quote:
Posted by
heypaul

Can you talk about 20 overs a little more.
I'm not 100% clear on what it means....
I understand that's the 'new' format for the game (Twenty20) but what's an over?

International Cricket (think major league, but between countries) basically has 3 major formats: Test Cricket, One-Day International Cricket and Twenty20 cricket.

1. Test cricket: Is the traditional form of the game which purists love. It lasts 5 days. There are a total of 90 overs or 540 balls/pitches per day (90 overs = 6 * 90 = 540). Each team gets to bat twice in the 5 day span. This is the only format in cricket where there is more than one 'inning'. A team can win the toss and elect to bat or bowl.

Read more about test cricket here (especially about the part of the 6 possible results): Test Cricket

2. One Day International (ODI) cricket: In the late 70s, to take advantage of flood lights and color television, a new format of the game was introduced called ODI cricket. Here each team only get to bat once and they each get 50 overs or 300 balls/pitches (300 = 6 * 50) per inning. They try to score as many runs as they can in the 300 pitches and the other team tries to chase that score down. This format of the game lasts about 8 hours. Each team has to use a minimum of 5 bowlers and one bowler can bowl a maximum of 10 overs or 60 balls/pitches (60 = 6 * 10).

Read more about ODI cricket here: ODI cricket

3. Twenty20 cricket: Is more of a recent phenomenon. People found 8 hours to be too long and wanted a smaller format. So they reduced the number of balls per innings to 120 from 300. The game is exactly like ODI cricket, but in just a shortened format. Each bowler can bowl a maximum of 4 overs or 24 balls. So a total of 5 bowlers bowl a total of 120 balls. Old school traditionalists aren't big fans of this format since it emphasizes hitting 4s and 6s more than the traditional cricket batsmen ethos of patience and the art of batting for a long time without losing focus. But Twenty20 brings in the big bucks and the most ad revenue.

Further reading for Twenty20: LINK

quote:

Posted by
VermilionTiger

Are outs recorded the same way?

And how many outs are you allowed?

Can you strike out?

A batsman can be out many different ways. He can be bowled (ball hits the wickets behind him), he can be run-out (like baseball), he can be caught in the outfield on a fly-ball (like baseball) or he can be out 'Leg-before-wicket' (LBW) where the ball hits his leg, which if it wasn't in the way would have hit the wickets (umpire's judgement call).

A team is allowed 10 outs per batting inning.

There is no strike out in cricket. You can swing and miss as many times as you want. You can hit the ball and stay your ground. You can refuse to play a shot, but you have to make sure it doesn't hit your wicket first - See this example of a batsman choosing to let the ball go, but misjudges it and lets it hit his wickets - Rickey Ponting bowled by Waqar Younis' late in-swing

Here are a few good videos that explain the laws of cricket - Laws of cricket

This post was edited on 4/6/14 at 1:26 pm