In order to get bounce and movement seam bowlers need to bowl the ball "into" the pitch. Standard deliveries by elite players are typically projected at around 7° below horizontal. In contrast, young players currently often need to release the ball almost horizontally in an effort to get the ball to bounce close enough to the batter. We anticipated that shortening the pitch could be a simple way to help young bowlers to release the ball at a better angle and with more consistency. Twenty county or best in club age group under 10 and under 11 seam bowlers were analysed bowling indoors on two different pitch lengths. They were found to project the ball on average 3.4° further below horizontal on a 16 yard pitch compared with a 19 yard pitch, while ball speed and position at release changed negligibly. Pitch length did not affect the consistency of the release parameters. The shorter pitch led to a ball release angle closer to that of elite bowlers without changing release speed, and this should enable players to achieve greater success and develop more variety in their bowling.

The pitch lengths used for junior cricket are a subject of debate but to date there have been no studies of their influence on the game. This study evaluated the effect of reducing the pitch length on batting, bowling and fielding. County under 10 and club under 11 matches were analysed, ten played on pitch lengths currently recommended by the England and Wales Cricket Board, 19 yards/17.37 m or 20 yards/18.28 m respectively, and ten played on 16 yard (14.63 m) pitches. Differences between measures of batting, bowling and fielding were calculated to assess the effects of the shorter pitch length. In club and county matches on 16 yards, running between the wickets increased by 22% and 39% respectively, while boundary fours and sixes decreased by 54% and 68%. Deliveries played to the Mid-wicket area decreased by 44% in club and 33% in county matches, both accompanied by a more even distribution of fielding opportunities. Club matches saw a 15% increase in playable deliveries, largely due to fewer deliveries bouncing twice. Attempted shots, full toss No balls and Wide balls changed negligibly. Playing on a shorter pitch had positive impacts for bowlers, batters and fielders, consequently resulting in matches which were more engaging. Coaches and governing bodies should consider shorter pitches as a means of enhancing junior cricket.Keywords: Match analysis; modified sport; competitive engineering; youth sport INTRODUCTIONThe standard length of a cricket pitch is 22 yards (20.12 m) between the stumps at each end, 1 a distance equivalent to the antiquated unit of one 'chain'. Below the age of 14, the age by which many young players have begun to play open-age or "senior" cricket, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) recommend slightly shorter pitches and following trials in their 2016/17 season. Cricket Australia also revised their guidance for junior formats, making a range of changes including shorter pitches than they had previously endorsed. 2 It is unclear how these pitch length recommendations (Table 1) were determined: for example simply scaling a full length pitch based on the average height of juniors compared with adults would result in a pitch for under 11 boys approximately 17.8 yards (16.3 m) long rather than the 20 yards (18.28 m) the MCC and ECB have specified, but close to the 16 m recently advocated by Cricket Australia. The MCC acknowledged criticism and debate over the junior pitch lengths in earlier codes of the Laws of Cricket 3 and removed their recommendations from the 2017 Code effective from 1st October 2017, 1 leaving governing bodies to make their own recommendations. However, to date no research has been published which quantifies the effects that playing on shorter pitches might have on junior matches.

This study sought to determine whether playing on a shorter cricket pitch would lead batters to make more appropriate decisions about whether to play front foot or back foot shots. Based on an analysis of the shots played by top order batters against seam bowling in county under-10 matches, an age-specific "good length" region between 5.0 yards and 6.5 yards (4.57 to 5.94 m) from the batters' stumps was derived. This was where batters were uncertain whether to play on the front or back foot. It was then possible to define deliveries as "short" or "full" depending upon whether they bounced further from or nearer to the batter than the good length region. Club under-11 and county under-10 match data revealed that when playing on a 16 yard pitch batters played more back foot shots to short balls and county batters also played more front foot shots to full balls compared with matches on the currently recommended 20 or 19 yard pitches. For batters a shorter pitch should strengthen the coupling between perception of delivery length and appropriate shot selection, and the increased task demand should lead to improved anticipation, both key features of skilled batting.

In this study, the effects of two different hand placement techniques used by gymnasts to perform Tsukahara and Kasamatsu long horse vaults were examined. Selected linear and angular flight descriptors were calculated to determine whether those gymnasts making initial hand contact on the end of the horse gained additional lift, range or rotation when compared to those gymnasts making the more traditional initial hand contact on top of the horse. Three-dimensional cine-film analysis using the Direct Linear Transformation (DLT) was used to obtain data on 17 elite gymnasts competing in the 1991 World Student Games at Sheffield, UK. The gymnasts were divided into two groups according to the techniques used: group E in which the first hand contact was made on the vertical surface of the near end and the second on the top of the horse, and group T in which both hands were placed on top of the horse. The vertical and horizontal motion of each gymnast's mass centre and the somersault rotation during pre-flight (board take-off to horse contact) and post-flight (horse take-off to ground landing) were determined. The projections of linear displacements of each gymnast's mass centre onto a vertical plane were determined from the three-dimensional mass centre co-ordinates, and somersault angles were calculated using the line joining the midpoints of each gymnast's shoulders and knees. Whole body mass centre linear velocity and somersault angular velocity were determined using quintic splines.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)