Matthew Lewis' Guide to Cricket

- Hello, and welcome to Matthew Lewis' Guide to Cricket.

(swooshing sounds) A pitch, well, we are standing on it.

This is the pitch.

Basically everything within the white boundary ropes going along the edge.

(swooshing sounds) Ah, now the wicket is the square in the middle.

And that's where all the magic happens.

(bat thwacks) (crowd claps) - That's where the Batsman will be running up and down, it's where the Bowlers will be bowling the ball, and it's where the stumps are at either end.

(swooshing sounds) A cricket team is comprised of 11 players but at any one time, there will only be 13 players out in the middle because you'll have the 11 Fielders, so 10 out in the field and one Bowler.

And then you'll have the two Batsman for the opposing team.

(swooshing sounds) The Bowler is the person who bowls the ball.

This is a cricket ball.

And they'll be the one that are running in and bowling the ball down the pitch, down the wicket to the Batsman.

It's just like a pitcher in baseball.

(swooshing sounds) A Batsman is the person at the other end with of one of these, a cricket bat, which you would call a batter in baseball.

And they're the one that'll be receiving the ball.

(ball thwacks) - And trying to smack it all over the pitch.

You can see how different the bat is from a baseball bat.

It is, probably is similar in terms of, well this one's an old one, as you can see, from the 1930s.

So this one's a little bit lighter than a modern day cricket bat.

This is probably about the weight of a baseball bat, to be honest, but you can see that it's much flatter on one side, it's made of wood.

I know not a lot of baseball bats are made of wood these days, but these are always made of willow which makes that glorious sound when it cracks against a ball.

(balls thwack) - That open, flat face means that you can control the direction of your shots much easier and really score runs all over the ground.

Apart from scoring runs, the thing that a Batsman's trying to do is protect his stumps.

Now a Batsman's trying to defend those whereas a Bowler is trying to smash them to bits and knock the bales, which are the two bits on top, trying to knock them off.

(swooshing sounds) - The Wicket Keeper is the person behind the Batsman.

If the Batsman misses it, they will catch the ball.

The Wicket Keeper will be behind with gloves and pads and ready to receive the ball if the Batsman doesn't hit it.

(swooshing sounds) - If you're not involved in the main play, so if you're not a Batsman, a Bowler, or Wicket Keeper, then you are a Fielder, which means you'll be out here elsewhere on the pitch ready to field the ball.

Either catch, make a catch and get someone out, or you'll be just trying to retrieve the ball and get it back into the wicket as quickly as possible.

(swooshing sounds) - You're out in cricket in several different ways.

Again, very similar to baseball in that if the ball comes off your bat and goes up into the air and it is caught by a Fielder before hitting the ground you are out just like baseball.

If the Bowler hits the stumps, you're out.

If you hit them, you're out.

Oh, LBW, of course!

The famous one, leg before wicket.

If the ball was going to hit those stumps but it hit your leg instead, then you are out, but only if it's not hit your bat first.

If you get a bit of bat on, if you get a bit of bat on the ball and then it hits your leg, you're not out, but if it misses your bat, hits your leg, and it would have gone on to hit the stumps, you are out.

And that will be an umpire's decision as to whether he thinks it would've gone on to hit the stumps or not.

- Not out.

(crowd groans) - [Audience Member] Rotten luck!

- You have 10 wickets per inning, which I am aware that you don't know what a wicket is.

You think that a wicket's the pitch, and it is!

But it's also something else.

(ball thwacks) - And when someone loses their wicket, it means they are out.

And an inning is comprised of 10.

So once you've got 10 outs, your inning is over, and they move on to the opposition team's inning and they also have 10 outs or wickets.

And you get two innings each.

(swooshing sounds) - In a nutshell, that's it.

Score as many runs as you can without losing your wicket.

(crowd applauds) - [Man] My, that's more exciting than I'd anticipated.

- I'll make a cricket convert of you yet.

- Well played.

- You too.

(upbeat music plays)