page_title: Fielding (cricket)
section_title: Fielding position names and locations
hierarchical_section_title: Fielding (cricket) / Fielding position names and locations
caption_attribution_description: English: Identifier: reliablebookofou00chad (find matches) Title: The reliable book of outdoor games. Containing official rules for playing base ball, foot ball, cricket, lacrosse, tennis, croquet, etc Year: 1893 (1890s) Authors: Chadwick, Henry, 1824-1908 Subjects: Games Sports Publisher: New York, F. M. Lupton Contributing Library: The Library of Congress Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress View Book Page: Book Viewer About This Book: Catalog Entry View All Images: All Images From Book Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book. Text Appearing Before Image: ped out; then, too, he is out if he handlesthe ball while standing at tho wicket or after bat-ting the ball; and he is out if he prevents thebowled ball from hitting the wicket by placinghis leg in the way of tho bowled ball. He is alsoout if he steps in front of the batting creasewhile the ball is in play, and he fails to get backbefore the bails of his wicket are knocked off.Thus it will be seen that the batsman can be dis-posed of in seven different ways, not countingwillful interference with a fielder in fielding aball. Ten of the eleven men only can be put out bythe opposite side, one man of the batting sidealways being left to carry his bat out, a verycreditable point of play to make if he haschances afforded him to score runs and he ac-cepts them. Two innings on each side consti-tutes a game, and the side scoring the largestaggregate of runs in these two innings wins the THE RELIABLE BOOK OF OUT-BOOB GAMES. 19 LONG SLIP COV£/f SHORT LEG UMP/RE. •■ to thl LEFT or r*e STRMq. Text Appearing After Image: UMPIRE.• bowie* LONG F/ELO O/V game. Iu one day matches, if two innings oneach side are not played to a fiuish, then thescore of the first innings decide the contest,the runs in the incompleted innings not count-ing. There is no limit as to time in playing the twoinnings on each side in a match game, exceptby mutual agreement; consequently a two in- nings a side match may he decided in one day,two days or three days. In Australia they havefrequently occupied the best part of four daysin playing a first-»lass match. It is the lengthof time in playing a match which is the greatdistinctive feature between cricket and baseball,the former requiring as many days for a matchas the other does hours. 20 THE RELIABLE BOOK: OF OTJT-DOOR GAMES. THE SEVERAL DEPARTMENTS OF THE GAME. THE BOWLING. There are three special departments in thegame of cricket, viz., bowling, batting and field-ing. Of these the bowling is the most import-ant, for there can he no thoroughly good cricketplaying without sp Note About Images Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original work.
context_page_description: Fielding in the sport of cricket is the action of fielders in collecting the ball after it is struck by the batsman, to limit the number of runs that the batsman scores and/or to get the batsman out by catching the ball in flight or by running the batsman out. There are a number of recognised fielding positions, and they can be categorised into the offside and leg side of the field. Fielding generally involves preventing the ball from going to or over the edge of the field, and getting the ball to either wicket as quickly as possible.
  A fielder or fieldsman may field the ball with any part of his body. However, if while the ball is in play he wilfully fields it otherwise, the ball becomes dead and five penalty runs are awarded to the batting side, unless the ball previously struck a batsman not attempting to hit or avoid the ball. Most of the rules covering fielders are in Law 28 of the Laws of cricket.
  Fake fielding is the action caused by a fielder when he makes movements of some of his body parts as if he is fielding only to confuse batsmen into making mistakes. It is now a punishable offence under the new ICC rules.
context_section_description: There are 11 players in a team: one is the bowler and another is the wicket-keeper, so only nine other fielding positions can be occupied at any time. Where fielders are positioned is a tactical decision made by the captain of the fielding team. The captain (usually in consultation with the bowler and sometimes other members of the team) may move players between fielding positions at any time except when a bowler is in the act of bowling to a batsman.
  There are a number of named basic fielding positions, some of which are employed very commonly and others that are used less often. However, these positions are neither fixed nor precisely defined, and fielders can be placed in positions that differ from the basic positions. The nomenclature of the positions is somewhat esoteric, but roughly follows a system of polar coordinates – one word (leg, cover, mid-wicket) specifies the angle from the batsman, and is sometimes preceded by an adjective describing the distance from the batsman (silly, short, deep or long). Words such as "backward", "forward", or "square" can further indicate the angle.
  The image shows the location of most of the named fielding positions based on a right-handed batsman. The area to the left of a right-handed batsman (from the batsman's point of view – facing the bowler) is called the leg side or on side, while that to the right is the off side. If the batsman is left-handed, the leg and off sides are reversed and the fielding positions are a mirror image of those shown.
caption: Some historic fielding position names, from the 1893 publication The reliable book of outdoor games.
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