Social Cricket Experiences

[nompere]

I am wondering whether anyone has any sensible rules for playing social evening cricket by groups of over-40 year old teams, many of whom have never played cricket properly.

Our organiser is suggesting that we should have teams of 6 players and that each bowls 1 over (apart from the wicket-keeper) but batsmen stay in until they are out or until they reach 30 runs. Wides & No Balls count 4.

I am not very impressed, especially as team may have to travel 60 miles in the later stages of the competition.

Can anyone suggest a better formula or does this one work better than I guess?

Some junior team play with batsmen in pairs for fixed number of overs and deduct runs for each wicket. Does this work well?

[swerveman]

nompere said:

Some junior team play with batsmen in pairs for fixed number of overs and deduct runs for each wicket. Does this work well?

It certainly works well for juniors, and I don't see why it wouldn't work just as well for social cricket. Our U11s play ten a side for 20 overs, each pair batting for four overs. Bowlers are allowed a maximum of four overs because of their age, but you could adapt that to suit.

It's similar to Kwik Cricket, which typically has teams of 8, everyone bowls one over, and the batsmen bat in pairs for two overs each pair. It's very popular with kids at all experience levels.

[acachairman]

Here in Vienna (Austria!) we have a 20 overs format in place at Vienna Cricket Club where we have a blend of inexperienced and first team players playing. The teams are selected to try to ensure a balance of experience and inexperience. For 6-a-side we have batsman retirements at 25. If we are 8-a-side we have batsman retired at 20 - with the chance for batsmen to come back at the end - with last man standing. Boycottesque knocks are curtailed after 10 overs. We have wides and no-balls counting as four extras with no extra ball to ensure that the games which start at 5:30pm are finished by about 8:15pm. Bowling restricted to 4 overs per bowler (6-a-side) or 3 overs per bowler (8-a-side). This way we are ensuring everyone's involvement. Granted our aims are more for introducing the game to indigenous Austrians than a competitive aim - but it has borne fruits - one Austrian who had seen a bit of the game in Australia on holiday now regularly scores his 25 and retires and didn't disgrace himself fillin-in in our Cup competition.