Do you think bowling or batting is the harder skill to learn?

[Burgey]

Finger spin is easy to learn. Any able bodied toddler over 18 months old can do it. Not master it of course, but lob up some dross.
Fast/ seam bowling is a pretty unnatural physiological act I guess.
Batting is just see the ball and hit it, at its most basic level. Would put it second to seam bowling to learn, but probably the hardest to get anywhere near proficient at

 

[Starfighter]

I too remember at junior cricket training batting getting so much more technical with regards to the coaches. I think the most ever attention we got with bowling was him dropping a round marker on off stump on a good length and making us try to pitch the ball there

With batting I remember practicing every shot every week, having the right grip and stance drilled into us, being told about hitting bad balls and blocking good ones.

Bowling it's just try not to bowl wides. I never even used a run up marker and still did completely fine. I feel like batting is inherently more fun and everyone including the coaches know it. I guess they expect you'll naturally pick it up bowling in the nets long enough

I feel like fielding and catching practice even got more attention than bowling

Most coaches for whatever reason were batsmen. I have seen very few who have any technical knowledge of bowling at all. And I think it's harder to make changes when bowling, so that only emphasises the difference.

 

[Slifer]

Bowling. I play cricket, tennis and baseball among other sports. The natural swing of the bat (racket) in all three isn't that much different. An adjustment here or there. But bowling is a totally difference kettle of fish. Case in point, I went to a school where there were plenty of Indians, west Indians etc. We all played cricket among ourselves. Teaching our American school mates to bat, was a piece of cake. Bowling on the other hand no. Most were chucking. Now, teaching non-cricket players the rules is like teaching an English speaker Arabic.

 

[Flem274*]

offies are easiest at any level below video cameras because you can just chuck if you're in a tight spot and say 'oh nah i wasn't aye'.

also i chuck my offies naturally. my natural body reserves the straight arm for real bowling.

 

[Burgey]

Bowling. I play cricket, tennis and baseball among other sports. The natural swing of the bat (racket) in all three isn't that much different. An adjustment here or there. But bowling is a totally difference kettle of fish. Case in point, I went to a school where there were plenty of Indians, west Indians etc. We all played cricket among ourselves. Teaching our American school mates to bat, was a piece of cake. Bowling on the other hand no. Most were chucking. Now, teaching non-cricket players the rules is like teaching an English speaker Arabic.

Tbf I’ve coached kids’ teams from Milo cricket through to under 16s and it’s just an unnatural bio-mechanical thing to do imo. But most kids get the ithe idea of not chucking within a few sessions. I can imagine it would be a lot harder trying to learn it as an adult from a muscle memory pov

 

[Kirkut]

No way batting is easy. At least at the international level where you must have sound awareness of your body and footwork is all about transferring you whole bodyweight on one foot and timing your shots, all done in few seconds. Excellent vision and a spatial awareness are also needed, because a lapse in concentration could mean losing your wicket irrespective of how good your batting was till that shot.

 

[honestbharani]

offies are easiest at any level below video cameras because you can just chuck if you're in a tight spot and say 'oh nah i wasn't aye'.

also i chuck my offies naturally. my natural body reserves the straight arm for real bowling.

I dunno mate... at club cricket level, I have seen a lot of chucking of medium pace stuff too. Its usually batsmen who wanna have a second skill but CBF'd getting a proper action.

I feel it s why the likes of KW and Dhawan end up actually bowling in international level and then getting found out, lol.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Too much chucking gets allowed at every level. It's pretty rare in Aus so that the ones that come through like Nair, Green, Gannon really stand out, but there are a few around club and grade cricket too that keep doing it.

Can't speak for other countries but as an outsider there was a period there 5-10 years ago where it seemed like every spinner that came out of Sri Lankan first-class cricket blatantly chucked it. Might still be the case I haven't really seen SL play much lately

 

[_00_deathscar]

Absolutely, for a child that has never played cricket before seam up bowling will be simpler. I was specifically talking about already minimally experienced cricketers:

The difference between these medium pacers you see like Kohli is they have been bowling that their whole life and just never got that good. You don't see a 25-30 year old decent-level cricket suddenly take up seam bowling and have success at it, almost never happens. But it happens far too often with finger spin. Seen it too much in my time and genuinely annoys me that some hack that's never bowled spin before in his life can just decide to give it a crack and be serviceable at it with very little training and effort.

Thinking more top level here but isn’t that because either:
A) the pitch is an absolute minefield or
B) the bats aren’t very good players of spin

Realistically if you had the opposite where the conditions are more like England and the bats still are ****, you’d just have as much success bowling crap medium pace seam up.

Imagine having never bowled in your life, match is in India on a minefield, and you’re asked to bowl.
1) Your opponent is about half the English team not including Joe Root
2) Rishabh Pant is on strike, currently at 30 (50)

Would you really try bowling finger spin in situation #2?

 

[TheJediBrah]

Thinking more top level here but isn’t that because either:
A) the pitch is an absolute minefield or
B) the bats aren’t very good players of spin

Realistically if you had the opposite where the conditions are more like England and the bats still are ****, you’d just have as much success bowling crap medium pace seam up.

Imagine having never bowled in your life, match is in India on a minefield, and you’re asked to bowl.
1) Your opponent is about half the English team not including Joe Root
2) Rishabh Pant is on strike, currently at 30 (50)

Would you really try bowling finger spin in situation #2?

Yeah I'm not really talking about the top level. Unless it's a T20 and you're trying to buy an early over with a real part-time hack you still need some decent skill as a spin bowler to have any kind of extended success at that level.

I'm talking more semi-decent club level where I've seen many players just start bowling spin and have some success almost immediately

 

[Flem274*]

extremely quick and extremely hacky slow bowling seems to really separate the club batsmen from guys who can go further.

fc standard batsmen deal with it all, the rest start staying legside of the former and hole out to the latter.

all us true hacks from 1-11 love nothing more than a nice solid 90-115kph accurate bowler to face. I know I do, because I suck at batting and changes of pace wreck me. I hate slow bowling so much.

 

[Starfighter]

I much prefer facing quite slow spin. Probably because I can move my feet but have the reaction time of a sloth and little batting instinct, so I can't do more than vaguely block anything over 100 km/h.

Most lower level club batsmen I see are the opposite - decent eye but no footwork, so they can face pace but they play vaguely back or just prod at anything slow.

 

[mr_mister]

I also prefer facing spin. I love the extra reaction time you get. Pity hardly anyone bowls it in my grade

 

[Shady Slim]

Too much chucking gets allowed at every level. It's pretty rare in Aus so that the ones that come through like Nair, Green, Gannon really stand out, but there are a few around club and grade cricket too that keep doing it.

Can't speak for other countries but as an outsider there was a period there 5-10 years ago where it seemed like every spinner that came out of Sri Lankan first-class cricket blatantly chucked it. Might still be the case I haven't really seen SL play much lately

i tried to call a kid for chucking while i was batting last year and his dad got the ****s and fired up at me, brought himself on, tried bouncing me and i baseball'd the guy back over his head for six on the first ball. by far the coolest thing i've ever done on a cricket field

 

[TheJediBrah]

i tried to call a kid for chucking while i was batting last year and his dad got the ****s and fired up at me, brought himself on, tried bouncing me and i baseball'd the guy back over his head for six on the first ball. by far the coolest thing i've ever done on a cricket field

Lmao you tried calling a guy for chucking as an opposition player? Alpha af

 

[Blenkinsop]

I never had any proper training and picked up bowling pretty easily. I was super consistent as a teenager and could hit the stumps ball after ball if there wasn't a batter in the way. But I never learned how to bowl with any real pace, and when I realised I was gripping the ball all wrong, it took years to re-learn that.

On the other hand I was utterly hopeless at batting for years and years and have only recently become slightly less **** in my late 40s.