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Setting a field

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TopCat

Striker
Just started bowling off-spin after many years bowling pace. I play midweek 16-20 over games and tend to be brought on to dry up runs and take a wicket or 2. We tend to field with everyone in a ring but am thinking I want to be a bit more innovative. I rarely get hit on the offside (tend to bowl on off stump, but quite full and fairly brisk for a spinner) and really only get hit for runs over mid-wicket when I start to tire and drag the ball down short. Would it be too risky to set a 3-6 legside field?

Am thinking:
short third man, cover (saving 1), mid-off
short fine leg, deep square, deep mid-wicket, mid-on, mid-wicket (saving 1) and [short]square-leg (saving 1)

Is that too risky? Would you maybe sacrifice one of the 2 square legs or mid-wickets for a cover point?

I tend to get my wickets bowled or LBW (when the cheating f***ing players from the other side acting as umpires actually give it!) and want to give the batsman something to hit on the offside to entice the drive.

All input appreciated.....
 

Would rather have a deep point in 20/20 games like, you don't need to save ones everywhere. Or have that fielder up to start with and then drop him back towards the end of an innings.

Would say there's no need for two square legs to be honest. If you have your saving one mid wicket quite square and short fine quite square then they can cover off that gap anyway.
 
Dexter said:
Would rather have a deep point in 20/20 games like, you don't need to save ones everywhere. Or have that fielder up to start with and then drop him back towards the end of an innings.

Would say there's no need for two square legs to be honest. If you have your saving one mid wicket quite square and short fine quite square then they can cover off that gap anyway.
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Yeah, thinking you are probably right, maybe go square leg and drop him out if required and put the extra fielder in the covers.,...

mikemanc said:
Get a slip in for your doosra
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It's in development! To be honest, at this stage, I'm just trying to make sure I land every ball. I tend to bowl 5 out of 6 where I want them and 1 tends to be a full toss or wide. Getting there though and getting some genuine turn - bowled a lad through the gate last week that pitched outside off and hit middle/leg. Need to get some consistency with pace/pitch/turn then look to learn how to get drift and/or loop (am 6'1" so loop is probably out of the question)
 
All depends on the state of the game and the batsman but as a standard to a right hander I would personally take out either your square leg or midwicket saving 1 and have them on the point boundary (or saving 1 if you prefer). If you want to attack a little more take the fielder from deep midwicket.

Obviously if some neckender is just fetching everything to leg, then get the point across to leg again.

TopCat said:
Just started bowling off-spin after many years bowling pace. I play midweek 16-20 over games and tend to be brought on to dry up runs and take a wicket or 2. We tend to field with everyone in a ring but am thinking I want to be a bit more innovative. I rarely get hit on the offside (tend to bowl on off stump, but quite full and fairly brisk for a spinner) and really only get hit for runs over mid-wicket when I start to tire and drag the ball down short. Would it be too risky to set a 3-6 legside field?

Am thinking:
short third man, cover (saving 1), mid-off
short fine leg, deep square, deep mid-wicket, mid-on, mid-wicket (saving 1) and [short]square-leg (saving 1)

Is that too risky? Would you maybe sacrifice one of the 2 square legs or mid-wickets for a cover point?

I tend to get my wickets bowled or LBW (when the cheating f***ing players from the other side acting as umpires actually give it!) and want to give the batsman something to hit on the offside to entice the drive.

All input appreciated.....
Click to expand...
 
Carteron said:
All depends on the state of the game and the batsman but as a standard to a right hander I would personally take out either your square leg or midwicket saving 1 and have them on the point boundary (or saving 1 if you prefer). If you want to attack a little more take the fielder from deep midwicket.

Obviously if some neckender is just fetching everything to leg, then get the point across to leg again.
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It's a bit of both. Whilst it's a low level of cricket (4th division, midweek league) there are some decent batsmen out there. Regardless of that, I vary rarely get hit between mid off and third man and don't want to waste fielders especially when I know I have the propensity to drag a few down towards the end of my spell. To be honest, I think shifting a couple of fielders out to cow-corner towards the end of my spell will probably suffice. It's saving the 1s that is the big thing - I want a couple of fielders in and around the square to cut off the single from the defensive push.
 
That's assuming your captain lets some little upstart set their own field.

My skipper knows what field I want, and who I want where. Only minor changes if there is a batsman swinging for everything.

If he set a 4-5 legside for me there'd be hell on.
 
Aleem Dar said:
That's assuming your captain lets some little upstart set their own field.

My skipper knows what field I want, and who I want where. Only minor changes if there is a batsman swinging for everything.

If he set a 4-5 legside for me there'd be hell on.
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To be fair, I'm 38 and 6' 1" and he's happy for us to set our own fields (for the most part - one of our opening bowlers would love 4 slips but that ain't gonna happen!)
 
I think as long as you are confident of bowling to that field then so be it. I've not captained that much but the odd game that i did i tended to rely on the below to tell me what field i wanted. Obviously if he then pisses about bowling shite i would change it.
 
I bowl off spin and also like to ring it on the off side with a straight extra and a cover to right handers in 20 over games. I have my sweepers oput on the leg side. One thing I've had to except is that I need to have a short thrid man when no one's catching at slip I've leaked a lot of 2's and 3's to third man without one.
 
Can the lads posting all this well balanced, sensible fielding theory on here give Cooky some tips...
 
TopCat said:
I rarely get hit on the offside (tend to bowl on off stump, but quite full and fairly brisk for a spinner) and really only get hit for runs over mid-wicket when I start to tire and drag the ball down short. Would it be too risky to set a 3-6 legside field?.
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How do you get tired bowling off spin in a 20 over game ? You must only bowl 4 or 5 overs max !
 
Depends what stage of the game at your at and to what standard you play at.

If your just playing shit standard midweek games you have to remember that batsman tend to just try and wack the ball to leg side to an off spinner. If your playing to a decent standard your field will obviously alter.

For an off spinner, attacking, looking to take wickets in the longer format of the game I would personally set the field as :-

Short fine leg, deep backward square, one slip, point, leave cover open to encourage to hit against the spin, mid off and short extra close catching. Then have a stump high wide mid on with another 2 additional catchers in between midwicket and mid on.

In Twenty20 looking to restrict runs i would tend to have a short third and fine, deep backward square and point on the line. Cover and midwicket tight on the singles with a man out at cow corner and then your wide mid on and mid off.

Also add to that above, In Twenty20 come around the wicket and dart the ball in between middle and leg, makes it very very difficult to work the ball with those angles especially if you have your cover/midwicket tight and a wide mid on just off the midwickets shoulder around 15 yards back. It makes it virtually impossible at club level to hit straight unless you ball a full toss, then you deserve to get the tap anyway.
 
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Well. That went well(!) Set a 4-5 field with third man, cover point, extra cover, mid off, mid on, short midwicket deep midwicket, square leg and short fine leg. Opened the bowling and bowled 3 overs 3-0-11-1. Came back on to bowl the 15th over when they were teeing off, took outside edge 3 frigging times (no slip in the interests of saving runs) but the lad at third man fucked up 3 times in a row and let the ball passed him for 3 boundaries(!) Ended up 4-0-25-1 including 2 dropped catches, 5 edges, a plumb lbw given not out and 2 balls bouncing over middle stump with the batsmen swinging and missing....

Pissed off at the final over, but generally happy overall. Struggling with my grip though, trying to spin it off the 2nd nuckle of my first finger and 1st nuckle of my second finger but feel like I'm not in control of the ball so end up not spinning it as much as I would like. Any tips? Do I need to work on my finger strength? Again, any tips?
 
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