field
beautifully’ (Purandare 2005, p 174).
rotate
rotate vb —rotate the strike (of a batsman or batting pair) to ensure that the strike is
shared between the two batsmen in a way that brings maximum advantage:
‘If you rotate the strike – especially when you’re a right- and left-hand combination as
we were here – then it becomes much harder for the bowler to build the pressure’
(Virender Sehwag, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p 58).
‘He could take the singles and rotate the strike as Srikkanth went great guns’ (Bhattach-
arya 2006, p 131).
Compare FARM
rough
rough n —the rough a worn or roughened area on the pitch produced by the repeated
impact of the bowler’s feet as he ‘follows through’ after delivering the ball; a ball
pitching in the rough is more likely to grip the turf and respond to any spin that has been
imparted to it:
‘The selectors were disappointed that Emburey had not taken more wickets when
bowling into the rough at Lord’s’ (Brearley 1982, p 50).
‘Bowled from over the wicket, it was a perfectly respectable delivery pitching in the
rough outside Farhat’s off-stump, but the opener was already on the charge’ (Steve
James, Guardian 19 August 2006).
roundarm
roundarm adj, adv using a bowling action in which the arm, extended more or less
horizontally, is brought round from behind the bowler in a plane between the level of the
elbow and the level of the shoulder:
‘Miss Dean, for example, showed really superior cricket … her bowling (roundarm) was
highly effective, and she made a number of exceedingly smart catches in the field’ (Town
and Country Journal [Sydney] 13 March 1886).
Roundarm bowling is said to have been pioneered by Christina Willes, the sister of the
Kent player John Willes, in the early 19th century: Miss Willes found it difficult to
bowl underarm because of her voluminous skirts, and got around the problem by
developing a higher action. Roundarm bowling ‘marked the transition from the old
order to the new’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 100). Its legalisation in 1835 – by a law stating
that the hand must not go above the shoulder – was in reality a rearguard action
intended to halt any further development towards a full overarm delivery. But as noted
by a contemporary, ‘umpires were commissioned to watch with a keen eye the
elevation of the arm, but notwithstanding their vigilance it rose and rose’ (Box 1868,
pp 118–9). Consequently, roundarm bowling had already become fairly uncommon by
the time overarm bowling was legalised in 1864.
See BOWLING
round the wicket
round the wicket adv delivering the ball from the hand that is further away from the
bowler’s wicket; a right-arm bowler going round the wicket has the wicket on his left and
is thus able to slant the ball across the batsman’s wicket at a considerable angle and, if
the batsman is a left-hander, to get a clearer view of the stumps:
‘Marshall usually switches to round the wicket if his first spell has been wicketless, and
it makes an awesome sight too’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 4 December 1983).
‘Warne finished with 3–83 in the second innings and was a constant danger, particularly
bowling around the wicket into the rough to the left-handers’ (Chloe Saltau, The Age
(Melbourne), 21 December 2005).
Compare OVER THE WICKET
rubber
rubber n a series of Test matches or other games at international level. The word ‘rubber’
has been used to denote a set of games – e.g., in whist, backgammon, or bowls – for over
400 years, but its use in a cricket context is much more recent. In its earliest sense it
denoted the deciding game in a set of three or five, and this may account for its derivation
– meaning the game that eliminated, or ‘rubbed out’, one of the contestants.
run 152
run
run n 1. an act of running from one popping crease to the other by both batsmen
simultaneously, each batsman reaching the other end of the pitch without his wicket
being broken by the fielding side; completion of this procedure results in a score of one
being added to the batting side’s total:
‘Each Umpire is the sole Judge of all Nips and Catches; Inns and Outs; good or bad
Runs, at his own Wicket’ (Laws 1744).
‘Gatting committed himself to the run and was run out by about a foot’ (Matthew Engel,
‘Through the last five years Dravid, by sheer weight of runs, has been the most valuable
batsman in the Indian side’ (Mukul Kesavan, Cricinfo Magazine August 2006, p 36).
2. any of the scoring units that are credited to the total score of a team or individual and
are gained in any of the following ways: (a) by the completion of a ‘run’ (see 1); (b) by
the ball crossing the boundary while in play; (c) by the awarding of PENALTY RUNS (qv)
such as those for a no-ball or wide. The runs of a batsman comprise all those made as a
result of actual hits, while the runs of a team comprise all those made by any legitimate
means.
3. a team’s margin of victory expressed in terms of the number of runs by which the
losing side’s aggregate score falls short of that of the winning side:
‘Earlier in the year, a Hong Kong ladies representative side had made the trip to
Shanghai, losing to the Shanghai pearls by one run’ (Mike Tsemelis, Wisden 2005, p
1524).
See RESULT
4. a bowler’s running approach to the bowling crease prior to delivering the ball; run-up:
‘Willis, off his short run, quickly wrapped up the innings by taking the last four wickets’
(Andrew Longmore, Cricketer April 1984).
‘Before the fast bowler began his run he held the ball up and shook it at Cudjoe, and
Cudjoe in turn held up his bat and shook it at the bowler’ (James 1963, p 18).
5. —among the runs/in the runs (of a batsman) scoring a lot of runs, especially scor-
ing freely:
‘Peter Goggin (120) and Stuart Law (69) also got among the runs before Craig McDer-
mott and Greg Rowell combined to run through SA’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
‘England made 448, Amiss again in the runs with 118’ (Manley 1988, p209).
쐽 vb 1. to cross from one wicket to the other in order to score a run:
‘There are no set rules as to how to run … but there are certain points pretty generally
accepted and followed’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 200).
2. to obtain a stated number of runs by actually running, rather than by hitting a
boundary:
‘Bailey … was hit into the deep by Davidson, at which the batsmen once again ran four,
quite a common occurrence on this immensely long ground’ (Peebles 1959, p 55).
3. to act as a runner to an incapacitated batsman:
‘Tyldesley came in with Rhodes to run for him, his leg still being painful’ (Melbourne
Argus 17 December 1903).
‘Ganga, running for Edwards, did his bit to calm the duo down’ (Siddhartha Vaidy-
anathan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 73).
4. to deflect the ball off an angled bat so that it goes along the ground into the area
backward of square, usually on the off-side:
‘Greenidge, trying to run one wide of slip, was caught by Downton’ (John Thicknesse,
WCM September 1984).
In order to complete a run the batsmen, after crossing, must each ground some part of
his bat in his hand or of his person behind the line of the popping crease. This procedure
was already operating when the original (1744) code of Laws was drawn up, but had
probably not been established for very long. An earlier method is described in a
narrative poem by William Goldwin, written in Latin in 1706 (‘In Certamen Pilae’). In
Goldwin’s poem there is an umpire at each wicket ‘leaning on his staff’, and in order
to score a valid run the batsman had to touch this staff with his bat. This arrangement
153 run out

was apparently still in force as late as 1727, for the ‘Articles of Agreement’ governing
two games to be played in that year between the Duke of Richmond and a Mr Brodrick
include the provision: ‘The Batt Men for every one they count are to touch the
Umpire’s stick’. However, this method of completing a run was only a transitional
stage from the still earlier procedure by which the batsman had to ‘pop’ his bat into a
hole dug between the stumps.
See POPPING CREASE. See also EXTRAS, SHORT RUN
run-chase
run-chase n a situation in which the batting side has to score runs very quickly in order
to reach a winning target:
‘The three-day game had become near enough a farce, unwinnable in most circum-
stances except through junk bowling, leading to a declaration and a run-chase’ (John
Thicknesse, Wisden 1993, 24).
‘I still remember … Brijesh Patel racing to his forty-nine not out during that incredible
400-plus run chase after Gavaskar and Vishwanath had scored centuries to lay the foun-
dations for victory’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 56).
runner
runner n 1. a player who is allowed to take runs on behalf of an incapacitated batsman:

‘England had just three wickets standing and one of these, Simon Jones, was only doing
so with assistance: Strauss was padding up as his runner’ (Haigh 2005, p 149).
2. India the batsman at the non-striker’s end.
Compare FACER
running ground
running ground n the area between the two popping creases which the batsmen cross
in making a run, as distinguished from the batsmen’s ‘home’ ground. An old regulation
allowed the batsmen to obstruct a fielder attempting a catch within this area – ‘When the
Ball is hit up, either of the Strikers may hinder the Catch in his running Ground’ – but it
seems to have dropped out of the code by the end of the 18th century. (obsolete)
run out adv a mode of dismissal in which either of the batsmen may be given out ‘if at
run out
any time while the ball is in play (i) he is out of his ground and (ii) his wicket is fairly
put down by the opposing side’ (Law 38 § 1); the dismissal remains valid even in the case
of a no-ball; it is not credited either to the bowler or to the fielder and is entered in the
scorebook as ‘run out’. If the batsmen have already crossed, the one running towards the
wicket that is put down is out, but if they have not crossed, the batsman who has left the
wicket that is put down is out. Only one batsman can be run out off a single delivery. Any
runs already completed before the run-out are credited to the batsman in the usual way.
With regard to the run-out Law, there are two borderline areas which occasionally cause
confusion. The first is the case of the striker hitting the ball straight on to the opposite
wicket when his partner has already left his ground: in this case, neither batsman is out
unless the ball has been touched en route by a member of the fielding side. Secondly
there is the more contentious problem of the bowler attempting to run out the non-striker
run-out 154
when he is backing up too far before the ball is actually bowled: for further discussion,
see MANKAD.
쐽 vb 1. to cause the dismissal of a batsman in this way:
‘When Atherton was run out for 99, slipping on the turn when Gatting sent him back on
what would have been a safe third run … Australia never looked like being stopped’
(John Thicknesse Wisden 1994, p 332).
2. to get runs by actually running, rather than as a result of a boundary hit:
‘Up to about 100 years ago it was customary for all hits to be run out, and this resulted
in some most productive strokes, such as the Hon Fred Ponsonby’s hit to leg for nine …
in 1842’ (Gerald Brodribb, WCM December 1983).
3. to leave one’s crease and advance down the wicket when playing a stroke:
‘I do not think that batsmen run out enough at slow bowling or at lobs’ (Ranjitsinhji
1897, p 172).
run-out
run-out n a dismissal in which a batsman is run out:

‘Chamberlain’s 38 in 33 balls, backed up by two wickets, a split-second run-out and a
surreal catch made her the “man of the match”’ (Marqusee 1994, p 23).
run rate
run rate n the average number of runs scored by a team within a given period or number
of balls; run rates are usually expressed as runs per over or runs per 100 balls:
‘Ian Bradshaw’s heroic 25 overs on the trot for just 47 runs helped check the run-rate
and also delay the declaration’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July
2006, p 73).
‘As hesitant stroke-making and indecisive running led to three run-outs, the required run
rate climbed to eight an over’ (Purandare 2005, p 156).
run-saving adj denotes a field setting or fielding position primarily intended to prevent
run-saving
the batsmen from scoring runs; third man and long leg are among the typical ‘run-saving’
positions found in a defensive field setting:
‘He obviously considered the time was come to check a situation which might become
dangerous, and for a spell Davidson and Mackay bowled defensively to deep-set, run-
saving fields’ (Peebles 1959, p 135).
run-up
run-up n 1. the bowler’s running approach to the wicket prior to delivering the ball:
‘The object of the run-up is to bring the bowler to the bowling crease completely
balanced and with the momentum necessary to bowl … at his normal, designed pace’
(MCC 1952, p 28).
‘With Willis and Botham operating off shortened run-ups, England managed to capture
the last four wickets in eight overs’ (David Frith, WCM April 1984).
‘Miller’s action was close to flawless, consisting of a wonderful delivery stride from a
short run-up’ (Richie Benaud, Wisden 2005, p 41).
2. the area of ground over which a bowler runs when approaching the wicket to bowl:
‘Whenever possible, the bowlers’ run ups shall be covered in inclement weather, in order
to keep them dry’ (Law 11 §3).
S
sandshoe crusher
sandshoe crusher n Australia a yorker that lands on the batsman’s foot (slang)
save
save vb 1. to be in a position to prevent the batsmen from taking the stated number of runs;
e.g., a player stationed to ‘save the two’ is intended to deter batsmen from going for a
second run after they have run a single:
‘Suppose the fieldsman to be standing out to the hip, for the purpose of saving two runs,
and the wicketkeeper draw him in by a motion of his hand, to save the one run’ (Nyren
1833 in HM, p 29).
2. —save the follow-on to score enough runs to avoid being asked to follow on:
‘This marked the point at which South Africa stepped up the run rate and the follow-on
was saved in the fifth over of the second new ball by McMillan’s crunching cover drive
off De Freitas’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
scoop
scoop n an unorthodox batting stroke in which the ball is deflected into the leg-side area
behind square, the batsman using the pace of the ball to hoist it over his left shoulder in
the direction of fine-leg, in the manner of someone shovelling earth over his shoulder
when digging a hole:
‘Moin’s scoop was usually played off a good-length ball, with the aim of lofting it over
the fine-leg boundary’ (Simon Briggs, Wisden 2003, p 32).
See also MARILLIER
score
score n 1. the number of runs made by an individual or team in an innings or at a particular

point in the innings:
‘In looking over carefully the list of matches for twenty years, we shall find no scores on
the average at all approaching those of the elder Walker and Beldham’ (Mitford 1833
in HM, p 129).
‘The most romantic of all cricket records, the highest individual Test score, fell to Brian
Lara at the Antigua Recreation Ground yesterday at 11.45 am’ (Christopher Martin-
Jenkins, Daily Telegraph 19 April 1994).
‘An outside edge, or late cut, or guided defensive shot, or whatever Ntini might claim he
played, ran down to third man and the scores were level’ (Edward Craig, Cricinfo Maga-
zine April 2006, p 76).
2. the record of all the runs made in a match:
‘The score was kept by notching each individual run on a stick’ (Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica 1877, vol VI p 578).
3. a mark or ‘notch’ made on a tally as a primitive way of recording the making of a run
(obsolete):
‘It is called a run, and one notch or score is made upon the tally towards the game’ (J.
Strutt, The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England 1801, p 84).
쐽 vb 1. to gain a run or runs:
‘Diver followed, but it was some time before he could score’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 20).
‘Of his 10,000-plus runs, Allan Border has scored almost 4,500 runs in boundaries’
(B.B. Mama, Sportstar [Chennai] 4 June 1994).
‘The record is held by India’s Chandrasekhar, who four times was out without scoring
in both innings of a Test’ (WCM October 1984).
scoreboard 156
‘It was an innings that did more than score runs: it brought the beginnings of despair to
the opposition’ (Simon Barnes, Wisden 2006, p 171).
2. (of an individual or team) to make the stated score:
‘England could only manage 8—84 in their allotted overs against Australia … and
Australia won easily, scoring 210 with the evergreen Sharon Tredrea top scoring with
69’ (Cashman & Weaver 1991, p 171).
‘Botham started fairly quietly, scoring 39 in 87 minutes before tea’ (Brearley 1982, p
68).
3. to add a run or runs to the total made by an individual or team; record as part of the
score:
‘The one run penalty for a No ball shall be scored as a No ball extra’ (Law 24 § 13).
4. to record the score in a match; act as the scorer:
‘The great thing in keeping score, after keeping it correctly, is to score neatly’ (W. G.
Grace in Outdoor Games and Recreations 1891, p 14).
5. to cut a mark or ‘notch’ in a tally as a way of recording the making of a run (obsolete):
‘They are sole Judges of all Hindrances … and in case of Hindrance may order a Notch
to be scor’d’ (Laws 1744).
The original meaning of the word ‘score’ is ‘to cut an incision’, and in the earliest phase
of the game the scores were kept by cutting notches on a stick (see NOTCH). This was a
perfectly practicable system at a time when low scores were the norm and it was fairly
unusual for batsmen even to reach double figures. (In the earliest major match for
which the full scores are known – the encounter between Kent and All England in 1746
– the highest individual score was 18, and the aggregate total of all four innings was
221.) But the increasing sophistication of the game from the late 18th century onwards
led to higher scores and, in turn, to the development of more complex scoring methods.
In contemporary cricket, the scores of the teams and players, as well as other details,
are kept by the scorers on a standard SCORESHEET (qv) and the salient features are also
displayed on a scoreboard. This much is standard at almost every level of the game, but
in the realm of professional cricket scoring has been elevated to something like a
combination of high art and exact science. Computerised scoring is now fairly
widespread – in the English county game, for example, all scorers were issued with
laptop computers in 1993. Consequently, scoring systems of great complexity can now
provide a comprehensive description of everything that happens on the field of play,
and the computer has made it possible for TV viewers to be regaled with detailed
statistical analyses of players’ achievements while they are still in the process of
achieving them.
scoreboard
scoreboard n a device used for displaying a concurrent record of the score of a game
which will be visible to both players and spectators. In the early days of cricket, before
the introduction of scoreboards, it was traditional for the scorers to stand up when the
scores of the two sides drew level, as an indication to players and spectators that the
batting side needed only one run to win; this convention apart, the public were left to
their own devices as far as the scores were concerned. Scoreboards – originally known
as ‘telegraph boards’ – began to appear at major grounds in the mid-19th century (Lord’s
got one in 1846, the Oval in 1848) but the early versions conveyed only a bare minimum
of information. The simplest type of scoreboard – still often seen in school and club
cricket – consists of a board on which movable metal plates are hung or mounted,
showing three rows of figures: the top row gives the score of the team, the middle row
the number of wickets down, and the bottom row the score of the last man out. The
traditional mechanical scoreboards used at first-class grounds show a good deal more
information, including the scores of the batsmen at the crease, the mode of dismissal of
the last man out, and the score at which each wicket has fallen. The electronic
scoreboards now seen at most Test grounds not only provide a wealth of statistical detail
but can also show instant replays of the action in the middle.
scorebook
scorebook n a book containing the scoresheets used in keeping the score of a cricket
match
157 seam
scorecard
scorecard n a printed card, produced and issued for sale at a cricket ground, showing the
names of the players on each side listed in their batting order and giving details of the
scores, dismissals, and fall of wickets up to the time at which the card was printed.
Scorecards of some kind were already in existence before the end of the 18th century, but
it was Fred Lillywhite, touring the major grounds with his portable printing press from
1848, who made the continually-updated scorecard one of the institutions of the game.
scorer
scorer n 1. a person appointed to keep a concurrent record of the scores in a match. The
Laws stipulate that ‘Two scorers shall be appointed’ and that they ‘shall frequently check
to ensure that their records agree’ (Law 4 § 1–2).
2. —without troubling the scorers (of a dismissed batsman) having scored no runs:
‘Langer had a horrendous tour of South Africa earlier this year, hardly troubling the
scorers before he was sent home with concussion from a vicious Makhaya Ntini bouncer’
(The Advertiser (Adelaide), 18 July 2006).
See DUCK
scoresheet
scoresheet n a printed form, typically occupying a double-page spread in a scorebook,

on which details relating to the score of a match are entered by the scorer as each ball is
bowled so as to form a complete tabulated record:
‘The words “retired hurt” on the score-sheet are far more pleasant to the bowler than
the batsman’ (P G Wodehouse, Now, Talking about Cricket, 1903).
scoring board
scoring board n a scoreboard (obsolete):

‘Another help to reporters I should like to see extended to all grounds would be the erec-
tion of scoring boards, upon which each run is registered as it is made’ (C. Stewart
Caine, Wisden 1893, p xlviii).
scoring rate
scoring rate n the average number of runs per over scored by a team or individual; RUN
RATE:
‘There was a suspicion that England should have made more than 407, but the signifi-
cant figure was their 5.13 run-per-over scoring rate’ (Haigh 2005, p 67).
scout
scout (obsolete) n a fielder:

‘It fell upon the tip of the bat and bounded far away over the heads of the scouts’
(Dickens, Pickwick Papers 1837, ch 7).
Like ‘fag’, scout can also denote a boy whose job is to retrieve balls during net practice.
쐽 vb to field, or act as a scout retrieving balls:
‘The small boys of the neighbourhood gather to field (or scout, as they call it) for the
members at the nets’ (Daily Chronicle 14 August 1908).
scratch
scratch n a crease, especially the popping crease (obsolete):

‘Your skill all depends upon distance and sight
Stand firm to your scratch, let your bat be upright’
(Rev R. Cotton, ‘Hambledon Song’ 1778 in HM, p 52).
This term was formerly used in a variety of sporting contexts to denote a line or starting
point at which a participant stood; for example, a line drawn across a prize-fighting ring
at which the contestants stood at the beginning of a bout.
screw
screw n rotary motion, or ‘break’, imparted to the ball by the bowler, causing it to change
direction on pitching; the term is borrowed from the vocabulary of snooker and billiards
(obsolete):
‘The next ball, very swift, with lots of screw on, is snicked into the slips’ (W. G. Grace in
Outdoor Games and Recreations 1891, p 13).
scudder
scudder n a fast ball that keeps low after pitching:

‘Gooch was lbw to a scudder, the first ball of a new spell by Donald’ (Richard Hutton,
Cricketer September 1994).
seam
seam n 1. the ridge formed by the rows of stitching that join the two halves of the leather
outer case of a cricket ball; depending on the type of ball used, the seam of a new ball
can protrude up to a quarter of an inch above the rest of the surface, and this affects both
the ball’s trajectory through the air and the way it moves after it pitches:
seamer 158
‘Neil Foster … created a favourable impression with his straightforward approach,
pace, and ability to move the ball awkwardly off the seam’ (John Arlott, WCM December
1983).
2. a style of bowling, typically practised by bowlers of fast-medium or medium pace,
characterised by movement in the air and especially movement off the pitch as the ball’s
seam makes contact with the surface:
‘Karen Smithies was England’s player of the tournament. Her 77 overs of seam cost just
1.54 runs each and she took 15 wickets at 7.93’ (Carol Salmon Wisden 1994, p 952).
‘Alan had scored 100 runs in the low-scoring match, and played our strong seam attack
with skill’ (Brearley 1982, p 110).
‘Courtney Walsh is regarded as a seam bowler, since he relies more on movement off the
pitch than in the air’ (Simon Hughes, Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket 2002,
p 78).
3. movement of the ball off the pitch:
‘Relentlessly hitting a length, he found seam, a hint of swing, four wickets and a place in
Ashes history’ (Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 121).
Compare SWING
쐽 vb 1. to make the ball deviate after pitching by using its seam to produce movement,
rather than by means of spin:
‘Selvey played three times for England but has sustained a reputation as an economical
new-ball bowler with ability to swing and seam the ball either way’ (Alan Lee, Cricketer
December 1982).
2. (of the ball ) to deviate after pitching on the seam:
‘Often he [Wasim Akram] bowled too well: that is, when bowling over the wicket, he
made the ball seam away so sharply that right-handers could not get a touch’ (Scyld
Berry, Wisden 1993, p 267).
3. (of the wicket) to be conducive to movement off the seam:
‘An exciting morning’s cricket is promised on Headingley’s seaming wicket where West
Indies … will be striving to keep a fingerhold on the Prudential World Cup’ (Derek
Hodgson, Observer 12 June 1983).
‘When they encountered seaming conditions on the opening day of the series, in Antigua,
they folded for 241’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine August 2006, p 77).
The use of the term seam to describe one of the major ‘schools’ of bowling is a fairly
recent development in the language of cricket. In its narrowest sense it indicates the
movement off the pitch that results when a ball of medium or fast-medium pace hits the
ground with its seam at a slight angle to the surface. More generally, the term is used
to denote a type of bowling that is neither slow nor very fast and combines movement
off the pitch with movement in the air, or ‘swing’. It is a style especially well adapted
to conditions often found in England – a damp, overcast atmosphere and a well-grassed
or ‘green’ wicket. In recent years the economical, stroke-inhibiting seam bowler has
often been preferred to the spinner for the role of ‘stock bowler’. As John Arlott
lamented, ‘there is now a vast army in English cricket of practitioners of “military
medium”; bowling briskly, seam up, achieving a little movement but, above all,
striving for sufficient precision to avoid punishment’ (Arlott 1983, p 41), and this
development has been accelerated by the tactical demands of one-day cricket.
seamer
seamer n 1. an exponent of seam bowling; in its narrow sense the term denotes a bowler
who relies mainly on movement off the pitch, but ‘seamer’ has a wide application and is
often used as a coverall term to distinguish the faster bowlers of a side’s attack from its
slow bowlers or spinners:
‘Bishan Bedi urged “Gooch must have faith in his spin specialists”. Instead, England
chose four seamers plus Salisbury’ (Marqusee 1994, p 239).
‘Sussex recovered from 78 for six to reach 172 in seamer-friendly conditions’ (Paul
Weaver, Guardian 28 August 2006).
2. a ball bowled by a seam bowler:
‘On English wickets you can usually get away with bowling little seamers to a defensive
field’ (Bob Willis, Observer 3 June 1984).
159 send-off
seam-up
seam-up n a style of seam bowling in which the ball is held with the seam more or less
straight (rather than at an angle to the line of the fingers) and bowled at medium pace so
that it may swing either way in the air (though not dramatically) and deviate in either
direction as the seam grips the pitch:
‘In an age of long-drawn-out overs of fast bowling … or the seemingly endless proces-
sion of fast-medium “seam-up”, cricket needs the kind of spectator-stimulus that wrist-
spin affords’ (John Arlott, WCM May 1984).
seamy
seamy adj (of a wicket) helpful to seam bowling; conducive to movement off the pitch:
‘The wicket was green and seamy’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 31 May 1983).
seeker out
seeker out n a fielder (obsolete):

‘Four times from Hodswell’s arm it skims the grass.
Then Mills succeeds. The seekers out change place’
(James Love, Cricket: an Heroic Poem, 1746).
seek out
seek out vb to field; be a fielder (obsolete):

‘The man who is in, must strike the ball before these limits, or boundary lines; and it must
be returned in the same direction by those who are seeking out’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p
38).
Many of the older terms used for fielding, such as ‘seek out’, ‘look out’, and ‘scout’,
would have originated at a time when the game was played without boundaries on
rough, often undulating terrain, and the ball would often have to be literally ‘sought
out’.
semicircle
semicircle n one of the semicircular shapes at each end of the playing area marked out
by white dots painted on the ground, which are connected by a pair of parallel lines going
down each side of the pitch; the area marked out in this way is called the ‘circle’ and is
used in applying fielding restrictions in some one-day competitions. See CIRCLE:
‘An oversight by Bob Willis cost a no-ball when he posted only three men, one short of
the legal minimum, within the white semi-circles’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 19 June 1983).
send back
send back vb 1. (of a bowler) to dismiss a batsman, and thus send him back to the
pavilion:
‘In the space of seven balls, he sent back Tavaré, Gower and Randall without conceding
a run’ (Andrew Longmore, Cricketer April 1984).
2. (of a batsman) to turn down a call for a run and tell his batting partner to go back to
his end:
‘Tendulkar just flicked the ball at the stumps and Mark Waugh, sent back looking for the
second run by brother Steve, had no chance’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 7
May 1994).
send down
send down vb (of a bowler) to deliver a ball or balls:

‘England were all out for 151 with Valentine taking 4 for 48 and Ramadhin 5 for 66.
They split 88 overs almost equally and sent down an astonishing 55 maidens between
them’ (Manley 1988, p 87).
‘Hoggard has sent down just 22 competitive overs since England’s Test defeat to Sri
Lanka on 5 June’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 10 July 2006).
send off
send off vb (of a fielder or bowler) to shout abuse or make abusive gestures at a departing
batsman after he has been dismissed or injured:
‘It was this practice of “sending off” opposing batsmen that the Australian Cricket
Board chairman Alan Crompton sought to outlaw when he announced the board was
imposing its own fine of A$4000 (£1920) on Warne and Hughes’ (Richard Yallop,
send-off
send-off n an act of ‘sending off’ a departing batsman:

‘Slater, who was caught in the covers after edging onto his helmet, received an unnec-
essary wide-armed “send-off” from bowler Donald’ (WCM March 1994).
‘Hayden grafted to 31 before being well caught by the tumbling Trescothick at slip –
Simon Jones’s over-the-top send-off cost him 20% of his match fee’ (Steven Lynch,
Wisden 2006, p 104).
session 160
session
session n any of the three periods of play that make up a full day’s cricket at first-class
level, separated by the intervals for lunch and tea:
‘England needed to bat for five sessions to save the game, and a flurry of rain and the
composure of Stewart were the only sources of optimism for the tourists on the rest day’
(Vic Marks, Cricketer May 1994).
set
set adj having played oneself in so as to be confidently established at the crease and able
to play the bowling without difficulty:
‘Here was a state of things to which Australian enthusiasts had long looked forward …
Hill and Trumper in on a perfect wicket, both well set, and the bowlers tiring’
(Melbourne Argus 16 January 1904).
‘Kanhai was dismissed on an unusually high number of occasions when he seemed set,
often losing his wicket in the 70s and 80s’ (Manley 1988, p 213).
쐽 n the target that must be reached by the side batting last in order to win a match (old):
‘The grand total of 288 left Oxford with a “set” of 331’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 362).
SG ball
SG ball n a type of cricket ball manufactured in India and used in Test matches there. The
SG ball, so-called because it is made by the company Sanspareils Greenlands, uses
thicker string in the stitching and thus has a more prominent seam than the KOOKABURRA
BALL (qv). It is also said to have better shape-retention properties, an advantage on
India’s hard, dry wickets.
shape
shape vb to get oneself in position to play a particular stroke, but without necessarily
executing the shot successfully:
‘A brutal ball from Miller reared shoulder-high, Denis shaped to hook it, but slipped on
the wet grass, and fell on the stumps’ (Cardus 1978, p 105).
‘I have seen a bunch of short-legs cower when a batsman shaped at a loose one, but kept
my eye on Tony Lock and saw him bend at the waist a little and face it’ (James 1963, p
91).
sharp
sharp adj 1. (of a ball coming off the striker’s bat) potentially catchable, but only with
great difficulty; a ‘sharp chance’ is one that is difficult to hold:
‘Mohsin … had failed to get his hand round both a sharp one and a sitter at slip to Qadir’
(Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 25 March 1984).
‘The moment of aggression resulted in a sharp chance flying to third slip, which was
gratefully accepted by Paul Collingwood’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 18 July 2006).
2. denoting an opportunity to take a run which entails a high risk of one of the batsmen
being run out:
‘Kevin Pietersen was then calm enough to use a sympathetic underarm throw to Sajid
Mahmood … when Mohammad Sami reluctantly accepted Inzamam’s call for a sharp
single’ (Steve James, Guardian 9 August 2006).
쐽 adj, adv relatively close to the line separating leg and off behind the striker’s wicket;
fine (obsolete):
‘The old-fashioned long-leg hitting of George Parr is almost a thing of the past; so that
long-leg should stand too square, rather than too sharp’ (Badminton 1888, p 258).
sheet anchor
sheet anchor n See ANCHOR:

‘Sardesai was batting on 97 having played the sheet anchor role the whole day while
scoring 91 runs’ (Gulu Ezekiel, Sportstar [Chennai] 17 June 2006).
shell
shell vb to fail to take a possible catch (slang):

‘They proceeded to lose the toss and drop five catches on the first day, three of them
shelled by the hapless Imran Farhat at slip’ (Andrew Miller, Cricinfo Magazine August
2006, p 79).
shine
shine n the smoothness and polish characteristic of a new ball, which is gradually
impaired as the ball repeatedly hits the ground and is struck by the batsmen:
‘May joined Graveney, and both batsmen exercised due caution until the shine was less-
ened’ (Peebles 1959, p 56).
‘The greatest of fast bowlers needs the support of comparable fire at the other end …
especially while the shine is still on the ball’ (Manley 1988, p 135).
161 short
A high degree of shine keeps friction to a minimum and is generally felt to assist the
faster bowlers, as well as being conducive to movement in the air; on the other hand,
as the ball loses its shine and the surface becomes rougher, it is more likely to respond
to break imparted by the slower bowlers.
shirtfront
shirtfront, shirtfront wicket n a good, true batting wicket with an even bounce, offering
little assistance to either seam or spin bowling. It is hard and flat, like the starched, well-
ironed front of an old-fashioned dress shirt:
‘As those who knew it best had prophesied, the “googly” possessed few terrors on the
“shirt-front” wickets of Adelaide and Sydney’ (H. S. Altham, History of Cricket 1926, p
348).
‘On another “shirtfront” in Hyderabad, he made an unbeaten fifty-five in three and a
half hours’ (Berry 1982, p 97).
‘On 11 of the 16 days of play in the series, they had shirt-fronts laid out for them, which
allowed their batsmen to rack up big scores’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Maga-
zine August 2006, p 77).
shock bowler
shock bowler n a fast bowler used very sparingly in a purely attacking role:
‘I recalled Willis’s early Test experiences under Illingworth, when he was used solely as
a shock bowler’ (Brearley 1982, p 67).
‘Flintoff should not be doing England’s donkey work …With all his other duties, he must
be a shock, not a stock, bowler’ (Vic Marks, Observer 21 May 2006).
shoot
shoot vb (of the ball) to keep low and come rapidly on to the bat after pitching, usually
because of some irregularity in the wicket:
‘When you see the ball shoot, play the bat back as near to the wicket as possible, taking
care not to knock it down’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 23).
‘There were signs later in the day that there could be more of the low shooting deliveries
that have made the MCG a batsman’s nightmare in recent years’ (Ian Brayshaw, Times
27 December 1983).
shooter
shooter n a ball that fails to rise normally after pitching and comes rapidly on to the bat;
shooters were a regular feature of the game until playing surfaces began to improve in
the second half of the 19th century:
‘Not a great many years ago Lord’s used to be celebrated for shooters, owing to its
rough condition’ (Badminton 1888, p 184).
shoot out
shoot out vb to dismiss a batsman or team quickly and for a low score:
‘His career as an opener was brought to a rough ending when his old adversary Lind-
wall shot him out for a pair at Melbourne’ (Peebles 1959, p 205).
‘English cricket took a long time to recover from this pair’s demolition of a strong MCC
side at Lord’s in 1878, when the premier club were shot out for 33 and 19’ (Frith 1984,
p 33).
short
short adj, adv 1. occupying or indicating a position relatively close to the batsman’s
wicket; the term is often used in combination to indicate a modified fielding position that
would normally be somewhat further from the striker, such as third man, mid-wicket, or
extra cover:
‘Wessels and Dyson took their opening stand to 39 before Wessels pulled one from Willis
to Botham at a short and rather wide mid-on’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February 1983).
‘Such … made further inroads, having Mark Taylor caught at short gully off bat and pad’
Compare DEEP. See FIELDING POSITIONS
2. pitching at a point on the wicket somewhat closer to the bowler than a ball of good
length but further down the wicket than a long hop (See LENGTH):
‘Holding produced a vicious rising short ball to have Gavaskar caught at slip when 10
runs more would have given the batsman a unique 30th Test century’ (WCM January
1984).
‘There is also the question of whether the wearing of a helmet, especially by the lower
order batsmen, gives fast bowlers a licence to bowl short even at batsmen incompetent
to deal with the bouncer’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
short extra 162

쐽 adj —short of a length closer to the bowler than a good length:
‘De Villiers … hit upon the right line, consistently running the ball down the slope, either
in the air or off the ground, from just short of a good length’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
short extra
short extra n short extra cover (see EXTRA COVER):

‘Atherton was out … driving on the up to short extra where the substitute Cullinan
proved himself an equal of any of his colleagues in the field’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer
September 1994).
short leg
short leg n a close leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) anywhere in an
arc between leg-slip and silly mid-on: See FIELDING POSITIONS. As the MCC coaching
book observes, ‘it is impossible to lay down any fixed rule as to the “normal” position of
short-leg’ (MCC 1952, p 24), since, like slip, it is not a single position but a general area
that may be occupied by a ring of fielders. While a forward short leg is used in a variety
of attacks, the use of a ring of short legs ‘can only be justified for a bowler who, whether
by swing or spin, is bringing the ball into the batsman’ (MCC 1952, p 24) – e.g., an off-
break bowler on a turning wicket. Harold Larwood’s fast leg-theory attack was based on
a packed leg-side field that included up to four short legs and a silly mid-on, but the more
extreme form of ‘bodyline’ field is now outlawed by fielding restrictions which state that
‘at the instant of the bowler’s delivery there shall not be more than two fielders, other
than the wicket-keeper, behind the popping crease on the on side’ (Law 41 § 5).
short-pitched
short-pitched adj (of a ball) pitching before it reaches a full length; SHORT 2:
‘The bowling of fast short pitched balls is dangerous and unfair if the umpire at the
bowler’s end considers that … they are likely to inflict physical injury on the striker’
(Law 42 § 6).
The connection between short-pitched bowling and the deliberate intimidation of
batsmen is a relatively modern one. In the 19th century it was believed that ‘a short ball
is the worst ball a man delivers’ because ‘a batsman can hit it almost where he chooses’
(Clarke 1851 in HM, p 159). Clarke’s view is typical of his generation, and indeed of
much later writers too. The inference seems to be that wickets in the 19th and early 20th
century were not as lively as they later became, and their relatively lower bounce would
tend to turn a short-pitched ball into an innocuous long hop rather than a vicious
bouncer. At the height of the Bodyline crisis an article by J. W. Trumble discussed the
claim that ‘old-time fast bowlers’ had not resorted to the ploy of bowling short, and
made the telling point that ‘on the old-time turf wickets … as it did not rise, short-
pitched bowling was in those days looked upon as rubbish, and generally had heavy
punishment’ (Melbourne Argus 23 January 1933). Trumble’s point seems to be
corroborated by the gradual shift in meaning of the terms ‘bumper’ and ‘bouncer’:
these were originally used to describe a ball that rose steeply off the pitch because of
some irregularity in the surface, and only later came to be exclusively applied to the
fast short-pitched ball used to unnerve the batsman.
short run
short run n 1. (also formerly short notch) a run which either or both of the batsmen fail
to complete properly (by grounding the bat or part of the body over the popping crease)
before turning to take another run. In the case of a short run the umpire, once the ball is
dead, calls ‘one short’ and signals to the scorer by bending one arm upwards and
touching the shoulder. The incomplete run is not credited to the score, but the batsmen
do not – as might be expected – cross back to the opposite wickets. The regulations
governing short runs were introduced in 1774 and have remained essentially unchanged.
There was a proposal in 1835 that two runs be deducted rather than one, on the grounds
that the batsman ‘not having run home in the first instance, cannot have started in the
second from the proper goal’. This suggestion was not, however, incorporated in the
revision of that year, and the modern code specifically states that ‘Although a short run
shortens the succeeding one, the latter if completed shall not be regarded as short’ (Law
18 § 3).
2. a quickly-taken run off a ball that only travels a short distance from the wicket:
163 shutters
‘A safe field is generally a slow one … and, as batsmen get to know this, the short run is
attempted with impunity’ (Badminton 1888, p 248).
short-slip
short-slip n an off-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) equivalent to what
would now be called slip (obsolete):
‘On no occasion should short-slip be dispensed with … The object of short-slip is to pick
up snicks which just miss the wicket-keeper’ (Badminton 1888, p 179).
‘He remembers occasional outstanding hits, as … when he beat short-slip in a race for
a delivery of Harris’s’ (P.G.Wodehouse, Reginald’s Record Knock 1909).
Compare LONG SLIP
shot
shot n 1. an act of hitting the ball, especially when the emphasis is on scoring runs rather
than on the quality of the execution; a well-timed and elegantly executed hit tends to be
described as a ‘stroke’ rather than a shot (see STROKE):
‘If we played stupid shots, like you see nowadays because of one-day cricket, we
wouldn’t have lasted long. We had to play top class strokes and bat long in the middle’
(Zaheer Abbas, Sportstar [Chennai] 28 May 1994).
2. —go for one’s shots to bat aggressively with the aim of scoring runs quickly:
‘West Indies virtually lost the match on the first morning with a totally irresponsible
display of batting. With everybody going for their shots as if it were a one-day game …
wickets were literally thrown away’ (Manley 1988, p231).
shot selection
shot selection n a batsman’s skill in choosing how to play each ball:

‘Bradman was not given to overstatement. He had watched closely, and had thought that
Tendulkar’s technique and shot selection matched his own’ (Purandare 2005, p 197).
shoulder
shoulder n the slightly concave upper edge of the blade of the bat, close to where it joins
the handle:
‘Kirsten’s brave and proficient occupation was ended by an awkward delivery, which
took off from a length to find the shoulder of his bat and carry some distance to short
third man’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
쐽 vb —shoulder arms, shoulder up to raise the bat high above the shoulders, espe-
cially while padding up (see PAD UP), so as to avoid any possibility of getting an ‘edge’:
‘The first ball brought another two to the on, but as the second pitched the batsman
covered up and shouldered arms’ (Peebles 1959, p 158).
‘Pitched outside off, it holds its line and then cuts back sharply off the seam. Greenidge
shoulders arms. He turns around to see his stumps shattered’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 89).
쐽 —open one’s shoulders to play an attacking shot, typically a pull or cut, with a full
swing of the bat:
‘Soon after tea, Flintoff opened his shoulders and hit Warne for three successive fours’
(Hugh Chevallier, Wisden 2006, p 119).
shout
shout n an appeal made against a batsman:

‘Botham had one convincing shout against Richards and then beat him with a ball of
exquisite beauty’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 1 July 1984).
‘His first lbw shout against Flintoff yesterday morning seemed either to be stuck on an
endless loop or echoing off the Fox Road Stand’s space age roof’ (Haigh 2005, p 156).
shuffle across
shuffle across vb to move across towards the off-side but without committing oneself
to a shot, thereby making oneself vulnerable to an lbw dismissal:
‘Howarth was bowled by a plain delivery, the shock compounded when Crowe was
fourth out at 47, shuffling casually across’ (Christopher Wordsworth, Observer 19 June
1983).
shutters
shutters n —put up the shutters (of a batsman or batting side) to adopt a purely
defensive style of batting, especially when the batting side is playing for a draw, having
concluded that a win is unobtainable or that chasing it is too risky:
‘Sobers took a gamble and declared, setting us 215 to get in165 minutes. He was
convinced that we would put up the shutters and that he would torment us with four spin-
ners’ (Colin Cowdrey, Daily Telegraph 14 February 1994).
side-on 164
side-on
side-on adj describing the classic fast bowling action in which, at the point of delivery,
the bowler’s front arm points straight down the wicket, and ‘he looks over his left
shoulder at the wicket with his chest facing the non-striker’ (Simon Hughes,
Jargonbusting: Mastering the Art of Cricket 2002, p 72):
‘Then began that angled run, building to the beautiful side-on delivery, the expectation
of a wicket with every ball’ (Stephen Chalke, Obituary for Fred Trueman, Cricinfo
Magazine August 2006, p 92).
Compare CHEST-ON
sight
sight n a sense of confidence in one’s ability to judge accurately the flight, pace, and
length of the ball, developed by a batsman as his innings progresses:
‘Once he has had a sight of the ball and judged the pace and bounce of the ball off the
pitch, he should start thinking about scoring opportunities’ (Alf Gover, Cricketer March
1983).
sightboard
sightboard n Australia a sightscreen:

‘The cheering and waving of hats was inspiring when Trumper stepped out and lifted a
ball from Rhodes straight over the sight-board for five’ (Melbourne Argus 5 January
1904).
sighter
sighter n an unthreatening ball bowled early in a bowler’s spell or early in a batsman’s

innings, which the batsman does not need to play; this gives him the opportunity to
become accustomed to the bowling without any risk to his wicket:
‘Subba Row was bowled off his pad before he had got a sighter, and MCC were once
again off to a bad start’ (Peebles 1959, p 56).
‘England’s middle order may be rather more gifted than that of Sussex in this game, but
they will need a few sighters before feeling comfortable against Malinga’ (Vic Marks,
sightscreen
sightscreen n a movable structure with a large flat surface, typically made of slatted
wood but occasionally of other materials (such as canvas), which is placed just outside
the boundary directly behind either of the wickets in order to assist the batsman by
enhancing the visibility of the bowled ball. Sightscreens are traditionally white, but black
sightscreens are used in day-night games played with white balls. Some modern
sightscreens have surfaces that can be changed between overs, showing advertisements
when the bowler is operating from the other end.
silly
silly adj, adv (of a fielder or fielding position) extremely close to the batsman; very short:
‘Gatting took two catches at short-extra and forward short-leg, positioned some yards
farther from the bat than the “silly” helmeted situations now in favour’ (Robin Marlar,
Sunday Times 28 August 1983).
‘Instead of patting it back, the little man cracked an audacious square cut that raced
away to the boundary, the silly-point fielder looking both silly and pointless as he ducked
for cover’ (Bhattacharya 2006, p 71).
The term is normally used in combination to indicate a modified fielding position in
front of the wicket that would otherwise be considerably further from the striker,
specifically point, mid-off, and mid-on: See FIELDING POSITIONS. The word simply
alludes to the ‘silliness’ of exposing oneself to such danger, though the OED does
record a now obsolete – but rather appropriate – use of silly to mean ‘defenceless’.
‘Silly’ fielding positions were popularised, if not actually invented, by the Australian
team that toured England in 1878, and had been made possible by the recent
improvements in playing surfaces (See WICKET). According to H. S. Altham (History
of Cricket 1926, p 148) ‘it was a revelation when on the sticky wickets of 1878 Boyle
proceeded to take up his position at silly mid-on, often no more than 6 or 7 yards from
the bat’. The silly fieldsman’s dual role – of taking close catches and unsettling the
batsman – seems to have been appreciated from an early stage:
‘Sometimes mid-off … is required to go “silly mid-off” with a view to catching a pokey
batsman or putting him off his stroke’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 54).
165 sitter
Since the advent of the helmet, it has become fashionable to station heavily armoured
fielders in very silly positions, and the fairness of this practice has been a matter of de-
bate.
single
single n one run added to the score, obtained by the batsmen actually running:
‘He hurled the ball wide from short cover when the last pair of Englishmen dashed for
the single which brought a one-wicket victory at Melbourne’ (Frith 1984, p 83).
‘Gomes on Tuesday was the perfect foil once again, taking the singles England some-
what carelessly offered, in the knowledge that Greenidge would continue to crash the
ball for four’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 8 July 1984).
single wicket
single wicket n 1. a form of cricket in which two individual players compete against one
another, sometimes as part of a knockout competition. Each bowls a specified number of
overs at the other, and the player who scores most runs wins (or goes through to the next
round). Single-wicket competitions are popular at club level, especially in village
cricket, and the BBC’s online ‘Ambridge Archive’ (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/
archers/ambridgearchive/sport.shtml) describes a single wicket competition which is
staged annually in the Borsetshire village.
2. a form of cricket in which there is only one set of stumps, with a single stump at the
other end of the pitch from which the ball is always bowled (old)
The single wicket version of the game seems to have existed since the earliest days of
cricket, and in the 18th and early 19th century ‘single-wicket matches … were played
nearly as often as double-wicket games’ (Badminton 1888, p 383). These contests
included not only games between the foremost sides of the day (such as those between
‘five of Hambledon’ and ‘five of All England’ in 1773 and 1781) but also one-to-one
encounters between great all-round players like Alfred Mynn and Tom Marsden. By
1850, however, single wicket was ‘practically dead’ (Badminton 1888, p 387), and
despite various attempts to revive the single-wicket game in some form or other
(notably in contests staged between leading international all-rounders) it is unlikely
ever to be more than an occasional entertainment at the margins of the game.
sitter n an easy catching chance offered to a fielder:
sitter
six 166
‘He had not been at his best, but would I think have been retained if he had not dropped
a “sitter” from Border when he had scored only 10’ (Brearley 1982, p 20).
six
six n a shot by the batsman that sends the ball over the boundary without bouncing,
resulting in an addition of six runs to the batsman’s score:
‘A six is at once an expression of a batsman’s command – however temporary – and an
act of defiance’ (Bose 1990, p 78).
‘The BCG [Baghdad Cricket Ground] is enclosed by a 12ft fence, itself surrounded by an
outer wall topped by razor wire. For obvious reasons, what would normally be a six out
of the ground is deemed out’ (Keith Scott, Wisden 2005, p 1526).
A ball caught by a fielder and then carried over the boundary also counts as a six and
in this case, of course, the striker is not out. Presumably a ball going straight over the
boundary from an overthrow or as a bye would also be a six, though such cases are – it
is to be hoped – purely hypothetical. A ball that hits a sightscreen full pitch when the
sightscreen is on or inside the boundary only counts as four, not six, and the same
applies to other obstacles within the field of play (such as the tree at Canterbury). The
umpire signals a six to the scorers by raising both arms above his head (see illustration
on previous page). The allowance of six runs dates only from 1910, before which the
ball had to be hit right out of the ground to score six. See BOUNDARY
sixer
sixer n a six (old):

‘Hammond rounded off this noisy series with a smashing sixer off O’Reilly’ (Larwood
1933, p 161).
‘Rajesh Chauhan the off-spinner may never be remembered as a bowler, but a sixer he
hit to clinch a one-day final against Pakistan in the last over will be recalled for years
to come’ (Purandare 2005, p 77).
skid
skid vb (of a fast ball) to come quickly on to the bat or wicket with a lower than expected
bounce and an (apparent) increase in pace off the pitch:
‘Statham was soon recalled, and for the moment checked the dashing young man, who
had a narrow escape when what was intended to be a bouncer skidded’ (Peebles 1959,
p 87).
‘Even the direction of the blades [of grass] makes a difference. If they face the stumps the
ball skids but if it is facing down the track the ball tends to hold on to the surface just a
shade longer’ (Amrit Mathur, Sportstar [Chennai] 16 July 1994).
skier
skier n a SKYER
skimmer
skimmer n a ball hit by the batsman that follows a low flat trajectory:
‘In the 53rd over, John Carr, fielding as substitute, caught a skimmer at deep mid-on to
send back Turner’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 24 July 1983).
skittle
skittle vb to dismiss a batting side cheaply and quickly:

‘Australia won the final meeting by 202 runs, but not before Gomez had skittled them for
116 in the first innings’ (Manley 1988, p 98).
sky
sky vb to hit the ball high into the air, especially so as to offer the fielding side a catch;
‘loft’ the ball:
‘Two runs later Hookes was out when he tried to pull Cowans and skied the ball towards
mid-wicket where Willis … judged the catch beautifully’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer
February 1983).
‘What would they say if such an ambitious stroke ended with a tame, skied catch to
cover?’ (Vic Marks, Observer 13 August 2006).
skyer
skyer, skier n a ball hit high into the air, especially so as to offer the fielding side a catch:
‘After almost four hours of familiar devastation, one of New Zealand’s fielders finally
accepted a chance from Botham — a monstrous skyer that nobody felt like going for but
was finally taken at cover’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 22 January 1984).
‘Tim Wren soon made inroads when Glamorgan batted, dismissing Steve James with his
first ball and in the following over had Matthew Maynard caught off a skier at mid-off’
(Edward Bevan, Daily Telegraph, 25 July 1994).
sky-rocket
sky-rocket vb to sky the ball (obsolete):

167 slice
‘At times it’s enough to make you bite your thumbs to see your best balls pulled and sky-
rocketed about’ (Clarke 1851 in HM, p 162).
slant
slant vb to deliver the ball so that it comes into the striker (from off to leg) or moves across
him (from leg to off) at a fairly sharp angle to the line of the wickets; the effect is
achieved by movement in the air or off the pitch, especially when combined with a fairly
‘wide’ bowling position which maximises the angle of the ball’s line of flight relative to
the line of the wickets:
‘Often in the past fast bowlers have switched their line of attack from over to round the
wicket, in order to slant the ball across a right-hand batsman and get him edging into
the slips’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 4 December 1983).
sledge
sledge vb to attempt to unsettle a batsman by means of ‘sledging’:

‘Last season Edmonds was ticked off by the umpire … for allegedly “sledging” the
Indian batsman Dilip Vengsarkar at Lord’s and generally overdoing the overt aggres-
sion at forward short-leg’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer December 1982).
‘The South Africans threw everything in their arsenal at Hodge, and even sledged him
when he asked for fly-spray, with skipper Graeme Smith chirping “don’t harm your
national bird”’ (Jon Pierik, Herald Sun (Melbourne) 19 December 2005).
sledging
sledging n a form of gamesmanship in which a close fielder attempts to unsettle the

batsman at the crease and make him lose his concentration, especially by making abusive
comments:
‘Throughout this period many English players … were disturbed by the highly developed
Australian “sledging”, usually aimed at them when they were trying to concentrate on
an innings’ (John Arlott, WCM January 1985).
The term seems to have originated in Australia, and perhaps alludes to the idea of
‘breaking down’ the batsman’s concentration, as if with a sledgehammer. The practice
of ‘sledging’ is covered by a section in the unfair play law, to the effect that the umpire
‘shall call and signal “dead ball” if, in his opinion, any Player of the fielding side
incommodes the Striker by any noise or action while he is receiving a ball’ (Law 42 §
6). An almost identical clause appears in the original (1744) code of Laws, suggesting
that this form of gamesmanship had already been perfected over 200 years ago. Nyren
also warns the wicket-keeper against annoying the batsman ‘either by noise, uncalled-
for remarks, or unnecessary action’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 12), and sixty-odd years later
Ranjitsinhji observes:
‘I heard the other day of another way of getting out – viz. being talked out … Batsmen
are quite within their rights in requesting conversational fieldsmen to hold their tongues’
All of which goes to show that although ‘sledging’ is a new word it is certainly not a new
phenomenon.
slice
slice n a batting stroke in which the bat is swung across the line of flight of the ball with
the face at a sharp angle, often resulting in a dangerously high trajectory as the ball flies
off the bat, usually into (or over) the area between point and slip; the stroke may be
played deliberately, as a rather risky form of cut, but it is just as likely to be the result of
a more orthodox shot that has been mistimed; the term is borrowed from the vocabulary
of golf, where it has a much longer history
쐽 vb 1. to hit the ball with a slice:
‘He had only one rampant phase, when swinging Snedden over square leg for six, slicing
Martin Crowe high over the slips, and pulling both for four more’ (Scyld Berry,
‘But Botham was unable to capitalise, caught in the gully off a searing sliced drive’
(Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1984).
‘Smith reached his second hundred in successive Tests before slicing a ball from Gayle
to extra cover’ (Telford Vice, Wisden 2006, p 1113).
2. (of the ball) to fly uppishly off the angled face of the bat:
‘He is not the type of cricketer who guffaws when his cover drive slices over third slip
for four’ (Vic Marks on Chris Tavaré, Cricketer December 1982).
slider 168
slider
slider n a ball bowled by a wrist-spin bowler which tends to go straight on but to bounce
less than a TOP-SPINNER (qv), as a result of back-spin imparted to as the ball is released:
‘Warne’s weapon of choice in this Test, however, was not the monster leg-break of yore.
It was a ball going straight on, delivered with a leg-break action but squirted out of the
front of the hand: a “slider”, to dignify it with the Benaudism of the moment’ (Haigh
2005, p 48).
slide stop
slide stop n a movement used when fielding a ball that is heading towards the boundary,
in which the fielder slides up to the ball, grabs it, and spins round into a throwing
position; the slide stop is a feature of the more athletic fielding characteristic of the
modern game
slip
slip n 1. an off-side fielding position behind the batsman’s wicket, between the wicket-
keeper and gully; slip is a close catching position, but like the position of wicket-keeper
its ‘depth’ increases in direct proportion to the pace of the bowling:
‘In backing up, he should take care to give the man at the slip sufficient room’ (Lambert
1816, p 41).
‘Greenidge, trying to run one wide of slip, was caught by Downton’ (John Thicknesse,
WCM September 1984).
‘Wessels then edged DeFreitas just out of Atherton’s diving reach at third slip’ (Richard
2. a fielder occupying this position, or any of several fielders occupying positions in an
arc between the wicket-keeper and gully and called collectively the slips; when there is
more than one slip they are called first slip, second slip, and so on, first slip being the
one closest to the wicket-keeper:
‘Balls which should have come along stump-high, sprang up, hit the batsman on the
fingers, and found a resting-place in the slip’s hands’ (P.G.Wodehouse, The Pro: a
Cricket Story).
‘The best slips I have ever seen are Chapman, Lohmann, Hammond, and Constantine’
(Warner 1934, p 82).
‘I remember facing him [Lillee] in the Centenary Test at Melbourne … bowling with six
slips, a square cover, short leg, and deep fine-leg’ (Brearley 1982, p 65).
‘Too many wickets go begging because of nicks falling just in front of the slips’ (Chas
Keys, Australian Cricket October 1993).
쐽 vb to ‘run’ the ball towards slip off the angled face of a straight bat (obsolete):
‘Strokes behind the wicket were the chief features of his game; his cutting and slipping,
leg-hitting and leg-gliding being safe and brilliant always’ (Headlam 1903, p 219).
169 slow
The origins of this term are hinted at in Nyren’s description of the long stop, who ‘is
required to cover many slips from the bat’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 34). The slip’s job is
to catch balls that glance off the bat, and most balls that do so are the result of a batting
error, or ‘slip’. Early writers identify two slip positions, a ‘short-slip’ (equivalent to the
modern first or second slip) and a ‘long-slip’ (equivalent to a shortish third man or fly-
slip), but in certain conditions – ‘in particular when the ground is hard’ – a ‘Second
Short-Slip’ may also be needed (Boxall 1800, p 54). By the turn of the 20th century an
attacking field would usually have two slips (in the modern sense), which were called
‘first-slip’ and ‘cover-slip’ or ‘extra-slip’; and ‘sometimes for very fast bowling a third
slip is added’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 42). The growing importance of the slips, especially
to fast bowlers, reflects the development of the modern ‘off-theory’ attack in the late
19th century (See OFF-THEORY). Nowadays, three slips are the norm for a fast bowler’s
attacking field, four would not be unusual, and in exceptional circumstances even more
may be used.
slip cordon
slip cordon See CORDON

slip machine
slip machine n Australia an apparatus used for catching practice; a CRADLE

slog
slog n a powerful, usually cross-batted shot in which the bat is swung forcefully and often
blindly at the ball, regardless of its length or direction
쐽 vb to hit the ball powerfully and often indiscriminately, especially towards the on-side
with a horizontal bat:
‘Clift slogged vigorously for a while, once striking Watkinson for six over cover, but
finally skied one to third man’ (David Green, Daily Telegraph 15 August 1984).
‘From his intelligent slogging in the final-innings run-chase at Edgbaston to the stoicism
he showed in taking his licks from England’s pace battery throughout, Lee left an
enduring image of vivacious engagement’ (Kevin Mitchell, Wisden 2006, p 68).
slog overs
slog overs, the slog n the stage in a one-day game when fast scoring is required and
batsmen hit out freely; the death:
‘Waugh reveals his approach while bowling these slog overs. “I just enjoy it. Lots of
other guys get tense and tight about bowling in the slog overs. For me, it’s the best part
of one-day bowling”’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 28 May 1994).
‘When fast bowler Pushpakumara bowled one outside the off-stump in the slog-overs, he
shifted outside the line, bent a little and smacked the ball again over the long-on’
slog-sweep
slog-sweep n an aggressive form of SWEEP played with the aim of lofting the ball
towards the mid-wicket boundary:
‘His get-out-of-jail shot against slow bowling is the slog-sweep, but Vaughan posted a
man to the provinces on the leg side immediately yesterday and eliminated the option’
(Haigh 2005, p 75).
쐽 vb to hit the ball when playing a slog-sweep:
‘The loss of 3 for 3 in eight balls brought together Pietersen and Flintoff, and both went
for their shots. Flintoff drove Sami powerfully for four and Pietersen slog-swept Kaneria
for six’ (Angus Fraser, Independent, 17 November 2006).
slot
slot n —the slot the optimum place, from the batsman’s point of view, for a ball to pitch;
a ball that is ‘right up in the slot’ can be played comfortably by the batsman playing
forward
slow
slow adj, adv denoting a bowler, a ball, or a style of bowling characterised by a speed
lower than that of a medium-pace bowler, roughly in the range 45 mph/75 kph to 55
mph/90 kph; ‘slow’ is one of the three basic types according to which bowlers are
conventionally categorised (the other two being fast and medium-pace) and bowlers of
this type rely on flight, turn, accuracy, and deception, rather than on speed through the
air:
‘The gradation of a day’s cricket, begun with new-ball thrills as athletic fast bowlers
operate and continued as the slow men take over, knows no parallel in terms of enter-
tainment value’ (Frith 1984, p 12).
slower ball 170

‘Gayle claimed the last four wickets to finish with five for 91 – a part-time slow bowler
cleaning up the opposition at this former fast-bowling haven’ (Fazeer Mohammed,
Wisden 2006, p 1128).
쐽 adj (of the wicket) providing conditions that are unhelpful to the faster bowlers, in that
the ball is likely to lose pace and life after pitching; a ‘slow’ pitch will often also assist
the spin bowlers:
‘Thorpe … played his best innings of the tour, a composed 86 notable for the precision
of his pulling whenever the West Indies dropped short on a pitch that became both slower
and more unreliable as the game progressed’ (Vic Marks, Cricketer May 1994).
쐽 n a slow ball or slow bowler:
‘At last Parr went on at Stephenson’s end, and it was soon found that the Canadians
were not up to the slows, for Parr made sad work with them’ (Lillywhite 1860, p 19).
‘There is a golden rule to be carefully remembered in playing slows, and that is, never
to run out to a ball that is well outside the off stump’ (Badminton 1888, p 80).
slower ball
slower ball n a ball bowled by a fast bowler at a significantly lower speed than his usual
delivery, with the intention of inducing the batsman to play the ball too early:
‘Cooley finds no less reward in … developing the country’s ablest teenagers than he did
in helping Harmison perfect his slower ball, which in the second Ashes Test at
Edgbaston so memorably did for Michael Clarke’ (Brian Viner, Independent 20 January
2006).
‘The googly, in theory, is actually nothing more special than a slower ball or a bouncer
– at one level all are ruses designed only to fool batsmen’ (Osman Samiuddin, Cricinfo
Magazine February 2006, p 30).
See also CHANGE OF PACE
slow left-arm
slow left-arm adj, adv practising or denoting a style of slow bowling characteristic of
some left-arm bowlers, in which break is imparted to the ball by means of finger-spin,
making it turn from leg towards off when bowled to a right-handed batsman:
‘Hadlee sent down one delivery slow left-arm to Chris Smith on the fourth day’ (WCM
April 1984).
‘The match had a special note of interest in the first appearance for Barbados at an inter-
national level of a young, slow left-arm spinner named Garfield Sobers’ (Manley 1988,
p 100).
Slow left-arm bowling is the left-armer’s equivalent of the off-spin bowling of an
‘orthodox’ right-arm spinner, in that it depends on finger-spin rather than wrist-spin,
and the slow left-armer’s stock ball is in effect a leg-break. A wrist-spin bowler who
happens to be left-handed is more likely to be called a ‘left-arm wrist-spinner’ than a
‘slow left-armer’.
slow left-armer
slow left-armer n an exponent of slow left-arm bowling:

‘Another slow left-armer who must have rued often the existence of Rhodes and Blythe
was George Dennett of Gloucestershire’ (Frith 1984, p 73).
smear
smear vb to hit the ball powerfully but perhaps inelegantly:

‘Chris Gayle smeared the erratic Indian seamers to various corners while Ramnaresh
Sarwan and Bravo thwarted India’s bid to fight back’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan,
Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 72).
smother
smother vb to bring the bat well forward so as to meet the ball as soon as possible after
it pitches, thus precluding the possibility of the ball rising steeply or turning sharply:
‘The deviation of the ball from its original line of flight makes forward-strokes rather
unsafe unless the ball is completely smothered at the pitch’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 204).
sneak
sneak n an underarm ball that pitches very short and travels mostly along the ground
(obsolete):
‘It is as certain as anything can be at cricket that a good forward straight bat cannot miss
a “sneak”’ (Badminton 1888, p 185).
snick
snick n a very slight hit in which the ball only just makes contact with the edge of the bat
instead of meeting the full face; a ‘thin’ edge:
171 spin
‘A snick to long-leg may bring more runs than a hard hit straight’ (Badminton 1888, p
307).
쐽 vb to hit the ball lightly with the very edge of the bat; ‘edge’ the ball:
‘Border and the luckless Kim Hughes put together a fourth wicket stand of 62 but
Marshall forced the captain to snick a slip catch and the West Indies wrapped up the
Australian tail’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer June 1984).
snickometer
snickometer n a device that converts sounds, picked up by a microphone in the stumps,

into a soundwave; the shape of the wave can help determine whether the ball brushed the
batsman’s bat as it passed
soft
soft adj —with soft hands using a defensive batting technique, especially against spin
bowling, in which one’s grip on the handle of the bat is relaxed rather than firm; this tends
to deaden the impact of the ball and reduce the risk of edges to the slips
specialist
specialist n a player who is selected for his skill either as a batsman or as a bowler, rather
than as an all-rounder:
‘England … were the bit-part players, the bowlers to supply the runs and, even by the
start of play, all four specialists had conceded upwards of 100’ (Alan Lee, The Times 19
April 1994).
spectacles
spectacles n a batsman’s score of nought in each innings of a match; a pair (obsolete):

‘Unlucky enough to make spectacles for his side against Middlesex’ (Whitaker’s Alma-
nack 1893, p 613).
See PAIR
spectator catch
spectator catch n a ball caught by a fielder after first being played hard into the ground
by the batsman, giving spectators the illusion that the batsman is out caught; a BUMP
BALL
speed merchant
speed merchant, speedster n a fast bowler:

‘As Holding took his guard and looked around the field purposefully … the discussion
turned to the role of the speed merchants’ (Manley 1988, p 211).
‘NSW speedster Wayne Holdsworth clearly suffered from dysfunctional radar in putting
down 26 overs for a costly 101’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
‘Dennis Lillee, Jeff Thomson and and all the West Indian speedsters have wrought havoc
there, forcing the best of batsmen to sweat and squirm in discomfort’ (Purandare 2005,
p 128).
spell
spell n a period of bowling by a particular bowler, consisting of a number of overs bowled

consecutively from one end of the pitch, allowing of course for another bowler operating
from the other end in alternate overs:
‘A makeshift notice, Rest in Pieces, had been pinned to the bowling crease from where
Curtly Ambrose had propelled one of the greatest and most destructive spells of fast
bowling to reduce England to 40 for eight overnight’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 31 March
1994).
‘Towards the end of a 31-over spell that was almost a sentence, Warne began to tire’
(Haigh 2005, p 200).
쐽 vb Australia to take a bowler off, especially in order to prevent him from becoming
over-tired:
‘Had a Gilchrist been there as well as Hall, Worrell would have had two options: a pair
of fast bowlers could have been “spelled” assuring the shock attack was fresh at all
times’ (Manley 1988, p 162).
‘Vaughan’s own acclimatisation was aided by Ponting’s bowling choices: Australia’s
captain unaccountably spelled Lee after 5–2–6–1 in favour of Gillespie’ (Haigh 2005, p
103).
spill
spill vb to fail to take a possible catch:

‘Richards was missed knee-high by Allott at mid-on off Cook, Gower having spilt Gomes
at slip off Pringle’ (David Frith, WCM September 1984).
spin
spin n 1. a rotary motion imparted to the ball as it is delivered by the bowler, causing it to
change pace or deviate from its original line of flight after pitching:
spin 172
‘The wickets were coconut matting on hard clay … but they took all the spin you put on
the ball and there was always some lift’ (James 1963, p 60).
2. the technique of spinning the ball, or the type of bowling produced in this way; spin
bowling:
‘It is often possible nowadays to watch much of a day’s cricket — certainly in over-limit
games — without seeing much worthwhile spin’ (Arlott 1983, p 41).
‘In this opening Test there was so little Indian spin that seventeen of the eighteen English
wickets that fell went to seamers or quick bowlers’ (Bose 1990, p 72).
‘In 1950, the West Indies and the Three W’s achieved their greatest success in England,
their exploits complementing those of the spin bowlers Sonny Ramadhin and Alf Valen-
tine’ (B C Pires, obituary for Sir Clyde Walcott, Guardian 28 August 2006).
3. —with/against the spin playing the ball in the same direction/opposite direction to
the way it is spinning:
‘He slogged Warne against the spin to the Grand Stand, first in front of square then
behind, and finally drove with the spin down the hill to the Mound Stand boundary’
(Haigh 2005, p 47).
쐽 vb 1. to impart spin to the ball when bowling:
‘Allan, a left-hander, spun the ball a lot and made it curl in the air before hopping
towards first slip’ (Frith 1984, p 32).
2. (of the ball ) to change direction after pitching as a result of spin:
‘The ball that turned the series was undoubtedly the first-up delivery from leggie Shane
Warne, which deceived Gatting in flight and then spun from a foot outside the leg stump
to hit off’ (Peter Hook, Australian Cricket October 1993).
Spin is applied by the movement of the bowler’s fingers or wrist at the moment of
delivery (See FINGER-SPIN, WRIST-SPIN) and, to a large extent, depends for its effect on
the responsiveness of the playing surface. On ‘crumbling’ or ‘sticky’ wickets, for
example, the spin imparted to the ball is converted into movement off the pitch (either
laterally, or with a change of pace) to a very high degree. Although bowlers of any pace
can put spin on the ball, the term is generally used to describe the technique of the
slower bowlers; faster bowlers are said to ‘cut’ the ball rather than spin it (See CUT).
Spin bowling was already a feature of the game in the days of underarm bowling. Until
the late 18th century bowlers who spun, or ‘twisted’, the ball generally made it turn
from leg to off, for ‘it is as natural to bowl leg-spin underarm as it is to bowl off-spin
overarm’ (Frith 1984, p 13). Consequently the Hambledon bowler Lamborn tied his
opponents in knots when he pioneered the art of spinning the ball the other way in about
1780. Half a century or so later, with the arrival of overarm bowling, off-spin came to
be the norm: in overarm bowling, a certain amount of clockwise rotation tends almost
automatically to be imparted to the ball in the course of a right-arm bowler’s delivery
(See ACTION-BREAK) and the technique of off-spin is thus, as a rule, more easily learned
than the somewhat ‘artificial’ leg-spin. Spin-bowling of all kinds – and wrist-spin in
particular – endured a rather lean patch in the second half of the 20th century. Factors
173 square
in its decline include the virtual elimination of the ‘sticky’ wickets of old, and a
tendency among groundsmen to prepare flatter wickets that favoured medium-pace or
fast-medium seam bowling. But in the contemporary game there has been a welcome
revival, as bowlers have developed new techniques (see for example DOOSRA and
SLIDER), and at the time of writing, the two leading wicket-takers at Test level (Shane
Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan) are both exponents of spin. See also WRIST-SPIN,
OFF-SPIN
spinner
spinner n 1. a bowler who specialises in spinning the ball; broadly, any slow bowler:
‘If boundaries were extended, no second new balls were permitted, and outfields were
made less lush, the spinner could come back into his own’ (Frith 1984, p 186).
‘He [Shane Warne] is the most prodigious spinner of the ball of the last three decades,
a gift which causes deceptive in-swing as well as excessive turn’ (Vic Marks, Wisden
1994, p 22).
‘Iqbal struck Panesar back over his head for a six and a four, forcing the spinner to bowl
over the wicket’ (Angus Fraser, Independent 18 July 2006).
2. a ball bowled with spin on it:
‘He got an undeniable spinner past the stubborn bat of the Lancashire man’ (Westmin-
ster Gazette 2 March 1895).
splice
splice n 1. the wedge-shaped bottom end of the handle of the bat, which fits into a
corresponding mortice in the top of the blade.
See BAT
2. —sit on the splice (of a batsman) to play very defensively, presenting a straight bat
to every delivery:
‘Three consecutive balls from Bruce he turned into full tosses and swept to the leg
boundary, and, assisted by Barnes, who had been sitting on the splice in his usual
manner, he raised the total to seventy-one before being yorked’ (P.G. Wodehouse, Mike
and Psmith 1909, ch. 30).
spoon
spoon vb to hit the ball high in the air but without much force, especially as a result of a
mistimed stroke:
‘Shahid, too, in leaden boots, spooned a simple catch to short midwicket against a ball
he never saw’ (Richard Streeton, The Times 23 June 1983).
sporting
sporting adj denotes a wicket, typically one that is hard and dry, that gives considerable
assistance to the faster bowlers and makes it unlikely that the batsmen will ever be in
command:
‘There are, of course, some good wickets left in England, but there are far too many of
this “sporting” variety, and we are now paying the price’ (Peebles 1959, p 199).
square
square adj, adv close to or along an imaginary line extending outwards on either side of
the batsman’s wicket:
‘For Lillee, Hughes took Dyson from the slips and put him at squarish third man’
‘Woolmer … was content to wait for the ball which could be punched square of the
wicket, especially on the offside’ (Norman Harris, Sunday Times 10 July 1983).
쐽 n 1. the imaginary line extending outwards from the batsman’s wicket:
‘The ploy worked nicely, Hughes timing his hook perfectly so that it carried all the way
to Emburey fielding a few yards in from the edge just behind square’ (Brearley 1982, p
93).
2. the closely-mown area in the middle of a cricket ground, on which all the pitches used
for playing matches are laid out:
‘The Oval square is one of the largest in the country. There are 27 pitches altogether, 20
of them for first-class matches’ (Harry Brind, WCM December 1983).
‘Having knuckled down to reach 48 off 151 deliveries, he was put in a cage for the next
21, struggling to get the ball off the square’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Maga-
zine July 2006, p 72).
square cut 174

square cut
square cut n a cut made by bringing a more or less horizontal bat sharply down on a
short-pitched off-side ball at the moment that it passes the batsman, usually sending the
ball slightly backward of square, between point and third man. See CUT n 1:
‘Balls that were short and well outside the off-stump got full-blooded square-cuts, with
Tendulkar getting right on top of the ball, and knocking it down severely to the ground’
square-cut
square-cut vb to hit the ball when playing a square cut:

‘Fraser was devoid of a third man and whenever room was offered outside the off stump
Wessels square-cut to the boundary’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
square drive
square drive n a form of drive, played to a good-length ball pitching just outside off
stump, in which the ball is sent into the area between cover and point. See DRIVE.
square-drive
square-drive vb to hit the ball when playing a square drive:

‘After lunch Viswanath displayed the only commanding strokeplay of the entire match
when he twice drove Willis for four and square-drove a three in the same over’ (Berry
1982, p 60).
square leg
square leg n a leg-side fielding position (or the player occupying it) roughly in a line
with the batsman’s wicket and usually close enough in to save the single; if closer to the
boundary it becomes deep square leg. It is one of the ‘standard’ positions shown in all
the early 19th-century cricket manuals, but is used rather less often in the modern game.
square-leg umpire
square-leg umpire n the umpire who usually stands in a position equivalent to that of
a shortish square leg: See UMPIRE
squat
squat vb to fail to rise significantly after pitching; keep low:

‘With some deliveries squatting and others lifting it was clear that survival would be
difficult’ (Paul Fitzpatrick, Guardian 3 August 1983).
squatter
squatter n a ball that keeps low after pitching; a shooter

squirt
squirt vb to propel the ball along the ground, typically by deflecting it off an angled bat
into the area behind square:
‘There had not been enough bounce to justify having a short square-leg with the old ball;
better, we agreed, to stop him squirting a single out on the leg-side’ (Brearley 1982, p
88).
‘He had got to 365 with a cover drive off Caddick to the boundary. Not for him the
nervous squirting of the ball into the gaps for runs which could, in theory, be made more
safely’ (R. Mohan, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
sr
sr abbr STRIKE RATE

st
st abbr STUMPED: used in the scorebook, following the name of a batsman and preceding
the name of the wicket-keeper, to indicate the manner of the batsman’s dismissal and the
player responsible for it. In earlier times dismissals by stumping were usually credited to
the wicket-keeper alone, but since the early 19th century it has been usual to mention the
bowler as well (thus ‘st Dhoni b Harbhajan’). See STUMPED.
Staffordshire cut
Staffordshire cut n a CHINESE CUT

stance
stance n the position adopted by the batsman as he stands at the wicket to receive the ball:
‘That incident ended a promising partnership between Vengsarkar and the in-form
Amarnath who, from an unclassical square-on stance, plays most of the strokes with
vigour and courage’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 16 June 1983).
‘Striking the ball fluently from a stance that is essentially upright, Trescothick drives
firmly off either foot, and cuts and pulls with panache’ (S. Dinakar, Sportstar [Chennai],
2 February 2002).
stand
stand n a period in which two batsmen are batting together, considered in terms of the
runs that are scored while they are at the wicket; ‘stand’ is used interchangeably with
‘partnership’, but perhaps carries an added suggestion of defiance in adverse
circumstances (think of Custer’s last stand), and so is often used to describe partnerships
involving late-order batsmen:
175 sticker
‘The Baptiste-Holding stand for the ninth wicket was worth 150’ (David Frith, WCM
August 1984).
‘Mohinder Amarnath, for long considered India’s best – or at least bravest – batsman
against genuine pace, puts together a stand with Yashpal Sharma’ (Bhattacharya 2006,
p 87).
쐽 vb (of an umpire) to officiate in a match:
‘After “standing” in a match at Beersheva I gave a 90-minute lecture in a school in the
middle of the Negev desert’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 20).
‘Though ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed was at pains to confirm that “I hope we can
find a way in which Darrell Hair can continue to umpire at international level”, the
chances of the burly Australian standing on the world stage again must be remote’ (Vic
Marks, Observer 27 August 2006).
stand out
stand out vb to act as a fieldsman; field (obsolete):

‘No substitute shall in any case be allowed to stand out or run between wickets for
another person without the consent of the opposite party’ (Laws 1854).
stand up
stand up vb (of the wicket-keeper) to take up a position immediately behind the stumps,
typically for a slow bowler, rather than several yards back from the wicket:
‘One of the most thrilling sights in cricket is the wicket-keeper standing up to a fast-
medium bowler and bringing off a stumping’ (Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 194).
star
star n a batsman’s innings completed without the batsman being dismissed, so called
because an asterisk (or ‘star’) is used in the scorebook to indicate a not-out score.
See also ASTERISK
쐽 vb to offer a potential catch to the fielding side (obsolete):
‘Hollins … proceeded to give chance after chance that was not accepted. He starred 7
before being finely caught and bowled for 28’ (Headlam 1903, p 157).
steeple
steeple vb (of the ball) to rise to a considerable height at an unusually steep angle, often
because of unevenness in the wicket:
‘John … was a consistent danger. So was the inconsistent bounce. Rumesh Ratnayeke
had one steepling from a length and Wright’s nose was broken’ (Dick Brittenden, Crick-
eter May 1983).
steepler
steepler n a ball that ‘steeples’, either off the pitch or off the striker’s bat:
‘Catching nearer the wicket is all over in a moment and there is no time to think, except
in the case of a steepler near the wicket’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 60).
‘At Lord’s, Monty was still living down that infamous moment when he had shaped to
take a steepler off Mahendra Singh Dhoni, and instead had watched the ball plop to
earth a full four feet to his right’ (Andrew Miller, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 84).
steer
steer vb to deflect the ball off the face of the bat so that it travels close to or along the
ground, usually into the area behind square; the word suggests careful placing and
minimal use of force:
‘From the opening ball of the match from McCague, a long, wide half-volley that Slater
steered to the third-man boundary, the Australians were able to defend their wickets
secure in the knowledge that at least one hittable ball would come their way every over’
stick
stick vb (of a possible catch) to be successfully held by a fielder:

‘If these two catches had stuck Australia would have been 32 for three’ (Henry Blofeld,
Guardian 10 December 1983).
쐽 n a stump, specifically one of the stumps making up the batsman’s wicket:
‘In these particular games [the Bodyline Tests] it is noticeable that our bowlers have hit
the sticks so often’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933).
‘Curtly Ambrose, apparently distressed by the lack of fighting spirit in his side, smashed
down the two remaining stumps after his leg stick was removed by Chris Lewis’ (Ted
Corbett, Sportstar [Chennai] 30 April 1994).
sticker
sticker n a cautious defensive batsman whose main objective is to stay at the crease rather
than to score runs (old ):
sticky 176
‘Sometimes, when the ground is very bad, it is good to have a sticker, but taken alto-
gether cricket would be very much better off if the whole race of stickers occasionally
adopted a somewhat freer style’ (Badminton 1888, p 200).
sticky
sticky adj denoting the type of wicket that is produced when the ground is drying out in
warm sunshine after a heavy downpour. The soft, glutinous quality of the pitch provides
ideal conditions for the slower bowlers because the ball can really ‘bite’ the turf and will
often turn quite alarmingly, making batting a nightmare. With the added attraction of
variable bounce, the ‘sticky’ wicket is ‘liable to bring about the ignominious downfall of
the most powerful side imaginable’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 88). In such circumstances,
batsmen were advised to ‘throw careful play to the winds, and hit, pull, and slog in every
direction’ (Badminton 1888, p 152). But modern regulations on the covering of pitches
(See COVER) have to all intents and purposes eliminated the sticky wicket from
contemporary cricket – a situation which, though no doubt agreeable to batsmen, has
taken away one of the traditional features of the game, especially the English and
Australian game.
sticky dog
sticky dog n a ‘sticky’ wicket (old):

‘We did not like the look of the sky with the possibility of having to get over 100 against
O’Reilly and Ironmonger on a sticky dog in the fourth innings’ (Larwood 1933, p 146).
stock ball
stock ball n the most-frequently used type of delivery in bowler’s repertoire, as opposed
to other types of ball that are occasionally bowled as a variation to take the batsman by
surprise:
‘Lillee and Alderman … both swing their stock ball away, but can bowl an inswinger’
‘The other three had the leg-break as a stock ball with the hard-to-pick googly as a lethal
wicket-taker’ (Frith 1984, p 65).
‘As a general rule, the more the ball does, the quicker the slow bowler’s stock ball can
be, and the less need for variation in speed’ (Mike Brearley, Observer 30 July 2006).
stock bowler
stock bowler n a bowler whose primary function is to bowl accurately and defensively
for long spells in order to restrict the opposition’s scoring opportunities, rather than to
take wickets:
‘Gibbs toiled away predominantly as a stock bowler through series after series … tying
batsmen down for hours without necessarily reaping great harvests’ (Frith 1984, p 162).
‘If ever his control is threatened, he [Warne] can regroup by bowling around the wicket
to the right-handed batsman, thereby restricting him to just one scoring stroke, a risky
sweep. Hence in the Ashes series his captain, Border, was able to use him as both shock
and stock bowler’ (Vic Marks, Wisden 1994, p 22).
Compare STRIKE BOWLER
stonewall
stonewall vb to bat extremely defensively, with the intention of remaining at the crease
rather than scoring runs:
‘Australia had England on the ropes at 8—76 … but some determined stonewalling by
English bat Wilkie, who scored only 5 runs in eighty-six minutes, saved the tourists’
stonewaller
stonewaller n a player who ‘stonewalls’; a totally defensive batsman:

‘The stonewallers of our cricket fields have a great deal to answer for in the heavy indict-
ment against modern players of leaving so many unfinished matches’ (Badminton 1888,
p 199).
stop
stop n = LONG STOP (obsolete):

‘In laying out your field, you should be careful in selecting good men for your principal
places, such as wicket-keeper, point, stop, short-slip’ (Clarke 1851 in HM, p 160).
쐽 vb 1. to field as long stop (obsolete):
‘No substitute in the field shall be allowed to bowl, keep wicket, stand at the point or
middle wicket, or stop behind to a fast bowler, unless by consent of the opposite party’
(Laws 1830).
2. to block the ball defensively:
177 strike
‘I would strongly recommend the young batsman to turn his whole attention to stopping:
for, by acting this part well, he becomes a serious antagonist to the bowler’ (Nyren 1833
in HM, p 22).
3. —stop and look at you to rise quite steeply off the wicket with a significant loss of
pace, often as a result of back spin:
‘Both Briggs and Jack Hearne, when helped by the wicket, are very skilful at making
balls of apparently similar flights either “stop and look at you” or whip along like light-
ning’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 81).
stopper
stopper n a fielder, especially one stationed behind the wicket-keeper (obsolete):

‘When the Ball has been in Hand by one of the Keepers, or Stoppers, and the Player has
been at Home, he may go where he pleases till the next Ball is bowled’ (Laws 1744).
straight
straight adj, adv close to an imaginary line separating the off and leg sides of the pitch in
front of the batsman; the term is used in describing fielding positions in front of the
wicket, such as long-on or mid-off, but can also denote a ‘correct’ style of batting (see
STRAIGHT BAT) or a ball hit by the batsman that goes back past the bowler or over his
head:
‘The pace of the pitch is indicated by the setting of the field. If it is fast, mid-on, mid-off
and cover-point will be set straighter than usual; if slow, they will be more square’
(Arlott 1983, p 21).
‘His 150, reached in 333 minutes, included a delightful straight six off Matthews’ (Ian
Brayshaw, The Times 27 December 1983).
‘The only batsman who exuded any sense of security was Kevin Pietersen, … who played
irreproachably straight without sacrificing any of his attacking instincts’ (Haigh 2005,
p 37).
straight-arm
straight-arm adj, adv using a bowling action in which the arm remains unbent at the
moment of delivery; roundarm or overarm (obsolete):
‘The straight-arm bowling, introduced by John Willes, Esq., was generally practised in
the game’ (Box 1868, p 73).
straight bat
straight bat n a bat held in a perpendicular position so that, in the execution of a stroke,
it moves straight down the ball’s line of flight rather than across it; this ensures that the
maximum possible area of the bat’s surface is presented to the ball:
‘The fundamental principle of good safe batting is playing with a straight bat’
Compare CROSS BAT
straight drive
straight drive n a form of drive, played to a good-length ball pitching around middle or
off stump, by which the ball is sent back down the pitch (or over the bowler’s head) into
the area directly behind the bowler’s wicket. See illustration on next page and DRIVE:
‘Truly, the straight drive is the most satisfying of cricket strokes because it is executed
with the full blade that placates scientists and the flourish that impresses artists’ (Peter
Roebuck, The Age (Melbourne) 17 December 2005).
straight-drive
straight-drive vb to hit the ball when playing a straight drive:

‘Before he was eventually out for 99, straight-driving back to McMillan, Atherton might
have been out twice on that score’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
streaky
streaky adj (of a batting stroke) making the ball glance dangerously off the edge of the
bat into the area behind the wicket:
‘Almost every batsman I have seen play this strange attack has made one or more streaky
strokes through these leg-side fieldsmen’ (James 1963, p 207).
‘Viswanath cut a straight ball past second slip for four, off the meat too and along the
ground, not streaky at all’ (Berry 1982, p 103).
strike
strike n 1. the position of being the batsman who is actually facing the bowling; in British
usage, the facing batsman is said – somewhat confusingly for the uninitiated – to be on
strike, but elsewhere the usual term is in strike:
strike bowler 178
‘Once into his eighties, he proceeded quietly, with Randall (of all people) telling him to
keep concentrating and pinching most of the strike’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 22 January
1984).
‘Such was Lara’s superiority and feeling of confidence that he thought it necessary to
keep the strike at all times’ (Paul Allott, Cricketer May 1994).
‘Yuvraj got strike after the first delivery, edged a four off the second, and spanked
another off the third’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July 2006, p 83).
2. —take first strike to be the team that bats first:
‘In the first [Test] they lost the toss and were required to take first strike’ (Manley 1988,
p223).
See also FARM, ROTATE
strike bowler
strike bowler n a ‘frontline’ bowler who bowls in fairly short spells to an attacking field,
especially with the new ball or to a new batsman, and whose primary function is to take
wickets rather than to restrict scoring opportunities:
‘The emergence within a few days of Frank Tyson as a magnificent strike bowler and his
partnership with Brian Statham transformed England’ (John Arlott, WCM September
1984).
‘His bowling had gone from useful-third-seamer to firecracker strike bowler’ (Simon
Barnes, Wisden 2006, p 171).
Compare STOCK BOWLER
striker
striker n 1. the batsman who is facing the bowling, as distinguished from the batsman at
the bowler’s end (the ‘non-striker’); the batsman who is ‘on strike’:
‘When the ball is hit in front of the wicket the striker calls’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 200).
2. either of the two batsmen at the wicket (obsolete):
‘When the Ball is hit up, either of the Strikers may hinder the catch in his running
Ground’ (Laws 1744).
strike rate
strike rate, striking rate n 1. a measure of the average rate at which a bowler or bowling
attack takes wickets:
‘He [Ambrose] has been the backbone of the West Indian attack for more than five years
and … he has maintained a remarkable strike rate’ (Australian Cricket October 1993).
179 strokeplay
‘His Test total of 242 wickets placed him next to Bedi, his striking rate of 4.17 per Test
being best of them all’ (Frith 1984, p 174).
‘Warne’s world-record 651 wickets from 133 Tests have come at a strike rate of 57.43’
(Malcolm Conn, The Age (Melbourne), 24–25 December 2005).
The strike rate for bowlers can be calculated by dividing the number of wickets taken
by the number of games played (as in the last example above), but is more often shown
in terms of wickets taken per 100 balls bowled.
2. a measure of the average rate at which a batsman or batting side scores runs:
‘When lunch came the West Indies were 130 for 1 off 14 eight-ball overs, an incredible
strike rate’ (Manley 1988, p233).
The strike rate for batsmen can be calculated in various ways, the most usual of which
is to divide the number of runs scored by the number of balls faced, then multiply by
100; thus a strike rate of exactly 100 means a batsman has scored, on average, one run
for every ball faced.
strip
strip n the area between the two sets of stumps, especially when considered in terms of its
qualities as a playing surface; the wicket:
‘Selected on the merits of an end of season spurt, Wayne Holdsworth never came to grips
with the slower, more placid English strips’ (Peter Hook, Australian Cricket October
1993).
stroke
stroke n 1. an act of hitting the ball, especially when the emphasis is on the way the ball
is played rather than on the outcome; by contrast with SHOT (qv), which makes no
comment on the orthodoxy (or otherwise) of the way the ball is hit, the word ‘stroke’
suggests a gracefully executed, well-timed hit in which maximum effect is achieved by
minimum force:
‘Wazir, like Nayadu, was a powerful right-hand bat who could play some very elegant
strokes, including a charming cover-drive’ (Bose 1990, p 76).
‘What was unusual, even unique, about Viswanath was the ridiculous ease with which
he used to execute the late-cut, intoxicatingly beautiful and the most difficult of all
strokes’ (Haresh Pandya, Illustrated Weekly of India 20 April 1991).
2. a run; a notch marked on the scorer’s stick to indicate that a run has been scored
(obsolete):
‘On Tues., May 22, on Blackheath, London beat Greenwich by 15 strokes; London went
in first and got 112 strokes the first hands’ (Whitehall Evening Post 26 May 1733).
쐽 vb to score runs by playing the ball with good timing and footwork, and with a graceful
swing of the bat:
‘When the New Zealanders took the new ball on Thursday, Randall stroked four extraor-
dinary boundaries in the first two overs’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 28 August 1983).
‘Left-hander Sanath Jayasuriya, maker of two double-centuries against Pakistan “A”,
stroked an impressive 70-ball 66’ (David Frith, WCM October 1991).
strokeful
strokeful adj India (of a batsman’s innings) full of well-executed strokes:

‘A century by Ajay Mehra and a strokeful 95 by Vikram Rathore made it a one-sided
contest’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai] 23 July 1994).
‘In the Australian innings, there was Dean Jones’ strokeful ninety; in the Indian chase,
there was Azhar’s sizzling ninety-three’ (Purandare 2005, p 134).
strokeless
strokeless adj unable to play scoring strokes freely, especially because the bowling gives
no opportunity to do so safely:
‘For the first two hours of his innings he was virtually strokeless against Garner and
Botham’ (Vic Marks, Cricketer December 1982).
‘Only one run came in the last nine overs, with Warne … bowling a strokeless Gary
Kirsten with a vicious legspinner’ (WCM March 1994).
strokeplay
strokeplay n batting characterised by skilful, well-timed, and often graceful hitting (See
STROKE):
‘At times the attack was directed at the leg stump, with as many as six fielders to the on
side, which was not conducive to free stroke-play’ (Peebles 1959, p 78).
stroke sheet 180

‘Those who stayed away missed some elegant strokeplay of old-fashioned correctitude’
(David Frith WCM October 1984).
‘His recent Test innings have been diffident affairs, with sporadic explosions of stroke-
play the only reminder of a batsman who imposed his will on bowlers for the best part
of a decade’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 37).
stroke sheet
stroke sheet n a WAGON WHEEL

stump
stump n one of the three upright wooden rods which, with the two bails laid across their
tops, form one of the two wickets used in a game of cricket:
‘“A good ball, Mr Trueman” they would say when their stumps went cartwheeling.
“Aye” he would reply, “And it were bloody wasted on thee”’ (cited by Stephen Chalke,
쐽 vb (of the wicket-keeper) to dismiss the striker by putting down his wicket if he is out
of his ground when receiving a ball from the bowler:
‘If the Striker should move off his ground … the Wicket-Keeper will then do his best, and
endeavour to put down the wicket, which is called stumping out’ (Lambert 1816, p 38).
‘First ball after lunch, exit Mohammad Yousuf, beautifully stumped, after the third
umpire had been consulted’ (Kevin Mitchell, Observer 30 July 2006).
No part of the wicket-keeper’s body should be in front of the wicket as the ball is taken,
unless the ball has already touched the batsman’s bat or body. If any other fielder is
involved, or if the batsman is out of his ground because he is attempting a run, the
dismissal counts as a run-out rather than a stumping. Stumping seems to have been a
feature of cricket since the very early days of the game and it is one of the modes of
dismissal listed in the 1744 code (though stumpings were not credited to the bowler
until around 1835): ‘If in striking, both his Feet are over the Popping-Crease, and his
Wicket put down, except his Bat is down within, it’s out’. On the decline of stumping
in the modern game, see STUMPER.
stumped
stumped adv a mode of dismissal in which the batsman is given out if the wicket-keeper
stumps him (See STUMP). The dismissal is credited to the bowler and is entered in the
scorebook as ‘st wicket-keeper b bowler’. A batsman cannot be out stumped off a no-
ball.
stumper
stumper n a wicket-keeper:
‘I had almost forgot, they deserve a large bumper; Little George the long-stop, and Tom
Sueter, the stumper’ (Rev R. Cotton, ‘Hambledon Song’ 1778 in HM, p 52).
The word ‘stumper’ has been used interchangeably with wicket-keeper since the 18th
century, but nowadays sounds old-fashioned. Its decline as a word is no accident: it
reflects the decline of stumping itself as a feature of the wicket-keeper’s job. The slow
Benson and Hedges

semi-final,
Chelmsford 2002
Essex v Worcester
Irani stumped Rhodes
© Patrick Eagar
181 surface
bowler, once an indispensable member of any attack, has seen his position somewhat
eroded, so opportunities for stumping have been reduced. The effects are illustrated by
the contrasting achievements of two of the great modern wicket-keepers: Les Ames,
one of the leading English ‘stumpers’ in the inter-war period, ended his career with a
total of 1121 dismissals, made up of 703 catches and 418 stumpings. In striking
contrast, Australia’s Rodney Marsh, one of the game’s most successful wicket-keepers
at international level, ended his Test career in 1984 with a record total of 355 dismissals
– but only 12 of them were stumpings.
stumping
stumping n an instance of a batsman being stumped:

‘There were five stumpings in the innings, four of them off Hirwani’ (Bose 1990, p 366).
stumps
stumps n the time when stumps are drawn; close of play:

‘His dismissal — for 59 — ten minutes before the close brought Australia back almost to
even terms with the score 191–4 at stumps’ (Brearley 1982, p 28).
‘The captain’s methodical half-century was ended in sight of stumps by his rival:
Ponting’s fifth Test wicket, and probably his best’ (Haigh 2005, p 145).
sub
sub abbr, n a substitute:

‘Akram, the sub, held Marks off the fourth chance’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 25
March 1984).
The abbreviation is used in the scorebook when recording a catch made by a substitute
fielder, who is never mentioned by name (thus ‘c sub b Lillee’).
쐽 vb to field as a substitute:
‘Subbing for Broad on the long-leg boundary, he clung on left-handed to Marshall’s
hook … but teetered over the rope’ (Scyld Berry, WCM August 1984).
submarine
submarine vb (of the ball ) to beat the batsman by keeping very low and passing
underneath his bat:
‘Botham later paid the penalty for trying, submarined by an offbreak that almost
bounced a second time before it bowled him’ (John Thicknesse, Cricketer August 1983).
substitute
substitute n a player who takes the field in place of another who, in the course of the
game, has left the field owing to illness, injury, or (more controversially) for no obvious
reason:
‘Pratt’s moment came in the Trent Bridge Test when, late on the Saturday – acting as a
substitute for the injured Simon Jones – he ran out Ponting with a superb pick-up and
throw from cover’ (Stephen Moss, Wisden 2006, p 114).
The earliest (1744) code of Laws specifically ruled out the possibility of substitutes,
with a clause to the effect that umpires ‘are not to allow a fresh Man to play, on either
Side, on any Account’. The revised code of 1774 makes no mention of this rule and in
1798 there is a new regulation stating that if a player is hurt ‘some other Person may
be allowed to stand out for him, but not go in’. So far, there are no restrictions on the
substitute’s freedom of movement, but twenty or so years later a new clause outlined a
number of limitations on the position of a substitute fielder: not only could he not bowl,
but he was not to keep wicket or field at point, cover point, or long stop. This was later
modified (1854) by a general rule that effectively gave the opposing captain a veto over
where a substitute could field. The 1947 code gave opposing captains the right to
‘indicate positions in which the substitute shall not field’, and this regulation applied
until the 1980 revision. In that version, the opposing captain had the right only to object
to the substitute playing as wicket-keeper. The current ruling, explicitly banning the
substitute from keeping wicket, became part of the Laws in 1992, after being
introduced experimentally three years earlier.
sundries
sundries n Australia = EXTRAS

surface
surface n the pitch between the two sets of stumps, considered in terms of the way it
affects the behaviour of the ball:
‘Both found that their strokeplay benefited from the extra pace and bounce in the pitch
that had been missing on the slower surfaces of the previous Tests’ (Mike Selvey,
sweater 182
sweater
sweater n —take one’s sweater (of a bowler) to conclude a spell of bowling; a bowler
will often give his sweater to the umpire while he is bowling and take it back again at the
end of a spell:
‘When Hadlee took his sweater … Rice began with a wide to symbolise his rare appear-
ance in the attack nowadays’ (Scyld Berry, Observer 9 September 1984).
sweep
sweep n a batting stroke in which the ball is hit into the area between square leg and long
leg with a long sweeping movement of a horizontal bat, the bottom edge almost brushing
the ground. It is typically played to a slower ball pitching around middle or leg stump,
and is executed by advancing the front foot down the wicket and bending the other leg
so as to assume a half-kneeling position:
‘He stretched his left foot down the wicket and, with a sweep that seemed to begin from
first-slip and encompassed the whole horizon, smashed the ball hard and low to square-
leg’ (James 1963, p 91).
See also REVERSE SWEEP, SLOG-SWEEP
쐽 vb to hit the ball when playing a sweep:
‘Dujon reached his first hundred against England (234 minutes) with a swept four off
Cook’ (John Thicknesse, WCM September 1984).
sweeper
sweeper n a deep fielder who patrols a large area close to the boundary, in the region
either of cover or of mid-wicket; the term borrowed from the vocabulary of soccer, in
which a sweeper is a player who ‘sweeps’ the whole area behind the backs as an extra
line of defence:
‘Lewis assiduously adjusted his field, brought in the leg-side sweeper to save one, then
inexplicably dropped the next ball short’ (Alan Lee, The Times 19 April 1994).
‘Rather like Allan Border at the Gabba nineteen years ago when he made room for
Botham’s last Ashes hundred, Ponting eschewed catchers, posted sweepers, and seemed
happy simply to quell a riot’ (Haigh 2005, p 145).
swerve
swerve n movement of the ball in the air; swing (old):

183 swing
‘Hassett’s gamble was enforced on him by a dread of Bedser and the new ball on a moist
wicket in an atmosphere likely to help swerve’ (Cardus 1978, p 206).
쐽 vb (of the ball) to move in the air; swing:
‘I was then bowling to a four slips field, as I invariably do while the ball is shiny and
likely to swerve away’ (Larwood 1933, p 97).
swerver
swerver n 1. a ball that moves in the air; an inswinger or outswinger (old):

‘When about to bowl the swerver the seam of the ball is held vertical, two fingers on each
side of it on the top, and the thumb directly underneath’ (Warner 1934, p 63).
2. a bowler who makes the ball swerve; a swing bowler:
‘Nowadays every cricket eleven has its “swerver” … and almost excessive care is taken
to keep the newness and shine on the ball as long as possible in order that he may have
every chance’ (Warner 1934, p 60).
swing
swing n lateral movement of the ball while in flight resulting in a curving rather than
straight trajectory, or the technique of imparting such movement to the ball:
‘This time Willis, Cowans and Dilley found that speed and bounce were less important
than swing and cut’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
‘Hoggard at once began to obtain a degree of orthodox swing comparable with that
obtained in reverse by Flintoff’ (Haigh 2005, p 146).
‘He ran in hard, generated some pace, found some swing, rediscovered his yorker, and
dismissed Shivnarine Chanderpaul’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine July
2006, p 80).
쐽 vb 1. (of the bowler) to make the ball deviate laterally while in flight; move the ball in
the air:
swing 184
‘He swung the ball out and in late enough for it not to be clear whether the movement
was in the air or off the pitch’ (Brearley 1982, p 150).
2. (of the ball ) to curve while in flight; move in the air:
‘The match was played in sweltering conditions, which throughout encouraged the ball
to swing whatever its age and condition’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
‘One ball was shaped across his bows, swinging away towards the waiting slips and past
a groping blade’ (Mike Selvey, Cricinfo Magazine January 2006, p 78).
Swing occurs as a result of uneven distribution of pressure on the two sides of the ball
as it passes through the air. It can be achieved by holding the ball with the seam
‘canted’ in the direction towards which the bowler intends the ball to swing – that is,
towards first slip for outswing or fine leg for inswing. The angled seam produces
turbulence on one side of the ball only, and the greater the resulting pressure difference,
the more marked will be the degree of swing.
The phenomenon of swing may have been dimly recognised back in the days of
underarm bowling: it was said of the Hambledon bowler Noah Mann that ‘his merit
consisted in giving a curve to the ball the whole way’ (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 62). But
it was not until the late 19th century that swing began to be talked of as a significant
new development in the art of bowling. Both the Badminton book (1888) and
Ranjitsinhji’s Jubilee Book (1897) devote considerable space to the apparent novelty
of bowlers getting the ball to ‘curl in the air’, and both books acknowledge the
influence of baseball (whose pitchers routinely strive for the ‘curve ball’) on the
development of swing in cricket. Ranjitsinhji, for example, mentions a Philadelphian
bowler (probably J. B. King) who had completely baffled the Australian XI on its
recent US tour: ‘He is an excellent baseball player, and is said to have learnt to apply
the methods of that game to cricket’. At any rate, Ranjitsinhji concludes that ‘when
cricketers learn to command this curl in addition to their other devices, batting will
become more difficult than ever’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 108).
Swing quickly became assimilated into the repertoire of the game, though relatively
few bowlers can be said to have learned to ‘command’ it. While it is true that ‘given
certain conditions, almost every bowler … can make the ball swerve’ (MCC 1952, p
35), the ability to do so with complete control has generally proved elusive – which is
hardly surprising when one considers the complex physics of swing. The conventional
wisdom is that certain conditions are particularly favourable to swing, notably a newish
ball (because the seam on a new ball is more prominent and so acts as a rudder), a wind
from the right quarter, and a damp, overcast atmosphere. The importance of the
protruding seam, which has been verified in wind tunnel experiments, helps explain the
efforts made by some bowlers to raise the seam on older balls (See BALL-TAMPERING).
But scientific research does not altogether bear out traditional ideas about the influence
of weather conditions. A paper in Nature (R. D. Mehta et al, ‘Factors affecting cricket
ball swing’, Nature 303, 30 June 1983) shows that the degree of swing is a function of
several variables, especially the angle of the seam, the speed of the ball, and the ball’s
rate of spin. Thus ‘at a bowling speed of ~30ms-1 (70 mph or 110kph) maximum swing
is obtained at a seam angle of 20° and a spin rate of 11.4 rev s-1. However, at lower
speeds … and at lower seam angles … it is better to have a higher spin rate of about 14
rev s-1’. Complete control over swing depends on getting all these variables right –
which is obviously quite a tall order. Bowlers have traditionally relied on their instincts
and experience, but some lessons can be learned from the relevant physics. For
example, a low seam angle (say 10°) may have the undesirable effect of making the ball
swing too early, and the lower the speed of the ball, the higher the seam angle needs to
be in order to avoid this. The research tends to confirm that genuinely fast bowling does
not usually to produce much swing, though this finding is at odds with the way a ball
can behave as a result of the less orthodox ‘reverse swing’. Interestingly, however,
Mehta’s experiments do not support ‘the popular view that swing increases in damp
and humid conditions’. The only explanation the authors can offer for the apparent link
between swing and humidity is that ‘the varnish painted on new balls reacts with
moisture to produce a rather tacky surface’ – which in turn improves the bowler’s grip
185 swinger
and so produces more spin. ‘So perhaps without actually realising it, the bowler just
imparts more spin on a damp or humid day’. Finally, pressure differences between the
ball’s two hemispheres can also be affected by their differing degrees of roughness and
heaviness, and bowlers have found ways of influencing these factors, too.
See also OUTSWING, INSWING, REVERSE SWING
swinger
swinger n a ball that moves in the air; an inswinger or outswinger:

‘You could see that Botham didn’t want to get out to Coney’s gentle swingers’ (Peter
Roebuck, Cricketer November 1983).
T
tail
tail n the lower end of a side’s batting order, usually consisting of players who are in the
team primarily for their bowling skills and are not expected to contribute significantly to
the team’s score; a tail may be ‘long’ or ‘short’, depending on the number of weaker
batsmen; if the late-order batsmen unexpectedly make a lot of runs, the tail is said to
‘wag’:
‘The English tail again wagged strongly and it was not until 3 o’clock that the last wicket
fell’ (Melbourne Argus 19 January 1933).
‘Nor did England’s tail dither: 114 runs came in 133 deliveries, including the ninth and
tenth sixes of the innings from Harmison and Jones’ (Haigh 2005, p 67).
tailender
tailender n a late-order batsman; a member of the ‘tail’:

‘The Indians scored at one run a minute. To cap it all, the tail-enders Kumble and
Chauhan both clouted sixes off the tiring Emburey’ (Marqusee 1994, p 242).
talent money
talent money n a bonus formerly paid by some clubs to a professional player who had
made a particularly valuable contribution in a match:
‘There is also a possibility for a man to earn what is called his “talent money”, viz. 1 l.
extra by making fifty runs or over’ (Badminton 1888, p 103).
Unlike the modern ‘man of the match’ awards, which acknowledge an outstanding
personal performance, talent money was dispensed automatically according to a scale
of values fixed by each club; so, for example, some clubs would award £1 for every 50
runs scored or every five wickets taken.
tape ball
tape ball n 1. a tennis ball wrapped in coloured sticky tape, used instead of a regular
cricket ball in some informal cricket games
2. a type of cricket played with a tape ball
Tape-ball cricket is played in parks and on the street, especially by children. Though
increasingly popular in many parts of the world, it is played most widely in the Indian
subcontinent, and especially in Pakistan, where tape-ball tournaments are regularly
organised. The tape makes the ball heavier than a tennis ball, but not as hard or heavy
as a standard cricket ball. This makes it more suitable for improvised games, reducing
the risk of danger to players, passers-by, and property.
tapetto
tapetto n Corfu lit ‘mat’ or ‘carpet’: the pitch, so called because cricket in Corfu is mostly
played on matting. Like many Corfiot cricket terms it shows the strong Italian influence
on the local language, dating from the period before Corfu became a British protectorate
in 1815.
TCCB
TCCB abbr the Test and County Cricket Board: the body that administered cricket in
England at first-class level until 1997, when its responsibilities were taken over by the
newly-formed ECB
telegraph
telegraph, telegraph board n a scoreboard (obsolete):

‘The telegraph is generally about ten feet in height and the upper portion, or face, is
provided with grooves into which iron plates of about a foot square are inserted’ (Box
1868, p 138).
‘Half-past six chimed, and two hundred and fifty went up on the telegraph board’
(P.G.Wodehouse, Mike 1909).
187 thick-edge
Etymologically, the word means ‘writing that can be read at a distance’, but it was not
applied to a cricket scoreboard until long after the invention of the ‘electrical telegraph’
which sent messages along a wire.
television umpire
television umpire, tele-ump n the THIRD UMPIRE (qv), which is now the more usual
term:
‘Wherever facilities make it possible there will also be a “television umpire”, who will
come from the ranks of the host country’s umpires’ (Chas Keys, Australian Cricket
October 1993).
‘Later Graham Thorpe … pushed de Villiers to mid-on, from where Peter Kirsten defied
his 39 years to throw down the bowler’s stumps while off-balance, the tele-ump clari-
fying the decision’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 26 August 1994).
ten-for
ten-for n a bowler’s haul of ten or more wickets in a game (slang):

‘It was the steadily maturing galumpher, Andre Nel, who hissed, glared, and bowled his
way to a career-best ten for 88 – his maiden ten-for in first-class cricket’ (Telford Vice,
Wisden 2006, p 1113).
See also FIVE-FOR
Test
Test n (also Test match) one of a series of international cricket matches, typically lasting
five days, played between representative teams from any two of the ten countries
enjoying full membership of the ICC (qv):
‘Zimbabwe even entertained hopes of becoming the first country to win their maiden Test
since Australia in 1876—77 when John Traicos … claimed three wickets to reduce India
to 101 for five’ (Terry Yates-Round, Wisden 1994, p 1234).
쐽 adj of or relating to a Test match or Test matches:
‘No other pronouncement of the attainment of new nationhood could have been more
emphatic than South Africa’s return to Test cricket in England … at Lord’s’ (Richard
‘The painful lesson in the end, at Lord’s as at Edgbaston, was that England remain
desperately short of Test class bowlers’ (Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer August
1984).
The first firm reference to cricket being played outside England dates back to 1676,
when Henry Tonge describes in his diary a game of ‘krickett’ being played outside
Aleppo (now in Syria) by members of the British mission there. True international
cricket began when an English team – not fully representative, but a strong side
nevertheless – made a tour of Canada and the United States in 1859, organised by Fred
Lillywhite. Two years later another English party toured Australia, and opened the
proceedings by defeating XVIII of Victoria by an innings. But the first match involving
genuinely representative national sides meeting on even terms was played between
Australia (officially a ‘Grand Combined Melbourne and Sydney Eleven’) and an
England touring team at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 15th – 19th March 1877.
The Australian side won by 45 runs. This game is now generally accepted as the first
ever Test match, even though the term itself – which simply indicates that the series of
games is regarded as a ‘test’ of the relative strength of the two sides – did not begin to
be used until about ten years later. The first women’s Test, also between England and
Australia, was played in Brisbane in December 1934, and ended in an emphatic victory
for England.
Test match length
Test match length n a fast bowler’s ‘length’ (the point at which he makes the ball pitch)
that is slightly shorter than a standard ‘good length’, so that the ball has to travel a little
further to reach the batsman after pitching, giving more time for any extra movement or
bounce to take effect:
‘His natural length is what is known professionally as a “Test match length”, which is
probably too short for county batsmen, with the ball doing too much’ (Nick Cook, WCM
March 1994).
thick-edge
thick-edge vb to hit the ball, either deliberately or accidentally, so that it makes fairly
good contact with the edge of the bat (rather than being finely ‘snicked’), and is therefore
deflected at a considerable angle:
thin-edge 188
‘I remember one over from Willis in which Wood thick-edged him between third slip and
gully to the boundary’ (Brearley 1982, p 61).
thin-edge
thin-edge vb to fail to hit the ball with the face of the bat, making only slight contact with
the edge of the bat so that the ball is deflected only slightly; snick:
‘Lawrence forced the next breakthrough, Tillekeratne thin-edging onto his pad for a
simple catch’ (David Frith, WCM October 1991).
think out
think out vb to bring about the dismissal of a batsman by some form of cunning or
deception:
‘Coney thought out Lamb with a perfect inswinger in the second innings’ (Christopher
Martin-Jenkins, Cricketer September 1983).
‘Worrell … had always been an intelligent medium-paced left-hand bowler who could
tie down an end until he thought a batsman out’ (Manley 1988, p 153).
third man
third man, (also formerly third man up) n a relatively deep off-side fielding position (or
the player occupying it) behind the batsman’s wicket and covering the slips and gully:
See FIELDING POSITIONS. The term third man originally denoted a position much closer
to the wicket. It first appears in the mid-19th century to describe a position that was
beginning to be used more often (with the spread of overarm bowling and the
development of the ‘off-theory’ attack) to supplement the more established close off-side
fielding positions of point and short-slip. The new fieldsman was thus the third man up:
‘The advantage of a third man up is proved to be most efficacious in the over-hand Fast-
Bowling; seeing that when a man lounges out to play at a ball which he judges to be over-
tossed he does not sufficiently provide for the twist and … becomes easy prey to this
newly-formed adversary’ (Felix 1850, p 48).
Indeed, the Rev Canon McCormick, who played in the 1850s and 60s, came in for
criticism from opposing batsmen because he ‘stood so close up at third man and caught
them off the bat as they blocked the ball’ (Pullin 1900, p 69). By the 1890s, with second
or ‘extra’ slip now established as a position in its own right, third man had retreated
somewhat to become ‘rather a middle-slip, being long-slip placed in close enough to
save the run’ (W. G. Grace in Outdoor Games & Recreations 1891, p 26). Nowadays
third man denotes a position of variable ‘depth’ anywhere in the quadrant bounded by
point and the wicket-keeper.
third umpire
third umpire, television umpire n an off-field umpire who can be asked by the on-field
umpires to adjudicate, with the benefit of television replays, on close decisions,
specifically in cases of run-outs, stumpings, and hit-wicket dismissals. Some catches and
boundary decisions (e.g., when it is hard to tell whether a ball cleared the boundary for
a six, or even reached the boundary for a four) can also be referred to the third umpire:
‘The nightwatchman, dropped by Boon at short leg when 8, survived a third-umpire
referral for a stumping’ (WCM March 1994).
It was at the ICC’s annual meeting in July 1993 that the decision was made to introduce
‘electronic umpiring’ to all international cricket matches wherever the facilities were
available. The first-ever ‘third umpire’ was Karl Liebenberg, who officiated in a Test
between India and South Africa at Durban in November 1992. A run-out appeal against
Sachin Tendulkar was referred to him by the square-leg umpire, and Liebenberg gave
Tendulkar out. Initially, the third umpire was permitted to give a ruling only when
requested to do so by the umpires on the field. But within a year he had been given the
right to intervene off his own bat and, effectively, to overrule the umpires if – with the
advantage of the instant TV replay – he is able to see something which they did not.
The introduction of the third umpire was welcomed in some quarters on the grounds
that, in the highly competitive modern game, ‘it is hard to argue with the principle of
utilising every available means of ensuring fair adjudication’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian
16 June 1993). But there is bound to be some concern that less able and less confident
umpires may become over-reliant on the third umpire and pass the buck whenever they
are in the slightest doubt. And in the longer term, the use of a third umpire, coming on
top of the introduction of match referees, seems certain to undermine the ancient
principle in cricket that ‘the umpire is right even when he is wrong’. To quote the Editor
189 tie
of Wisden: ‘If cricket has contributed anything to society as a whole, it is the notion
that the umpire’s decision is final and that cricketers do not argue with it’ (Wisden
1993, p 13). According to this view, the advent of the third umpire marks an
abandonment of the historic principle, enshrined in the original Laws of 1744, that the
umpires ‘are sole Judges of all Outs and Inns’
thrash
thrash n (in one-day cricket) the closing stages of a side’s innings, when only a few of the
allotted overs remain and the main object is to score runs rather than to conserve wickets;
the batsmen may be further assisted by facing a relatively weak bowling attack, in cases
where their opponents’ leading bowlers have already completed their full quota of overs:
‘A further 22 overs of torrid pace … made a mockery of any attempt at what cricketers
term the closing “thrash”’ (Richard Streeton, The Times 23 June 1983).
‘Fielding against the Australians leaves no time for rest. Even in a four-day game they
run all day as if in the last five overs of a one-day thrash’ (Graham Thorpe, Guardian 19
November 1994).
throat
throat n the central upper part of the face of the bat where the splice meets the blade:
‘The ball looped from the throat of the bat and Athey dived forward at slip to catch the
ball inches from the ground’ (Paul Fitzpatrick, Guardian 31 May 1983).
throat ball
throat ball n a short-pitched fast ball that rises steeply off the pitch towards the batsman’s
throat:
‘Pocock, whose 42-minute stint as nightwatchman constituted one of the most gallant
noughts of our time, Gower, Tavaré and Botham all went to throat balls’ (Matthew
Engel, WCM October 1984).
throw
throw vb 1. to deliver the ball using an action that constitutes a throw according to the
Laws of cricket:
‘When Darrell Hair tried to emulate Phillips and Egar by calling Muralitharan for
throwing at Melbourne in 1995, the response reached new heights of indignation’
(David Frith, Wisden 2005, p 70).
In the early 19th century players of the old school like Nyren condemned the roundarm
and overarm innovations as ‘throwing bowling’, and the early exponents of these styles
were often no-balled in accordance with contemporary definitions of a throw. The
legalisation of both types of action led to a narrower definition of the term, but even so
major controversies have flared from time to time. See BOWLING, NO-BALL
2. —throw the bat to bat with sustained aggression, attacking every ball regardless of
its quality; slog:
‘Boundaries must be taken only when they are offered since they cannot easily be
extracted by throwing the bat at the likes of Lindwall, Miller and Johnston’ (Manley
1988, p98).
throw out
throw out vb (of a fielder) to run a batsman out by means of a throw that makes a direct
hit on the stumps:
‘I think particularly of three brilliant practitioners — Graham Barlow of Middlesex;
Peter Squires of Yorkshire; and Derek Randall of Notts. All three have “thrown out”
batsmen by direct hits on the stumps when it looked as though the run was on’ (Oslear &
Mosey 1993, p 189).
‘Ponting transferred the fury he should have felt with his partner and himself to England
because he had been thrown out by eagle-eyed substitute fielder Gary Pratt’ (Haigh
2005, p 147).
tice
tice n a ball of full length that pitches close to the popping crease; a yorker (obsolete):
‘There is a ball that in these days more frequently than any other succeeds in bowling
people out, and that is the familiar “tice” or “yorker”’ (Badminton 1888, p 58).
It is so called because its aim is to ‘entice’ the batsman, who, in moving forward to play
it as a full toss, may be yorked as the ball passes under his bat.
tie
tie n in modern usage, the result of a match that ends with the scores exactly level, provided
that the side batting last has completed its innings (Law 21 § 4); before 1948, the term
timber 190
encompassed any games ending with the scores level, including those in which the team
batting last had not lost all its wickets:
‘A three days’ match was played at the Surrey Ground, Kennington Oval, commencing
on the 1st of July, 1847, between the counties of Kent and Surrey; each side scored 272
runs in the two innings, thus making it a tie’ (‘Bat’ 1851, p 73).
Ties are extremely rare in first-class cricket, and there have been only two instances of
a Test match ending in this way. The first was the game between West Indies and
Australia at Brisbane in December 1960, and the second took place at Madras in
September 1986, when the second Test between India and Australia ended in a tie. In
one-day cricket, ties are not especially uncommon, and in many one-day competitions
a game ending in a tie is awarded to the side that has lost fewest wickets or, if an equal
number of wickets has fallen, the side with the higher scoring rate.
timber
timber n one of the stumps that make up a batsman’s wicket, or the wicket as a whole
(old):
‘Before either were out 50 runs were got. Caffyn’s timber was lowered by Mr. Fisher’
timed out
timed out adv a mode of dismissal in which an incoming batsman may be given out if he
is not ‘in position to take guard or for his partner to be ready to receive the next ball
within 3 minutes of the fall of the previous wicket’ (Law 31 § 1). A dismissal under this
law is entered in the scorebook as ‘timed out’ and the wicket is not credited to the bowler.
‘Timed out’ is the newest form of dismissal (it was introduced in 1980) and there have
only been four instances of it in first-class cricket (none in Tests). Before its introduction
there had always been a provision in the Laws (dating back to the original code of 1744)
for a maximum interval of two minutes for each fresh batsman to come to the wicket, but
a breach of this time allowance did not carry the threat of dismissal. In theory, it could
entail the even more dire consequence of the match being awarded to the other side, if
the umpires were satisfied that ‘the delay of the individual amounts to a refusal of the
batting side to continue play’ (1947 code). In practice, however, this draconian penalty
was rarely if ever imposed.
ton
ton n a batsman’s score of a hundred runs; a century:

‘In a relatively low-scoring match Glenn Turner played the vital hand with a ton in each
innings and the Kiwis got home by five wickets’ (Chas Keys, Australian Cricket October
1993).
‘At 17 years and 112 days, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar had become the second-youngest
batsman to score a Test ton’ (Purandare 2005, p 105).
tonk
tonk vb to hit the ball with unrestrained aggression; slog (slang):

‘After the match, Pakistan skipper Salim Malik conceded that he was really worried
when Tendulkar was tonking the bowlers all over’ (Vijay Lokapally, Sportstar [Chennai]
30 April 1994).
‘Few who witnessed it will forget his cameo at Sydney in 1994–95, when he tonked Shane
Warne straight out of the ground during an uplifting last-wicket stand’ (Andrew Miller,
Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 84).
top
top n = TOP-SPIN. See also OVER THE TOP:

‘Inasmuch as every bowler should … try to reach the highest standard, he should do his
best to acquire a command of off-break and leg-break, “top” and “hang”’ (Ranjitsinhji
1897, p 81).
top-bailer
top-bailer n a well-pitched-up ball that rises to the height of the bails; a BAIL BALL (qv)
(obsolete):
‘He soon became sensible of the safety and excellence of the practice [of advancing to
the pitch of the ball]; which saves alike the fingers and the wickets from a first-rate top-
bailer’ (Mitford 1833 in HM, p 128).
top-edge
top-edge vb to hit the ball with the upper edge of the bat, especially when hitting across
the line of flight (as in making a hook or pull) and misjudging the height of the ball; the
top-edged ball loses pace and lobs upwards off the bat, often creating a chance for the
fielding side:
191 toss
‘Marsh, too, tried to hook Willis, top-edged, and Dilley judged an awkward catch
perfectly’ (Brearley 1982, p 77).
‘Tendulkar finished as Man of the Tournament, but a top-edged swing at Glenn McGrath
ended his hopes of World Cup glory’ (Dileep Premachandran, Cricinfo Magazine June
2006, p 38).
쐽 n a ball coming off the upper edge of the bat; a top-edged ball:
‘Although in hooking at 16 he was fortunate that Dujon did not pick up a top-edge,
Gavaskar raced surely to his 50 in only 37 balls’ (WCM December 1983).
top order
top order n the specialist batsmen in a side, typically the openers and the players batting
as far down as five or six in the order:
‘As so often happens in such situations, the Australian top order fell apart due to an
inspired spell by Mary Duggan who had the figures of 5—5 at one stage’ (Cashman &
Weaver 1991, p 109).
‘In a hectic first session after Ricky Ponting won the toss from Michael Vaughan,
Stephen Harmison tenderised Australia’s top order with bowling that seldom arrived
below the waist’ (Haigh 2005, p 36).
toppie
toppie n Australia a ball bowled with top-spin; a top-spinner (slang):

‘Warne … did Richardson with a toppie to break a dangerous stand’ (Chas Keys,
Australian Cricket October 1993).
top-score
top-score vb to make the highest score of one’s side’s innings:

‘Gatting top-scored with 33 (off 143 deliveries) and England were all out for 163’
(Marqusee 1994, p 239).
‘England went meekly, always excepting Pietersen, the first England batsman since
Grieg in 1972 to top-score in both innings on debut’ (David Frith, Wisden 2006, p 99).
top-spin
top-spin n a variety of wrist-spin in which the direction of the spin imparted to the ball is
the same as the direction in which the ball is travelling, causing it to ‘hurry’ off the wicket
after pitching, with an apparent increase in pace but with little or no deviation:
‘The ball comes off the wickets faster in comparison to its pace through the air … the
reason being that it is possible to impart more top spin with a low delivery than with a
high one’ (Warner 1934, p 35).
top-spinner
top-spinner n a ball delivered with top-spin; its unexpected change of pace, added
bounce, and failure to turn after pitching make it a useful surprise ball for the wrist-
spinner:
‘Despite hands so small that he could not hold the ball comfortably, he [Tich Freeman]
bowled the leg-break, googly, and top-spinner’ (John Arlott, WCM May 1984).
toss
toss n the flipping of a coin by one of the two captains as a way of deciding which team
shall bat first:
‘The toss in cricket is more important in determining the result of matches than in any
other sport’ (Marqusee 1994, p 51).
The toss takes place not more than quarter of an hour before the match is due to start,
and ‘the winner of the toss shall notify his decision to bat or to field to the opposing
Captain not later than 10 minutes before the time scheduled for the match to start’ (Law
12 § 4). It is important to note that the captains must nominate their teams before
making the toss, and no changes in the line-up can be made subsequently.
쐽 vb to flip a coin in order to decide which team shall bat first:
‘As Hughes and I walked out to toss in the bright sunshine, there was already an eager
air of anticipation around the ground’ (Brearley 1982, p 82).
In the very early days of cricket the winner of the toss not only had the choice of innings
but could also decide the location of the pitch:
‘The pitching of the first Wicket is to be determined by the Toss of a Piece of Money’
(Laws 1744).
The toss fell into abeyance when the revised code of 1774 introduced a new and rather
chivalrous clause to the effect that ‘the Party which goes from home shall have the choice
of the innings and the pitching of the wickets’. But a further adjustment of the law about
track 192
35 years later brought it more or less to its present shape, removing the choice of pitch
from the captains and leaving them to toss for choice of innings.
track
track n the pitch, especially with reference to the quality of the playing surface as it affects
the game or, in phrases like ‘go down the track’, to describe the action of an attacking
batsman who advances out of his ground, usually to a slower bowler:
‘Like Rhodes before him, he had defied popular opinion that an English slow left-arm
bowler would be murdered on hard Australian tracks’ (Frith 1984, p 97).
‘I can clearly recollect this ball that cut sharply in from outside the off-stump from none
other than the great Dennis Lillee at Perth (which was certainly one of the quickest
tracks in the world) and hit me in the box’ (Farokh Engineer, Sportstar [Chennai] 14 May
1994).
‘Botham was in fiery mood; hooking the short stuff … and then marching down the track
to hit Harper over the top’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 13 July 1984).
trial ball
trial ball n a ball bowled by a fresh bowler before beginning his spell and not counting in
the game. Trial balls were introduced in about 1817 by a rule allowing a new bowler two
such deliveries, with the proviso that he was then committed to bowling an over
immediately afterwards: ‘In the event of a change of Bowling no more than Two Balls to
be allowed in practice. The Bowler who takes the Two Balls, to be obliged to bowl Four
Balls’. According to R. S. Rait Kerr (The Laws of Cricket 1950, p 78), trial balls were
discontinued in 1838, but the 1920 edition of the Badminton book mentions ‘the
abolition of trial balls in 1911’ (p 66), and this later date seems to be supported by a
match report from 1903:
‘At 103 Saunders relieved Armstrong. In his trial ball he bowled the wicket down, and
Hirst laughed at the thought of what might have happened’ (Melbourne Argus, 17
December 1903).
trimmer
trimmer n a fast ball of exceptional quality, especially one that clips the bails without
disturbing the stumps:
‘He was invited to play for Middlesex against the University and took six for 13… One
of his victims was Hubert Ashton, the Cambridge captain, bowled by a trimmer’ (J. J.
Warr, ‘A portrait of “Gubby”’, Wisden 1987).
trull
trull n a delivery of the ball (obsolete):

‘On the second day rain prevented play until 3.30, when T. Walker went in and made 5
runs in 230 trulls (at one time 1 in 189)’ (Kentish Gazette 21–23 August 1788).
The term clearly belongs to the earliest cricketing vocabulary since it comes from the
verb ‘troll’, meaning to roll a ball along the ground as in bowls, ninepins, and (in its
original form) cricket.
trundle
trundle vb to bowl (obsolete):

‘Just to show that I was supposed to be able to trundle a bit, I might mention that in 1865
… playing for the All-England Eleven, I got all the 10 Yorkshire wickets in one innings’
(George Wootton in Pullin 1900, p 199).
trundler
trundler n 1. a bowler (obsolete):

‘The two greatest Australian batsmen were seen playing the balls of England’s two most
famous trundlers’ (Westminster Gazette 1 March 1895).
2. a defensive, usually medium-pace, ‘stock’ bowler, or a ball bowled by such a bowler:
‘India had nothing to offer except trundlers — even Kapil Dev was uninspired and
looked little different to all the others’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 16 June 1983).
‘Ranatunga … used the new ball himself for two overs of club-standard slow-medium
trundlers before making his predictable move’ (Tony Cozier, Caribbean Cricket
January/March 1994).
tuck up
tuck up vb to restrict a batsman’s freedom of movement, typically with a sharply rising

ball or one that moves sharply in from off to leg, giving him no room to play either an
attacking or defensive stroke:
‘Early on he got tucked up by a short ball from Botham and received the benefit of the
doubt when Gower dived to claim a splendid catch in the gully’ (Michael Carey, Daily
Telegraph 10 August 1984).
193 twister
turn
turn vb 1. (of the ball) to change direction after pitching, especially as a result of spin
imparted by the bowler; break:
‘Bracewell made the next breakthrough with his off-spinners, which were sometimes
turning though never lifting’ (Robin Marlar, Sunday Times 28 August 1983).
2. (of the wicket) to be conducive to spin:
‘All critics agree that his sixty-odd on a turning wicket in the last Test against Pakistan
in 1958 was batting at the peak’ (James 1963, p 223).
‘We do want to see a wide range of pitches: some which start damp, some which start
dry, some which seam and some which don’t, some which turn on the third day and
others on the first’ (Scyld Berry, Cricinfo Magazine June 2006, p 55).
쐽 n 1. movement of the ball off the pitch as a result of spin imparted by the bowler:
‘There were also fine cracks in the pitch, and one could move the earth between the
cracks with one’s hand: this suggested both uneven bounce and the chance of turn later’
2. a quality in the wicket that makes it conducive to spin:
‘Though the Manchester wicket had turn, the Indian spinners failed to make the most of
it’ (Purandare 2005, p 101).
turner
turner n a ‘turning’ wicket, providing conditions favourable to spin bowling:

‘The Australians, by winning the played-to-a-finish final Test, took the series by two to
the one Verity won for England on a turner at Lord’s’ (John Arlott, WCM January 1984).
‘When you have handled Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh on dusty turners in India,
Ashley Giles wheeling away from over the wicket does not present the sternest challenge’
(Haigh 2005, p 44).
tweaker
tweaker n a spin bowler:

‘Once the shine was lessened … the wicket was very good and the left-handed tweakers
found little help against such powerful opposition’ (Peebles 1959, p 57).
‘They succeeded in having him left out of the team for the first Test, but the tweaker from
Ferntree Gully [Shane Warne] was back for the MCG game’ (Australian Cricket
October 1993).
twelfth man
twelfth man n an additional player acting as a reserve member of a team. The selectors
typically name twelve players in advance of a match and then – on the morning of the
game – choose eleven of them to play, after considering the state of the wicket and the
players’ fitness. The twelfth man may be used as a substitute but at Test level he is often
released, and if a substitute is needed it will typically be someone with good fielding
skills who is not currently involved in a game for his own side.
See SUBSTITUTE
Twenty20
Twenty20 n a form of one-day cricket in which the competing teams each have one
innings of a maximum of 20 overs. The Laws of cricket apply in Twenty20, but with a
few exceptions: e.g., no bowler may bowl more than four overs, and the penalty for a no-
ball is two runs rather than one. Twenty20 has gained rapid popularity since its
introduction in 2003, and there are now several domestic and international competitions.
Part of its attraction – for spectators and organisers alike – lies in the fact that a game can
be completed in a timespan not significantly greater than that of a soccer or rugby match.
twist
twist (obsolete) n movement imparted to the ball by the bowler which makes it change
direction after pitching; spin:
‘According as the axis of rotation … is horizontal or oblique, so it will have, upon
reaching the ground, the bias, or “twist”, as it is called’ (Felix 1850, p 2).
쐽 vb to spin the ball, or (of the ball) to change direction after pitching as a result of spin:
‘For a Bowler to twist the Ball: when the ball goes out of a bowler’s hand he must
endeavor to make it twist a little across, then after it hits the ground it will twist the same
way as it rolls when it goes from the hand’ (Boxall 1800, p 17).
twister
twister n a ball that changes direction after pitching; a spinner (obsolete):

‘“Mr Pinder, you’re a sinful man”. “How so Mr Craven?” “You bowl twisters; twisters
are intended to deceive; and all deception is sin”’ (Pullin 1900, p 218).
two-eyed 194
‘The fellows were practising long shies and bowling lobs and slow twisters’ (James
Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man 1916, ch. 1).
two-eyed
two-eyed adj denoting a batsman, or the stance of a batsman, who stands relatively
square-on to the bowler
two leg
two leg n the position of the bat when it is held so as to cover the middle and leg stumps
by a batsman taking guard.
Compare ONE LEG
U
UCBSA
UCBSA abbr United Cricket Board of South Africa: the governing body for cricket in
South Africa, a Full Member of the ICC (qv) since 1909 (but with a hiatus between 1961
and 1991)
UCCE abbr University Centre of Cricket Excellence: one of six groups of universities in
UCCE
the UK designated by the ECB as a centre for aspiring cricket professionals; games
involving UCCE sides and English counties have first-class status
umbrella field
umbrella field n a very attacking field set for a new-ball bowler, packed with close
catchers and typically including four slips, a gully, and a point on the off-side, and two
or three close fielders on the leg-side; a CARMODY FIELD (qv)
umpire
umpire n either of the two (or at international level, four) officials whose function is to
ensure that a cricket match is conducted in accordance with the Laws and spirit of the
game and to adjudicate on any point submitted to them by the players; the two ‘on-field’
umpires are, in international games, supplemented by two ‘off-field’ umpires, the THIRD
UMPIRE and FOURTH UMPIRE (qv):
‘Each Umpire is the sole Judge of all Nips and Catches; Inns and Outs; good or bad
Runs … and his Determination shall be absolute’ (Laws 1744).
unbeaten 196
‘A week ago, Hair became the first umpire to impose a five-run penalty for ball-
tampering’ (Vic Marks, Observer 27 August 2006).
쐽 vb to act as umpire in a cricket match:
‘More often, when feelings ran high umpiring was the cause’ (John Woodcock, Wisden
1984, p 50).
The umpire at the bowler’s end stands behind the stumps, to be in the best position for
judging lbw appeals and ensuring that the bowler’s delivery is ‘fair’, while the umpire
at the striker’s end (‘the square-leg umpire’) usually stands in the position of a shortish
square leg but ‘may elect to stand on the off instead of the leg side’ (Law 3 § 10).
Appeals by the fielding side are in most cases answered by the umpire at the bowler’s
end, but the square-leg umpire adjudicates in cases of stumping, hit wicket, or run-outs
at the striker’s wicket. At the end of each over the umpire at the bowler’s end moves
out to square leg at the same end of the pitch, while his counterpart moves in to the
wicket to become the ‘main’ umpire. The umpires change ends after each side has
completed one innings.
The term ‘an umpire’ first appears in English as ‘a noumpere’ (= a ‘non-peer’ or
‘unequal’) indicating an ‘odd man’ or third party called in to adjudicate between two
contestants. As far as cricket is concerned however, there have always been two
umpires – an arrangement presumably dating back to the origins of the double wicket
game. Early illustrations, corroborated by William Goldwin’s narrative poem on a
cricket match (‘In Certamen Pilae’ 1706), show an umpire standing at each wicket and
holding a staff which – under a convention that had already died out when the first code
of Laws was drawn up in 1744 – the batsmen had to touch with their bats in order to
complete a run (See RUN). The umpires’ sphere of authority has always been
exceptionally wide. In addition to the usual functions of counting the ball in an over,
answering appeals, calling no-balls and wides, and signalling extras or boundaries to
the scorers, the umpires are also ‘the sole judges of fair and unfair play’, and thus
responsible for dealing with any infringements of Law 42 (See UNFAIR PLAY). The
fitness of the pitch, the light, the weather, and the ball are also subject to the umpires’
jurisdiction. The power wielded by umpires is well illustrated by the law stating that ‘If
an Umpire miscounts the number of balls, the over as counted by the Umpire shall
stand’ (Law 22 § 4). But the umpires’ job, always exacting, has become increasingly
difficult in an age of instant replays, with players less willing to accept bad decisions
as readily as earlier generations did (or are supposed to have done). In response to these
developments, three organisational changes have been instituted in recent years at the
international level. The use of an INDEPENDENT UMPIRE (qv) is intended to prevent the
problems that can arise when touring sides feel – rightly or wrongly – that they are
getting a raw deal from partisan local umpires. A match REFEREE (qv) provides backup
specifically in the area of ensuring ‘fair play’. And the THIRD UMPIRE (qv), adjudicating
on doubtful line decisions with the benefit of TV replays, reduces the umpires’
exposure to criticism in such cases. Whether any of this really enhances the umpires’
authority – or whether it reduces it by compromising the principle that the umpires’
decision is final – is likely to remain a matter for debate.
unbeaten
unbeaten, undefeated adj (of a batsman’s score) (made) without losing one’s wicket:
‘By virtue of his unbeaten 127, Gavaskar became the first Indian batsman to carry his
bat through an innings’ (Z. H. Syed, Cricketer March 1983).
‘The Notts innings, graced in particular by an undefeated 93 from West Indian all-
rounder Jimmy Adams, was clouded by an injury to Wayne Noon’ (Doug Ibbotson, Daily
Telegraph 25 July 1994).
‘Laxman had made 148; Dravid was unbeaten on 199. India had run the Aussies ragged’
(Bhattacharya 2006, p 179).
uncapped
uncapped adj not yet selected to play for a team, especially for one’s national side (See
CAP):
‘This pool should consist of the five senior tourists, the uncapped Caddick, Millns,
McCague, Ilott and Cork, and the old timers Foster, Pringle, Fraser and Mallender’
(Vic Marks, Observer 2 May 1993).
197 unplayable
‘England yesterday named the uncapped Monty Panesar as the 16th member of their
Test squad for the forthcoming tour of India’ (Independent 28 January 2006).
underarm
underarm adj, adv (also under-hand) using a bowling action in which the arm ‘is
swung nearly pendulum-wise very much as it is at the game of bowls’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897,
p 94). Originally all bowling was underarm, but with the acceptance of roundarm
bowling in 1835 ‘the under-hand delivery tapered down in a few seasons to such small
dimensions as to become kinsman to a curiosity’ (Box 1868, p 75). The only real survivor
of this change was the lob-bowler, who could still be found even at the highest levels of
the game until the beginning of the first world war (See LOB). The underarm delivery was
used as recently as 1981 at international level, on the notorious occasion when
Australia’s Trevor Chappell bowled a daisy-cutter as the last ball of a one-day game
against New Zealand for the World Series Cup, thus ensuring that New Zealand could
not get the six runs they needed to tie the match. Until the revision of the code in 2000,
the Laws still permitted underarm bowling, provided the bowler informed the umpire of
his intentions. But current rules state that ‘Underarm bowling shall not be permitted
except by special agreement before the match’(Law 24 §1). See BOWLING.
쐽 vb to throw the ball with an underarm action when fielding:
‘When the last ball was bowled, Carl Rackemann was tardy in starting for the bye to win
the game as wicketkeeper Jeff Dujon underarmed the ball into the wicket for the run out’
(Phil Wilkins, Cricketer April 1984).
under-edge
under-edge n 1. the bottom edge of the bat:

‘His pawky shot succeeded only in deflecting the ball from the under-edge on to his
stumps’ (Mike Selvey, Guardian 18 March 1994).
2. a ball deflected off the bottom edge of the bat:
‘The follow-on was saved with an under edge for four between wicket-keeper and first
slip’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
‘Three sixes and five fours studded his 47 from 44 balls before his under edge was caught
on the third man fence’ (Haigh 2005, p 147).
쐽 vb to deflect the ball off the bottom edge of the bat:
‘Before he was cut short by an under-edged pull at Lord’s, however, Hayden looked in
ominously secure touch’ (Haigh 2005, p 55).
underpitch
underpitch vb to bowl the ball so that it pitches well short of a good length, making it
easy for the batsman to play:
‘The revival came with a stand of 124 in 30 overs from McMillan and David Richardson
… as the England bowlers began to underpitch randomly and hopelessly’ (Mike Selvey,
See LENGTH
unfair play
unfair play n any behaviour that contravenes the ‘spirit of the game’, including:
obstruction of the batsman in running, sledging, time wasting, persistent bowling of
bouncers or beamers, deliberate damage to the pitch or ball, and failure to accept the
decisions of the umpire. The clause in the Laws that makes the umpires the ‘sole judges
of all fair or unfair play’ has survived intact from the original (1744) code, and the
modern code assembles all the various offences against fair play under the heading ‘Fair
and Unfair Play’ (Law 42).
unplayable
unplayable adj denoting a bowler, a playing surface, or especially a delivery of the ball
that is difficult or impossible for the batsman to deal with or survive against:
‘Australia could only scratch together 144 runs in their second innings, Gibbs being
virtually unplayable with 6 for 29’ (Manley 1988, p 173).
‘Viswanath was brilliant in an hour of crisis and was always at his technical best on bad
and often unplayable wickets’ (Haresh Pandya, Illustrated Weekly of India 20 April
1991).
‘Switched to the Kirkstall Lane End he found little more until producing the ultimate in
unplayable balls to bowl the nightwatchman’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September
1994).
unsighted 198
‘Deliveries that were unplayable for the rest seemed routine for Dravid; his technique
was so good’ (Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, Cricinfo Magazine August 2006, p 76).
unsighted
unsighted adj (of a batsman or fielder) unable to see the ball clearly because of some
obstacle:
‘One day at Lord’s he was bowled by an unplayable ball. “Bad luck” I said, as he walked
down the Long Room. Sutcliffe was clearly surprised at this comment. “I was unsighted
by a man moving in the Pavilion”, he said’ (Cardus 1978, p 91).
‘To many, Healy’s catch of Matthew Maynard off Tim May’s bowling in the Edgbaston
Test was a fairly straightforward affair, but he was unsighted till the last second’
(Australian Cricket October 1993).
up
up adv, prep pitching relatively close to the batsman’s wicket:

‘The spinner bowls further “up” the pitch and therefore there is less distance (between
pitching and making contact with the striker) for the umpire to observe deviation’
(Oslear & Mosey 1993, p 180).
쐽 n —on the up driving the ball as it rises off the pitch from a good length:
‘Their defensive partnership would be punctuated by the occasional pedigree stroke, as
when Vengsarkar drove “on the up”, which would bring a whole stand to its feet’ (Berry
1982, p 114).
쐽 adj (of a catchable ball ) carrying to the fielder without bouncing
uppercut
uppercut n a form of cut or slice in which the ball glances up off the angled face of a
horizontal bat, usually going towards or over the heads of the slips:
‘So many [runs] came from uppercuts over the slips that Willis eventually sent two men
two thirds of the way back to the boundary to act as fly-slips’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian
6 November 1982).
‘Despite the enthusiastic patronage of Tony Grieg and Alan Knott … the uppercut
remained something of an oddity until the 1996 World Cup, where Sanath Jayasuriya
audaciously attacked the new ball’ (Simon Briggs, Wisden 2003, p 30).
쐽 vb to hit the ball with an uppercut:
‘He will uppercut the ball gleefully for six with muscle, and next ball … slide it softly past
the bowler for four’ (Rohit Brijnath, Wisden 2003, p 48).
uppish
uppish adj (of a batting stroke) sending the ball dangerously high, so that it is likely to
be caught:
‘Spofforth may have bowled more men out, but Giffen certainly was the cause of more
misjudged and uppish strokes’ (Badminton 1888, p 171).
‘Thorpe’s pugnacious innings ended tamely with his only false stroke, an uppish drive
from wide of off stump into cover’s hands’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
uppishly
uppishly adv playing an ‘uppish’ stroke:

‘Denning had perished as he had flourished — cutting uppishly and being caught in the
gully’ (Michael Austin, Daily Telegraph 1 June 1984).
‘Finally, he fell victim to his own uncontrolled aggression when eleven short of a
hundred, he slashed uppishly to point and was snapped up’ (Purandare 2005, p 69).
upstairs
upstairs adv involving a referral to the third umpire:

‘Michael Clarke’s bat-pad catch was also sent upstairs, but after Hair gained no advan-
tage from the TV pictures it was left to Rudi Koertzen to go with his gut feeling’ (Andrew
McGlashan, Cricinfo website 14 October 2005).
urn
urn n —the urn the Ashes

useful
useful adj good; commendable:

‘The Kiwis made a useful 312 and then knocked the home side over for a mere 162,
Richard Hadlee taking 4/33’ (Chas Keys, Australian Cricket October 1993).
For cricket commentators, ‘useful’ has become an indispensable all-purpose word that
is used fairly indiscriminately to express approval of any cricketing achievement: so,
for example, a ball does not have to actually have any practical effect in order to qualify
as a ‘useful delivery’. The extent to which this word has invaded the vocabulary of even
199 useful
the most accomplished writers is well illustrated by the following snippet from a well-
known and greatly-missed expert on wine:
‘Yugoslavian Cabernet Sauvignon: a useful example of the rapidly improving Yugoslav
red wines’ (John Arlott, Guardian 22 April 1983).
V
V
V n —the V an area in front of the batsman’s wicket into which the ball is hit (usually
driven), bounded by two imaginary lines going outward from the batsman so as to form
a ‘V’ shape; the ‘V’ is generally thought of as including the area between extra cover and
wide mid-on, but its boundaries are variable:
‘He cuts well, but prefers to drive through the wide V between cover and mid-wicket’
(John Arlott, Guardian 19 November 1983).
‘The half-volleys were sent back in the “V”, and mostly well beyond cover, mid-on, mid-
off and mid-wicket’ (Purandare 2005, p 130).
VJD method
VJD method n a system for calculating revised run targets in rain-interrupted one-day
games, used in Indian domestic cricket between 2004 and 2006. Unlike the better-known
DUCKWORTH/LEWIS METHOD, the VJD method (named after its inventor V. Jayadevan)
sets targets on the basis of scoring patterns from earlier games.
W
wagon wheel
wagon wheel n a diagram giving a visual record of all the scoring strokes played by a
batsman in the course of an innings; each shot is represented by a line drawn from either
end of the pitch towards a circular boundary, showing the direction taken by the ball and
the number of runs scored
walk
walk vb to leave the crease without waiting for the umpire’s verdict, as an
acknowledgement that one has been fairly dismissed:
‘It was good to see that Graveney started to walk before the umpire raised his finger’
(Peebles 1959, p 72).
‘In the First Test of the 1946–47 series, Bradman refused to walk, although everyone on
the ground thought he was out caught except the umpire’ (Matthew Engel, Guardian 13
November 1982).
It is traditionally regarded as sporting to ‘walk’ when the fielding side has appealed to
the umpire in a case where there is some doubt about the dismissal, as for example a
stumping, an lbw, or a catch off a very thin edge. Walking is increasingly rare among
top-level cricketers, and some professionals contend that players who have gained a
reputation as ‘walkers’ may fail to walk in situations of particular stress, thus making
it a very subtle form of gamesmanship.
watch
watch n a fielder (obsolete):

‘The “watches” are placed more behind the wicket, since the introduction of Round
bowling, than they were formerly’ (Practical Hints on Cricket 1843, frontispiece).
watch out
watch out vb to field (obsolete):

‘Little Tom Clement is visiting at Petersfield, where he plays much at cricket: Tom bats;
his grandmother bowls; and his great-grandmother watches out!!’ (Rev Gilbert White,
letter dated 1786, in HM xi).
wheel
wheel vb (of a slow bowler) to bowl for long periods:

‘In those four innings he wheeled down 57, 56.5, 60 and 64.5 six-ball overs for a total of
87 maidens and 19 wickets’ (Frith 1984, p 97).
‘He wheeled away from the Cathedral end for hour after hour without finding much turn
but his control of length and line was a joy to watch’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February
1983).
‘The latter involved Panesar wheeling away at the Rugby Stand end while the quick
bowlers were rotated coming down the hill’ (Steve James, Guardian 9 August 2006).
whippy
whippy adj (of a bowler’s action) characterised by a sudden sharp movement as the ball
is delivered, rather than a continuous flowing movement:
‘Just before lunch Watkinson … getting occasional steep bounce from his high, whippy
action, had him caught behind off an unpleasant lifter’ (David Green, Daily Telegraph
15 August 1984).
WICB
WICB abbr West Indies Cricket Board: the governing body for cricket in the West Indies,
a Full Member of the ICC (qv) since 1926
wicket1 n 1. either of the two targets at which the ball is bowled in cricket and which the
wicket
batsman defends with his bat, each consisting of three stumps set in the ground and
surmounted by two bails, the whole construction measuring 28 inches (71.1 centimetres)
high by 9 inches (22.86 centimetres) wide. The two wickets are set up ‘opposite and
wicket 202
parallel to each other at a distance of 22 yards/20.12m. between the centres of the two
middle stumps’ (Law 8 § 1). In the normal, double-wicket version of the game the ball
is bowled from one wicket (the bowler’s wicket) at the other (the batsman’s wicket) and
the bowler’s and batsman’s wickets alternate after each over.
2. a stump (old ):
‘In the following year was played a match, when the Gentleman defended three wickets,
27 inches by 8, and the Players four, 36 inches by 12’ (Badminton 1888, p 358).
The word ‘stump’ is a vestige of an ancient embryonic phase of the game when the ball
was probably bowled at a tree-stump, but even at an early stage the need must have
been felt for a more portable target. This presented itself in the form of the movable
hurdles used by shepherds in erecting temporary pens, or of the little gate (or ‘wicket’)
by which such pens were entered. The earliest artificial wickets would have been
modelled on these structures, and consisted of two upright sticks with forked ends
across which a single bail was laid. There is some evidence to suggest that 17th century
wickets were low and wide (like the original tree-stumps), measuring only one foot
high by two feet in width (Nyren 1833 in HM, p 84). But the familiar tall and narrow
configuration had already become established by the time the earliest code of Laws was
drawn up in 1744, prescribing a wicket in which ‘the Stumps must be Twenty-Two
inches long, and the Bail Six inches’. The middle stump was added in about 1775
following an incident in a Kent v Hambledon match, when ‘Lumpy’ Stevens bowled
three balls straight through John Small’s wicket without disturbing the bail. This
development led in turn to the addition of a second bail in about 1786 (See BAIL) and
since then the basic construction of the wicket has remained the same, notwithstanding
occasional proposals for the addition of a fourth stump. The size of the wicket,
however, has gradually increased, partly because the change to roundarm bowling
necessitated a rather higher target. The dimensions of the wicket have been modified
as follows since the original code of Laws: 1798 – to 24 × 7 inches; 1819–21 – to 26 ×
7 inches; 1823–5 – to 27 × 8 inches; and 1931 – to 28 × 9 inches.
3. —at the wicket playing as wicket-keeper, or caught by the wicket-keeper:
‘Every man knew his place. Jackson and Caffyn started bowling, Lockyer at the wicket,
Parr point, Diver long-stop’ (Lillywhite 1860, p19).
‘There were confident appeals against Sutcliffe for lbw when he was 42, and for a catch
at the wicket when he had reached 51’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933, p 30).
왘 See also OVER THE WICKET, ROUND THE WICKET
wicket2 n 1. the area of ground between the two sets of stumps, measuring 22 yards (20.12
wicket
metres) in length and 10 feet (3.04 metres) in width; the pitch, especially when
considered in terms of its quality as a playing surface and the extent to which it is likely
to assist the batsman or bowler:
‘Barclay thought long and hard before deciding to go in first on a slow wicket which
impeded brisk scoring but encouraged the quicker bowlers to move the ball off the seam’
(David Lacey, Guardian 16 June 1983).
‘At Leeds, batting first on a perfect wicket, Fredericks and Greenidge gave the West
Indies a magnificent start with an opening partnership of 192’ (Manley 1988, p 245).
‘The laws of physics say that anything that strikes an object loses speed. So any ball has
to lose a little pace as it comes off the wicket’ (Purandare 2005, p 128).
The behaviour of the ball when it pitches is affected by so many variables – rainfall,
sunshine, moisture in the air and in the pitch, type of soil, depth of grass, quality of
drainage, etc. – that an almost infinite number of different types of surface may be
encountered. Consequently a large vocabulary has evolved to classify the various kinds
of wicket in terms of their pace, bounce, liveliness, and the degree to which they favour
turn or movement off the seam. Essentially, however, ‘wickets may be divided into
those in favour of the batsman and those in favour of the bowler’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p
84), and they range between the ‘plumb’ batting wicket that offers no help to the
bowler, and the dreaded ‘sticky’ wicket on which batting is a nightmare.
The kinds of fine distinction that can now be made between one wicket and another
could not be applied to the pitches on which cricket was played in its formative years.
203 wicket
Early wickets were of such poor quality that they were all, effectively, bowler’s
wickets, and the unequal contest between bat and ball is reflected in the very low scores
that prevailed until well into the 19th century (See SCORE). Even Lord’s cricket ground,
with its unpredictable bounce and its reputation for ‘shooters’, was still a dangerous
place for batsmen when W. G. Grace first played there in the 1860s. But in the last 30
years of the century, serious attention began to be paid to improving the quality of
playing surfaces, and the subsequent ‘revolution in the state of the wickets’ (Pullin
1900, p 180) had a profound effect on the character of the game. By 1888, pundits were
already complaining about the evil of ‘gigantic scoring’ (Badminton 1888, p 401) and
the tedious drawn matches that had become a regular feature since the tremendous
improvements in the quality of wickets.
See also CRUMBLE, GREEN, PLUMB, STICKY, CRICKET WICKET, RESULT WICKET
2. —come down the wicket (of a batsman) to leave one’s ground and advance towards
the pitch of the ball, typically when playing an attacking shot, in order to minimise any
movement off the pitch:
‘“I decided to come down the wicket”, he says. “The ball was in the arc for hitting”’
(Chris Read cited by Vic Marks, Observer 13 August 2006).
wicket3 n 1. the batsman’s wicket considered as something that the batting side attempts
wicket
to keep and the fielding side attempts to capture. The wicket remains ‘standing’ while a
batsman is in, and ‘falls’ or is ‘taken’ when a batsman is dismissed; a team’s innings is
complete when ten of its eleven wickets have fallen:
‘Last week there was a cricket match … between the gentlemen of Shipdown and the
gentlemen of Docking and Burnham, which was won by the latter with three wickets
standing’ (Norfolk Chronicle 23 August 1777).
‘The loss of Amarnath to an expert slip catch by Lloyd triggered an inexplicable collapse
as seven wickets fell for 44 runs’ (Tony Cozier, Cricketer May 1983).
‘During the Ashes he [Ponting] developed a habit of losing his wicket without warning’
(Peter Roebuck, The Age (Melbourne) 17 December 2005).
2. a dismissal credited to a bowler:
‘Hadlee completed his farewell performance by taking 5 for 53, giving him a Test total
of 431 wickets’ (Christopher Sandford, Cricketer May 1994).
‘Allott gave England the advantage by taking three prized wickets in his first five overs’
(John Woodcock, The Times 27 July 1984).
3. a dismissal considered in terms of the batsman who is out:
‘After Lillee had claimed the vital wicket of Mudassar, Hogg ripped through the heart of
Pakistan’s batting with a devastating spell of 3 for 0 in 10 balls’ (WCM January 1984).
‘Mills is the only man who has taken the wicket of George Headley and Everton Weekes
for nought’ (Manley 1988, p 82).
4. the part of a side’s innings during which two batsmen are together between the fall of
one wicket and the fall of the next:
‘By adding 92 for the ninth wicket Paynter and Verity did much to recover the ground
England had lost on the third day’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933, p 31).
‘The second wicket produced 145 in 200 minutes’ (WCM May 1984).
‘Apart from batting in stifling heat for six hours, Collingwood inspired Matthew
Hoggard, Steve Harmison and Monty Panesar to help him add 159 for the last three
wickets’ (Donald McRae, Guardian 9 May 2006).
5. a team’s margin of victory expressed in terms of the number of batsmen on the
winning side whose innings were either not completed or had never started when the
required number of runs had been reached:
‘England won the first match at Lord’s by the comfortable margin of six wickets’
See RESULT
6. —among the wickets (of a bowler) taking wickets:
wicket-keeper 204
‘He was among the wickets again at the death, when Mohammad Sami edged another
Harmison flier, Umar Gul tickled one down leg and … Abdul Razzaq top-edged Harm-
ison to give England victory’ (Kevin Mitchell, Observer 30 July 2006).
wicket-keeper
wicket-keeper n a specialist fielder behind the batsman’s wicket whose job is to stop
balls that beat the bat, catch balls coming off the edge of the bat, and – when possible –
effect stumpings and run-outs. The wicket-keeper usually stands, or rather squats,
slightly towards the off-side (‘the left foot will be behind the middle and off stumps’,
says the MCC coaching book) and will nowadays take up his position either right up to
the wicket or well back from it, according to the pace of the bowler; in earlier times, the
deeper position was occupied by long stop, and wicket-keepers were advised ‘to avoid
standing so far away as not to be able comfortably to put down the wicket without
moving the legs’ (Badminton 1888, p 254).
Although the original (1744) code of Laws includes a section on ‘Laws for the Wicket-
Keepers’, the job of keeping wicket was not originally done by a single specialist
player, but fell to the bowlers at their own end in between overs – hence the importance
of long stop in the early game. The emergence of the specialist wicket-keeper seems to
date from the late 18th century and, according to the Rev John Mitford, Hambledon’s
Tom Sueter ‘was the first wicket-keeper; that part of the game not having been attended
to before’ (Mitford 1833 in HM, p 128). The cricket manuals of the early 19th century
(Boxall, Lambert, and Nyren) all insist that the wicket-keeper is ‘the most proper
person to place the players in the field’ (Boxall 1800, p 50), apparently because his
gesturing to the fielders could not be observed by the batsman on strike. This rather
dubious arrangement had, however, been abandoned well before the end of the 19th
century.
See also STUMPER
wicketkeeper-batsman
wicketkeeper-batsman n a wicket-keeper who is a good enough batsman to be

regarded as one of the ‘specialist’ batsmen in his side:
‘By the end of Australia’s triumphant tour he [Ian Healy] had emerged as a wicket-
keeper-batsman of outstanding ability’ (Mike Coward, Wisden 1994, p 18).
‘Jim Parks, one of England’s finest wicketkeeper-batsmen, has praised the selectors for
their decision to return to the more specialised skills of Chris Read for this week’s Head-
ingley Test’ (Paul Weaver, Guardian 1 August 2006).
wicketless
wicketless adj without any wickets being taken, or without taking any wickets:
‘Some of the bowling served to Lara was embarrassing … Sobers had only a marginally
more testing time. Khan Mohammed conceded 259 runs in 54 wicketless overs’ (Tunku
Varadarajan, The Times 19 April 1994).
‘Shane Warne claimed nine wickets for the match but off-spinner Tim May went wicket-
less’ (Malcolm Conn, The Age (Melbourne), 24–25 December 2005).
wicket maiden
wicket maiden n a maiden over in which the bowler takes at least one wicket; wicket
maidens are represented in the scorebook by joining up the dots in the record of the over
to form a letter ‘W’
wide
wide n (also formally wide ball) a ball that passes out of reach of the batsman at the
wicket, which is not ‘sufficiently within his reach for him to be able to hit it with his bat
by means of a normal cricket stroke’ (Law 25 § 1). When a wide is bowled the umpire
calls ‘wide’ and signals to the scorers by extending both arms horizontally. A wide
appears as a cross in the bowling analysis and does not count as one of the six balls of
the over. One run is credited to the batting side, unless the batsmen actually run more
runs or the ball goes to the boundary, in which case any runs scored are credited to the
extras as wides. In most limited-overs competitions a more stringent interpretation of the
law is applied, and the umpires are instructed to discourage ‘negative bowling’ by calling
as wides any balls bowled sufficiently far from the stumps ‘to make it virtually
impossible for the striker to play a “normal cricket stroke”’.
Wides first appear in the Laws in 1810–11 and, as with many such developments (cf
BAT), the new regulations came in the wake of a notorious incident in which the absence
of any ruling had been flagrantly exploited. In this case William Lambert had managed
205 wrist-spinner
to retrieve a desperate situation to win a single-wicket match at Lord’s in 1810, by
bowling his opponent, Lord Frederick Beauclerk, a series of wides in order ‘to put him
out of temper’. Initially wides were not treated separately, and any runs that resulted were
‘to be put down to the Byes’ (Laws c 1810). ‘The first mention of “wides” on the score
sheet appears to be in a match at Brighton between Kent and Sussex’ (Box 1868, p 121),
probably in 1827. There is a law of 1835 to the effect that the ball becomes dead as soon
as ‘wide’ is called, so that no further runs could be taken, but this was reversed in 1844,
and since then the batsmen have been allowed to take as many runs as they can get.
See also EXTRAS
쐽 adj, adv relatively far from an imaginary line separating the off and leg sides of the
pitch in front of the batsman; the term is used especially to describe fielding positions in
the area behind the bowler’s wicket, such as long-on or mid-off:
‘Dyson took two offside fours off Pringle before playing him wide of mid-on for the two
runs which took Australia to an eight-wicket victory’ (Henry Blofeld, Cricketer February
1983).
‘Maddy smote him for one wounding six over wide midwicket, then repeated the shot to
just short of the boundary’ (Jamie Jackson, Observer 13 August 2006).
Compare STRAIGHT. See FIELDING POSITIONS
willow
willow n the bat:

‘Lovers of the game know that there is no sweeter sound than the “woosh” of an off-drive
perfectly timed in the “meat” of the willow’ (Manley 1988, p 84).
work
work vb 1. to deflect the ball off a more or less straight bat, sending it along the ground
especially into the leg-side area:
‘Phillips … produced many attractive strokes, particularly square-cuts and off-drives,
and worked the ball off his legs well’ (WCM January 1984).
‘If the wicket, for instance, is certified damp the batsmen stay on the back foot and forget
the drive, preferring to work the ball away square of the wicket’ (Amrit Mathur, Sport-
star [Chennai] 16 July 1994).
‘The way that Mahela Jayawardene worked the ball into the gaps during the middle
stages provided an object lesson in technique and composure’ (Richard Hobson,
2. to change direction after pitching; break (obsolete):
‘A ball that twists after pitching is said to “work” in or off as it turns either towards or
from the wicket’ (G. H. Selkirk, Guide to the Cricket Ground 1867, p 40).
쐽 n spin imparted to the ball or the resulting deviation of the ball on pitching; break (old ):
‘On a wicket where an off-break bowler can get much work on the ball, it is sure to be
frequently played towards short-leg’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897, p 56).
‘He appears to be a roller rather than a spinner, but is said to get a bit more work into
his googly’ (Peebles 1959, p 40).
workhorse
workhorse n a bowler whose main function is to bowl defensively for long spells in order
to contain the batting side; a stock bowler:
‘Jackman, who was brought out here to be a workhorse, had not played in five weeks’
(Matthew Engel, Guardian 27 January 1983).
wrist-spin
wrist-spin n spin imparted to the ball mainly by movement of the wrist at the moment of
delivery:
‘There was swing bowling of the first order from Andrew Flintoff and Matthew Hoggard,
while Shane Warne’s 12–246 was a sublime exhibition of wrist spin’ (Haigh 2005, p
195).
쐽 vb to bowl a ball with wrist-spin:
‘Hobbs crouched and advanced upon the crease to whip over a wrist-spun ball that
buzzed and was liable to turn either way’ (Frith 1984, p 157).
wrist-spinner
wrist-spinner n an exponent of wrist-spin bowling:

‘Warne … managed to concede under two runs per over, thereby flouting the tradition
of profligate wrist-spinners buying their wickets’ (Vic Marks, Wisden 1994, p 22).
wristy 206
wristy
wristy adj characterised by skilful and supple movement of the wrists, as in playing a cut
or delivering a ball with wrist-spin:
‘Lara has long been linked with Sobers, for they share so many attributes — left-hand-
edness, a wristy, irrepressible back-foot technique and, just as striking, a ready smile
and a love of life’ (Alan Lee, The Times 19 April 1994).
‘Ian Chappell was a testing proposition for Test batsmen, letting loose wristy leg-breaks
and wrong’uns from a strong action’ (Frith 1984, p 176).
wrong’un
wrong’un, (also wrongie Australia) n a ball bowled by a wrist-spinner that turns in the
opposite direction from usual; a right-arm bowler’s googly or a left-arm bowler’s
chinaman:
‘Lock was overwhelmed trying to cut a very good wrong’un from Philpott’ (Peebles
1959, p 51).
‘In the New Zealand Tests, Warne’s mixture of, as he puts it, “various leggies, toppies,
and wrongies” conceded only one-and-a-half runs an over’ (Frank Keating, Guardian 2
June 1993).
YZ
york
york vb to dismiss a batsman by bowling him with a yorker:

‘Larwood made some beautiful strokes, including a six off Ironmonger, before being
yorked’ (Cricketer Spring Annual 1933, p 31).
‘In the space of three balls he yorked Rhodes and then Kirsten, in almost identical
fashion’ (Richard Hutton, Cricketer September 1994).
‘Lee then hit Strauss behind the right ear, drawing blood, preparatory to yorking him
with a well-concealed slower delivery’ (Haigh 2005, p 103).
yorker
yorker n a straight ball that passes underneath the striker’s bat, especially by pitching right
up to or just inside the popping crease:
‘A yorker … depends for its success upon being mistaken for a half-volley and, therefore,
of being hit at’ (Larwood 1933, p 190).
The bowler can attempt to deliver a yorker but the ball only becomes a yorker if the
batsman takes the bait and is induced to misjudge the ball’s length, playing it either as
a half-volley or a full toss. It is thus quite possible for a batsman to be ‘yorked’ even if
he is a yard or two out of his ground so long as, in failing to read the ball’s length
correctly, he allows it to pass beneath the bat. The word yorker seems to have come
into use during the 1860s, and within less than thirty years the perennial controversy
zooter 208
over its origins had already begun. The favoured, but really quite unconvincing
explanation for its etymology – namely that this type of delivery originated in
Yorkshire – was already being advanced in 1888:
‘We can find no derivation for the word “yorker”, but are told that it came from the
Yorkshiremen, who were fonder of bowling this ball than any other’ (Badminton 1888,
p 133).
A more fruitful area of investigation is the well-attested connection, in 18th and 19th
century regional slang, between the words ‘Yorkshire’ and ‘york’ and the notion of
cheating or deception. To ‘york’ or ‘put Yorkshire on someone’ are defined in the Eng-
lish Dialect Dictionary (1905) as ‘to cheat, trick, or overreach a person’, while Captain
Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1811) includes the phrase ‘to come Yorkshire
over someone’, meaning to deceive them.
Another strand worth investigating is the similarity between ‘yorker’ and ‘jerker’, which
led Andrew Lang (in a manuscript paper on ‘The Yorker’ written in the 1890s and now
in the MCC library) to speculate on a possible etymological connection. Lang rejected
this idea on the grounds that the Laws said a ball should be ‘bowled not jerked’, but there
is some evidence – also in the English Dialect Dictionary – for a dialectal variant yerker
or yarker, indicating ‘something that jerks or wrenches’; hence, perhaps, a ball that goes
under the bat and wrenches the stumps out of the ground. It is impossible to rule with any
certainty on the etymology of a word whose origins were already obscure within a gen-
eration of its being coined. But it is probably fair to say that the likeliest derivation is
from the york, Yorkshire words, which denote the kind of deception that is indispensable
to a successful yorker.
See also TICE
zooter
zooter n a ball bowled by a wrist-spinner with relatively little spin on it, which comes out
of the front of the hand and tends to go straight on and dip in to the batsman; originally
an Australianism, the word is pronounced to rhyme with ‘footer’ rather than ‘shooter’:
‘Recently on to the scene has come something called the zooter, which nobody really
understands but which Mike Gatting … is certain to receive the ultimate version of’
(David Hopps, Guardian 24 November 1994).
See also MYSTERY BALL
A note on source material
All good dictionaries start from the observation of language in use. The
Wisden Dictionary of Cricket follows this principle, and is based on a
detailed analysis of cricket literature. It draws on a wide range of sources
from all corners of the cricket-playing world - from match reports in early
18th-century newspapers to the most recent edition of Wisden Cricketers'
Almanack. Almost every word or phrase defined is supported by carefully
selected quotations, taken from books, newspapers, magazines, and
websites. Though numerous sources have been consulted and many are cited
in the dictionary, the ones I have relied on most heavily are listed here.
Laws and Regulations:

• the Laws of Cricket: various editions, from the original version
published in 1744 to the 2nd edition (2003) of the Code revised in
2000. (References to the Laws are to this edition unless otherwise
stated.)
• various other regulations such as the ICC's 'Standard Test Match
Playing Conditions' and the ECB's 'First Class Regulations and
Playing Conditions'
Newspapers:
• Quotations from 18th-century newspapers are taken mainly from
Fresh Light on 18th Century Cricket by G.B. Buckley (1935) and
Cricketing References in Norwich Newspapers 1701 to 1800 by J.S.
Penny (1979).
• Dozens of other newspapers have been cited – most of them British
and covering the last 25 years, but a substantial number from other
times and places
Cricket Magazines and Journals:

• Numerous magazines have been mined for information, but the most
regularly quoted are the The Cricketer and Wisden Cricket Monthly
(WCM) – now merged as The Wisden Cricketer – and a more recent
arrival from India, Cricinfo Magazine.
• References in the text to 'Wisden' are of course to the Wisden
Cricketers' Almanack
Books:
While other books are occasionally cited, the majority of quotations come
from the ones listed here. They were selected to provide a representative
sample of cricket writing from across the world, from 1800 to the present
day. Some are classics of cricket literature, but all provide invaluable
evidence of the way the language and customs of the game have evolved
over the last two centuries or more.
Arlott 1983 John Arlott, How to watch Cricket 1983

Badminton 1888 A.G. Steel and the Hon. R.H. Lyttelton (Eds),
The Badminton Library: Cricket 1888
'Bat' 1851 'Bat' (Charles Box), The Cricketer's Manual
(5th edn) 1851
Berry 1882 Scyld Berry, Cricket Wallah 1982
Bhattacharyra 2006 Soumya Bhattacharyra, You Must Like
Cricket? 2006
Bose 1990 Mihir Bose, A History of Indian Cricket 1990
Box 1868 Charles Box, The Theory and Practice of
Cricket 1868
Boxall 1800 T.Boxall, Rules & Instructions for Playing at
the Game of Cricket as practised by the most
eminent Players 1800
Brearley 1982 Mike Brearley, Phoenix from the Ashes 1982
Cardus 1978 Neville Cardus, Cardus in the Covers 1978
Cashman & Weaver 1991 Richard Cashman & Amanda Weaver,
Wicket Women: Cricket and Women in
Australia 1991
Clarke 1851 William Clarke, 'Practical hints on Cricket'
(from Cricket Notes 1851) in HM
Felix 1850 'Felix' (Nicholas Wanostrocht), Felix on the
Bat: being a scientific Inquiry in the use of
the Cricket Bat 1850
Frith 1984 David Frith, The Slow Men 1984
Haigh 2005 Gideon Haigh, A Fair Field and No Favour
2005 (the Australian edition; there is also a
UK edition, with the title Ashes 2005 - The
Greatest Test Series)
Headlam 1903 J. Headlam, Ten Thousand Miles through
India and Burma (a cricket tour by the
Oxford University Authentics) 1903
HM E.V. Lucas (Ed.), The Hambledon Men (a
selection of classic 19th-century writings)
1907
James 1963 C.L.R. James, Beyond a Boundary 1963
Lambert 1816 William Lambert, Instructions & Rules for
playing the Noble Game of Cricket 1816
Larwood 1933 Harold Larwood, Body-Line? 1933
Lillywhite 1860 Fred. Lillywhite, The English Cricketers' Trip
to Canada and the United States in 1859, 1860
Manley 1988 Michael Manley, A History of West Indian
Cricket 1988
Marqusee 1994 Mike Marqusee, Anyone but England: Cricket
and the National Malaise 1994
MCC 1952 The M.C.C. Cricket Coaching Book 1952
Mitford 1833 Rev. John Mitford, Review of Nyren 1833 in
Gentleman's Magazine July/Sept 1833, in HM
Moorhouse 1979 Geoffrey Moorhouse, The Best-Loved Game
1979
Nyren 1833 John Nyren, The Young Cricketer's Tutor and
The Cricketers of my Time 1833, in HM
Oslear & Mosey 1993 Don Oslear with Don Mosey, The Wisden
Book of Cricket Laws 1993
Peebles 1959 Ian Peebles, The Fight for the Ashes 1958-9,
1959
Pullin 1900 A.W. Pullin, Talks with old English Cricketers
1900
Purandare 2005 Vaibhav Purandare, Sachin Tendulkar: a
definitive biography 2005
Pycroft 1854 Rev. James Pycroft, The Cricket Field (2nd
edn) 1854
Ranjitsinhji 1897 K.S. Ranjitsinhji, The Jubilee Book of Cricket
1897
Warner 1934 Sir Pelham Warner, The Book of Cricket (3rd
edn) 1934

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Dictionary of Cricket

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The Wisden

A & C Black 앫 London

A & C Black Publishers Ltd

© Michael Rundell 2006

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

ISBN-10: 0 7136 7915 8

Text typeset by A & C Black

When I was asked to write this foreword, I became very enthusiastic - as a

I was also keen to add my tuppence-worth to cricketing etymology. The J

There is a further complication. Though jaffa is a compliment to a bowler,

Matthew Engel Herefordshire, September 2006

It’s a privilege to have my dictionary published under the Wisden colours,

ACCA abbr Anglo-Corfiot Cricket Association

ACS abbr Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians

action-break n break imparted to the ball by a fast or medium-pace bowler, either as a

ACU abbr Association of Cricket Umpires and Scorers, an organisation representing

air-break n movement of the ball in the air; swing (old):

amateur n a person who plays cricket as a pastime rather than as a profession;

analysis n the record of a bowler’s performance in an innings or match, or sometimes

5 around the corner

around the corner phrase See CORNER

around the wicket 6

around the wicket adv = ROUND THE WICKET

at prep used following an aggregate number of wickets or runs, to indicate a player’s

bad light See LIGHT

ball-doctoring See BALL-TAMPERING

ball-tampering, ball-doctoring n the practice of deliberately and illegally altering the

barndoor n 1. ‘a player that blocks every ball’ (OED) (obsolete)

barrack vb to shout sarcastic or abusive comments about the performance of a team of

bat-and-pad See BAT-PAD

batswoman n a female batsman (old):

batting n the performance or ability of an individual batsman or of the batsmen in a team

batting average See AVERAGE

batting crease = POPPING CREASE

batting order See ORDER

batting points See BONUS POINTS

beamer n a fast, high full toss aimed at the batsman’s head:

beat vb 1. to break through a batsman’s defence, though without necessarily dismissing

bend vb to change direction after pitching; break (old):

beneficiary n a player who has been awarded a benefit by his county:

bias (obsolete) n the ‘break’ put on the ball by a spin bowler:

biomechanics n the mechanics of living organisms; especially (in a cricketing context),

bits-and-pieces player n a player who is neither a specialist batsman nor a specialist

blob n a batsman’s score of nought; a duck (old):

blonger n a batsman’s score of nought; a duck (slang):

board n the scoreboard:

body-break n = ACTION-BREAK (old):

bombada Corfu lit a ‘bomb’: a full toss

bosie, bosey n especially in Australia a googly, so called after its ‘inventor’ B. J. T.

23 bowler’s back drive

bowling average See AVERAGE

bowling points See BONUS POINTS

bowl out vb 1. = BOWL vb 3

bowl-out n a method of settling the result of a match in a knock-out competition, used

brace n —bag a brace to score nought in each innings of a match:

Bradmanesque adj denotes a style of batting, or a player’s batting record, characterised

brain bucket n especially in South Africa a protective helmet (slang)

bumper n 1. a fast short-pitched ball; a bouncer:

bunny n 1. a late-order batsman with little or no batting skill; a rabbit:

bunsen n a pitch conducive to spin bowling; a ‘turning’ wicket (slang):