{"id":5578,"date":"2016-10-05T12:36:48","date_gmt":"2016-10-05T07:36:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/jwt2015\/?p=5578"},"modified":"2016-10-05T12:36:48","modified_gmt":"2016-10-05T07:36:48","slug":"the-bloody-truth-about-cricket","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/studykit\/currentaffairs\/the-bloody-truth-about-cricket\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bloody Truth About Cricket"},"content":{"rendered":"
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London \u2014 Twenty thousand Englishmen baying at the enemy. Screaming themselves hoarse, urging their champion to strike flesh. And then, it happens: The enemy is hit. Yes! Unwilling to show pain, he removes his helmet. Blood \u2014 the sight most keenly craved for \u2014 trickles down. His entourage runs to assist him \u2014 he attempts nonchalance, but concussion is an issue. The crowd is ecstatic.<\/p>\n

Is this the Saxons at the Battle of Hastings, eager for Norman gore? Or Wellington\u2019s men at Waterloo, bayonets fixed for Frenchies? No, it\u2019s June 2005 at Lord\u2019s Cricket Ground, the spiritual home of cricket worldwide. And the bloodthirsty mob of 20,000 are mostly wearing blazers, brogues and club ties. On other days of the week, you\u2019ll find them at work in arbitrage.<\/p>\n

And the blood? Australian, of course \u2014 the ancient enemy, rival for the Ashes, as the trophy for each five-match tournament between England and Australia is known. What a start that was, and there were still some 24 more days of such glorious skirmishing to look forward to.<\/p>\n

In fact, the 2005 Ashes series turned into the greatest I have ever witnessed, the probable outcome seesawing almost hourly. There were moments when I had to leave the TV, my anxiety too intense. (Spectating can be more nerve-racking even than playing oneself.) I still cannot watch the highlights of the second match \u2014 which England won by the closest margin in 123 years of the contest \u2014 without fear stoking my pulse. It also remains the only time I have attended a victory parade: Trafalgar Square, London, was awash with jubilant jackets and ties that day.<\/p>\n

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England vs. Australia in cricket may be one of the oldest sporting rivalries, but it is hardly the most chivalrous. Rather, it is when this oh-so-civilized game truly reveals its nasty, brutish heart. Cricket may be the only team game in the world in which it is entirely legal for a player to make a move whose only purpose is to hurt, if not hospitalize, an opponent. In cricket, this is not a foul; no penalty is awarded, or score deducted. For, central to this gentleman\u2019s pastime \u2014 whether played on a village green or at Lord\u2019s \u2014 is \u201cthe bouncer.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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For the uninitiated: In cricket, the bowler (think pitcher) bounces the ball before it reaches the batsman (batter). Counterintuitively, a ball, or \u201cdelivery,\u201d that reaches the batsman without bouncing (\u201ca full toss\u201d) is generally an easy hit. The bowler is aiming at \u201cthe stumps,\u201d three wooden sticks creating a target almost hip high and nine inches wide. Strike those and the batsman is out (of one of the two innings).<\/p>\n

For the side that\u2019s in the field, that\u2019s a desirable result. So, as a rule, the bowler bounces the ball near the batsman, aiming to hit those stumps. However, if a fast bowler makes the ball \u201cpitch\u201d \u2014 that is, land \u2014 halfway down the 22-yard strip, it will most likely have bounced to head height by the time it reaches the batsman. There is no question of hitting the stumps: The bouncer\u2019s intended target is the batsman\u2019s upper body or head. The projectile is a sphere of varnished red leather, weighing 5.75 ounces and marginally harder than a baseball, and traveling at approximately 90 miles per hour.<\/p>\n

Of course, the bowler will claim that he hopes the batsman will use his bat to defend himself, the ball will fly off at an angle and the batsman will be out if the ball is caught. That\u2019s merely the necessary pretense: The bowler\u2019s primary objective is to terrify the batsman, and if in the course of this terror campaign a cheekbone is shattered, well, that\u2019s dashed unlucky.<\/p>\n

What are the batsman\u2019s options, faced with this assault? He has about half a second to decide, from when the ball leaves the bowler\u2019s hand to when it reaches him. The temptation is to use the bat to defend himself (my default method), in spite of the risk of giving a catch. Those blessed with spectacular reactions (not me) can swivel and, swinging the bat, \u201chook\u201d the ball away for runs. A more circumspect batsman keeps his eye on the ball \u2014 tempting, yet fatal, though it is to flinch and blink \u2014 and sways away, like a dodging boxer. The truly steely player (never me, if I can help it) opts to \u201cwear\u201d it: Keeping his bat out of the way, he lets the ball strike his chest, shoulder or back.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s merely the prologue. If you\u2019ve survived that delivery, you pretend nonchalance. You look around, as though planning your next scoring shot: Could you hit it as far as those chestnut trees next to the pub? In reality, you\u2019re sweating about the next ball.<\/p>\n

Unlike a batter in baseball, a cricketer needs to keep his head in line with the flight of the ball as it hurtles toward him. Because the ball has an equatorial seam which stands about an eighth of an inch proud, the bowler is scheming to use this asymmetry to make the ball deviate after it bounces. Most batsmen are out as a result of the ball\u2019s glancing off the outer edge of the bat and being caught by the wicketkeeper (think catcher). The only way to avoid this is to watch the ball in direct line and thus read the seam movement instantaneously.<\/p>\n

Here is the cumulative power of fear. The first ball almost booked you in to the dentist; so, less than a minute later, do you dare step into alignment with the next missile?<\/p>\n

The best players do. It is partly a matter of technique and practice, but at bottom \u2014 and herein lies the Englishness of it all \u2014 it\u2019s a simple matter of necessity. On a team of 11 players, only six or seven of you have been selected for your batting prowess. You have an obligation to score; it\u2019s What You Have to Do.<\/p>\n

All this and more was at stake when, not long ago, on a hot, humid Saturday in London\u2019s Dulwich neighborhood, I answered an invitation to play for the Writers Guild XI. What\u2019s an Oscar nomination or a Bafta award by comparison?<\/p>\n

The changing room brought the first nasty shock: Not many writers had been drafted; the team seemed to comprise mostly keen cricketers, subbed in. I\u2019d been relying on occasionals of all ages, not a squad of young, muscled colts. On the field came a second shock: Our opponents, allegedly a Royal College of Surgeons XI, appeared much the same.<\/p>\n

In what, I have to concede, became my retirement game, I stood ready, padded and fortified. The bowler\u2019s first four deliveries were \u201con a length,\u201d bouncing just above knee height. I went forward and met the ball each time with a firm, straight bat.<\/p>\n

After the last, the bowler strolled down the pitch toward me. Did he want to discuss the state of play, the weather, maybe the middle act of my latest play? No, he said just two words \u2014 \u201cNext one\u2019s \u2026…\u201d \u2014 and made a gesture, tapping a grass-stained fingernail against his front teeth.<\/p>\n

He was as good as his word. I saw the ball hurtle from his hand, a Zeus-like thunderbolt, and bounce halfway down the pitch. I turned my head and felt the ball part the back of my hair. There was a trembling weakness in my knees that would not settle. And a wave of sadness that pointed to nothing but my advanced age.<\/p>\n

This is the power of fear. You watch the fast bowler run in, gradually enlarging. You tell yourself to move to the ball \u2014 \u201csmell the leather,\u201d as your old school coach taught \u2014 but suddenly your feet seem stuck in cement. The ball rips through your defense and clatters into the stumps. The bouncer has done its work.<\/p>\n

Which is exactly what happened that sad day in South London. I have not played since.<\/p>\n

To succeed as a batsman means finding a way to defeat that fear. When English cricket fans applaud the national team for defeating Sri Lanka or South Africa or even Australia, it is this that we acknowledge and celebrate as much as anything else. And when the Little Hamblewick XI beats the King\u2019s Head XI, it\u2019s no different.<\/p>\n

Of course, this violence is cricket\u2019s dirty secret. No Englishman would dream of talking about it. To the rest of the world, we promote it as a sport played in languorous white, a sport that stops for tea, a sport where dissent to the umpire is quite unthinkable. And when it\u2019s beautiful, it is an exquisite game: The batsman who times his stroke perfectly never even feels the ball touch the bat. That is the wonder of a magically sprung piece of willow: the furious pace of the bowler\u2019s delivery is effortlessly reversed.<\/p>\n

You crave that moment \u2014 I enjoyed about three such in my batting career and remember each distinctly \u2014 and suffer everything else in its pursuit. But without the fear, and the struggle to overcome it, cricket is nothing.<\/p>\n