Strewth!

Blimey I don't half ache today! My legs are stiff and my muscles are aching and my thumbs still swollen and painful if I try and do stuff with it. I've also got a bit of a cold so feeling pretty knackered, so come Wednesday when I should be doing the running back and forth across a field and throwing the ball at the stumps malarky and practicing my high catches it looks like I'll be curled up with my Horlicks and Lemsip watching the tele or sitting here more likely ranting about the Fluffy Bunny Brigade. Actually I wont, having read back over yesterdays blog, I think the rant at the beginning was a bit too much and might put people off reading the content further down?

So aches and pains and a snivelly nose and sore throat - sounds like I should take it easy for a few days.

Later.....

Can't keep away. I wrote a load more stuff while I was going to work on the train this morning and have just tried to transfer it across to this computer, but there was a file incompatability issue and now have lost all the files! So I've now got to remember all the stuff I wrote and re-write it all!

It was primarily with regards the new variation The Gipper. Neil "Sammers" the captain asked about it and whether they were going to get to see it, I explained that at this stage it was very much "Work in progress" and that I can get it down the other end of the pitch but with no pace as yet, but loads of turn. He then asked about how it comes out of the hand and I showed him saying that I can't imagine actually bowling it in a match for some time yet and he said to try and get it ready for July/August. The thing was he wasn't taking the P**s he seemed genuinely interested and offering real encouragement.

In the match yesterday I had another little positive with "Super Dave" calling me Dave "Warnesque" Thompson. Nothing to do with any spinning aspects of my bowling but the fact that my mannerisms leading up to the point where the ball leaves the hand have all got traits of Shane warne. Apparently I cup the ball in my hand making smoothing actions (I was drying it) and wiping it on my clothes? Then I spin it from hand to hand which Warney does and then my run-in is short building up to the release in virtually the same way that Warne does? Maybe all this was so convincing following Neils dismissal in his first over that the batsmen bought into it and thought I could bowl as well as Neil?

It'd be good if I could just get The Gipper to get up the other end with some accuracy enbaling me to pitch it outside Leg Stump and then turn freakishly across the batsman towards off. If I could produce 2 balls like that and then follow up with all my other variations that might be just enough to instill a sense of fear in the batsmen to then see me through my spell without them getting the other hand?