What is the most difficult sport to play at a high standard?

[TheJediBrah]

From personal experiences, bowling offspin is the easiest. On a deteriorating wicket, I think I can at least not be a complete joke at the highest level especially if I'm bowling to left handers.

So much truth to this. Give me a wicket with a bit of turn and I look like Murali against most batsmen short of Grade 1st XI (bent elbow included), and I am not by any stretch a bowler.

No surprise you have players like Michael Clarke and Joe Root taking bags of wickets on dustys

flip side though is without any assistance even some of the very best finger spinners become useless and reliant on batsmen doing something stupid

 

[Gob]

So much truth to this. Give me a wicket with a bit of turn and I look like Murali against most batsmen short of Grade 1st XI (bent elbow included), and I am not by any stretch a bowler.

No surprise you have players like Michael Clarke and Joe Root taking bags of wickets on dustys

flip side though is without any assistance even some of the very best finger spinners become useless and reliant on batsmen doing something stupid

If I get to bowl on some of the wickets they have in India for recent tests, I'd average around 24.32 tbh.

 

[Gob]

Initially yeah, but not so much now he's had a number of fights, and it hasn't been for massive dough in the scheme of things, nor has he been fighting current champions.

Was more thinking about this Logan Paul idiot fighting Mayweather. I mean, come on ffs. I despise Mayweather as a bloke but it debases the sport for him to fight this ****. He's 50-0 and this **** gets a walk up start to fight him when he's had one fight, and that was against some other YouTuber ffs. The **** should be closer to fighting me than an ATG like Mayweather. It's embarrassing. I hope he splatters him across the venue inside two minutes. Just so ****ed up for fighters on the way up to see this sort of **** while they're busting their balls to get a decent pay day.

I'd like to see Mayweather vs Pewdiepie next tbh

 

[Howe_zat]

At the expense of possibly coming off as Cribb lite here I think the answer is probably in the money. Not necessarily players' wages, because different sports have different levels of rules designed mainly to funnel money away from players and into owners, but the amount of cash in the game overall.

Things like ultra-marathons are insanely physically demanding, ostensibly much more so than any pro sport, but they are won by IT technicians who run in their spare time because there's no money in it.

While there's no 'best athletes' to get the most money, you are more likely to have people train their whole lives to perfect a sport that does have the fame and prestige that goes hand in hand with masses of cash, so the more competitive the sport becomes.

 

[Flem274*]

At the expense of possibly coming off as Cribb lite here I think the answer is probably in the money. Not necessarily players' wages, because different sports have different levels of rules designed mainly to funnel money away from players and into owners, but the amount of cash in the game overall.

Things like ultra-marathons are insanely physically demanding, ostensibly much more so than any pro sport, but they are won by IT technicians who run in their spare time because there's no money in it.

While there's no 'best athletes' to get the most money, you are more likely to have people train their whole lives to perfect a sport that does have the fame and prestige that goes hand in hand with masses of cash, so the more competitive the sport becomes.

so the answer is boats?

tbf they have the best broadcast coverage in the world. cricket is a joke compared to the coverage you get during the americas cup. it's educational to the layman yet still insightful to boat nerds and the technical graphics and stuff is top line.

 

[cnerd123]

If you mean a contest between average Joes at the end of the deadline that is of passable quality and within the laws of the sport, then I imagine football and rugby might be easier to pick up than the rest. Mostly because among other skills, they also greatly depend on relatively "primitive" movements i.e. running, kicking, tackling. Of course there's incredible specialization even within those movements, but they might be easier to teach to newbies who've already built up some base of fitness through their lives.

Yea following this thought process I think cricket is the hardest sport. It's pretty easy to pick up the basics of most sports (Rugby, football, basketball, tennis, golf, badminton, most track and field events, combat sports) and to play them under the same conditions and rule sets as the pros, even if you're doing it badly. E-sports by nature are designed to by accessible to beginners of all ages as well.

Cricket is tough if you come into it late in life, and has to be made beginner friendly via things like underarm bowling/chucking, smaller grounds, softer ball, etc. Taking 22 people who have never played it before and getting them to put on a full T20 match under 'proper' conditions will take more training that getting them to play any other sport IMO.

Another good example would be all autosports - F1, motorcycling racing, etc. Learning the basics of driving itself will take months, then trying to learn how to drive a racing vehicle safely in a way that won't leave you dead...not easy.

tbf they have the best broadcast coverage in the world. cricket is a joke compared to the coverage you get during the americas cup.

cricket coverage is a joke compared to basically any other sport tbf

 

[Uppercut]

Yea following this thought process I think cricket is the hardest sport. It's pretty easy to pick up the basics of most sports (Rugby, football, basketball, tennis, golf, badminton, most track and field events, combat sports) and to play them under the same conditions and rule sets as the pros, even if you're doing it badly. E-sports by nature are designed to by accessible to beginners of all ages as well.

Cricket is tough if you come into it late in life, and has to be made beginner friendly via things like underarm bowling/chucking, smaller grounds, softer ball, etc. Taking 22 people who have never played it before and getting them to put on a full T20 match under 'proper' conditions will take more training that getting them to play any other sport IMO.

Another good example would be all autosports - F1, motorcycling racing, etc. Learning the basics of driving itself will take months, then trying to learn how to drive a racing vehicle safely in a way that won't leave you dead...not easy.


cricket coverage is a joke compared to basically any other sport tbf

The thing about cricket though is that a team can have a passenger. If you get a duck in both innings, don't bowl, and field very badly at fine leg, you've technically played cricket at a high level and your team could very easily still win.

 

[Line and Length]

I disagree that cricket is tough if one starts later in life. I was well into my twenties when I first played an official game. Before then I hadn't even bowled a ball or held a bat while at school but I did play a bit of 'street cricket'. I received no formal training or instruction. Despite this, I had no trouble breaking into the Club's top side in my first year. Admittedly it took a while to develop an effective batting technique but bowling (pace) was my forte and I had no problems.

 

[honestbharani]

The thing about cricket though is that a team can have a passenger. If you get a duck in both innings, don't bowl, and field very badly at fine leg, you've technically played cricket at a high level and your team could very easily still win.

*The best thing...

 

[Burgey]

Cricket is tough if you come into it late in life, and has to be made beginner friendly via things like underarm bowling/chucking, smaller grounds, softer ball, etc.

Since when? You can join a team, as L&L said, and they don’t modify the game for you.

golf is a much tougher sport as a beginner than cricket is. Like, miles and miles harder

 

[cnerd123]

For every L&L out there are dozens of adults who rock up to play cricket for the first time ever and can barely do anything. A bowling action is not intuitive. Batting a bit easier to pick up. As with most things, if you go into it having watched/experienced some cricket you'll pick it up faster.

Never tried golf so can't comment, but surely all you're doing is hitting a ball off a tee? It might take a few tries and your first round may be well over par, but it's not hard to fundamentally play a game of golf. Whereas 22 beginners who can barely bowl and bat will struggle to complete a cricket game as per the laws within the scheduled time - think of all the wides and noballs!

 

[trundler]

The more you understand a sport, the more you become privy to its technicalities. To the uninitiated, bowling fast is just jogging and throwing a rock but a legal, biomechanically sound action pretty much goes against every kinetic instinct your body naturally eggs you towards. Someone above reckoned football consists of more primal movements so its easier but a football fan may argue controlling a ball with your feet as opposed to your hands is much harder.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Never tried golf so can't comment, but surely all you're doing is hitting a ball off a tee? It might take a few tries and your first round may be well over par, but it's not hard to fundamentally play a game of golf. Whereas 22 beginners who can barely bowl and bat will struggle to complete a cricket game as per the laws within the scheduled time - think of all the wides and noballs!

noobs are probably going to smash the golf ball into the trees

 

[cnerd123]

noobs are probably going to smash the golf ball into the trees

this reminds me - tennis is actually sneakily hard to play first time, especially coming from cricket. I kept hitting the ball out of the court...

 

[Starfighter]

Anybody else think this is a stupid thread? There are so many sports that have little in common other than needing the usual requisites of fitness, motor skills, reactions etc that calming that one or another is more difficult is an exercise in utter futility.

 

[Burgey]

Never tried golf so can't comment, but surely all you're doing is hitting a ball off a tee?

Golf is miles harder to pick up than cricket. Seriously, it’s a complete mind **** of a sport.

 

[Uppercut]

The more you understand a sport, the more you become privy to its technicalities. To the uninitiated, bowling fast is just jogging and throwing a rock but a legal, biomechanically sound action pretty much goes against every kinetic instinct your body naturally eggs you towards. Someone above reckoned football consists of more primal movements so its easier but a football fan may argue controlling a ball with your feet as opposed to your hands is much harder.

I kind of reject the premise of this comparison. The immediate problem for a total noob playing high level football would be that they would almost never touch the ball due to slow reaction times. So whether they had a competent technique or not wouldn't even really be relevant.

Didn't Dirk Nannes learn to bowl from scratch as an adult?

 

[mr_mister]

For every L&L out there are dozens of adults who rock up to play cricket for the first time ever and can barely do anything. A bowling action is not intuitive. Batting a bit easier to pick up. As with most things, if you go into it having watched/experienced some cricket you'll pick it up faster.

Never tried golf so can't comment, but surely all you're doing is hitting a ball off a tee? It might take a few tries and your first round may be well over par, but it's not hard to fundamentally play a game of golf. Whereas 22 beginners who can barely bowl and bat will struggle to complete a cricket game as per the laws within the scheduled time - think of all the wides and noballs!

Swinging a golf club doesnt transfer from other sports as easy as Happy Gilmore makes it seem

After years of playing cricket it took ages for me to drive a golf ball off a tee with any kind of consistency when i first started

 

[Howe_zat]

I kind of reject the premise of this comparison. The immediate problem for a total noob playing high level football would be that they would almost never touch the ball due to slow reaction times. So whether they had a competent technique or not wouldn't even really be relevant.

Didn't Dirk Nannes learn to bowl from scratch as an adult?

As far as new people playing at top level goes, I’d say there’s a big gap between directly competitive sports like football codes and tennis vs indirectly competitive ones like golf.

I’ve never picked up a golf club, but I could get round Augusta if they let me even if it took a week. Whereas if I’m directly up against pros I just don’t play at all

 

[TheJediBrah]

Never tried golf so can't comment, but surely all you're doing is hitting a ball off a tee? It might take a few tries and your first round may be well over par, but it's not hard to fundamentally play a game of golf.

noobs are probably going to smash the golf ball into the trees

This is painful, pls stop

you were right the first time, if you've never "tried golf", you can't comment