Taylor Wood - Harlow Town cc 2nd XI
I encountered Taylor in August 2018 having been drafted in to our 2nd XI team. We went onto the field with several 4th XI players and a man short as well. Needless to say the outcome of the game wasn't pretty.
Taylor batted at No.4 and looked pretty good. Looking at his Play cricket data here he doesn't have any particular weaknesses with regards being dismissed - roughly a 50/50 split between bowled and caught. Only a 2% incidence of being stumped.
The image above are his scoring areas...
With the make of the team being as described above, there were obvious weak areas in the field and Taylor was able to identify and exploit these. In particular our bloke at No.3; when the ball glanced off the bat finer, being slightly further out you'd have hoped we'd have had a bloke there that could have stopped it. The regular 2nd XI team would have dealt with it easily, but because we had old blokes like me and small boys playing Wood was able to guide the ball through there with ease. The bowling attack was medium/medium fast with the bowlers seeing good bounce and carry in the wicket. I didn't get to bowl and fielded at 6, dropping one that was hit straight at me - off the middle of the bat and another breaking through my fingers over my head. In this game Wood didn't face any spin at all.
At the end of the game I spoke to him briefly and explained what I'd be doing with this blog post when I asked to get the photo of him and in that conversation having explained that I was a wrist-spinner he said "Funnily enough I always get out to spinners".
With regards ideas as to how to bowl at a Left-Handed player like this...
As I recall, he played the shots down the ground with a straight bat, in part because our bowling was pretty good. The shots through the point and square-leg regions were the shorter balls that he was more than up to playing - targeting the leg-side. You can see that despite the fact that the shortest boundary was on his off-side, virtually no shots were played through that area. Looking at the scoring analysis for the game, there were a lot of wides that I'm assuming were leg-side, so perhaps the bowling was targeting the leg-stump region?
My field therefore, is set for the classic approach of bowling on a good length outside of his off-stump, trying to drag him out wide looking to get the edge and a catch on the off-side at 2,3,4 and 5. He obviously sees himself as a being a leg-side player as a lot of his shots targeted that area and there may be a need to adapt the field and accommodate that scenario if it arises, giving yourself either more protection or the potential to get wickets with something that is more conventional, see here for the classic Peter Philpott field for left-handers.
The theory here, is based on the fact that he says he struggles against spin and that in our game he played no shots what-so-ever in the space between (8) mid-off and (5) Backward-point. So, with this field we're saying here's this space with no fielders except for (7) Silly mid-off, you've got pretty much 4's all day long if you bring out your cover-dive/lofted cover-drive. (11) Mid-wicket is potentially in the game, I fielded here as mentioned and got my hand to at least two balls, but a more athletic player would have had him, so I would have one of your more agile catchers in this position.
The two blokes at mid-on and mid-off need to be good athletic ground fielders as they're definitely going to be in the game. Similarly (10) Fine leg, needs to be agile and a decent catcher, I'd start with him out and bring him up if it looks like a catch is going to be on. Only make such moves if it looks like it's more of an attacking option.
The theory here, is based on the fact that he says he struggles against spin and that in our game he played no shots what-so-ever in the space between (8) mid-off and (5) Backward-point. So, with this field we're saying here's this space with no fielders except for (7) Silly mid-off, you've got pretty much 4's all day long if you bring out your cover-dive/lofted cover-drive. (11) Mid-wicket is potentially in the game, I fielded here as mentioned and got my hand to at least two balls, but a more athletic player would have had him, so I would have one of your more agile catchers in this position.
The two blokes at mid-on and mid-off need to be good athletic ground fielders as they're definitely going to be in the game. Similarly (10) Fine leg, needs to be agile and a decent catcher, I'd start with him out and bring him up if it looks like a catch is going to be on. Only make such moves if it looks like it's more of an attacking option.
Please note - You set these fields at your own risk. The owner of the blog is in no way responsible for you getting carted around the park for 4's and 6's. Seek professional advice and guidance if in doubt.
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