Custom Bats Cricket Forum
Equipment => Gloves => Topic started by: M77 on October 17, 2012, 07:26:24 PM
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Having had to design a number of gloves this summer I dissected a number of top end gloves to break down their inner workings to see how things could be improved. Everything from foam density, cavity foams and even materials from the motor industry have been looked at.
But when it comes to looks often people stick to what they no... this leaves me with a bit of an issue and the question for a glove design (that i have and continue to work on for Affinity) that i know will be one of the safest for your paws yet will come at the cost of something odd in the way that it looks. (not feels, they feel very good)
But be honest in your feedback and in your vote as i have watched many an item getting panned.
Would you be as critical if the changes in aesthetics simply made something designed to protect you the best you could buy?
Thanks
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Start with the Salix gloves and see where that takes you...
looks, design and protection please all for £40 a pair with english pittards palms.
am I asking too much?
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I've bought and use an ayrtek. Enough said. Having said that, at most levels of cricket, do you need the best hand protection? Are the bowlers fast enough or canny enough to warrant it? Having said that, both my current pairs of gloves are top of range modern style bought in sales to get best protection.
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I think it has to be an equal blend of both. I don't think many would buy the best looking gloves if they offered little protection, regardless of the level they played at.
We know that in many cases, aesthetics such as stickers has a big influence on what brand of bat someone might go for. If they had 2 bats with similar performance, 9 out of 10 times the buyer will choose the one that looks good as well.
With that in mind I think softs are very similar. You want to know you are getting decent protection for the money and then it would come down to a choice of looks. I think what comes first with glove choice though is comfort.
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Start with the Salix gloves and see where that takes you...
looks, design and protection please all for £40 a pair with english pittards palms.
am I asking too much?
Buzz, im beyond that in terms of materials... same old same old...
Tim2000s in general yes bowlers are just not at the levels i play. The point of these new gloves it to take the impact a leading glove cannot.
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Unless you're sponsoring or supplying kit to a number of players to help sway public opinion, then you find it very very difficult to sell an odd looking glove no matter how good the grip or protection.
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I always tell people at my club to splash out a little more on gloves so when they get hit it doesn't hurt, the amount of times i see people get hit then shake their hand in pain whereas I'm just able to get on with the next ball thanks to my Ayrteks. Always worth extra money.
Obviously the design will get people's attention and they won't buy gloves that look naff
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Unless you're sponsoring or supplying kit to a number of players to help sway public opinion, then you find it very very difficult to sell an odd looking glove no matter how good the grip or protection.
I'm not really after a player buying the glove as I doubt more than 10 will ever exist through me and less than 5 pairs will make it for sale. Whilst its very relevant, with any difficulty there is opportunity.
Doing anything that actually benefits is often the hardest challenge of all as Ayrtek would testify too... breaking convention is a much harder route but one i feel is worthwhile when you are asked about your contribution to the development of safety in the game.
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So if there are only 5 going to be sold, and the aim is to produce the best protective glove to improve safety - does our opinion on those aesthetics matter? As we're then not really the target market for such a product.
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Might be me but I like flexibility, comfort, grip and sweat resistance. If you can't grip a bat in comfort and maintain that grip it's a bit pointless it looking good or offering superior protection.
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I'll try them out for you Marcus. I'm not afraid of something that looks different. Even if I don't need the protection.
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The question is how do u know if l need the protection until its too late? Having done my dissertation on gloves I'd have to brush up on it to see what frequency of injuries etc occurred.
A Beamer that u fend off with ur hand that could potentially break your finger etc. if the product is right people will invest, the ICC have gloves on their next project to do list after helmets so there must be some issues surrounding them in their current format. (I accept at our levels it's a rarity to see a serious finger injury but still happens) but at the pro level at least.
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Gloves are my recent obsession, I've got the ayrtek elites and some ayrtek club but I'm constantly on the lookout for new ones. To a degree the comfort and protection (not that I've ever actually been hit on the gloves ever for some reason) are the main things I look for.
I'd certainly be interested to see the new glove designs but I'm not sure I'd wear anything that was too wacky - the new kook mittens for example are probably good but I really don't fancy them.
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I'd be interested to see as using sausage at month but used all sorts incl Arcas gloves which were interesting pair of gloves
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How many have tried the aero mitts? Sadly their sizing was terrible, and they were tiny, but the idea was great and I bought a pair. Interesting idea that failed physical limitations for me, rather than concept.
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So if there are only 5 going to be sold, and the aim is to produce the best protective glove to improve safety - does our opinion on those aesthetics matter? As we're then not really the target market for such a product.
I'd say the voices here are exceptionally relevant regardless of wether anything i design under my own name sell more than a few units. It doesn't mean that the design isn't going to be used under a different name.
Also "target market" makes my skin itch... its always people... things like statistics in product development or for that matter any form of marketing leave huge holes. People vary even if they are the ones you feel would be potential customers... they are always people.
I'll try them out for you Marcus. I'm not afraid of something that looks different. Even if I don't need the protection.
Thanks Tim, you seem to be my first port of call for most of the items i introduce... edna says hi! ;)
But it may seem odd that an independent would go to such lengths and personal cost, but larger companies with a following rarely break that trend of introducing the radical. This trend is slightly bucked by kooks but not through to completion. A rather brave but lazy attempt. I can tell you that glove will be one of the best for proximal, intermediate and distal phalanges on fingers 4/5 (i know the thumbs isn't strictly a finger but is gets counted all the same). The issue is that with a mounted slab with no fixing its a moving plate. Closer to a poor sparring mitt. But where it gains in protections from certain angles it loses on others and the shock value for the most common injury will be no better than a very high end three part sausage glove.
In truth most items produced in the cricket world are above most of us as players, we all have equipment that is not comparable to our standard as a player. We simply choose the best because we can or that it gives us a buzz and its something we can discuss. If it werent so, grade 3 willow would be selling very well, but we can't quite bring ourselves to use something considered by many to be a poorer quality than the man next to us.
My only argument is if this is the trend then i would like to ensure that people who will pay to have what is considered to be the best actually do so with products of safety and get substance to match the price point.
It may no be everyones cup of tea, but i wear a certain lid because it offers me quantifiably the best levels of protection. I want to see that as an option for each area of cricket protection and thank fully others do to. Hence me doing and using the polarised view of the forum to gauge the extreme/aware view of a new item along with convention testing with online research companies like Toluna.
All in all i wanted people to know that something was being progressed other than what colour swatch can i change this year and where shall i place the badge?... More can be done... so i am.
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as Tim said, if you need a tester I'm in.
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All in all i wanted people to know that something was being progressed other than what colour swatch can i change this year and where shall i place the badge?... More can be done... so i am.
So this is just a convuluted way of advertising yourself and your soon to be launched brand?
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As a man who has lots of gloves and has tried to move his obsessional behaviour away from bats (as gloves are cheaper!) I love all innovations in handwear! For me, looks and comfort are key. At the level I am playing at these days it's actually quite hard to find any gloves that don't offer sufficient protection. Obviously guys who are facing 80+mph week in, week out may feel differently but I imagine the vast majority of us on here are more interested in looks and comfort. If you need someone to test those two then I'll happily help you out!
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So this is just a convuluted way of advertising yourself and your soon to be launched brand?
Ha, not quite. I think most people know what I have been doing so it really doesn't need shouting from the roof tops and in terms of marketing myself or what i do, I don't really need to do that here.
Nope it simply is as it is... getting a little info from 'chatter'. As experimenting with foams and accidentally cutting myself with a scalpel is far too "convoluted" a strategy even for me Tom ;)
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This is an interesting debate.
When it comes to looks and design, good and bad are subjective. So the only real way to know is by producing something and seeing how people react. (People are after all, fickle).
But when it comes to innovation, I think people like to be drip fed changes – too many changes at once makes people nervous.
For example hybrid cars; great there is a “new type of engine”, but they also initially made the cars look very different to non-hybrid models. I completely didn’t get the logic. The hybrids which look more like conventional petrol and diesel models seem to be far more desirable now. (Not suggesting Gloves are like cars but the principle of: reduced aggregate change is easier to swallow).
So in summary; if it were me, I would take the ‘popular’ designs and make some signature changes – marketing it on the safety improvements. (Over re-writing the book on gloves).
Just my 2pence worth.
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Protection first and foremost!
I took one on my bottom hand tip of the thumb to a quick ball that got up a bit higher than expected in the nets last week, and though I had what I thought were good gloves it bloody hurt! The plastic cup was rotated and my thumb throbbed like a looney tunes cartoon effect.
They were slazenger £50 ish gloves, and are now in the bin
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Protection first and foremost!
I took one on my bottom hand tip of the thumb to a quick ball that got up a bit higher than expected in the nets last week, and though I had what I thought were good gloves it bloody hurt! The plastic cup was rotated and my thumb throbbed like a looney tunes cartoon effect.
They were slazenger £50 ish gloves, and are now in the bin
Not sure there is a single pair of gloves on the market that could cope with the ball hitting you square on the end of the thumb....throwing away your Slaz gloves might have been a bit premature! If they beef up that area of the glove then they become unwearable.....
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Sorry Pedals
Should have been clearer, the gloves are/were fairly trashed, but the end of the thumb was the last straw! Plus it was just after taking one high in the ribs, before I got my act together.
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Nothing to apologise for! Sounds like the gloves were due for replacement anyway! You're a rare case on here, someone who actually wears kit out as opposed to 'gets bored of it!' :D
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I have gone over loads of gloves over my life, have tried and used nearly every brand out there.
Personally aesthetics are extremely crucial for me. Because as we say "First impression, last forever" just like that if a pair of gloves is good looking then it will impress me and grow over me and eventually I will end up buying it, hence, I have loads of excessive pairs which are useless at the moment because I'm only struck to Salix Pod Black.
I don't know but I have always found the best looking gloves to be top of the line one because I guess the work they have put in is clearly visible.
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Best protection is important to me but also the quality of build. I have seen some top of the line gloves where threads are hanging out or things start to go a little bit after a few times of use, usually it doesn't get any worse but it irks me that a top of the line product could have shoddy workmanship...
So M77 good protections and good quality build/finishing for me....wouldn't mind trying one out either when you release your gloves..
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I'm a big fan of the split fingered designs, gives greater flexibility, but then I read most of the pros use the one piece/sausage style fingers for greater protection. I recently got a pair of GN XXX gloves and these have a one piece sausage padding on the bottom two fingers on both hands, and split thumb and split fingers for the ring/little finger. Really good quality protection at a very attractive price ($AU110 is reasonable for top end gloves from the big brands like GN/Kooka/GM, etc).
In terms of colours, I've gone with the all white cosmetics on the sweatbands/straps for my pads and gloves, etc. Looks classier and less chance of copping stick from behind the wicket about my gear. Some of the Kookaburra/Puma stuff is a bit out there for my liking, but obviously protection is of paramount importance.
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I think that most of the gloves that look cool are also at the top end in terms of protection, i.e.. Puma 5000 and the top Kookaburra ones
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Ask the Sri Lankans what they need in a glove
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Ask the Sri Lankans what they need in a glove
Like
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Out of interest D30 used by GM, just a gimmick or does it really serve a purpose?
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For me its a comfort thing rather than protection, and having just ordered some Ayrtek Elite gloves i hope my problem will be sorted. As for looking cool thats just a bit pouncy for me all the gear and no idea sort of thing
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I posted these pics in the Your Kit area, but in terms of style/substance, I reckon these are right up there, GN XXX Hand Crafted range from Meulemans in Perth.
(http://i1325.photobucket.com/albums/u638/ABETTS5/image_zps413519ab.jpg)
(http://i1325.photobucket.com/albums/u638/ABETTS5/image_zpsbb5c0790.jpg)
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Nice! I love simple glove design. The new GM Le's look almost perfect, but I bought the SAF gloves and have to say, the simple design, protection and materials seem spot on for me.
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It's protection and comfort for me any day of the week, but I'll be be picky on how they look as well. The Ayrtek Elites are absolutely awesome, but I've also been a big fan of the M&H Distinctions as well after using a teammates last season.
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Out of interest D30 used by GM, just a gimmick or does it really serve a purpose?
Good product but they only use it in a small section of the fingers due to the price of it as a raw material. We were introduced to d3o back in 2005 when CCC were considering using it in rugby/cricket products.
It's also not the lightest of materials when using it in any larger sizes.
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I remember from my time in America, that D30 was used all through baseball. You could get catching or fielding gloves and also they had "heart protectors" Although im not sure there has been many fatalities, they might actually be a good introduction to the Cricket game!