The Best Ways to Enjoy Yourself During the Off-Season
Michael Sheridan |
Whether you’re an avid player or merely a spectator of the sport, there’s something like an awful stagnancy that settles upon us once the season comes to a close. All of the effort, passion and concentration that has gone into the preceding months has come to an abrupt end, and you’re suddenly left with hours on your hands and no immediately discernible way to fill them.
Does that sound familiar? If so, don’t worry. There are plenty of enjoyable ways to pass those weeks and months until the new season starts up again, without divorcing your activities from the sport entirely. Here are a handful of our favourites which should serve both active engagers with bat and ball and those who prefer to survey its majesty from the comfort of an armchair.
SRL cricket
If you haven’t come across the term SRL cricket before, it’s time to get caught up. Short for “simulated reality league”, SRL cricket is an exciting new way to spectate and bet on the sport… even when there are no actual games to be played.
That’s because SRL cricket is based upon years and years of historical performance data, all of which is combined and combed through to deliver a simulated result of fictious games, based on real facts and figures. As such, it’s always available and not subject to the same sorts of niggly delays and variables as real-life cricket – and when you indulge in simulated reality league betting with bitcoin, you can even take advantage of the anonymity, security and efficiency benefits that come with crypto gambling. Something for everything to enjoy.
Preparing for next season
Whether you’re a batsman, bowler, fielder or spectator by trade, the off-season is an excellent opportunity to ready the mind and body for the one to come. For players, this could mean easing off on physical exertion to let your aching physique heal itself, with yoga and meditation especially effective methods of regeneration. Alternatively, if you feel you weren’t quite at the races last time around, you might want to use the downtime to upgrade your physical capabilities.
On the other hand, armchair cricket fans can spend the fallow periods scouring the internet for information on the latest transfers, takeovers and training news snippets. Not only will these whet your appetite from the action to come, but they can also inform your strategy when playing fantasy cricket games, like the Herald Sun’s SuperCoach BBL or Dream 11’s Fantasy IPL.
Switching gears – or even lanes altogether
The beauty of the modern sporting world is that even if the domestic leagues you follow have come to a close, there’s bound to be an alternative taking place in some other corner of the globe. You could switch gears to international Test cricket and follow the fortunes of your national side, or else seek out obscure leagues from the back of beyond.
Alternatively, there’s a whole wide world of sporting spectacles out there, just waiting to be gobbled up. If you don’t want to stray too far from the concept of bat on ball, you might want to dip your toes into Major League Baseball (or its regional equivalent wherever you are) to keep the fun going. Racquet sports are just a stone’s throw away from cricket in terms of hand-eye coordination, or else you could really branch out into basketball, rugby or a little-known up-and-comer that goes by the name “soccer”. But we doubt there’s much of a future in that one.
For committed fans of the magnificent game of cricket, the off-season can seem like an interminable challenge… but filling your time with one of the above alternatives will help it to fly by quicker than you can say “Howzat!”.
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