If you are a cricket fan since childhood, chances are that you started playing street cricket, backyard cricket, beach cricket or anywhere but an actual cricket ground. The popularity of a game depends heavily on whether it can be played even if you don’t have all the fixings of the way it is played professionally.

For example, tennis and golf are watched much more heavily than they are played. However, soccer, football and cricket are heavily played even under conditions that seem unlikely. Someone who is unfamiliar with cricket will ask, how can you play in a very restricted area without expensive equipment and protection? But take a look at the children in the photo – they are really enjoying themselves playing in the middle of the road at what looks like high noon (no long shadows).

Street cricket means that you have to break as many rules as possible without actually inventing a new game. Some of these made-on-the-spot rules are

• Use tennis or rubber balls so that you don’t need any protective gear at all. Also, in many poor countries, regular cricket balls can be expensive requiring even more costly bats. With these balls, you can use some conveniently shaped piece of wood or tree branch. Contradicting my previous point, tennis ball cricket has actually become a big sport in itself.
• Because the ball can be lost slowing down the game, you may not be allowed to hit sixes or even boundaries. Hitting sixes may land in the property of some unfriendly house-owners. So if you accidentally do that, you may be given out. Think about it – Six and out off the same ball!
• Nobody brings a tape to the playing area. So everyone takes the best guess at measuring 22 yards with their feet or some stick. Needless to say, it isn’t very accurate.
• 3 uneven tree branches usually make for the batsman’s stumps. No bails. If the ball goes between 2 sticks, you have to honor the word of the wicketkeeper. At the bowler end, a large stone usually serves as the stumps.
• Very often, there are only a few children available for a game, not even sufficient for a single cricket team. So everyone is made to field. If you have an odd number of children, one team gets to lose an additional wicket. There is no runner for the batsman, which means that he could be run out at either end (or maybe not – depends on who is making the rules). Usually the lazier fielders want to become the wicketkeeper, which actually is more work if you don’t know how to catch properly.
• No slip, but usually you have a long stop to compensate for the incompetence of the wicketkeeper. Sometimes, this is avoided by disallowing byes and leg byes. LBW’s are a major controversial subject. They are usually disallowed, but some wise guys crowd the stumps which angers the bowler. The unwritten rule is that all three wickets must be visible to the bowler.
• When you have a motley crew of children of different ages, some of them do know how to bowl over-arm. So you let them throw the ball instead. And if someone is too big for the rest of the group, they have to bat left-handed. The key thing in street cricket is participation. Everyone is given the opportunity to bat and bowl, even if they are terrible at it. So you will have the openers “retiring” after two overs so that the other children can bat.

Informal cricket was a lot of fun growing up. I remember we playing cricket inside an apartment. This was truly crazy because we played in the living room with lots of expensive equipment like TV’s and glass vases. And the parents of my friend let us – I have no idea what they were thinking. The rules of our game was to bat so that you can defend every ball earning a point each time. You get out if you are caught directly or on the first bounce.

Also, there was a time we played on some barren open area, left unused by the owner. Two sides of the area ended in a ditch and there was an open well without any walls very close to where the batsman stood. We bought a fisherman’s net to cover the well so that the ball wouldn’t fall in. But it was not strong to stop one of us from falling in. We had to be very careful when fielding close to it. We had some close shaves in that field, with one boy sliding over the edge and another tripping and getting his shoulder broken. Luckily no one fell in the well and got killed.

Professional international cricket is, rightly, the pinnacle of cricketing excellence. But for sheer fun and excitement, nothing can beat street cricket.

[Photo licensed from enygmatic]