Cricket Ball

The cricket ball is the swinging, bouncing, spinning heart of the glorious game that gives it its name. This entertaining journey through the history of cricket draws on philosophy, science, history, politics, literature, biography and the myriad facts and figures of the vast cricket universe itself to bring you the weird and wonderful story of this legendary leathern orb. What precisely is a cricket ball' What is it made of and how is it made' How has it evolved over the centuries along with the game itself and what is likely to be its multi-coloured future' Cricket Ball expertly answers all these questions and many more with a highly readable mixture of deep insight and light hearted humour. Cricket Ball tells the complex, multi-faceted life story of the cricket ball in its many guises- in play, as new ball, old ball, live ball, dead ball, no-ball, lost ball, swing ball and dot ball. It untangles the mysterious complexities of spin bowling (with a little help from Shane Warne), the tricks and cheats involved in ball tampering (including a look at the 2018 Australian ball-tampering scandal) and the drama that creates fools and villains along the way.