Welcome to Howzat!, the free magazine from www.cricket-for-parents.com.

In this issue you can discover how to improve your batting with the right trigger movement, how to develop batsmen's decision making with the line batting game, and learn about that latest problems with UDRS, the video referral system.

Getting the Best Trigger Movement

Many cricket coaches will tell you that most batting problems stem from a poor set-up, or stance. You can read more about the right set-up at http://www.cricket-for-parents.com/batting.html, but batsmen can build on this to give them more advantage over the bowler. This means making an initial movement or series of movements so that they move from their original stance to a “ready” position as the bowler releases the ball. This is known as a “pre-delivery” or “trigger” movement.

There are advantages and disadvantages to this. The advantages include “unweighting” the feet to allow rapid movement, creation of rhythm, and helping with weight transfer into strokes. Disadvantages include causing head movement, poor balance and bias to particular strokes. Generally, good trigger movements are consistent, rhythmical, keep head and eyes stable and level, make for balanced easy movement forward or back, and help with successful stroke execution.

As golfers always have to work on their swing, so batsmen need to work on their set-up and triggers – I’m currently working to correct an old habit of poor balance. Ever wondered how top batsmen play 90 mph bowling, that gives them about one third of a second to play a stroke? Next time you watch Ricky Ponting, see how front foot trigger movement gets his feet moving even before the ball is released.

Here’s a good way to develop batsmen’s decision making skills, by playing the right shot for the length and line of the ball. The wicket is divided into three zones by tape or chalk as shown, and each ball is served into one of these three channels. In the diagram, the fielders are labelled as F, the batsman as Ba, wicket keeper as Wk and bowler as Bo. Its best to use tennis balls for this game.

Balls landing in the offside channel should be hit to the off, balls landing in line should be hit straight and balls in the leg side channel should be hit to leg. The coach can award points for each correct shot, perhaps from a set number of balls to each batsman. The batsmen and bowlers change after a set number of repetitions. There are lots of variations to this, such as extra points for batsmen using the right technique, but getting his shot choice and direction right is a good first step.

For more info on cricket skills, visit http://www.cricket-for-parents.com/cricket-skills.html

More Problems for UDRS

After all the agonising over the cricketing merits of the Umpire Decision Review System (UDRS), the ICC’s plans to roll it out have now hit financial trouble. Following trials at domestic and international level, the ICC announced in June that the video referral system would be rolled out from October. But, they have told the national cricket boards and broadcasters that it is they and not the ICC who will have to stand the cost.

Understandably, this has not gone down well, and India and South Africa have already said they won’t be using UDRS in their upcoming test series. The problem is, hi-tech systems like Hawkeye and Hot Spot are expensive. A least one extra Hawkeye operator would be needed at grounds where it was used for referrals, and renting other necessary equipment would also add to broadcasting costs.

So, while the negotiations continue, cricket lags behind other sports like tennis, rugby and American football where video referrals are well established. Love it or hate it, I feel that UDRS will eventually come to cricket in some form, but that, sadly, the spectator will end up paying the bill.

For more info on technology in cricket, visit http://www.cricket-for-parents.com/cricket-on-TV.html

Until next time!

Best wishes,