Got up this morning and it was warm and sunny, the boys had their hair cut over at a place near Great Berry Open Space, so when we'd done that we went over and had a pitch inspection and I took a few photo's. The ground over there since the last visit has dried out considerably and is more or less ready to be rolled and maybe cut as well. I'm only going to do it if the other bloke who is up for it gets involved and is there when I do the cutting and rolling, as I don't want a situation where we end up having a run in with the blokes at the Pavillion. As he's a member there hopefully he'll be able to liaise with them and clear it and get their support? I'll have to see how it goes over this coming week?
Once back having seen how much that field had dried out, we had a look at the Paddock and we decided that the time was right for the first mowing of the year and a good roll. Joe, Ben and I got the roller and the mower over there and we did the work and spent over half an hour cutting and rolling.
It's very obvious that the work that was done over the summer and through the Autumn at the bowling end has made a massive difference as that area is very good with regards flatness, then as you walk towards the bowling end it get progressively worse. By the time we finished though it was looking pretty impressive and looking like what it is meant to be. We've just got to keep our fingers crossed now that other people don't get on there and take the Mick and ruin it. The weather looks to be good over the next few days with it staying warm (Today was 18 degrees centigrade and sunny) so hopefully it'll dry out and the grass will recover a bit from the rolling. We shot a few pictures and when I get some time I'll upload those as a visual progress report. 
Later in the day we found ourselves up North at a place called West Hallam and had the opportunity to bowl in the nets there http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=west+hallam&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=18.252022,32.519531&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=West+Hallam,+Ilkeston,+Derbyshire,+United+Kingdom&ll=52.965664,-1.362999&spn=0.001139,0.003007&t=h&z=19
I bowled with the kids for a while and they eventually wandered off and went exploring in the nearby woods leaving me to bowl with the Hockey Balls I'd brought up. I soon found that I couldn't bowl that well in the nets at my full capacity because the height of the nets was about 3 metres and I flight the ball a lot with dip, so I was hitting the top ceiling net 50% of the time. I decided to bring the stumps to the front of the net and try bowling the 'Biggun' and was soon up to 22 yards. I made some interesting observations - the more loose and relaxed I am with the Biggun right through the body the better it seemed to work. I have to be quite specific with the placement and position of the fingers otherwise it goes straight, but the rest of the body seems to need to be very fluid and relaxed and acts like whip does. The power comes through the body in a really smooth fluid manner and the crack at the end of the whip is like the rip out of the Fingers. When it works it turned really well and this was with a seamless ball that my usual Leg break approach wasn't producing any spin. So an interesting session giving me more incentive to work with the Biggun.
Once back having seen how much that field had dried out, we had a look at the Paddock and we decided that the time was right for the first mowing of the year and a good roll. Joe, Ben and I got the roller and the mower over there and we did the work and spent over half an hour cutting and rolling.
It's very obvious that the work that was done over the summer and through the Autumn at the bowling end has made a massive difference as that area is very good with regards flatness, then as you walk towards the bowling end it get progressively worse. By the time we finished though it was looking pretty impressive and looking like what it is meant to be. We've just got to keep our fingers crossed now that other people don't get on there and take the Mick and ruin it. The weather looks to be good over the next few days with it staying warm (Today was 18 degrees centigrade and sunny) so hopefully it'll dry out and the grass will recover a bit from the rolling. We shot a few pictures and when I get some time I'll upload those as a visual progress report. 
Later in the day we found ourselves up North at a place called West Hallam and had the opportunity to bowl in the nets there http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=west+hallam&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=18.252022,32.519531&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=West+Hallam,+Ilkeston,+Derbyshire,+United+Kingdom&ll=52.965664,-1.362999&spn=0.001139,0.003007&t=h&z=19
I bowled with the kids for a while and they eventually wandered off and went exploring in the nearby woods leaving me to bowl with the Hockey Balls I'd brought up. I soon found that I couldn't bowl that well in the nets at my full capacity because the height of the nets was about 3 metres and I flight the ball a lot with dip, so I was hitting the top ceiling net 50% of the time. I decided to bring the stumps to the front of the net and try bowling the 'Biggun' and was soon up to 22 yards. I made some interesting observations - the more loose and relaxed I am with the Biggun right through the body the better it seemed to work. I have to be quite specific with the placement and position of the fingers otherwise it goes straight, but the rest of the body seems to need to be very fluid and relaxed and acts like whip does. The power comes through the body in a really smooth fluid manner and the crack at the end of the whip is like the rip out of the Fingers. When it works it turned really well and this was with a seamless ball that my usual Leg break approach wasn't producing any spin. So an interesting session giving me more incentive to work with the Biggun.
