The Unpopular Opinions Thread

[cnerd123]

If the likes of Dean Elgar can take wickets in professional men's cricket, I'm sure some of the top tier women's spinners will be just fine.

The question is whether they'd get selected - spinners of Dean Elgar's quality who will bat 11 and be a liability in the field don't often get many games.

It's interesting to wonder if someone like 16-year old Shafali Verma could eventually face top tier men's bowling if she receives exposure to it and good training.

 

[GoodAreasShane]

For what it's worth Well0 has taken 10 wickets at 19 in men's 2nds here in Adelaide this season. She can certainly give the ball a fair rip


She is definitely a far better leggie than myself at the very least

 

[Flem274*]

amelia kerr opened the batting for her high school mens firsts. no idea how well she did but batting is her weaker suit in womens internationals.

 

[MrPrez]

That spinner for England (the SLA - not Kerr) looks like she could hold her own if she practised with the men.

 

[Burgey]

amelia kerr opened the batting for her high school mens firsts. no idea how well she did but batting is her weaker suit in womens internationals.

Yeah but watching the WC, you see a lot of the batters hurried up by 120kph bowling. They would be training on bowling machines which can crank it to 160, yet a lot of the time 120kph stuff troubles them for pace. Is that indicative of a widespread limitation or is it lack of conditioning to that level of pace? Genuinely don’t know the answer, but you would hope pro athletes train up to at least 140kph stuff wouldn’t you?

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

Yeah maybe it's a conditioning thing. If you can't consistently face 130k bowling you're going to be pretty unprepared.

 

[Kirkut]

Unpopular opinion: Playing spin is hard. I faced a Sri Lankan student at my uni and he bowled off spin, it is difficult to judge the flight of the ball. Those who effortlessly hit spinners for six have excellent intuition to predict the flight and degree of turn of the ball.

 

[cnerd123]

Unpopular opinion: Playing spin is hard. I faced a Sri Lankan student at my uni and he bowled off spin, it is difficult to judge the flight of the ball. Those who effortlessly hit spinners for six have excellent intuition to predict the flight and degree of turn of the ball.

Every spin bowler has a rhythm. The trick is to either to hit them off their rhythm, or to react to it

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Shemaine Campbell was part of the Rose Hall Town Youth and Sports Club's second division men's team a few years ago.

 

[Kirkut]

Every spin bowler has a rhythm. The trick is to either to hit them off their rhythm, or to react to it

Or play them on backfoot like Dravid, which is probably the hardest way to play spin.

 

[jimmy101]

Unpopular opinion: Playing spin is hard. I faced a Sri Lankan student at my uni and he bowled off spin, it is difficult to judge the flight of the ball. Those who effortlessly hit spinners for six have excellent intuition to predict the flight and degree of turn of the ball.

Sometimes it's good to take a no fear approach to spinners. If you send them packing for two expensive overs, more often than not the opposition captain will take them off. Risky strategy though.

I find spinners which drift the ball to be the hardest. Drift screws around with my brain.

 

[Burgey]

Unpopular opinion: Playing spin is hard. I faced a Sri Lankan student at my uni and he bowled off spin, it is difficult to judge the flight of the ball. Those who effortlessly hit spinners for six have excellent intuition to predict the flight and degree of turn of the ball.

It’s hard when people give them too much respect. They deserve none.

 

[Burgey]

Sometimes it's good to take a no fear approach to spinners. If you send them packing for two expensive overs, more often than not the opposition captain will take them off. Risky strategy though.

I find spinners which drift the ball to be the hardest. Drift screws around with my brain.

Just milk them for 3-4 singles per over. Always plenty of gaps and that keeps the opposing skipper interested, rather than taking them to the cleaners (which they all deserve) and having them taken off too soon

 

[jimmy101]

Just milk them for 3-4 singles per over. Always plenty of gaps and that keeps the opposing skipper interested, rather than taking them to the cleaners (which they all deserve) and having them taken off too soon

Definitely a good strategy against mediocre spinners. Though if I were facing a class spinner which took out the league bowling average last season bowling at 8.5, I'd try to get a few shots in whilst I could, hopefully without my head disappearing too far into the clouds.

 

[cnerd123]

Or play them on backfoot like Dravid, which is probably the hardest way to play spin.

The thing with playing off the backfoot is understanding not every ball should be played of the backfoot and recognising which ones to play forward to

 

[vcs]

The thing with playing off the backfoot is understanding not every ball should be played of the backfoot and recognising which ones to play forward to

Insightful stuff, straight from the Laxman Sivaramakrishnan school of punditry

 

[SteveNZ]

Ross Taylor should retire from tests. He's a liability in anything resembling spinning conditions these days, and hasn't played an innings of note against a decent bowling attack since his 100 against a touring Pakistan side in 2016. There are decent guys coming up behind him who will only stagnate if they continue to be left in domestic cricket.

Given everything he's done for NZ cricket the spot is obviously his until he doesn't want it. And it's no major secret that one of his career goals is 20 test hundreds (alongside 8000 runs) - something you'd back him to knock off when Wi tour next season. But I just felt like this season, with it's lineup of series against major opponents, is the ideal time for him to call it a day.

This is a pretty good shout. Probably has produced some innings' of note since then (100 this summer v England came at a dicey time at 1-0 up) but yeah it's reasonably threadbare other than that. And he's just seemingly started slogging when things get tense - witness most of the Australian tour. But the spot is his, and to be fair he'd probably offer more weight of runs than Will Young or anyone else (albeit holding Young back from his development).

 

[Burgey]

The thing with playing off the backfoot is understanding not every ball should be played of the backfoot and recognising which ones to play forward to

Who’d have thought good batting is about correctly reading the length of the ball?

 

[Gnske]

Ross Taylor should retire from tests. He's a liability in anything resembling spinning conditions these days, and hasn't played an innings of note against a decent bowling attack since his 100 against a touring Pakistan side in 2016. There are decent guys coming up behind him who will only stagnate if they continue to be left in domestic cricket.

Given everything he's done for NZ cricket the spot is obviously his until he doesn't want it. And it's no major secret that one of his career goals is 20 test hundreds (alongside 8000 runs) - something you'd back him to knock off when Wi tour next season. But I just felt like this season, with it's lineup of series against major opponents, is the ideal time for him to call it a day.

I dunno, WI's pace attack isn't that shabby these days now that Holder has discovered how to bowl in tests. I only wanted him to get to 100 tests personally.

 

[cnerd123]

Insightful stuff, straight from the Laxman Sivaramakrishnan school of punditry

Who’d have thought good batting is about correctly reading the length of the ball?

Glad I could teach you both something