Video Analysis

[Neil Pickup]

Bought a camcorder yesterday (I'm so enjoying no longer being a student) and today I had a long play around with it and recorded all kinds of bowling/throwing actions.

Would be muchly interested in feedback: www.youtube.com/npickup

[Manee]

Well, with all the help you have given me, I feel I should return the favour.

Your bowling action is not as bad as you make out. You get a good leap with your right knee driving through in the jump well. However, I feel that you go a bit too high and not enough far forward. The jump is aimed to get you are far forward as you can and the height is merely there to give you time to get the action through.

I also advise to keep the non bowling aim in an L-shape whilst in the air.

As you are aware, your bowling foot closes off the action. The key to solving this is not to make an effort to move the leg but to make an effort to keep the hips in a straight direction. This is easier and will help rectify any other flaws with your hips pointing in the wrong direction.

Your release is a bit wrong too. You seem to release it like Sohail Tanvir - take that how you may. I can't really pinpoint the problem though. With the inswinger and outswinger, I feel that your method is good but you are doing this at the expense of pace and it is not the only way to get swing either. If you can get your entire body going in a straight line and the seam pinpoint straight, you can swing it both ways by simply rotating the shiny and rough side - this makes it extremely hard to pick as well as not sacrificing pace.

With swing, I advise you read this: http://content-usa.cricinfo.com/ci/c...ry/258645.html

In the image, notice how your front arm has dropped completely. This is poor as it reduces leverage to a considerable extent:



They say it is ideal to have it just a tad below 90 degrees when the front foot lands so you can imagine how bad it is to have it completely dropped before the front foot lands.

With your throw, watch Nasser Hussain throw. It is more important to get a perfect form than whip the arm as you do because with the technique bad, you won't get any power anyway. Your second throw is worse in my opinion because you did not throw your back leg into it, which is the source of about 40% of the power of a good throw.

You don't seem to be the most co-ordinated person. I feel your pain, I am always tripping over and running into things

[Nnanden]

Always found releasing the ball works well when you're trying to take wickets, or even bowl in general.

[Matteh]

For some reason i don't like the bowling arm's angle. Just have a feeling that it would be a fairway outside of off stump if you actually bowled it.

[silentstriker]

Regarding your throw: you seem to throw with arm only. You need to throw by rotating your hips and really throwing with your body if you are trying to get a stronger throw.

[silentstriker]

For your bowling, I love the position of your toes (pointing straight ahead). If you kept your front leg straighter (putting it a bit further ahead) and tried rotating through it - it might add a bit of pace. But I like that action. Can you do any from the side angle?

[NUFAN]

It looks like your run into the crease isn't long enough or is that because of the area you were filming and were you only concerned about your bowling action?

[bond21]

your action looks awkward, you seem to drop your left arm too early or something.

go to a senior bowler or a qualified coach in your club and ask them about it

[open365]

Can someone explain to me why the Bickleigh bomb shelter has two chop sticks through it?

Bowling wise, you need to bowl with more than your shoulders, you need to get the left side of your body slightly angled and pulling your right side through the crease more.

And don't change your action for inswingers or outswingers, it acheives precisely nothing except propelling the ball down the leg side because you're head is in the way of your bowling arm.

[Neil Pickup]

Originally Posted by Nnanden

Always found releasing the ball works well when you're trying to take wickets, or even bowl in general.

Ha, ha. Very funny.

Originally Posted by Matteh

For some reason i don't like the bowling arm's angle. Just have a feeling that it would be a fairway outside of off stump if you actually bowled it.

Interesting. Particularly as I bowl leg-side wides virtually all the time I try to bowl medium pace...

Originally Posted by silentstriker

Regarding your throw: you seem to throw with arm only. You need to throw by rotating your hips and really throwing with your body if you are trying to get a stronger throw.

Which requires a wider base to rotate through: and seeing as that's progressively improved from (1) to (2), it'll get there. It felt infinitely better, as opposed to looking like an off-break. My throw has been a source of embarrassment for a good decade now...

Originally Posted by silentstriker

For your bowling, I love the position of your toes (pointing straight ahead). If you kept your front leg straighter (putting it a bit further ahead) and tried rotating through it - it might add a bit of pace. But I like that action. Can you do any from the side angle?

Links back to what Manee said - need to open the hips and avoid the bizarre phenomenon of having my arse to the batsman during the delivery stride!

Originally Posted by NUFAN

It looks like your run into the crease isn't long enough or is that because of the area you were filming and were you only concerned about your bowling action?

That's mainly due to the pond.

Originally Posted by bond21

your action looks awkward, you seem to drop your left arm too early or something.

go to a senior bowler or a qualified coach in your club and ask them about it

I don't care sufficiently about bowling fast to do anything to take up someone's time for an action that will only be used to aim at U13s in nets.

Originally Posted by open365

Can someone explain to me why the Bickleigh bomb shelter has two chop sticks through it?

Bowling wise, you need to bowl with more than your shoulders, you need to get the left side of your body slightly angled and pulling your right side through the crease more.

And don't change your action for inswingers or outswingers, it acheives precisely nothing except propelling the ball down the leg side because you're head is in the way of your bowling arm.

Hips again... and everything is in the way because of that left leg aiming at fine leg halfway through the delivery stride.

As for the bomb shelter, well, the class had one hour to create the most efficient "bomb shelter" from wood, plastic, card, and whatever else they could found. You'll have to ask Harry why he wanted the chopstick effect.

[Matteh]

Originally Posted by Neil Pickup

Interesting. Particularly as I bowl leg-side wides virtually all the time I try to bowl medium pace...

That'll be down to when you release the ball. The arm doesn't look like it has a straight action so you'd have to release it at the perfect point when you arm comes over for it to land well. I have a similiar sort of arm motion when i bowl, but i noticed during last season that i need to twist my back slightly and then it's fine. Probably doesn't do my back any good whatsoever, but it makes my bowling accurate.

[vic_orthdox]

Thought that the second throw was copybook. And that the front arm when bowling seemed a bit like window dressing, rather than doing its job.