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New to Cricket, lots of questions...

T

tinpanalley

Cricket Spectator
I'm a huge sports fan and watch more professional and non-professional sports than anyone I know. But when you love sports like this, there are naturally always a few that just get pushed to the backburner until you feel like you have time or interest to get more into them. Cricket is one such sport. My basic understanding means I have rather boring, mundane, and probably obvious questions but that will help me understand it in context of other sports I watch. And with that in mind, here are the things I don't get that are impeding my understanding of the sport as a televised event, as an organised sport, etc because frankly, rules I can probably just watch videos for...
  1. Is this a sport like Rugby in that the average, more mainstream fans seem more interested in the National teams than the club level?
  2. Is there a televised English "premier" League from which players are chosen to play for England?
  3. If only the International ICC tournaments are what matters, how do you actually "follow" cricket? In terms of a yearly season that begins and ends a campaign where teams compete. For example, in Football, I can follow United, Real Madrid, and have a general sense of how the leagues I am interested in are doing, I can see the better teams face off in the Champions League, I can look for those players in International Cups. The season ends, I get a sense of what happened in 2023-24. In Basketball, I can watch the NBA and WNBA every year and get a sense of what teams do well from year to year, the trajectories of the careers of particular players, which of those players play internationally, etc etc. What am I... actually following... when I follow Cricket? What's the "season"? As someone brought up on very Western/North American sports league models, this particular question eludes me. I understand it may be a tough one to answer.
  4. As with Rugby Union and Rugby League or NFL and CFL, are there different "types" of Cricket? Or different match types? I've seen some matches that apparently can take days and others that are intended for being completed sooner but I don't understand any of that.
  5. Does anyone know of a particularly good video/site that does a good job of explaining rules, game laws, what stats matter, etc?
  6. Is there ANY Cricket video game worth playing? A lot of my sports interest is coupled with being a big fan of sports gaming.
Thank you!!
 
Coronis

Coronis

International Coach
tinpanalley said:
I'm a huge sports fan and watch more professional and non-professional sports than anyone I know. But when you love sports like this, there are naturally always a few that just get pushed to the backburner until you feel like you have time or interest to get more into them. Cricket is one such sport. My basic understanding means I have rather boring, mundane, and probably obvious questions but that will help me understand it in context of other sports I watch. And with that in mind, here are the things I don't get that are impeding my understanding of the sport as a televised event, as an organised sport, etc because frankly, rules I can probably just watch videos for...
  1. Is this a sport like Rugby in that the average, more mainstream fans seem more interested in the National teams than the club level?
  2. Is there a televised English "premier" League from which players are chosen to play for England?
  3. If only the International ICC tournaments are what matters, how do you actually "follow" cricket? In terms of a yearly season that begins and ends a campaign where teams compete. For example, in Football, I can follow United, Real Madrid, and have a general sense of how the leagues I am interested in are doing, I can see the better teams face off in the Champions League, I can look for those players in International Cups. The season ends, I get a sense of what happened in 2023-24. In Basketball, I can watch the NBA and WNBA every year and get a sense of what teams do well from year to year, the trajectories of the careers of particular players, which of those players play internationally, etc etc. What am I... actually following... when I follow Cricket? What's the "season"? As someone brought up on very Western/North American sports league models, this particular question eludes me. I understand it may be a tough one to answer.
  4. As with Rugby Union and Rugby League or NFL and CFL, are there different "types" of Cricket? Or different match types? I've seen some matches that apparently can take days and others that are intended for being completed sooner but I don't understand any of that.
  5. Does anyone know of a particularly good video/site that does a good job of explaining rules, game laws, what stats matter, etc?
  6. Is there ANY Cricket video game worth playing? A lot of my sports interest is coupled with being a big fan of sports gaming.
Thank you!!
Click to expand...
1. Yes. International cricket is correctly seen as the pinnacle of the game.
4. There are three major types of cricket played internationally; Test Cricket - the oldest format of the game, 5 day matches with 2 innings per team, One Day International (ODI) - single day match with a single 50 over innings per team and Twenty20 International (T20I) - single day match with a single 20 over innings per team.
2. As a non-Englishman, I can’t speak to the TV situation there, but as far as I know, yes. They’ll have the County Championship (basically domestic tests), a domestic One Day Cup and a T20 league.
3. The international tournaments are considered of importance for ODIs and T20Is, basically other ODIs and T20Is are relatively meaningless as I understand it. T20 leagues are the big moneymakers at the moment, due to big aggressive hitting and shorter game times. The biggest leagues being the IPL (India) and the BBL (Australia).

Almost all test cricket is considered of importance for the top nations, with some teams having special rivalries (Australia/England, Australia/India). Cricket (especially tests) is generally only played in the summer in any specific country, so it is played around the world throughout the year. Different teams will play different amounts of tests (England, Australia and India - “The Big Three” will play the most generally) and have uneven schedules that will vary from year to year. To see how players have gone recently isn’t as simple as looking at a single season, you’d need to check over their last few series. Strength of their recent opponents can also vary greatly, so a comparison of two players from different teams isn’t as simple as a straight one to one.

5. I’m honestly not sure what the best website would be to get into all the laws, googling may be your best friend there or looking up some info on YT. re: stats, both batsmen and bowlers have averages, these are generally a good guide. In the shorter formats (ODI, T20) batting strike rate and bowling strike rate/economy are also very important.

6. Soz can’t help on this one, haven’t ever played a decent cricket video game.
 
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