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[Northern monkey]

I've been trying to bowl a wrong un, for over 30yrs, very rare I'm brave enough to bowl it in a game
But it's hugely satisfying to bowl it and take a wicket with it

[Big Mac]

The second best ever explains it best in my opinion...
https://youtu.be/VRalbzmKIEM

I remember having a lot of trouble with my line when I started playing cricket a year ago, no matter what I did most of my balls landed outside off stump which is bloody useless when you're turning it away.

I watched that MacGill video you linked to and the bit about the back foot being parallel to the crease made all the difference, it was literally the only change I made to my bowling and suddenly everything was landing on middle, middle and off and forcing the batsman to play. It's crazy how the tiniest changes can make such a massive difference.

I've been trying to bowl a wrong un, for over 30yrs, very rare I'm brave enough to bowl it in a game
But it's hugely satisfying to bowl it and take a wicket with it

I still can't bowl a googly reliably over 22 yards, I tried a couple the last time I played a few weeks back and they just came out as leggies with added top spin. My stock ball has a lot of side spin and not much top-spin so I think I'm better off trying to work out how to bowl a slider.

I've messed about with some left-arm wrist spin into the side netting from ten yards away and I actually find it easier to bowl left-handed than I do with my right hand so who knows, maybe that'll be the way to go 

[Nothing2SeeHere]

Thats a good video. So much information in there. I'm going to need to watch it several times to get the most out of it.

I have had good mileage from this video of Richie Benaud. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYiA2OJiCpw

Because he's coaching rather than explaining from scratch, I find the tweaks and adjustments to be simpler to follow. E.g. the tip about looking over the front shoulder behind the front arm. MacGill says the same point but he uses the feet to get the body perpindicular. For me, looking over the shoulder is an easier self check ( you can't look over your shoulder unless your back foot is along the line of the crease). Same stuff. Different way of explaining it.

[brokenbat]

I've been trying to bowl a wrong un, for over 30yrs, very rare I'm brave enough to bowl it in a game
But it's hugely satisfying to bowl it and take a wicket with it

Better to have a big spinning leggie than bowling a wrong un - take it from me ... I can ONLY bowl googlies. Haha. Grass is always greener...

[Woodyspin]

I actually find the googly pretty easy, the explain it is hard in words, and ever harder to take a video of it properly without direct feedback but here ot goes.

Take a tennis ball, with you finger pointing up spin the ball from right to left (this is your leg spinner). Take the ball again with your fingers pointing down take the ball from left roll your wrist down and from right to left flick the ball out the side. You should then if you're quick enough see the ball spin the other way.

You can do this sitting down!

Watch this video where he's standing there flicking the ball to him self is similar to what im trying to explain

https://youtu.be/_6ToQ5tfYn8

[Nothing2SeeHere]

It seems like another month, another change to my action.

The grass grew long at my practice spot and was finally mown. With the short grass I have been struggling with the vagaries of getting a decent repeatable delivery. Neither the line, length nor amount of spin I can generate is consistent.

Looking to get something on track I made an impulsive change to my action. I have always been a very front-on bowler and the change to side on accommodate the spin has been a struggle. In experimenting with a front on spin action I have also made a change to my cocked hand position.  The many tutorials I have seen have suggested a cocked wrist with the thumb uppermost (sort of like holding a bottle of beer). In order to get a decent action I have made the change to my wrist to rotate it so my thumb is pointing out (palm facing up). This is consistent with my seam bowling position as well.

So far the results are encouraging. I get less massive turn but more consistent movement off the ground. The big addition is also that in piggy backing onto an existing action I pretty much get some control of line and length for free.

I'm not practicing on a flat pitch so its difficult to say how much the massive turners were a symptom of bumps in the grass and how much was the previous technique. I'm tempted to say the the very wide arm turn did help to get the seam perpendicular to the line of direction which would give the most amount of sidewards movement but I'm happy to sacrifice some of this as I believe having an angled forward seam is likely to give better results (can control the amount of dip and amount of movement theoretically.).

What I'm less happy about is that at present it feels like I might not be generating as many revs on the ball. I have no way of really quantifying this though. The Malinga style sling of side on bowling feels like you generate more revs.

I'm going to persevere for another month or so and see what happens.

Pros - immediate accuracy improvement, can bowl a slow seamer as variation ball without massively different initial action, top spinner can be very accurate

Cons - Wrong-un doesn't feel as natural a position but is less obvious, possible reduction in spin levels

[Woodyspin]

Id love to physically see this. Where are you based?

[Nothing2SeeHere]

I'm near Southampton. I'll chuck a go pro down near me one practice session. I kind of wanted to give it a couple of weeks for things to bed down. It seems at the moment I'm making changes on a monthly basis to try and do things that both seem to work and also feel normal to me.

I'm worried I'm making things sound better than they are a bit here. I'm low down on the skill level and with no cricket experience prior to my mid thirties I'm trying to make the most of things as best as my joints allow. Happily much of my opposition is also happy to help out bowlers with rash shots so it doesn't take a lot of movement to look threatening.

I play at that level of cricket where extras is regularly one of the top scores on the score sheet (I'm fairly certain the bat and pad leg kick/glance is a sneaky innovation by some of the more wily players - I actually saw dead ball correctly called against a player who forgot to pretend to play a stroke to one - boy was he disappointed to have bust a gut to run two from it)

[Woodyspin]

Haha when we next have a net at eversley youll have to come!

[Nothing2SeeHere]

It seems I only ever post here when I have a good session of progress and that is certainly the case today.

With the wind and rain I haven't had as many practice sessions as I possibly need to improve well but in this I have possibly become a little more results focused. The amount of turn I was generating was inconsistent and I wasn't sure what had changed.

So today with the same old problems I decided to try bowling a few googlies. To my surprise, one of them spun like a leg break. I did a bit of research (spinning the ball at the same point from a drop) and I believe I have figured out my most recent problem.

To get a good level of turn, the seam needs to be spinning perpendicular to the ground. At my current bowling arm speed, the seam is rotating so it is parallel to the ground where the spin is having no effect. I tried a few slower balls and the balls started shooting off sideways. Bowling faster (more arm speed) and again the balls just carried straight on. For giggles I tried a loopy faster delivery to see if I could make one turn the wrong way and whilst I did get something that sort of moved the wrong way I couldn't be sure it wasn't a bump in the ground that I hit on that one particular ball. Would be hilarious if it worked though.

So a great day for me. I'm happy I'm spinning the ball fairly well and now I understand another piece in the puzzle of getting good turn. Even better, I now have an easy variation delivery that would be tricky to spot (bowling a fraction faster). Better yet, I can still carry on with my accurate arm action so I'm one stage closer to being able to try it out in a match.

Plenty of stuff still to improve but I'm finally starting to feel I'll be good to try some out in a match next season. 

[brokenbat]

It seems I only ever post here when I have a good session of progress and that is certainly the case today.

With the wind and rain I haven't had as many practice sessions as I possibly need to improve well but in this I have possibly become a little more results focused. The amount of turn I was generating was inconsistent and I wasn't sure what had changed.

So today with the same old problems I decided to try bowling a few googlies. To my surprise, one of them spun like a leg break. I did a bit of research (spinning the ball at the same point from a drop) and I believe I have figured out my most recent problem.

To get a good level of turn, the seam needs to be spinning perpendicular to the ground. At my current bowling arm speed, the seam is rotating so it is parallel to the ground where the spin is having no effect. I tried a few slower balls and the balls started shooting off sideways. Bowling faster (more arm speed) and again the balls just carried straight on. For giggles I tried a loopy faster delivery to see if I could make one turn the wrong way and whilst I did get something that sort of moved the wrong way I couldn't be sure it wasn't a bump in the ground that I hit on that one particular ball. Would be hilarious if it worked though.

So a great day for me. I'm happy I'm spinning the ball fairly well and now I understand another piece in the puzzle of getting good turn. Even better, I now have an easy variation delivery that would be tricky to spot (bowling a fraction faster). Better yet, I can still carry on with my accurate arm action so I'm one stage closer to being able to try it out in a match.

Plenty of stuff still to improve but I'm finally starting to feel I'll be good to try some out in a match next season.

Good stuff mate.... But, its actually not your arm speed that is creating the different angles of the seam.. it is the amount of time you are spending on your front foot.. Generally, when one tries to bowl fast, he/she spends less time on the front foot, and the tendency is to rush through the action a bit.. this leads to the shoulders rotating a bit more horizontally, instead of going "up and over". This leads to the seam going a bit like a flying saucer (in off spin, this would be called "undercutting" the ball)..

Seems like when you are "bowling slow", you are pivoting more, and spending more time on your front foot... leading to more vertical shoulder rotation, and that is leading to the correct seam position. If you so desire, I bet you could start bowling FAST leggies, if you focus on getting the extra speed through faster SHOULDER rotation (instead of whipping your arm through quicker). 

[Nothing2SeeHere]

Now that is interesting. I'll have to set up a go pro to see if I can see a difference.

I'm not sure I can totally visualise the faster shoulder rotation (in my head I'm imagining an axis through the spine of a bowler and its getting the shoulders turning faster around that axis that is going to give me extra pace. Is that correct?

[WalkingWicket37]

@Nothing2SeeHere who do you play for mate?

[Nothing2SeeHere]

So a month later and its all going wrong. Bah!

I have been occupied for a couple of weeks and haven't trained and it seems I have lost everything. Very frustrating. At the beginning of the month I was chatting to the off spinner from another team. He suggested with my action I might try off spin. So I did. And it spun nicely. So, I thought to myself - 'Great. No need to learn the googly. I something that I can work on even if its possible to pick. It should still keep the batsman honest.'

But it seems I have lost all my form and I can't get any turn out of my legspin. I believe I am still spinning as hard as before but everything just goes straight on. I was initially hoping it was down to the conditions (the grass is longer and wetter than before) but my off spin is moving pretty well so I am forced to concede its the technique.

I'm going to keep working on both but it may not be ready for next season after all. :-(

[brokenbat]

So a month later and its all going wrong. Bah!

I have been occupied for a couple of weeks and haven't trained and it seems I have lost everything. Very frustrating. At the beginning of the month I was chatting to the off spinner from another team. He suggested with my action I might try off spin. So I did. And it spun nicely. So, I thought to myself - 'Great. No need to learn the googly. I something that I can work on even if its possible to pick. It should still keep the batsman honest.'

But it seems I have lost all my form and I can't get any turn out of my legspin. I believe I am still spinning as hard as before but everything just goes straight on. I was initially hoping it was down to the conditions (the grass is longer and wetter than before) but my off spin is moving pretty well so I am forced to concede its the technique.

I'm going to keep working on both but it may not be ready for next season after all. :-(

Happens to the best - all the best leg spin coaches warn about "losing the leg spinner" if you focus too long on variations. You may be accidentally bowling the slider (seam rotating at 90 degrees instead of 45).. if all else fails, get a 2 colored ball and try recording yourself to see how the ball is coming out.