Switch hit: How the humble bat revolutionised cricket

How has the art of batting changed in over three decades! The range of shots played by batsmen in Twenty20 cricket seems to have no limit. You imagine the most fantastic of shots and someone out there is executing it to precision already. Batting has moved on from the paddle sweep, reverse sweep, shots over the slip cordon and hard flashes over the third man. We are in the age of the perfect switch hit, the scoop shot with its many variants and what not. There’s astounding creativity in batting days. It follows no coaching manual and no other grammar book of cricket. The new shots lack artistic quality but are highly productive, and entertaining. They fit snuggly into the adrenaline-driven new philosophy of spectator cricket. Back then things were so different! Before the 1980s cricket coaches used to be a tough lot. Budding batsmen had to perfect playing in the ‘V’ — the area between long on and long off. The bat had to make a neat arc in the air from the third man region through the first slip before coming in contact with the ball. Lofted shots were a strict no, no. Any cross-batted shot was mocked at and discouraged - it was the hallmark of an inferior batsman. [caption id=“attachment_292078” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Kevin Pietersen plays the switch hit really well. AFP”]  [/caption] Good players were supposed to play straight and balls had to be played on merit. Aggression in batting was good but not necessarily a great virtue. Any deviation from the coach’s manual was a crime. The deviant player would get an earful of expletives plus long lectures on the batting skills of Geoffrey Boycott, Sunil Gavaskar and Zaheer Abbas. The likes of Vivian Richards - there were not too many of them back then - were discussed with awe but considered freaks. The West Indian style of batting was revered but with no benefit of the television to dissect and analyse it, coaches felt it safe to follow the textbook. You knew a good batman from a look at his bat. It would have ball spots in the middle and not a scratch around the edges. Coaches loved such batsmen. Not any more. Cricket, the art of batting specifically, has been reinventing itself continuously. The advent of One-Day cricket and its growing popularity has added pace to the game. The need to score faster in this format spawned immense innovation with batsmen adding new shots to their repertoire. T20 has further quickened the speed. With the aggression on display in this format a Vivian Richards would probably not be considered too great a strokemaker. In the evolution of the game the spectator has been an important catalyst. His growing hunger for more thrill out of the game has been shaping the direction of the evolution. Over the decades, the lay fan has been dissociating himself from the pristine, artistic quantities of the game and seeking to extract more entertainment out of it. The One-Day format was the product of the yearning in the fan for more energy and action on the cricket field. T20 is a logical progression from that. At this point, as the format is still taking roots, it is difficult to predict the next format. However, the biggest game changer in cricket has been the bat, the humble instrument of murder with every batsman. The continuous upgradation of the cricket bats in the last three decades has allowed its wielder more power and freedom to break loose. Back then, the coaches were not fools. The bats had sweet spots in the middle. Playing in the ‘V’ ensured that the ball hit the sweet spot more often. Lofted shots would not have enough power to clear the fielder, so the chances of the batsman getting caught were more. If the coaches were conservative, it was not without reason. Now even a shot off the edge could clear the ropes easily. Batsmen could flash hard at balls that should be left alone because they are secure in the confidence that any reasonable good contact of the ball with the bat would carry it a great distance. The sweet spot is distributed evenly in the bat, making strokemaking easier. They get the power and the manoeuvrability in one good bat, thus more incentive to get adventurous. That is why we see more of the reverse sweep, switch hit and the sweep-slog these days, and a general disregard for technique and correctness. The result is, the net run rate is up across all formats of cricket. According to a research by cricket statistician Charles Davis, during the 19th Century less than half of the team scores came in boundaries. It remained unchanged almost the whole of 20th century. Things changed in the 1990s when 60 percent of runs through boundaries became normal. It would be much more now what with more T20 cricket being played. Thus the evolution of bat has revolutionised the game. The audience would not be getting its value for money or batsmen more entertaining without this.