Knackered Knees #2

It's late Friday having knackered my knees last Monday and I'm happy to report that there's been a slight improvement today and for much of the day I have been walking relatively normal. I've just to resist the temptation to bowl this weekend and keep resting it and massaging it and allow whatever it was that got over-stretched to repair itself. I'm still looking to not bowl for 2 weeks maybe more.

Knackered Knees

Four years into my development as a Wrist Spinner and perhaps I'm getting there, now that I've got a bound and it looks like my body may be on the verge of giving up on me? Last summer when I'd been sprinting in the outfield I'd come away from the games with sore knees. The soreness generally went after 24 hours or so. There as also a game at Hornchurch when I twisted my knee quite badly trying to change direction quickly and my spikes didn't grip, although I don't recall which leg that was. Anyway the general feeling was that something was going on in the knee department and then over the winter it wasn't an issue. But at some point this winter the soreness has returned possibly when playing badmintion and again I never took to much notice of it and it faded over-night to be okay the next day.

But, now with the new bowling action and it being a lot more dynamic the knee issue has become more pressing. The new action sees me come out of the bound with the right foot planted side on to facilitate a good rotation, which I guess must put some additional pressure on the knee joint as this is a wholly new physical action for my knee. In addition after the pivot and release of the ball, my follow through is an awful lot faster and more vigorous than previously and this is no doubt putting more pressure/impact on the knee? As a result I'm getting knee soreness at new levels and after bowling Sunday with the kids and then again for 2 hours at nets I've been hobbling around like an old man since and only now 48 hours later I'm beginning to feel slightly better. All of which is a bit worrying. So I reckon I may not bowl this weekend and I may give bowling in the nets a miss on Monday night and may only bat. I'm thinking I'll possibly do this for a couple of weeks and see how it goes, but it's definitely a concern and if the soreness persists I'll have to get to a Doctor and get it checked out.

Paddock maintenance

It's rained quite a bit today and I've taken the opportunity to get some seed down at the batting end and feed the grass at the same time with fishmeal and some top dressing. Whether that works out to be a good idea in the longer term I'm not that sure because I will want to roll it again soon and with new grass growing and being really fragile I don't know whether getting the seed in at this point is the best option? I suppose with all of these things I'll just have to see how it goes, it's all expermental and it's not like I've got another strip to work with while I let this one grow and the seeds to germinate. The only thing that is on our side is the intention that we wont be using it till May, but it's going to be tempting to use it during the Easter Break if the weather cheers up and we get a lot of sunny days. The intention is that on those days we'd be in the tennis courts at The Rec.



You can pick out the fact that I've put down some top dressing as it's the brown colour. As soon as I'd finished the rain came down again which is good as it'll get the grass off to a good start.

Joe and Ben nets

Another fairly decent net session with Joe and Ben. Ben's radar was a little iffy at times, bowling short a lot and balls a little wide of Leg Stump ocassionally. Despite that none of the batsmen lasted more than 4 or 5 of his deliveries with the exception of Harrison. Changes in pace look to be the downfall of the better batsmen, but whether Ben is able to bring this into his approach without being told to do so, when he bowls is another matter.

Joe in the next net was doing very well with his Leg Breaks turning them big outside of Leg and getting them to come in through the gate or across the body to hit off or middle and off impressing the blokes that were coaching him. I've also noticed that as Joe bowls these days he's more up on the ball of his foot and swinging his leg round the pivot leg. We've got a ball as well that Joe uses that's got a nice seam on it and I reckon that helps him and offers real encouragement.

Overall both Joe and Ben did quite well as we move towards the start of the season.

Window of opportunity closing

It hasn't rained a great deal since the middle of Feb and today being an opportunity to get into the paddock with the roller and roll it for the first time, looks like it may be put off in hope that it'll rain again and re-soak the ground again. With it being March 12th sunny days like today would be good if we had seeded it as well.

To be continued.......

Later; I went over and had a look as my lads were playing football in the paddock and realised that the grass was in fact pretty dry and not that long and could potentially be cut. I couldn't tempt them to go and play cricket over at The Rec (Tennis courts) and was at a bit of a loose end and thought I'd get the mower and see if I could cut the grass and sure enough as you can see below it was okay.



Additionally once I'd cut the grass I had a better sense of how uneven and lumpy the wicket was and decided that I would roll it after all. All in all considering I wasn't going to do this at all this weekend and was going to chance it after the next rain fall, I'm quite pleased that I got it done now. The only thing I really need to do is get some seed down, which I may do tomorrow.



As you can see my kids and their mates were on there today playing football and this is an on-going problem that I just have to live with and it's getting worse as each year there seems to be more and more kids getting in there and using it and they're all getting bigger by the year causing more damage. I'll just to have to see how it goes.

After the rolling and mowing I was going to go and have a bowl on my own, but I managed to persuade Joe and Ben and their mates to go over to the old tennis courts as the Rec and have a bit of a knock about. Ben and his mate Kieran were up for beating their current record of a 28 run partnership, but I limited it to 9 runs and the best partnership of the day ended up being Mine and Bens with a new record of 32 runs at which point I declared. In this scenario Ben usually comes away with the best bowling figures taking the most wickets, but he batted throughout this session with no-one getting him out and what with him not bowling I came home with the best results having taken 3 wickets! Mostly edges to Joe behind as wicket keeper.

Legspin Biomechanics

So, the new action is posted up on Youtube.......... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBRAN1ClFHE and the comments I'm receiving from people are very good, especially from people that are in the know. I'm now being given specific drills to tweak the new action and improve it further. Weirdly, this video here, from a biomechanical point of view illustrates clearly something that I'm not doing. Coming away from the last net session and the practice in the old tennis courts, one of the things I'd have said that I was aware of that was lacking in my bowling was the rotation through the hips. It's been pointed out that when I move onto the 'Pivot foot' it's pretty static (See here) and I need to work with this aspect of my action in order to force further improvements. The hope is, if I can replicate the twist that you can observe in the video clip game where the bowler clearly rotates on the ball of his foot in his rotation, I should achieve far more spin and turn off of the wicket whilst maintaining my fairly decent accuracy. So, in theory given a few weeks with the drill and some training, the next set of videos should hopefully include a better rotation on the ball of the foot and better spin.

Nets

I didn't warm up before I went out which meant that within 20 minutes or so of starting I had a tight calf muscle that impeded me a little. Added to that I've not felt well particularly all day and the end result seems to be my bowling was pretty poor. Again my usual gripe of 'You can't get any rhythm going because you bowl every six blokes or so' also comes into play as and the whole thing was pretty unsatisfactory. Having said that I got some of the blokes out including some of the better players, but then it is only a net situation and the expectancy is that they wouldn't bat like that in a real life situation. Bowled some good Flippers and some nice Wrong Uns which caused people problems but failed to get anyone out.

Feedback re new bowling action

I've had some feedback with regards my new action from Liz Ward who comments on the forum I post on and she seems fairly impressed with the new action so far. She's showing someone else and it sounds like she's going to come back to me with some tweaking that I've said I'll work on. So things seem to be moving along nicely. Nets tonight and session 4 with the new action and each time I work with it there seems to be improvements.

Liz Ward is a Strength and Conditioning Practitioner operating in and around Essex, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire and Suffolk with a mission to change the way cricketers train for the sport; introducing biomechanics, fitness, psychology and nutrition.

Practice with the new bowling action

On Saturday I took the stumps and a bucket of Hockey Balls and went over to The Rec (Tarmac Tennis courts) taking the Canon G9 to record where I am with the new bowling action. A quick update on the story if you're new to this blog. I've been bowling Wrist Spin since the inception of this blog - so this July I'd have been at it for 5 years and right from the outset with no coaching I started out with a peculiar little skip which can be seen in many of my videos that are posted on Youtube. Over the years loads of people have said that I need to get rid of this 'Skip' and bowl with a bound as it would improve many aspects of my bowling one of which is the speed at which I bowl. Changing it seemed inconceivable as it was such an ingrained action and not until I found the Beau Casson video on Youtube in which he demonstrated the Stand Start was I able to start to consider getting rid of the skip . Working with the stand start drill at the end of last season, I moved on to walking in off of 3 or 4 steps and in doing so noticed a dramatic improvement in my bowling.

Over the winter I continued to work with the stand start and having taught my older son Ben to bowl with a bound when he was bowling off the wrong foot, I realised that there was some hope that I may be able to work with the bound and develop it over the winter and into the pre-season preparation. My younger son Joe who is a Wrist Spinner as well helped me out initially with the basics of the action and got me on my way and week or so ago at this same venue I spent an hour practicing with it. The following week I bowled with the action in the nets and that was okay too. So with 3 hours of practice with this new action I took the camera out with me yesterday and video'd where I am with it now.


There's a far better quality version on Youtube here.......
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBRAN1ClFHE

Paddock News

So, we’re into March and what some may consider spring, but we’ve got off to a very cold start. Years ago when I was younger I’d have expected to have had my shirt off by the end of March and made a start on my tan, but going by the weather at the moment that looks a little optimistic. Although last week (Thursday) it was spring like with the temp hitting 15, but since the end of Feb the temp has plummeted and we've had daytime temperatures of around 2-5 degrees and colder at night. Despite this, the council, were out on March 1st cutting the grass adjacent to the paddock. From what I can tell they’ve not been in the paddock and cut the grass in there, but it’s an indication that the grass is growing and maintenance should start. The last time I had a look the ground was saturated with water, so even if the council did have a smaller mower with them to get through the narrow entrance to the paddock, they may have decided that it was far too wet?

This image above is shot from the usual bowling end, and the stumps would be situated in line with the goal posts at the other end. I'm contemplating as detailed below having the stumps at this end this year later in the season once we've wron out the far end.

Here you can see where the stumps normally are and you can see that the seeds that where sewn have been sucessful and the general growth of the grass has recovered. I'll sow some more possibly this weekend as the weather prospects are slightly better this coming week.

This shot is looking down towards the bowling end from where the stumps are situated. The ideas is that the stumps at the new end later in the year will be right up against the fence. This will allow us to bowl from a position some yards in front of the stumps and not over-wear the wicket in the area where we'd normally pitch the ball. The grass in the middle of our usual wicket is pretty uneven and if we end up bowling and walking-in around that area the wear and tear may facilitate a more productive repair process next October?

*********

As mentioned above what with it being March, I am looking to get some seed down as soon as possible, on the basis that the weather has got to break soon and a run of good, warm and sunny weather being imminent. I want the seed down and growing because we’re planning not getting in there till May to actually use it. Having said that though the small boys that have been using it over the last couple of years for football are all going to be a bit bigger and potentially more into their football, so there’s a chance that they’re going to damage it more this year? That aside the preparation plans are being made so that we don’t actually get in there till May. Last year we started in April and because the ground was damp still and the grass cover still fairly thin, it sustained a lot of wear and tear early in the season. We’re just looking to get a couple of good months out of it through May and June and then review the potential for changing the ends, as the last couple of years we’ve had the stumps at one end only. This has meant that the wear and tear at the bowlers end has been so heavy that it’s been impossible to bowl down that end, but the repairs and leveling that was done in September and the fact that we’re slowly extending the length of the strip means that an end swap may be possible?