What is Cricket
Cricket is a type of sport that is played with a bat and bowl and It is the second most popular international sport in the world after football. It is played between two teams at a time and for playing cricket a lot of fitness and strength are required.
How to Play Cricket?
Cricket is basically a competition between the batter and bowler and playing cricket is not quite difficult. A bowler bowls the cricket ball and his aim is to get the batsman out while the batter tries to score a run on that delivery without losing his wicket. The batsman can hit many shots like cover drive, straight drive, pull shot, square cut, and many more cricket shots.
Cricket is divided into three forms on the international level: T20 cricket, ODI or 50-over cricket, and Test cricket which is the purest form of cricket.
Basic Cricket Rules
Cricket is known as a gentleman’s game and it has many unique rules that the players are required to follow in the match. These cricket rules are very important to maintain the charm of cricket and you can’t understand this game clearly until you know about some of the important rules of cricket.
Many people know how to play cricket by watching or playing it but unfortunately, most of them usually don’t know about some basic rules of cricket. There are many cricket rules that must be followed while playing cricket. So, in this article, we will discuss the rules of cricket.
LBW rule
The full form of LBW in cricket is Leg Before Wicket. LBW is one of the methods in which a batter can get out in cricket. If the batsman misses a ball and it would have hit the wicket but any part of the batsman except the hand holding the bat comes in front of the wicket then he can be given LBW out but it requires an appeal from the fielding side.
The decision from the umpire will depend on several criteria, including where the ball landed or pitched, whether the ball landed in line with the wickets or not, and where it hit on the stumps. The ball should be pitched in line or outside of the pitch and the impact must also be landed outside off. If the ball is pitched outside leg or impact is outside leg then the batsman survives and will be given not out.
DRS technology rule
Both playing teams can challenge the umpire’s decision by using the DRS technology and even the umpire can review his own decision by using this technology. Most people don’t know about the full form of DRS in cricket. DRS stands for Decision Reviewing System which is used to maintain justice in cricket by assisting the decision made by the match officials. The DRS rule was started in the year 2008 by the International Cricket Council.
The on-field umpire consults the third umpire when the decision is asked to review by the batting or bowling team. This is known as Player Review. Each team can avail of the DRS technology 3 times in a Test match while twice in 50-over or 20-over cricket.
How many players in Cricket
A Cricket match is played between 2 teams and each team has a maximum number of eleven players in its lineup. If a player gets a little injured during the match then the 12th man can field in place of him but he can’t bowl and bat until the player returns. Hence, in a single cricket match, a total of 22 players participate.
Cricket Umpires
A cricket umpire is the one who makes the decision on the cricketing field. He has the authority to give the batsman out or not out, and check whether the ball is legal or not. The cricket umpire is responsible to make sure that both teams follow the cricket rules. Almost every important thing in a cricket match occurs under his decisions.
Test Cricket Rules
Test match is the purest and oldest form of cricket. Test cricket is a lot more difficult than the other two forms of cricket. Test cricket is also known as the longest format of cricket.
In the past few years, people started to lose interest in Test cricket but ICC has taken an excellent step to revive Test cricket. The International Cricket Council has started a tournament named WTC in which the top 8 ranked Test sides compete to become the Test Champions. The full form of WTC is World Test Championship.
Test cricket is played with a red ball and it has some different rules and playing terms as compared to ODI and T20 cricket.
Some important test match rules are discussed below:
Follow-on rule in Test cricket
The follow-on is a rule in the longest format of cricket in which the batting second team can be forced to bat again immediately after the end of their first innings. But it is decided by the batting first side whether they want their opposition to bat again or they don’t want to enforce the follow-on.
The follow-on only enables if the side batting first gains a first-innings lead of a minimum of 200 runs.
Number of Overs in Test cricket
Test cricket continues for 5 straight days and each side bats twice in a single game. If you are a cricket lover or expert then you must had listened to this question from the people, how many overs are in Test cricket? As we said earlier that the Test cricket is a 5-day game and there are no restrictions on overs in it. On each day of a Test match, at least 90 overs are bowled, depending upon the weather or light conditions.
New balls
New balls are available at the start of each innings in cricket. But in Test match cricket, a new ball is available after every 80 overs. Hence, a team can use more than two new balls in a single inning depending upon the number of overs played by the batting side.