Season Review – Bowling (Part 2)

Right, let’s get this over with, shall we?

Wargrave 11-1-50-1
In my first game post-holiday I started with a maiden and took a wicket (a slip catch by Zia) in my third over – both promising signs that a recovery of form might be on the way. But while nothing went disastrously wrong in this spell, nothing went particularly right either. Wargrave were nudging ones and twos at will towards the end and as they found me about as threatening as a heap of well-fed guinea pigs.

Portsmouth 7-0-44-1
A poor performance in this game could easily be explained away by the fact we were on tour and quite a lot of drinking had gone on. We’d been out clubbing all night and I was a bit jaded – certainly not at full strength. It is a bit of a worry, therefore, that this performance was indistinguishable from most of the others in 2010. My one wicket came thanks to a catch by Johnny Baker at point and everyone was so relieved we all forgot to congratulate him.

Hambleden 8-0-47-0
I don’t remember bowling a single good ball in this game, which is up there with the first Peppard game as contender for my worst showing of the season. I do remember being hit for two straight sixes and I also remember that the same two batsmen couldn’t get Zia off the square from the other end. Yes, I was bowling up the hill, but I can’t place any blame on the conditions – Dr Ashman replaced me and took three wickets.

Frieth 0.4-0-8-0
Defending a total of 112, I was brought on to bowl with Frieth at 105-9. As I said in the match report, some players would rise to the occasion and shatter the middle stump with the first ball of the over. That’s not really been the story of this season for me, and I needed only four balls to make a complete cock up of it.

Stonor 10-0-62-0
Stonor finished on 212-1 from 35 overs so I certainly wasn’t the only bowler to get hit about that day. In fact, this was a significantly better spell than any other I had bowled in the last few weeks. There were still too many four-balls, but with two very confident, hard-hitting batsmen there wasn’t much margin for error. Probably the first time in my RUASCC career I’ve gone three matches without taking a single wicket.

Greys Green 8-3-23-1
My first over went for 12 runs so the final figures actually represent a decent recovery - after clean bowling the other opening batsman in the second over everything seemed to tidy itself up and I didn’t get hit much again. Greys were dismissed for 116 with Main taking 1-7 and Zia 3-10 from similar spells.

Hambleden 8-1-20-3
Finally! It turns out Withers can bowl properly after all. The Hambleden openers would have been looking to fill their boots when they saw me open the bowling again, but something really clicked that day. Only one boundary came from my eight overs (a cover drive from the very last ball) and three top order batsmen were sent packing. This sort of thing used to happen a lot more often. I don’t know if there’s one specific thing I did differently, but more than one teammate commented afterwards that I ran in “with intent”.

Peppard 8-1-45-1
Having conceded 40 runs in just 5 overs here two months before there was room for improvement against Peppard. The opening pair set off like a train though, and after my initial 7 over spell I had conceded another 42 runs with nothing in the wickets column - I’d beaten the bat a few times but the batsmen were well in control. It wasn’t until I returned for the penultimate over of the innings that I managed to sneak a leg stump yorker through for my only success.

In the final match at Warborough I was unable to bowl due to a leg injury and an underlying inability to bowl. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, we won our fourth consecutive game to finish the season on a high.

The Stats

• I bowled 133.4 overs, more than anyone else for the club, and finished the season as only the fifth highest wicket-taker.

• My 13 wickets cost an average of 43.8 runs, the worst bowling average of anyone who qualified for a bowling average.

• My best figures were 3-20 and that was in one of the two matches I took more than one wicket.

• I conceded an average of 4.26 runs per over and only bowled 18 maidens in the entire season (average of just one per match).

It was without doubt my worst season since I started playing cricket and only on rare occasions did I feel like the same player I was in 2009. One thing that is patently obvious to me now is that I need to put in more effort: run in faster, hit the pitch harder and show that same “intent” that revealed itself in the return match against Hambleden. When I slow down to try to find the right line and length I get hit for more fours because the batsmen don’t feel threatened and just need to wait for the short ball, wide ball or full toss – which will inevitably come. I get away with a lot more when I bowl quicker, however my tendency to over-pitch does get found out when I meet a batsman who can drive the ball.

My problem is that I knew all this halfway through the season when I wrote the first part of this review - http://keiwitcricket.blogspot.com/2010/07/season-review-bowling.html - and yet I seemed quite unable to act on it. I’m optimistic that next season will be better and I’ll put in a strong pre-season from early in 2011 to make sure. Then you’ll see a much happier, fitter, stronger, wicket-taking blog.